Games are often condemned for being cases of style over substance. But as a criticism of an artistic endeavour, could this have any validity? Can style, sometimes, create substance? Such accusations are usually levelled at those games that feature a relatively basic form of player interaction plus a vivid and unique aesthetic treatment. And that’s why it’s a meaningless statement: among other things, videogames are a visual art, so the way they look is critically important in defining how their players derive interaction and meaning from them.

If you’re looking for an example of how you can take a remarkably simple gameplay formula and fashion something from it that has both huge variety and a unique sense of identity, forged by a solidly coherent stylistic focus, you can’t get much better than Space Channel 5: Part 2. One of the last hurrahs of Tetsuya Mizuguchi’s United Game Artists – before he departed Sega and the remnants of the group were swallowed up by Sonic Team – it remains perhaps his most human title.

At its core, it’s a remake of the original SC5. The same simple gameplay concept – a videogame version of MB Games’ Simon, made rhythmic – the same world and set of characters, levels that are at least thematically similar. Take a step back, though, and this sequel makes the first game look like nothing more than a proof of concept, a rushed and unfinished first draft. Fuzzy and uninteresting pre-rendered backgrounds, a near-fatal animation-based timing flaw, a soundtrack with a severe lack of variety, numerous missed opportunities: all problems within the original game, and all fixed in the sequel.

SC5P2 is one of the best examples of what’s become seen as the ‘Sega difference’ – the quality that’s so often referenced in the press and by fans, but so seldom defined. Blue skies, white clouds – those are the elements most commonly referred to. Clearly, though, that’s not it – it’s not just a matter of how the skybox is coloured. SC5P2 is everything that was great about Sega at the peak of the company’s creative high. Character, optimism, good times. No cynicism, no irony. Just an uplifting sense of the goodness in people. Games with heart. Games with inimitable style.



How many other games place you in a world like this? A retrotastic space age, spinning off from a point in time where the 1960s didn’t turn bad, where LSD was replaced by MDMA, the doctrine of free love by one of free groove, where Altamont never happened and Burt Bacharach invented house music and hip hop. Mike Flowers in a glass-domed helmet with an oxygen tank strapped to his back. The Jetsons discovering crotchless leather chaps. It’s high camp space opera. If you were to take Barbarella and replace that film’s preoccupation with sex for one with dance, you’d be part of the way towards describing the SC5 universe. It feels immediately familiar, like you’ve seen it in a thousand other places, but when you try and nail it down to being a copycat of something specific, you can’t. It’s a truly unique setting, not just in videogames, but in any medium.

But a game’s setting is as nothing without a main character to give it life. Enter Ulala (the clue’s in the pronunciation). Her design, like that of all the best characters – and rarely for a female starring role – is immediately identifiable and unique, especially for being introduced at a time when Tomb Raider was still big news. Consisting mainly of a pair of legs that stretch up to two bright pink bunches and an uncommonly slender frame, hers is a silhouette as recognisable as those of any of gaming’s more respected or prolific elders. She’s the embodiment of the Sega difference – upbeat, sassy and on the side of the angels, but never wide-eyed or naïve.

And this character infuses the rest of the game world’s population. Some are returning members of the original game’s cast list – say hello again to Space Kung-Fu Man, the channel’s newsreaders, the Morolians, Mr Blank, the schoolkids – some (including all of the bad guys) are new introductions, but all have the same vibrancy and life. And camp? Sailors, air hostesses, opera singers, cheerleaders, synchronised swimmers – no other game has a character list that comes close to matching that of Part 2.