Even the keisatsu play when they're not eating donuts!
Jet Set Radio (known as Jet Grind Radioin the NTSC U/C region) was a platforming/skating game released by Sega for the Sega Dreamcast in 2000. The game is centered around roller-bladingstreet gangs called Rudies, who battle for turf by spraying graffiti around the streets of Tokyo-to. Meanwhile, the Rudies are under attack by an evil corporate conglomerate which seeks to homogenize the city. The game pioneered the use ofcel-shading to create cartoony characters and backgrounds using 3D polygon graphics. The game is also remembered for its eclectic soundtrack.A sequel, Jet Set Radio Future, was later released for Xbox, though calling it a "Reformulated Game" might be more apt; save for the new levels, the game's characters and storyline are mostly unchanged from the original. Perhaps wary of JGR's lukewarm reception, developer Smilebit decided that the game played too slowly, and removed the joystick motion feature used for tagging graffiti. Rather than standing still while tagging, players in JSRF can simply skate on by, with no motions to input.Despite heavy promotion by Sega, the original Jet Grind Radio met with poor sales and was never ported to other consoles. Microsoft bundled JSRF together Sega GT 2002 and sold it as a console pack-in for the Xbox. Smilebit was scattered to the winds following the Sega-Sammy merger, later to be restructured into Sega's Sports R&D.Regardless of that, both the original game and its sequel/remake have since became cult classics. There was also a 2-D adaptation of the original released for the Gameboy Advance, which surprisingly isn't half bad.The original Jet Set Radio was re-released in full HD on Xbox Live Arcade, Playstation Network, and PC in September 2012, as part of the Sega Heritage line on the PC.Not to be confused with Jet Set Willy, an unrelated game.
The Jet Set Radio series contains the following tropes:
Absurdly Spacious Sewer; This game takes it to the extreme, especially in JSRF. Expect to spend a few chunks of both games in these.
Action Commands: When "tagging", the larger the tag, the more commands. Totally absent in JSRF.
Adaptation Dye Job: And how. Tab/Corn goes from brunet to blond (and so does Piranha/Boogie), Yoyo goes from being a redhead to having lime green hair, and Combo goes from having black hair to blue hair. Not to mention everybody changes outfits, and most of the changes are pretty significant, too.
Anthropomorphic Zig Zag: Once unlocked as a playable character, Potts can transform from a quadruped into a rollerblading, spraycan-wielding canine of justice. This occurs as a result of his dog-napping by the Noise Tanks, who outfit him with a helmet which makes Potts believe he's a cow. During a second playthrough, the Noise Tanks finally agree to 'fix' Potts - but only if you earn a "Jet" ranking in every stage.
And Your Reward Is Clothes: In JSRF, several hidden characters are often nothing more than reskins; despite having to get a "Jet" rank on several difficult challenges to play as minor characters and antagonists, several of them turn out to be pretty much the same thing. Note that it's not even subtle sometimes with certain combinations: Cube, the ex-leader of Poison Jam, is different only in clothes and color, even retaining the same skills and dances; the same applies for YoYo, Beat and their robot counterparts, who are identical save for different colors and an altered model respectively.
Art Attacker: Well, how else would you fight boss battles?
Ax Crazy: Hayashi - though considering who he works for, it might not be much of a stretch. Hayashi's been known to blow up police cars if his toadies fetch him the wrong flavor of candy.
The Love Shockers too, along with a Cleavage Window added in JSRF.
Battle in the Center of the Mind: When Rokkaku sucks you and hundreds of bystanders into his Humongous Mecha, you are transported into an acid-trip version of Tokyo filled with shadow creatures that constantly run after you. During all this, Rokkaku situates himself on the highest part of his dreamworld where he then transforms himself into a giant monster on skates. You have to grind and jump all the way up in order to fight him.
Fulton Street Folly: Averted with Grind Square (a parody of Manhattan's Times Square). The streets are deathly quiet, with the only foot traffic consisting of uzi-packing mooks.
Bilingual Bonus: Rude boy, rudeboy, rudie, rudi or rudy were common terms for juvenile delinquents and criminals in 1960s Jamaica, and have since been used in other contexts.
Gouji's final boss form, A.Ku.Mu, means "Nightmare" in Japanese.
Blond Guys Are Evil: With the exception of snipers (who are black), most of the Rhinos appear to dye their hair gold.
Bloodless Carnage: Even a missile will merely knock you off your feet for a while.
