Америка жолдарындағы шайқас: Vigilantes әлемі

1998 video game

Players combat over a number of stages located over the western United States, whether in Story or Arcade Mode. Each stage has interactive features, such as ballistic missiles and launching Aurora planes for the Area 51 level. Every vehicle is equipped with a machine gun by default, but players can add up to three out of five available weapons mines, auto cannons, rocket pods, mortars, and homing missiles, plus a special weapon unique to the vehicle. Three types of special attacks can be made using each of the five standard weapons, at a bigger cost in ammunition, by performing fighting game style movements and button presses on the control pad. These attacks may be performed during normal play or to eliminate nearly destroyed cars in a method called "Totaling." In line with the fighting game style element, players can also score up to six combo hits called Whammies. There are special icons scattered across the playing field; wrenches repair damage and yellow zigzag lines temporarily jam the opponent's homing based weapons. Certain objectives in Story Mode must be completed to help unlock the game's secret characters and stages. The PlayStation version also offers players the option to play standard music CDs during a match. The Nintendo 64 version includes a story mode for Y The Alien and a fantasy stage called Super Dreamland 64, as well as three multiplayer modes (two vs. two, three vs. one, and deathmatch) to take advantage of the system's four control ports, and a two player Story Mode. A 480x360 hi res mode is available from the pause menu if the Nintendo 64 Expansion Pack is installed. The Pack also enables a hidden 640x480 mode, available via password.

The Game Boy Color (GBC) version features five levels, each one from the console versions: Casino City, Hoover Dam, Oil Fields, Ski Resort, and Valley Farms. The game also features five game modes, each one essentially identical, with only minor changes. The game features three difficulty levels. Australian terrorist Sid Burn is hired by OMAR to dispose of all competing oil companies in the U. S. so that OMAR can establish an oil monopoly in the country. After hearing reports of destruction by Sid Burn's gang, the Coyotes, a man named Convoy, a kind hearted trucker, forms a group of his own, the Vigilantes, to combat the Coyotes and stop the tyranny of OMAR.

The game's protagonists are the Vigilantes, a group of residents from the Southwest who band together to preserve law and order in the light of chaos gripping the country. Their leader is Convoy, a rugged old cowboy driving a semi trailer. He is accompanied in the fight by his rebellious niece Sheila; Las Vegas high roller John Torque; Slick Clyde, whom Torque coerced into joining the Vigilantes; alien obsessed hippie Dave, who somehow finds himself fighting with the Vigilantes; and FBI agent Chassey Blue, who was assigned to investigate reports of gun battles in the region. The game's antagonists are the Coyotes, a group of hitmen recruited by OMAR to carry out their scheme by destroying commercial installations throughout the region using weaponry stolen from the top secret Site 4 military base in Nevada. Their founder is Sid Burn. His cohorts are disco loving petty criminal Boogie; mentally disturbed S4 test pilot Loki; Houston 3, a woman brainwashed by OMAR to become one of their assassins; beekeeper Beezwax, who was frustrated by the irradiation of his beehive;

The development team rewrote all of the PlayStation's libraries except ones for which Sony did not supply information regarding direct hardware access.

Vigilante 8 received "favorable" reviews on all platforms except the Game Boy Color version, which received "mixed" reviews, according to the review aggregation website GameRankings. Next Generation gave both the Nintendo 64 and PlayStation versions favorable reviews in two separate issues, saying that the latter version was "more fun than Interstate '76 and currently the best game of its type on PlayStation" (#45, September 1998); Eight issues later, Dan Elektro said that the Nintendo 64 version "could have been a hack job port of the PlayStation code, but instead, the game's been retooled and tweaked for its new platform – and the effort shows. N64 car combat fans, start your engines!" Michael L. House of AllGame gave the PlayStation version four stars out of five, saying that it "more than makes up for the shortcomings with the fantastic shooting action and nicely designed arenas. Whether or not it's a better game than Twisted Metal 2 is up to the player; if you value shooting over everything else, it is. If you value style as the most important thing, it isn't. Nonetheless, Vigilante 8 is darn good." Later, Scott Alan Marriott gave the Game Boy Color version three stars out of five, calling it "a good game that could have been much better." The PlayStation version was nominated for Best PlayStation Game at the 1998 CNET Gamecenter Awards, which went to Gran Turismo.

A sequel was produced, titled Vigilante 8: 2nd Offense, released for the PlayStation, Dreamcast, and Nintendo 64 in 1999. A remake for the Xbox 360, titled Vigilante 8 Arcade, was created by Isopod Labs, an independent company formed by the founders of Luxoflux. The game features a high definition rendition of the past games plus some added multiplayer levels complete with an online mode. It was released onto Xbox Live Arcade on November 5, 2008. The developer of the two Vigilante 8 games, Luxoflux, produced a game very similar to Vigilante 8 using the Star Wars license (and the Vigilante 8 game engine), titled Star Wars: Demolition.