Hybrid Heaven

About Hybrid Heaven

Hybrid Heaven (1999) is Konami Osaka's Nintendo 64 mix of action-adventure and RPG, set in an alien base beneath Manhattan, built as the studio's answer to Metal Gear Solid and one of the few N64 games with a widescreen mode.

Hybrid Heaven in Depth

Exploration borrows from 3D action-adventures such as Tomb Raider: the player moves freely, jumps, crawls, climbs and shoots, and solves puzzles by disabling electronic weapons or careful manoeuvring. Fights against monsters, called "biological weapons", switch to a different mode. Confined to a small room and unable to jump, crawl or climb, the player and the monster jostle for position in real time until one is close enough, with enough energy, to attack; time then freezes for a role-playing round in which the attacker picks an attack, the defender a defence, and the result is shown. Energy can be saved up to five times for combos, built one move at a time or chosen from presets. Using an attack or defence raises the statistics for that move, tracked separately for each limb, the torso and the head, and injured body parts make fights harder. A Vs. Battle Mode plays like a 3D fighting game with RPG elements.

The hero appears to be Mr. Diaz, a synthetic hybrid made by aliens, who turns on his masters by killing a clone meant to replace the President's bodyguard, Johnny Slater. In fact he is Slater, disguised as Diaz by the Gargatuans, three-foot aliens forced to help a traitor of their kind who plans to conquer Earth by replacing its leaders with clones, starting with the President.

Making Hybrid Heaven

Konami Computer Entertainment Osaka designed Hybrid Heaven as an answer to Konami Computer Entertainment Japan's Metal Gear Solid, trying to outdo its sister team's top title. It supports the Rumble Pak and Expansion Pak, and its enemies range from clones made for menial work and agents resembling secret servicemen in black suits and sunglasses to mutants, robots and hybrids of human and Gargatuan DNA; one hybrid, made to replace a cabinet secretary, pursues Johnny for much of the game. Because games of its kind were rare on the Nintendo 64, it carried a lot of hype, but reviews were mixed, from IGN's 7 out of 10 to GameSpot's 4.1. Next Generation said it was "certainly fun, but not quite excellent", arguing that with more variety, such as a city scene, it "could have been so much more than just an interesting hybrid with great graphics and sound".