Most consider the start of the 3D platforming genre the launch of Super Mario 64. It’s tough to blame them; developers tried but things were a little rough. One of the few that was worth playing was a curious title called Jumping Flash. This launch window game made a decent splash on the Sony PlayStation, but by and large the concepts it introduced have been abandoned and the franchise forgotten. Today I’m here to take a look at Jumping Flash with a set of modern eyes and see if it’s still worth playing.
The story here is crazy. There’s something about a cutesy characters and a series of land masses removed from a planet by a mad professor who plans to turn a profit from them. You play as a mechanical rabbit named Robbit. The scenario is certainly unusual, but it’s plenty charming for a game like this. The story is told through FMV with voice overs which is a nice touch.
Jumping Flash is a 3D platformer. You control Robbit who can jump and shoot twin lasers as his primary method of defeating enemies. In typical fashion he can leap rather high (even triple jump) and you’ll need to take advantage of this skill to succeed. Jumping Flash does however have one major twist. You view the action from a first person perspective. This means you’re looking through the eyes of Robbit and there are no other camera modes.
Rest assured however because I assure you this isn’t a first person shooter. Yes, your primary weapon is a projectile but this game plants firmly plants itself as a platform game. Enemies populate each of the stages but for the most part they can be avoided. Your goal in each level (barring boss encounters) is to find each of the fuel pods scattered in each stage. You’ll need to search high and low because, while they aren’t hidden or anything like that, they can be quite difficult to reach.
The level designs are very limited in scope. The landscapes are just small chunks of a bigger planet as per the story, after all. To keep things wide and open the developers opted to include a bunch of floating platforms (some that move and others that are stationary). While they don’t make a lot of sense they sure allow for some interesting gameplay scenarios. You’ll need to pull off some pretty intricate jumps if you’re planning to play Jumping Flash from start to finish.
Usually a first person viewpoint can be the kiss of death for any game that requires even the slightest bit of platforming. That’s not the case here because the developers took some precautions. When you jump multiple times, or fall from somewhere high up, Robbit will automatically look down to the ground while it falls. Your shadow indicates where you’ll land. It actually works really well and I never had any serious issues with the platforming. It’s downright enjoyable.
You can’t just stand around and smell the flowers though. As I mentioned earlier each stage is populated by monsters and if they get close enough they’ll attack. Robbit has a limited amount of health and once it’s depleted (or he falls off the edge) it’s going to cost him a life. Furthermore you’re racing against the clock. You have ten minutes to complete a stage. While this is more than enough time in the beginning later on I found that I was cutting it fairly close.
There are also sub-weapons you can pick up and use against enemies. These include things like grenades and a timer freeze. They’re limited in use but can come in handy occasionally. Enemies also drop coins when they’re defeated which add to your point score. Despite the unusual viewpoint Jumping Flash is actually a pretty traditional platforming game.
It must however be said; Jumping Flash is too short. I was able to complete the game in just a few hours and I didn’t really see any reason to return to Robbit’s world after this. There are just eighteen stages which is pretty bare for a game they were charging full price for at release. Each stage can be completed in a matter of minutes. Jumping Flash is also never particularly challenging. They should have stepped the designs up a little which could have gone a long way to increasing longevity.
One of the game’s weakest points is in its graphics. The general style they were going for is pretty charming to be honest, but the engine wasn’t capable of doing it justice. Everything looks rough here. The textures are extremely grainy, the environments bland, and the enemies use so few of polygons that they look more abstract than anything. What’s more is that the framerate often slows. It doesn’t make sense considering how basic the graphics engine is. Poorly optimised is the word of the day.
Jumping Flash does however have a pretty bouncy and fun soundtrack. Each world has its own theme and I must say that a lot of work went into these. You can tell right away that the composer had a lot of fun churning out this soundtrack. The sound effects are also really charming and fit the whimsical platformer style the rest of the game shoots for. The voice acting is pretty typical of this era. Nothing special, but it gets the job done.
Jumping Flash is easily one of the best early PlayStation games. I went in expecting to hate it but by the time the credits started rolling I was sad it was over. I never thought a first person viewpoint could allow for so much finesse in a platforming game. Personally, I think Jumping Flash should have been the console’s mascot because it’s better in my opinion than the original Crash Bandicoot.
