Body Harvest

by Midway Entertainment

Product Details

• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B00000IKQH
• Media: Game Cartridge
• Release Date: July 20, 1999
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #11,233 in Video Games (See Bestsellers in Video Games)

Product Description

GameSpot Review

Playing DMA Design's Body Harvest is like taking the lead role in a BBC sci-fi TV series. The visuals may not be revolutionary, and the story may be a bit cheesy, but there's something unmistakably charming about the whole thing.

Anyway, analogy aside, you're a super-soldier who's traveled back in time to put down the initial invading forces of an alien race that's ravaged your era's earth. This plays out into a game that's not easy to describe, save for the fact that it has a few graphical and gameplay similarities to Rare's Blast Corps. You move about a variety of terrain piloting your little soldier man or sitting behind the controls of cars, tanks, planes, boats, and the like. Crucial points of gameplay are reached when a harvesting force of aliens takes on a nearby town. You then have to locate and destroy them before they gobble up six humans, which would produce a nigh-invulnerable mutant alien (that's a very bad thing). Encounters with smaller forces are frequent and pepper the parts of the game where you have to solve minor puzzles in order to move along.

From within the gameplay, Body Harvest is not much like anything else, actually. It's a slower-paced title, but not to the point of being boring. Its originality is refreshing (being able to flip from walking to manning a tank to flying a plane is pretty nice). The graphics are pretty bland at times, as one might expect from a much-delayed first-generation N64 game, and the lack of a look function dates it, but neither of these elements really gets in the way. The soundtrack, while limited and too often repeated, is atmospheric in an X-Files theme song sort of way.

Where some elements of the game teeter on the edge of slightly above average, pushing well above the median there's a good chunk of value to Body Harvest, as each stage is pretty big and requires a lot of work to beat. On the downside of that upside, the game only allows you to save once a major task is accomplished. This means that you may have played a certain section for an hour, made a wrong turn, ended up in a lake, drowned, and had to restart the stage. Or it might so happen that you play for an hour, get thrashed by a boss character, and have to start over again. And so on. Consider yourself warned: This sort of scenario can happen frequently (a happenstance that robbed the score of at least a point for the reviewer's tilt).

For gamers looking for something almost completely unique or even just a big, dumb game to fill the void before Zelda comes out, Body Harvest fits the bill nicely. --Joe Fielder
--Copyright ©1999 GameSpot Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of GameSpot is prohibited. GameSpot and the GameSpot logo are trademarks of GameSpot Inc.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The best game you've never played!, March 18, 2000

By A Customer

Durability:5.0 out of 5 stars Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars Educational:5.0 out of 5 stars 

Don't judge this game by the pictures, or you'll be one of many to miss this tragically overlooked game. While the grahics are very bland and utilize heavy fogging, that can't detract at all from the quirky, action-packed fun that's to be had in this title. In the simplest terms, you go around and blow up big bugs, but the addition of puzzle-solving and some non-extermination related tasks - like putting out fires - make for a deeper experience. Add to that the ability to commandeer any parked vehicle and drive it to fight the bugs, and you've got one cool game! There is one thing I HATE about this game, though, and it's the save feature. You utilize the standard save point system, but it was poorly implemented in some cases. For instance, after beating the second boss in the first world, you go to the next level by a boat you picked up earlier in the level. However, if you don't beat that next stage, and load up you saved game, you're on the island where you beat the boss - with no boat! You must then go throug the entire secong level, pick up the boat, and cross into the new world. Annoying, eh? But if you can put this aside, there's a great game to enjoy.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The price is right, December 15, 2001

By	Knarf Black "zworty" (Milwaukee) - See all my reviews

I have to admit, as much as I want to praise this game, it is mostly wasted potential. Even though this game came out in the later stage of the N64's run, it has the graphics of a third party release title. (Read: They're not all that great.) Everything about the game reaches towards high concepts, but almost nothing reaches its goal. The idea is that you are a timetraveling hero who has to save the world from various attacks from interstellar insects throughout history. While the story is pure fluff, the gameplay (at least in theory) is not. DMA is well known for the Grand Theft Auto series of games, and Body Harvest follows a similar formula. You shoot things, then you get into various vehicles and shoot more things. The main difference is that in Body Harvest you don't want to run innocent people over.

The controls are innovative and simple, but not very well implimented. Its easy to get the hang of walking and driving the multitudes of cars/boats/planes/tanks, but the controls are too lose for your character to move around with much precision. In addition, the aiming system also fails to live up to its high concept. Basically you press the aim button, which brings up a cool looking recticule, but limits your movements. However, since the enemies are so slow and predictable, and the areas are so spacious, battles boil down to mere shooting galleries. When the enemies get tougher, faster, and more numerous in the later levels, it remains a shooting gallery, just with the bugs doing the shooting. At this point in the game, vehicles become not just the coolest part of the game (and they are cool) but totally necissary, since you are toast without them even on the easy difficulty. Combat in vehicles, even with aiming cababilities, usually devolve into shooting whatever is right in front of you.

Basically, this is a high concept game that didn't quite make the grade and feels very rushed (despite the fact that I waited a long time during its extended development.) Furthermore, with the next generation systems now on the market, the graphics and framerate become simply unacceptable and this game might be better off when viewed as a curiousity piece or a very early beta of Grand Theft Auto 3,

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Nintendo 64 - Body Harvest, August 9, 2004

By	Mike Reed (USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This is my first review I've done of a video game.Body Harvest is a game that's very much fun to play.Although I read through the instruction booklet,this game SEEMS tough to figure out as to what to do next.It's almost like having your OWN Johnny Quest cartoon to play.Although you get just one life in your player(sort of a futuristic-like space warrior),you get plenty of chances to rejuice his power.The graphics,in MY opinion are good even though I've heard others quoting that they didn't care for them.Also enjoy the music that starts up whenever the aliens start coming in for the kill.An hour can EASILY pass by when you play Body Harvest.A good game to own.