RETRO REBOOT Halloween Special - Carrier (Sega Dreamcast)

There isn't a game that comes off as blatant a ripoff as Carrier does with Resident Evil: Code Veronica. Both games had very close release dates, coming out very early 2000, so while Carrier more likely borrowed inspiration from Resident Evil 2, the similar offshore settings are a little too on the nose to not draw that comparison. Well, imitation is the greatest form of flattery. But for a ripoff, it plays well enough.

I haven't taken enough advantage of talking about Jaleco. The developer/publisher was a name in gaming, and had been around since the 80's. While they may not have the same kind of prominence as Konami or Hudson Soft, many of their games were pretty notable. They had the Bases Loaded series, City Connection, Shatterhand, and Rushing Beat (known here in the U.S. as Rival Turf), and Earth Defense Force. They've also published games like R-Type III and Maniac Mansion. Hard times were abound in the mid aughts and their parent company Game Yarou filed for bankruptcy and Jaleco disappeared from the industry with no trace. Their last release, to my knowledge, was wiZman's World, a Japan exclusive for the Nintendo DS.

Co-developed by Xicat Interactive, Carrier is a survival horror game released in 2000 exclusively for the Sega Dreamcast. In the year 2008, the world was becoming an ecological and agricultural wasteland and terrorist activity was on the rise (insert topical political joke here). Aboard the Heimdal, a high-powered carrier ship, the team SPARC (not to be confused with STARs) was sent to investigate the radio silence, and were gunned down by its defense systems. Upon arriving, Jack Ingles and Jessifer Manning (yes, her parents CHOSE that name on purpose) find a parasitic horror that turns people into mutants. The creature and its monsters seem more plantlike than undead, so Carrier beats The Last Of Us to the punch. Eat it, Druckmann. Ingles and Manning are separated, and you'd think you'd be able to choose either or route, but Jessifer's path is unlocked only after beating Jack's run.

Carrier is also one of the rare survival horror games at the time that's fully rendered in 3D. For the time, most of these games featured 3D character models traversing on hand drawn 2D backgrounds. While this era is certainly rough around the edges in regards to visuals, I do miss the artistic fixed camera angles that were used. The character models are alright, their animations are a little clumsy, but not too bad. What I like is the atmosphere. The cramped and claustrophobic confines of many rooms in the Heimdal, along with some clever lighting and the portions of the ship where the plants overrun it, gives Carrier a good alien-like air. Along with Resident Evil, there's also some influence from John Carpenter's The Thing and Alien that can be seen, so it's biting off the right sources, if I do say so myself.

If you've played Resident Evil games around this period, the controls are easy to pick up and grasp. The infamous tank controls, the weapon selection, even the item menu feels like very familiar territory. You do have the ability to quick-turn, and thank the stars for that. Aiming doesn't feel as finicky as it does in RE2, it was something that was adjusted in later points of the game, so Carrier handles a little better when it comes to controls. Unique to Carrier is the scanner system. Many monsters are hidden among the crew of the Heimdal and can't be identified by the naked eye. By using the thermal goggles, which toggles a first person perspective, you can skim the room for any hostiles or identify impostor crew members who may be infected or compromised. While this is an integral part of the game, I feel like it isn't used often enough in key situations. Like guessing wrong or waiting too long to scan officers can lead to the inability to earn extra weapons or effects your ending's efficiency score, but I digress.

The selection of weapons is admittedly a little underwhelming. You start off with your standard 9mm handgun and you eventually pick up a sub-machine gun and grenade launcher The T7 and T9 bombs you pick up are best used for clearing out the poisonous mushrooms in areas that drain away your health. The only unique weapon is a sort of short-ranged stun gun that has unlimited use. It makes up for the fact that there's no melee attack.

Carrier is pretty good for what it is. Yeah, these style of games retain their freshness like potato salad left at room temperature for a week, but the wonky Dreamcast controller actually compliments the obtuse mechanics. It holds its own against Capcom's flagship zombie buster, for a moment, anyway, but being locked on a console that was dying by this point means it got virtually no notoriety. The story is silly, but actually takes itself seriously. That already makes it better than Blue Stinger. There's a little bit of replay value, with Jessifer's game plus. It's alright, overall.

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