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Travel through the time along with Ecco the dolphin, in the only game that could call itself a "dolphin simulator". Indeed, you can do pretty much everything a typical dolphin does, including eating fishes, surface in order to breath, using your biological sonar and of course jump out of the water to amaze your friends. The storyline is actually deeper that one may think by looking at the box illustration. As Ecco, you are the only dolphin which managed to escape from the giant whirlpool who sucked down its entire pod. The five shining stars on your front show you are the chosen one to save them. But that task will be not be an easy one, as you will have to travel time and space with the Atlantean time machine, and meet the mystical Asterite in order to defeat the vortex queen. The gameplay is essentially side-scrolling, with horizontal, diagonal and vertical movement. Attacking enemies is accomplished by making Ecco ram into them at high speeds. Swimming can be made progressively faster by tapping a certain button, and the speed can be maintained by holding it down. Players can perform a purely aesthetic spin in the air when jumping out of the water. Two features of the game play on actual dolphin habits; one button causes Ecco to sing, allowing him to speak with other cetaceans and interact with certain objects. The same button is used for echolocation; holding it down causes the song to return, generating a map of the area. Additionally, Ecco, being a mammal, has to surface periodically for air, or else find an air vent. Ecco drowns if his "air meter" runs out. His health is measured by a separate meter; it is depleted by enemies or when his air meter runs out, and it is recharged by eating fish, "singing" to clams, or, later in the game, singing to special statues or crystals called Glyphs. This PC version features better graphics than its console counterparts (256 as opposed to 64 colors), full CD soundtrack and video sequences from the SEGA CD version of Ecco: The Tides of Time, and even a mulit-language support. This means that the PC version is probably the best version of the first game in the series - a fitting and competent job on one of SEGA's best games. In 2010, a port of the Genesis version came out on Steam. |
