Fish!! Dundandunandaun! Fish! (Sega Bass Fishing (DC))

Member Name: hellokitty

Product:	Sega Bass Fishing (DC)
Date:	14/04/01 (50 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: The FISH! exclamation

Disadvantages: no long term appeal or plot.

How does a thumping soundtrack go with one of the quietest sports in the world? When it's a videogame!

When I was given Sega Bass fishing, I thought that it would be quite, well, boring. The thought of fishing, willingly, was to be honest not what I'd first thought of when I got my Dreamcast. I'd anticipated Sonic the Hedgehog rushing about various gorgeously animated buildings, not a game about fishing.

However, my Dad and brother had already played part of it (before they gave it to me, grrrrr) and, although they failed to catch a single fish, they did recommend it.

So I sat down to play the game that I least anticipated. The game started and I chose the 'arcade' mode, hoping that it would be the most interesting. I then had to choose a lure. This was a bad thing. I chose the one that looked most like a fish (hoping that this would interest their cannibalistic instincts).

You are then asked to select which part of Sega fictional 'lake' you want to fish from. I was disappointed to see that you can't choose the sex of your fisherperson, that comes later, in the championship mode where you can 'unlock' a 'buxom babe' as my brother described.

You are then taken to the lake and sit in a small motorboat. My doubts increased. I cast the line and as it went underwater, I was amazed by the graphics. They are really cool! A very small fish swam towards the line. It then ignored it. I jiggled the line about a bit and pulled it in.

On my next try a monster fish, lurking in the shadows sniffed the lure. The lure cam was activated and I saw the fish's mouth get bigger and bigger until it ate it! At this point the action switched back to the boat a huge message shouting 'FISH!' blared out of the speaker and onto the screen and a rock and roll soundtrack blasted out at full volume. If this was fishing, I liked it! As I attempted to reel the massive bass in frantic com
mands were shouted like 'pull left', 'lower the rod' and the ominous. 'The line is going to break'. Which it did.

From this point on I had to play it a bit more and for a couple of weeks I became an avid player. A day just wasn't complete without a 9,500 pound bass being landed...

This, as all good things do, had to pass. The different bait's made absolutely no difference, apart from making it harder. And often, even in arcade mode there just weren't any fish about. If this was the championship final, this was a bit annoying to say the least.

The game just didn't have enough depth (no pun intended) to hold my interest for longer than a couple of weeks. It's great to come back to occasionally for a bit of a blast but I wouldn't go out and buy it now due to its limited long-term appeal.

Sega Bass Fishing was fun for a while but it's arcade roots showed with the lack of in depth gameplay and attention to detail. Certainly not worth splashing out (still, no pun intended) about £30 on the fishing rod controller for!

Summary: