Snatcher Review

The Sega CD was not exactly the worlds best selling console system, but it did indeed hold a catalogue of a few games that are really worth talking about. One of these is, Konami’s Snatcher. Which has firmly cemented itself among the best and most memorable games ever made.

Snatcher is the classic example of a low-profile game that comes out during the final days of a short-lived console (actually an add-on in this instance) and is only discovered by hardcore gamers.  Developed by Hideo Kojima (of Metal Gear Solid fame) and his Konami teammates, Snatcher showcased an entertaining experience and creative cyberpunk story that created quite a cult following.

Story

1/3 of the world’s population was wiped out due to the outbreak of a mysterious virus. Fifty years later, a strange life form mysteriously appears out of nowhere in the city of Neo Kobe, thus beginning the core story. These robotic beings, which look like the exoskeletons from the Terminator movies, disguise themselves as humans and kidnap (known as “snatching”) high-ranking people, taking their place in society. An operation known as JUNKER is set up to combat the Snatchers, to find out where they came from, what their ultimate purpose is, and how it connects to the global catastrophe that destroyed so much of the Earth.

The main character in Snatcher is Gillian Seed, a trenchcoat clad rookie to the JUNKER operation. Like many great detectives, he has a bit of a strange past – he and his wife Jamie were rescued from cryogenic sleep somewhere in Russia. They have no recollection of their past together, or why they were even frozen in the first place and this amnesia eventually leads to their seperation. The game actually starts when Gillian decides to become a JUNKER, for he believes that his mysterious past is in someway connected to the Snatchers.

Gameplay

When Gillian arrives at Junker HQ, you actually get to take control of the action. After getting introduced to your co-workers and issued your gun, you get assigned a little robot navigator named Metal Gear, based off one of Kojima’s other games that you may have heard of.  While this minature robot doesn’t have any weapons, it acts as a storage unit for graphical data, operates as a video phone, and also saves your game.

Rather than the point n’ click interface of many adventure games, everything in Snatcher is operated through menus.  Basic commands such as Look, Investigate and Move are almost always available, plus you can go into your Possessions menu to use various items.

While the actual gameplay really is astoundingly basic, the strength lies entirely in the storyline and writing.  Part of what makes the game so interesting is the chemistry between Gillian and Metal Gear.  They’re not exactly the cliched odd couple – while Gillian is mostly prone to fooling around as Metal Gear remains on business, they get into amusing arguments and random tangents during their investigation. Their banter is not only highly amusing, but goes so far as to make them seem real. Even more stunning the relationship between Gillian and his ex-wife Jamie. You can call her up at any time in the game to converse, but even as Gillian jokingly flirts with her, you can detect his sorrow as he awkwardly tries to be involved the woman he apparently once loved.

It’s not only the characters, but it’s the atmosphere where Snatcher comes off so well. Neo Kobe city and its characters are all astoundingly well realized. While each location is rarely more than a simple static screen with some minor animations, the writing brings everything to life – each little nook and cranny will uncover something new and interesting about this future. The background of the world is further fleshed out by reading all of the historical documents found in the JUNKER supercomputer, which shows how much effort was put into making Snatcher a truly engrossing experience.

Presentation

Snatcher takes inspiration from several sci-fi movies: the city and basic plotline is straight out of Blade Runner, the Snatchers are obviously ripped straight off of The Terminator, and bounty hunter Random Hajile looks astoundingly like Sting’s Harkonnen character Feyd from Dune. The Snatcher’s ability to shoot projectiles from its mouth also seems to have been lifted from the classic anime series Bubblegum Crisis. 

For a bit of history, Snatcher originated on the PC-88 and MSX computers. Obviously the technology wasn’t very hot, so the graphics were limited to pretty bad looking 16-color portraits. While the same basic storyline and gameplay is in place, the game is actually incomplete compared to all of the other versions – the third act is missing from these versions entirely and it wasn’t until the PC Engine Super CD that Snatcher started becoming the game that we know today. A few years later, a English version was made for the Sega CD, exclusively for the America and European market.

The graphics are almost identical, which is amazing considering that the PC Engine uses 256 color graphics and the Sega CD only uses 64 (apparently there was some programming technique to get the Sega CD to display 112 colors). The end result is that the difference is barely noticeable. While the CD music is the same, the chip-generated synth music is a bit better in the Sega CD version.

Despite the outcries against violence at the time (Snatcher game out in America amidst the popularity of Mortal Kombat and other violent video games) the Sega CD Snatcher has almost all of the graphics violence intact. However, some of the other more adult aspects have been slightly altered. While Gillian can still hit on all of the females in the game, some of the racier aspects have been toned down (when Katrina asks you to see your ID, one of your choices is “proof of manhood”). There’s also a porno video you can find in Plato’s Cavern that you can watch – there’s no video, but there are plenty of sound effects. Gillian drools and Metal Gear freaks out.

Conclusion

Snatcher on the Sega CD stands easily as one of the best games ever made.  It’s rich text based gameplay along with lovable, deep characters all combine to create this true masterpiece from the master himself, Hideo Kojima.  Since the Sega CD is quiet rare these days, I recommend playing snatcher through emulation on a PSP.

Final Score: 9.3/10