Ecco: The Tides of Time
Ecco: The Tides of Time, developed by Novatrade and published exclusively in Brazil by Tec Toy in 1996.
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Player's Review
"It's been some time since Ecco defeated Vortex, a dangerous monster whose sole purpose was to dominate all living things in the tranquil waters of Home Bay. These days are calm, but that could change quickly...
In the deepest depths of the ocean, rumours swirl that new trouble is brewing. Apparently, the Vortex race was nurtured by Queen Vortex, who has grown stronger and created a veritable army to launch a counterattack on the Ecco colony. Join him on this incredible adventure, in which he will travel the seas of all time, facing the most dangerous enemies, and having in his hands the most important of missions: preventing the evil Queen from exterminating the entire population of Home Bay!!"
Unlike the Game Gear version, the Master System (a port of the Game Gear game) game was only released in Brazil sporting the Portuguese language. I have recorded this version but also a second playthrough using a fan made mod by 'Arkonviox Aloísio Júnior' which puts the English translated text into this game as well as a couple of bug fixes and some changes to the story to be more inline with the mega drive original adding bits that the Game Gear released was missing.
The game looks pretty much the same as the previous game with plenty of ugly tiles that look like you are operating in character mode but there are some new gfx to see. Unfortunately they messed with the controls which makes the game really annoying to play. In the first game you fired sonar with button 1 and pressed 1+2 for dash. Now its button 1 for dash and both for sonar which ends up doing both at the same time! But that's not its only problem as the game always looks like it's on the verge of crashing with lots of flickering tiles all the time as well as some questionable colour palette choices in some areas. The whole thing looks like a hack job rather than the expected quality of Novatrade developers.
Like the previous game the levels are mostly small and easy to explore and memorise but there are a couple of larger levels especially in the late game when you are rebuilding the asterite. These large levels contain multiple areas and can get tiresome as you keep revisiting the stage. The moving block puzzles are back but thankfully nothing to difficult and thankfully nothing like the final atlantis stage of the previous game.
Overall I don't think it that great a conversion of the Mega-Drive game and seems hastily slapped together for sales. The sky tube levels and ocean swim levels are a nice touch but under utilised especially as there is no challenge to the swim levels. The music soon gets annoying and I almost decided to just shut it off but held off hoping for a new track and one did appear at the end of the game.
Note: Two downloads available. The first is the original game. The second is with an english translation mod applied and the times below are for the English video.
00:00:00 01 Residence
00:01:51 02 Medusas Trail
00:05:41 03 Trail of Stone
00:08:07 04 Sea of Darkness
00:12:27 05 Open Ocean (1)
00:13:08 06 Heavenly Way
00:14:11 07 Tubes of Medusa
00:16:00 08 Open Ocean (2)
00:16:33 09 The Gateway
00:18:54 10 Asterite
00:20:20 11 The Eye
00:31:22 12 Depths
00:43:56 13 Sea of Birds
00:46:43 14 Convergence
00:47:21 15 Open Ocean (3)
00:47:58 16 Vortex Future
00:49:52 17 Ruler of Spheres
00:51:42 18 Convergence
00:52:42 19 Open Ocean (4)
00:53:18 20 The New Machine
00:55:33 21 Queen Vortex
00:55:58 22 Ending
00:57:20 23 Open Ocean (5)
00:57:58 24 Atlantis
00:58:35 Credits
In the deepest depths of the ocean, rumours swirl that new trouble is brewing. Apparently, the Vortex race was nurtured by Queen Vortex, who has grown stronger and created a veritable army to launch a counterattack on the Ecco colony. Join him on this incredible adventure, in which he will travel the seas of all time, facing the most dangerous enemies, and having in his hands the most important of missions: preventing the evil Queen from exterminating the entire population of Home Bay!!"
Unlike the Game Gear version, the Master System (a port of the Game Gear game) game was only released in Brazil sporting the Portuguese language. I have recorded this version but also a second playthrough using a fan made mod by 'Arkonviox Aloísio Júnior' which puts the English translated text into this game as well as a couple of bug fixes and some changes to the story to be more inline with the mega drive original adding bits that the Game Gear released was missing.
The game looks pretty much the same as the previous game with plenty of ugly tiles that look like you are operating in character mode but there are some new gfx to see. Unfortunately they messed with the controls which makes the game really annoying to play. In the first game you fired sonar with button 1 and pressed 1+2 for dash. Now its button 1 for dash and both for sonar which ends up doing both at the same time! But that's not its only problem as the game always looks like it's on the verge of crashing with lots of flickering tiles all the time as well as some questionable colour palette choices in some areas. The whole thing looks like a hack job rather than the expected quality of Novatrade developers.
Like the previous game the levels are mostly small and easy to explore and memorise but there are a couple of larger levels especially in the late game when you are rebuilding the asterite. These large levels contain multiple areas and can get tiresome as you keep revisiting the stage. The moving block puzzles are back but thankfully nothing to difficult and thankfully nothing like the final atlantis stage of the previous game.
Overall I don't think it that great a conversion of the Mega-Drive game and seems hastily slapped together for sales. The sky tube levels and ocean swim levels are a nice touch but under utilised especially as there is no challenge to the swim levels. The music soon gets annoying and I almost decided to just shut it off but held off hoping for a new track and one did appear at the end of the game.
Note: Two downloads available. The first is the original game. The second is with an english translation mod applied and the times below are for the English video.
00:00:00 01 Residence
00:01:51 02 Medusas Trail
00:05:41 03 Trail of Stone
00:08:07 04 Sea of Darkness
00:12:27 05 Open Ocean (1)
00:13:08 06 Heavenly Way
00:14:11 07 Tubes of Medusa
00:16:00 08 Open Ocean (2)
00:16:33 09 The Gateway
00:18:54 10 Asterite
00:20:20 11 The Eye
00:31:22 12 Depths
00:43:56 13 Sea of Birds
00:46:43 14 Convergence
00:47:21 15 Open Ocean (3)
00:47:58 16 Vortex Future
00:49:52 17 Ruler of Spheres
00:51:42 18 Convergence
00:52:42 19 Open Ocean (4)
00:53:18 20 The New Machine
00:55:33 21 Queen Vortex
00:55:58 22 Ending
00:57:20 23 Open Ocean (5)
00:57:58 24 Atlantis
00:58:35 Credits
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