Jet Set Radio Future is the sequel to my favorite game of all time, Jet Grind Radio. Why the name change? In Japan it was released as Jet Set Radio, while in America it was released as Jet Grind Radio. Jet Set Radio Future was one of the first games out for Microsoft's first venture into the video game console world, and starting out with Jet Set Radio Future in their roster was a good call.
Jet Set Radio Future kicks things off right, by starting players off trying to form the gang of the GGs. However players don’t start out as the coverboy, Beat, like they did in Jet Grind Radio. Instead it gives players the most pestiferous character from the last game: Yo-Yo. His high pitched tone and slight gangster disposition just plain irk me. Fortunately, the game gives you the option to switch characters immediately after the tutorial is finished.
The gameplay of Jet Set Radio Future is slightly altered from the original. Future has a few new features for players to use to further extend their tricks around town. The graffiti system has been streamlined to a ridiculous degree. The left trigger is the button that you use to use spray paint; however in the original, the game would stop players and make them do a sequence of joystick movements to complete the graffiti. In Jet Set Radio Future, tagging is just rapidly pulling the left trigger to spray a larger sized mural. This has the potential to waste spray paint depending on the line that the player moves in and how frantic the mashing of the trigger is. When tagging, the game switches the camera to an angle which makes it nearly impossible to tag the area and maintain the flow of the game. In Future, you just slightly nudge the trigger and you waste a precious spray paint can. It doesn’t matter if you’re by a tag point or not, the character just sprays in the air. It’s useless! I say precious because spray paint is in scarce supply. Also, Jet Set Radio Future added boosting. When players collect ten spray paint cans, they can use them to make a rocket propelled boost. This feature, to me, is also useless, because all the gaps that require a boost will nearly be over shot when the player uses a boost. Also, ten cans? Didn’t I just mention how scarce spray paint was? If my finger slips and hits the boost button, there goes ten cans of spray paint and a slight portion of my health bar because I just accidentally shot myself into the water. Boosting is also a waste because it doesn’t help traveling any. In Jet Set Radio Future, all the maps are connected. This is confusing to me as I have a terrible sense of direction and this breaks up the flow of gameplay; once again, because I have to constantly be checking my map to see where I am going and if I’m heading in the right direction. And once I get to the next area I am not all that impressed.
The entire game doesn’t look that pleasant. Jet Grind Radio was bright, colorful, funky, and fresh. It was the first game ever to use the graphical art style known as cell shading. Cell shading is where everything looks more like a cartoon. In Jet Set Radio Future, all of the colors are toned down. Everything just kind of blends together in that sort of matte pallet that they chose for the game. Nothing really pops out, everything just seems flat, which is boring. What set Jet Grind Radio apart was it’s personality and style which existed both in the characters and in the environment. It seems as though the developers traded in the funk for an attempt to be cool. Everything in Jet Set Radio Future feels like it’s trying to be cool. The soundtrack is more edgy and dark. The graphics and characters seem apathetic, even the loud audacious Professor K isn’t as lively anymore. It just plain stinks. Unlike the soundtrack.
The soundtrack is pretty darn good. The new style and direction of the songs coincides with the game perfectly. It captures the tone of the futuristic setting while also maintaining the funky-fresh and carefree attitude of the original game. The soundtrack cannot hold a candle to the soundtrack of Jet Grind Radio. Every song in Jet Grind Radio was fun to listen to. Each song had a beat that you could dance to and it was like nothing else you’ve ever heard before. Jet Set Radio Future has all that, yet it also has, for some reason, obligatory crappy songs that are found in most games of that generation. And you can’t turn them off! The track list isn’t customizable at all. Why did they feel the need to put really annoying songs in the game, when a majority of the soundtrack was fine by itself? If the soundtrack didn’t have these loud, disruptive, and juvenile songs it would be just fine. And if I could customize the soundtrack, it’d be even better. But alas I cannot, so I just sit there, embarrassed, while this annoying music is blaring out of the TV and wait and hope that another bad song doesn’t come out.
All in all, Jet Set Radio Future tries to break ground for a new generation, but ultimately falls just short. Flaws in the gameplay, graphics, and sound come together to weigh the game down and make it not as enjoyable as the original was. Everything, the personality, the character, the funk, seems to have left the game. So, if you want a gameplay experience that’s like nothing you’ve ever seen or played, to a soundtrack that’ll make you get up and dance, play the original.
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