A Look At: Pixel Ripped 1995

BACK TO THE 90’s WE GO.

I have written about this series before (Pixel Ripped 1989), some of you might know by now that I love VR and just about everything is fun in that “world”, yes even retro-inspired games like the Pixel Ripped series.

Pixel Ripped 1995 is the second game out of currently 3, it came out on PSVR back in 2020, but while I did buy it I never got around to play it, luckily the game came out for the PSVR2 a few days ago which meant that I got no excuse to not play it now.

PR1995 kicks off pretty quickly with a Gameboy-esque handheld and as before you have to play a game inside a game, you have to hold both hands on the Gameboy while running and jumping on the tiny screen while looking around you in the “real world too”.

Sounds awkward and hard? Well, it ain’t, everything feels natural as soon as you get the hang of it.

From the Gameboy to the Super Nintendo-styled console…

Soon the game goes into color mode, and you have something that looks a lot like a Super Nintendo with a Zelda-ish game called Pixel Ripped.

Sounds a bit boring? Guess what, it ain’t as while you play this Zelda wannabe your mom talks on the phone and every now and then she goes apeshit on your player, screaming about how dangerous it is and all sorts of strange theories (mostly conspiracy) like most of us gamers back in the ’80s and 90’s heard a lot when our parents wanted us to go outside or just stop playing video games. To get her to stop you have to shoot stuff with your “bee bee gun”…

THAT ANNOYING KID NEXT DOOR…

The cool games back in the early 90s are covered in the game really, you got Donkey Kong Country, Castlevania, Streets Of Rage, Road Rash, and so on spread out through the game, all games work and play really well, they are even a lot better than in the first game for sure.

You also get to meet that typical stupid neighbor that we all had back then, the lying shit who kept bragging about getting games from his uncle that worked as “a game developer” and beating the games before they had even arrived in the shops, oh and yes he is two-faced too, mean and annoying to you but super friendly to your parents, seriously this part in the game made me furious lol.

SEGA 32X, THE ARCADE & THE VIDEO GAME STORE…

You eventually end up in a game store where you are looking for a game, naturally, the kid next door takes the last copy and you get challenged to beat a game, this is a bit of a spoiler but found this part really brilliant, you have to cheat to be able to beat this challenge and by doing that you will actually play on two different consoles at the same time.

These 2 consoles look a lot like an SNES and a Mega Drive/Genesis and the way it works is that you play one game (looks a lot like Sonic) and when you get stuck you play on the other console (which umm looks a lot like Metroid) to find a power-up there that you have to activate to use on the other console, seriously, it plays really good.

Another cool thing was that your dad brought home a new console from the shop that looks a lot like a SEGA 32X adapter.

I will stop there, can’t spoil the whole game for you guys, but yeah I do hope that I have managed to make you guys consider getting the game now…

THE VERDICT…

Pixel Ripped 1995 covers both the late 8-bit era and most of the 16-bit era (sadly no Amiga’s there…) and there are some more surprises to be seen in the game, a solid game that plays really well, the PSVR2 version has quite a bit of new features too which ain’t in the PSVR version, better controls, haptics, headset rumble, better graphics and so on, and maybe best of all is that it is a free upgrade if you already own it on the PSVR. Controls, music, graphics, style, length, difficulty, and so on fit the game nicely, yes there are some difficult parts but far from impossible, just give it a few more goes and if still stuck, then you look around in the room or wherever you are in-game as the clues are always near…

PS: Many might wonder which game in the trilogy is the best and how they rank next to each other, in my opinion, they complete each other although I have to admit that 1995 is the weakest of the lot albeit all 3 games are solid and fun games, on and unlike the first game this got a Platinum Trophy which to me is a huge replay incentive.