 Hello, and happy Thanksgiving. People familiar with this channel may have noticed that I like to post a video not only on Thanksgiving, but the day after as well, since a lot of people usually have that day off of work with not a lot to do, and I usually reserve those spots on the schedule for bigger games, like last year I looked at Final Fantasy 7 and Chrono Cross, the year before that was Earthbound in Donkey Kong Country, and the year before that was linked to the past in Mario World. The plan this year was to look at a couple big Nintendo 64 titles. I was tentatively looking at GoldenEye and Legend of Zelda Majora's Mask, but as I started writing about GoldenEye in particular, the write-up turned into me whining about how I don't like games of this era, how bleary, foggy, and ugly most of these games are, about Nintendo's absurd decision to stick with cartridges over CDs, about the god-awful N64 controller. It was just me whining the entire time, and nobody wants that. If I have any particular goal with this channel, it's that I hope it's useful, and the videos featuring me whining about how poorly a lot of N64 games of age is not very useful. So instead, let's get back to having fun and playing games that are still worth playing today. A good example would be the video I posted a couple days ago for Road Rash 64, so let's stay on that track and talk about Blastcore, developed by Rare. This is one of those games you always find on an N64 hidden gems list, you know, even though it was developed by Rare and sold over a million copies, but whatever. Blastcore's biggest strength, like in Road Rash 64, is its simplicity. Just take one look at the gameplay footage, and you're driving or flying around and making stuff go boom, that's pretty straightforward. The thing is though, the goal of each stage is to clear the path for a runaway vehicle carrying a nuclear missile to make its way to safety, and where Blastcore really stands out is in the numerous inventive ways you can create paths the further you progress into the game. You start out with a simple bulldozer, but you can eventually unlock other vehicles like this thing that has battering rams shoot out of its sides, a rocket-launching motorcycle thing, and three different giant macrobots, one of which you can use to butt-stomp buildings Mario 64 style. Man, that's so much fun, but as great as it is to just mindlessly wreck anything and everything, you do have to be mindful of the truck at all times. You can't touch it, and Blastcore has some excellent level design that makes clearing a path for the truck pretty tricky. In other words, Blastcore is an action puzzle game. You have to solve each map in a manner of speaking, but another way to describe it would be that it's almost like a fighting game, with the vehicle being your fighter and the map being your opponent. Sure, you might want to pick J-bomb every time, and once you unlock him and butt-stomp your way to victory, but there are a few occasions where you're better off picking the motorcycle or the side-swipe vehicle, for instance. You got to use the right vehicle at the right time, or in some cases, you'll have to leave your vehicle entirely, almost like in a game like Cybernator, so you can get into other vehicles and move them out of the way or use them to destroy something you otherwise couldn't. There's a total of 57 levels here and all sorts of unlockables, so even if you finish the game story mode, you can go back and play previous levels with different vehicles if you'd like. Many maps have secret areas you can find, allowing you to unlock secret maps, where you compete against an actual timer. Even better is that the game can save a ghost copy of your best time, so you can try and beat yourself the next time around. One thing in particular I really admire about how Blastcore was made is that it doesn't mess around with the camera. For the most part, it keeps your viewing angle set at an overhead isometric kind of viewpoint, although you can zoom in and out and pan horizontally if you need to. But keeping the camera consistent like this was really smart, because it eliminates that dreary looking gray fog that permeates so many games of the time, and because you don't usually have to mess with it. You can see everything just fine. It's not like Mario 64 or the early Resident Evil games where you have to constantly make adjustments. The set camera angle here is almost perfect. It seems like Rare really understood the abilities and the limitations of the N64 and worked with them really well. But yeah, despite how simple Blastcore looks on the surface, this is a very intelligently made game. Sure, the goal is ultimately just blowing stuff up, but you're also bridging gaps and strategically placing TNT where necessary and protecting that slow moving truck of death as it continues to lear forward. In case you didn't know, this was part of the Rare replay package released for Xbox One a couple years ago. So that's probably the most accessible way to play it today. But even then, the cartridge is still only about $7 on average. But yeah, Blastcore is a fantastic action puzzle game that's held up well over time because it takes a simple straightforward idea and adds some bells and whistles to it the further you progress. This is a rare early 3D game that's aged reasonably well.