Burning Rubber: The skates in JSRF emits plumes of flames when you go fast enough. And they sell these to kids?
Camera Screw: JGR's camera and tight corners don't really get along. If you really want to make the camera piss drunk, try the auto-aim button while on an elevator.
Car Fu: JGR's cops have no compunctions about running you over with their cruisers or motorbikes.
Changing of the Guard: The founder of the protagonists' gang in Jet Grind Radio is Beat. In the sequel, the main character is Yoyo, a New Meat recruit who wishes to join the already-established gang. Yoyo previously appeared in the latter half of JGR as a playable character.
Subverted, he's kidnapped and rendered unplayable for about two-thirds of the game.
Character Select Forcing: On your first playthrough, the Grind City flashbacks may only be played through as Combo or Cube. You can select anybody you like during a New Game Plus.
Cold Sniper: If you see a red laser sight pointed at you, it means a Golden Rhino sniper is nearby. Luckily, they're complete cowards and run away if you confront them head-on.
Cooking Duel: The gangs resort to competitions of skating skill to settle their differences directly. All of the 'boss' battles are just tagging people within a set time limit. It Makes Sense in Context.
Conveniently Empty Streets: The moment the military shows up, pedestrians magically vanish from the scene. Needless to say, this removes (some) of the guilt associated with crashing helicopters into commercial buildings.
Couldn't Find a Pen: Coin's final instructions to his friends were, fittingly enough, written in graffiti.
Dismantled MacGuffin: The Devil's Contract, a vinyl record rumored to summon a demonic entity. Somewhere along the line, the record was broken into three shards and scattered between Grind City and Tokyo.
Disproportionate Retribution: Thinking of tagging up the streets of Tokyo-To? Be prepared to have tanks coming after you.
Dramatic Stutter: Once he's safe inside his trippy light show, JSRF's Gouji suddenly goes all SHODAN.
Don't Try This at Home: Both games display a message about graffiti being criminal when starting up.
Ego Polis: The drive behind Rokkaku's crackdown on the streets is to pave the way for his "Rokkaku Expo", essentially branding everything with his logo.
Elite Mooks: The Golden Rhinos replace the police after you've run through all the levels once.
Enemy Chatter: The police dispatcher and Onishima can be heard barking orders over their radio. Gouji and his Golden Rhinos take over the airwaves later.
Evil Brit: The unseen voice commanding the Golden Rhinos over their PA system.
Evil Counterpart: "DJ Big Gouji" could be seen as an evil counterpart to Professor K.
Fingerless Gloves Beat wears these in the first game, though in Jet Set Radio Future, he wears full gloves. In JSRF, Yoyo wears fingerless gloves.
Flashback Effects: The flashbacks to Grind City appear in sepia tone, then slowly shift to color.
Fluffy the Terrible: The cutesy Rokkaku mascot, a gold rhino in overalls. At the end of the game, the Rhino statue on the front of Gouji's building comes to life and starts belching fire.
For The Cel Of It: The original game was the first to do this with both black outlines, and the use of two-tone shading on characters.
For the Evulz: Unlike his counterpart in the first game, the Gouji of JSRF is truly crazy.
Fourth Wall Mail Slot: Professor K reads aloud a couple letters from "Mr. Osaka", who is beset by roaches in his home. K jokingly advises him to burn his house down (which he does).
Frogs and Toads: One of JGR's branching paths involves the GG's hideout being overrun by frogs, set loose by Poison Jam.
Gang of Hats: A rather...quirky...variety of these. Most of them are just kids, though.
Gas Leak Coverup: Gouji's death and the implosion of his building in JGR is written off as "a construction accident".
Good Guns, Bad Guns: The Rhinos are packing some serious heat: Mac-10s and dragonovs.
Gondor Calls for Aid: In the bonus mission (see Regional Bonus below), Combo and Cube are forced to flee Grind City after the Rokkaku kidnap the third member of their gang.
Hoist by His Own Petard: The Golden Rhinos of JSRF make colorful departures when defeated, such as getting hit by a stray missile fired from a Rokkaku harrier jet. The flamethrower assassin is immolated when her flame tank explodes, and then crushed by a falling billboard sign which she had previously set aflame.
Jet Pack: Assasin #2 and his cronies have jetpacks, allowing them to rain gunfire on areas that other mooks can't. By far the most irritating enemies in the game.
Le Parkour: Assassin #5 isn't a big believer in stairs.
Lemming Cops: During the revisit to Benten, you can trigger a hidden scene in which dozens of pursuing Rokkaku sedans crash into a giant, flaming pileup.
