Time Crisis (video game)
A light-gun shooter that introduced a cover-system foot pedal.
Time Crisis is a 1995 light-gun shooter arcade game developed and published by Namco. It introduced a foot pedal that lets players take cover to reload and avoid enemy fire, distinguishing it from other shooters of the era. The game follows intelligence agent Richard Miller as he rescues an abducted woman from a tyrant seeking to reclaim control of his former country.
Quick Facts
- Developer
- Namco
- Producer
- Toru Iwatani
- Kazunori Sawano
- Takashi Sano
- Designer
- Hirofuki Kami; Takashi Satsukawa
- Composer
- Kazuhiro Nakamura
- Genre
- Light gun shooter, rail shooter
- Modes
- Single-player
- Platforms
- Arcade
- PlayStation
- PlayStation 2
- Arcade system
- Namco Super System 22
Facts from the source article.
Gameplay
Time Crisis is a first-person rail shooter where players use a light gun to shoot enemies on screen, much like Virtua Cop. Its key difference is a cover system that lets players duck behind obstacles to avoid incoming fire and reload. In the arcade, a foot pedal switches between hiding and shooting, while home console versions use a button instead. The PlayStation release also works with a racing wheel pedal. The game has three stages, each split into three areas and a boss fight. Every area is a series of gunfights where you must defeat a set group of enemies to move on. A one-minute timer runs during battles and between them, and only clearing a fight or hitting certain optional foes adds a few seconds. Players have a fixed number of lives; getting hit by an enemy or hazard costs one, and the game ends when lives or time run out. The arcade light gun, first used in Point Blank, has a memory chip that tracks where the gun points on screen and a recoil effect, which the PlayStation port lacks. The home version works with the GunCon light gun or a controller cursor, and includes a Special mode where how fast you clear areas changes the route and ending.
Plot
In 1995, the V.S.S.E. helps Sercian opposition leader William MacPherson overthrow a century-old authoritarian regime. MacPherson becomes the republic's first democratically elected president. Sherudo Garo, the last survivor of the previous regime's family, schemes to restore the old order through attacks and assassinations. He orders the abduction of President MacPherson's daughter Rachel and imprisons her in his family's castle on an isolated island, demanding military secrets for her life. MacPherson contacts the V.S.S.E., which dispatches agent Richard Miller to rescue Rachel. Miller reaches the island and rams his explosives-rigged boat into the castle exterior. Sherudo's head of security, Wild Dog, assures him Miller will not survive. Miller fights through the submarine hangar and courtyard, reaching Rachel, who warns him of a setup before being taken away. He defeats Sherudo's assassin Moz and learns Rachel is in the clock tower. There Miller guns down Sherudo, but finds Rachel held by Wild Dog. Wild Dog plans to blow up the castle and escape with Rachel. Miller pursues them to the helipad; Rachel breaks free and is shot by Wild Dog. Miller battles Wild Dog, who accidentally sets off his detonator and dies in an explosion. Miller escapes with Rachel in Wild Dog's helicopter as the castle burns.
Development
Both the arcade and PlayStation versions were developed internally at Namco, but no arcade developers worked on the PlayStation version. Because the PlayStation's CPU speed is lower than the System 22 arcade hardware, the team halved the frame rate, reduced polygon count, emulated real-time lighting by coloring polygons individually, and delayed enemy appearances to limit on-screen enemies. The team used photos of Tokyo hotels and factories as reference for the PlayStation mode's hotel design, leaving unrendered portions not visible to the player. Three planned sequences—an outdoor restaurant, a missile room explosion, and a boat race—were cut because creating them was not practical within the development time. New music for the Special Mission mode was recorded by Tatsuro Tani and Tomoko Tat2 using a synthesized orchestra of 50 individually synthesized instruments.
Reception
The Japanese arcade magazine Game Machine listed Time Crisis as the most-successful arcade game of the month in April 1996. Next Generation hailed it as superior to Virtua Cop 2, citing the foot pedal maneuver, and stated it thrust the light-gun genre into new territory. The PlayStation version received favorable reviews on GameRankings. Critics praised its close arcade conversion and said the special PlayStation mode extended the game's lifespan, even surpassing the original campaign. GamePro questioned the GunCon's accuracy, reporting that dead-on shots sometimes miss, but most critics deemed it the best light gun for the PlayStation. Some critics found the game too simplistic, lacking powerups or innocent bystanders, and criticized the absence of a multiplayer mode. Computer and Video Games complained about the PAL conversion's slowness; reviewer Tom Guise said he preferred the fully PAL-optimized Virtua Cop for the British home release, but concluded the game still deserved a high rating. Next Generation stated that for home light-gun shooters, Time Crisis is as good as it gets. There was disagreement over which method of emulating the foot pedal was best: GameSpot praised the GunCon's reload button for forcing a two-handed grip, while Computer and Video Games and Electronic Gaming Monthly said using the standard joypad buttons offered the best combination of accuracy and similarity.
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