Vib-Ribbon is a curious little game, released for the PlayStation 1 on the 12th of December 1999 and later re-released on PlayStation Network in 2014. It was developed by the company NanaOn-Sha and was published by Sony. You play as a little vector rabbit named "Vibri", she has to get through stages by timing her moves with the music playing in the background. The game can use your CDs by putting the game on the Playstation's RAM allowing for the CD to be swapped out.
Vib-Ribbon has a unique art style, instead of focusing on creating a new and original style they went with a minimalistic, vector appearance. This suits the game well as it means the player can focus on the game and isn't distracted by other things, it also gives the game a memorable appearance, separating it from the countless rhythm games of the past. The soundtrack matches the odd, quirky look of the game, it was created by a japanese band called "Laugh and Peace" which produce catchy yet odd songs. These things put together contribute to this game's magical atmosphere.
While the game has a memorable and uncommon mise en scène it also has some problems too, due to the minimalism of the game certain aspects had to be redone in a more unorthodox way, this leads to the confusing and slightly jarring score that can be seen on the top of the screen, this mathematical monstrosity looks nothing like the rest of the game's text and requires you to work it out which means you're not focusing on the game, a bad thing for rhythm games, this is especially odd because normal text is prevalent everywhere else.
A game this simple really doesn't have that many problems, however the problems it DOES have can ruin the experience if you were unfortunate enough to experience them. The game has several songs in store, but what happens when you're done with them, well worry not as this game can read CDs, sort of. There's been several reports of CDs not working, giving errors, crashing the game and being a general annoyance. Not only that but don't even try playing it on the PS2, the input lag on there renders the game unplayable.
While these problems can be bothersome, it is important to remember that they are rare and situational, when looking at the game as a whole you see an amazing experience, the mechanic of 4 key shapes assigned to 4 buttons is brilliant, especially when the shapes combine and you need to press several buttons at once, it keeps the game challenging and entertaining til the last second of gameplay, and with the ability to use CDs to play any song you want, the game never really ends.
Sources:
Vib-Ribbon-
http://www.technologytell.com/gaming/136456/vib-ribbon-review-getting-one-got-away/
http://www.hardcoregamer.com/2014/10/09/review-vib-ribbon/110688/
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/VibRibbon
https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/vib-ribbon-ps3/
http://www.pushsquare.com/news/2017/05/what_ever_happened_to_vib_ribbon_on_ps4
http://www.denofgeek.com/games/vib-ribbon/31980/vib-ribbon-to-return
https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/vib-ribbon-import-review/1900-2550100/
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