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My Played Video Games Review: James Bond 007: The Duel for the Sega Genesis

darthnavaPosted for Everyone to comment on, 3 years ago3 min read

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After posting about all the NES/Famicom games that I have played, I am now beginning to post about Sega Genesis/Megadrive games that I had the pleasure of playing from the mid to the late 1990s. I Thank you all for your continued support of my posts.

James Bond 007: The Duel is an action video game featuring the popular, fictional British secret agent James Bond. It was developed and published by UK game publisher Domark for the Sega Genesis (known as Megadrive in Japan) in 1993.

The Story

Her Majesty's secret service agent James Bond 007 - A name to strike fear in any villain stupid enough to cross him. Now he is back, in a brand new adventure especially from Sega. 4 dangerous levels of fast and tense action await you! What are you damn waiting for?

Sega Genesis cartridge of the game (image source)

The Graphics and Sound

The game has below average 16-bit graphics. It has overly saturated colors. The bright orange hull of the supply ship in the first level is an eye-sore.

The small sprites are nicely animated. However, the animation at being shot at is damn funny.

The backgrounds that the game is set against do not resemble those from the films and the way they are integrated into the game is terrible. It is often difficult to tell the background art against the platforms. You can't tell whether the platform ends in a physical wall or only a made one, while sometimes, objects in the foreground can blur the enemies altogether, again putting you at a disadvantage.

The music is a letdown. Apart from the first few notes from "James Bond Theme", the game music consists of generic MIDI tunes while the sound effects are muffled and bland. The game's British developers got real lazy on this one.

Gameplay sample of James Bond 007: The Duel on the Sega Genesis

The Gameplay

The controls are not so good due to the nature of the game. Bond's only good move is jumping, which can be nicely controlled. Enemies shoot first and ask questions later and crouching is the only defense you got against them. However, you can't move or even change directions while crouching. You gotta stop your character from running before you press "down", or you can't crouch at all. Similarly, when jumping, you can't crouch-land quickly, nor can you stay down after climbing ladders.

The bosses are easy. They roughly resemble various Bond villains, the main character's tuxedoed sprite is the only feature making him as James Bond. There are no nice gadgets to play with, no vehicles to ride in, and no good one-liners to finish off a level. For pity's sake, Bond's gun even isn't the Walther PPK as it only holds some measly six rounds.

Replay value is poor. There are no secrets to find out and once you finish it you can't seem to get the urge to play it again.

My Verdict

James Bond fans may like this but others may want to stay away. For an action platformer experience on the Sega Genesis, you might want to look at some other nice games with more superior gameplay to boot.

Try James Bond 007: The Duel on the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive or on your preferred emulators. See if you will like it.

Let's keep on gaming in the free world!

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