Developed by Novotrade and published by Sega in 1992
I never got to play Ecco back when it was first released, but I remember it featured prominently in Sega's Genesis and Mega Drive advertisements and promotional material. This was a game that rivalled even Sega's newly appointed mascot, Sonic, in terms of popularity.
It's not difficult to see why; the graphics, artwork and the kind of smooth scrolling Ecco was demonstrating made the game look every inch the big-budget game Sega's marketing machine was making it out to be.
Equally, the game's subject matter and overall style was a far cry from the typical arcade shooters, platformers, brawlers, or indeed just about anything else at the time. Casting the player as a time-travelling dolphin in such a sub-aqua adventure certainly couldn't be described as mainstream.
As for the story, Ecco's pod of dolphin's gets swept up in a mysterious vortex, which is caused by a race of extra-terrestrial beings come to harvest food from Earth's oceans. None-too pleased at the prospect of having his pals turned into fish-sticks, Ecco sets off on a journey that takes him back in time, gaining various powers and altering the course of history to prevent the disaster from occurring. It's all rather surreal, but Sega fans were probably too busy gawping at the visuals to care too much about the plot.
As good as the game might look, it's far from perfect; Ecco is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful games for the system, but it's also one of the toughest. The game runs at a blistering pace, making controlling Ecco very tricky indeed, something made even tougher by the fact the developers implemented a realistic movement scheme, meaning Ecco actually has to turn around to change directions, or turn parabolic arcs to change direction. It all looks very impressive, but when you're besieged by voracious sharks, stinging jellyfish and other denizens of the deep, your stress levels are certainly going to raise.
Newcomers to the game are likely to find that the puzzles and mechanics involved in solving them don't make a whole lot of sense; quite why pushing a spiral shell or ring of starfish into a bunch of rocks causes them to disintegrate is anyone's guess, and players need to get into the mindset of experimentation, back-tracking and trying different things. There's one section later in the game where Ecco has to use his beak to lift a stone block up and over various pits, which took a few moments of head-scratching to figure out (quite ingenious when the penny drops), but the fact you have to perform a vertical turn underneath the block to start it moving just doesn't make itself apparent.
Whatever it's foibles, Ecco the Dolphin remains a charming game, one made all the more special when you consider the humble beginnings of it's developer. Hungary-based Novotrade had grown up in the shadow of Soviet communism, a world where living behind the Iron Curtain meant getting your hands on western technology wasn't an easy thing. The fact Novotrade was responsible for such a prominent third-party title for Sega's 16-bit console just makes it all the more remarkable.
Credits
Producer: Ed Annunziata
Design: Ed Annunziata, László Szenttornyai
Coding: József Molnár, Mihály Brudnyák, Fox
Graphics: Zsolt Balogh, ‑Talent‑, András Bakai
Music: Spencer N. Nilsen, Brian Coburn, András Magyari
Chapters
0:00:00 Attract Mode
0:00:45 Level 1: Home Bay
0:01:45 Level 2: Medusa Bay
0:03:10 Level 3: Undercaves
0:06:00 Level 4: The Vents
0:11:43 Level 5: The Lagoon
0:17:38 Level 6: Ridge Water
0:21:14 Level 7: Open Ocean
0:22:19 Level 8: Ice Zone
0:23:15 Level 9: Hard Water
0:24:21 Level 10: Cold Water
0:26:48 Level 11: Island Zone
0:30:07 Level 12: Deep Water
0:31:58 Level 13: The Marble Sea
0:33:08 Level 14: The Library
0:38:18 Level 15: Deep City
0:40:03 Level 16: City of Forever
0:41:57 Level 17: Jurassic Beach
0:43:45 Level 18: Pteranodon Pond
0:47:08 Level 19: Origin Beach
0:49:01 Level 20: Trilobite Circle
0:50:13 Level 21: Dark Water
0:51:59 Level 22: Deep Water
0:53:19 Level 23: City of Forever
0:54:21 Level 24: Home Bay
0:54:51 Level 25: The Tube
0:56:45 Level 26: The Machine
1:02:39 Level 27: The Last Fight - Vortex Queen
1:04:54 Ending
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