Letter Motif: The NTSC-U/PAL versions introduces three new characters from out of town: Coin, Combo, and Cube.
Living Statue: Gouji's corporate Mascot, a giant cartoon rhino, is stationed on the front of his building. The statue comes to life during the final battle and begins breathing fire.
Load-Bearing Boss: Defeating Rokkaku causes his entire skyscraper to explode.
Rokkaku's Humongous Mecha starts to collapse after you defeat him at the end of JSRF.
Locomotive Level: Sort of, in the sense that you're chasing after a locomotive robot.
Lonely at the Top: At the conclusion of the game, Professor K speculates this might have been the case with Gouji Rokkaku.
The Men in Black: The Golden Rhinos. Professor K announces their arrival by referring to them as a new gang; it's plain to see, however, that they're working for Rokkaku Corp. Their 'graffiti' is merely Rokkaku advertisements plastered over your own burners.
Megacorp: Rokkaku Corporation. The logo is emblazoned on gas stations, satellite dishes, and trucks marked "Rokkaku Depot" (using the same typeface as Home Depot).
Neoclassical Punk Zydeco Rockabilly: The soundtrack, composed by Hideki Naganuma, incorporates elements of many genres such as rock, funk, and techno to make a very unique sound.
New Game Plus: After beating the game once, you could play it again with a selection of new levels.
Given the fact that you unlock a dozen characters after you finish the story, you have to wonder why this is absent in JSRF.
Nice Hat: In both games, Corn/Tab's eyes are hidden beneath his hat.
As a gang, the Immortals' gimmick is that they're bowler hat-wearing mummies.
No Communities Were Harmed: Weirdly subverted. Tokyo is referred to by name, but it bears almost no resemblance to the real Tokyo. Also, Tokyo-to is actually the full name of Tokyo ("to" is a suffix meaning "city/metropolis").
Oddly Small Organization: The rival gangs have three members each. (Or at least we assume, we only see three at once. It's likely that the other gangs are around the same size as the GGs.)
Police Are Useless: When assassins with guns and firebombing-throwing terrorists go after you, the police are nowhere to be seen. One intro states that they're too scared to even touch them.
Well, the police work for Rokkaku, and so do the assassins, so why would they get involved?
Regional Bonus: The North American release of JGR contains an extra mission sandwiched between the two run-throughs of Tokyo.
Also, each regional release of the game had some songs that the other version didn't. Most of these region-exclusive songs were included in the HD re-release though.
Remixed Level: The second half of JGR consists of beating the same three city districts again — only this time, the maps aren't segmented into individual missions; You have to tag the entire district at once.
Sailor Earth: Combo's gang on the other side of the Pacific.
Sampling: Very prevalent in both games' soundtracks.
Sanity Slippage: Over the course of JSRF, Hayashi's already-lacking sanity wears down more and more with each defeat he suffers.
Scoring Points: Deceptively important — Earning a "Jet" ranking in each level is the key to unlocking characters. Tagging and performing stunts adds to your score, as does completing the level with lots of time left on the clock.
Though all it does in Jet Set Radio Future is unlock some of the Graffiti Souls.
Secret Character: More than one, the best one of course being the dog, Potts.
Super Drowning Skills: Causes a deduction in health, after which the player climbs out of the water. Perhaps justified because they are wearing rollerblades.
Summon Backup Dancers: During the final battle with Rokkaku, gyrating cage dancers are suspended from revolving cranes.
Swiss Army Weapon: Player characters can use spray paint to stun police officers, give their rollerblades a crazy boost, disable machinery, cover spotlights, disable bomb timers, operate switches.....
In JSRF, it just looks like spray paint. In actuality, it's the soul of the streets. Uh-huh.
There Was A Door: Played for laughs in the first stage of Kogane. One method of crossing the river is plowing through a half-dozen plaster wall apartments. It's not until later that Garem shows you a cleaner route.
Title Drop: Inevitable, as the pirate station the game is based around is called "Jet Set Radio". But in the sequel, Professor K goes out of his way to say "Jet Set Radio Future!" near the endgame.
Title Scream: "JET SET RADIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Thriving Ghost Town: Averted. The game's most important character is Tokyo itself, and is designed to overwhelm the player with the sprawl of the urban landscape, populated by endless terrified NPCs.
Translation Convention: Despite hailing from the states, Combo and Cube have no trouble communicating with the Japanese Rudies. Possibly justified in that JSR's setting exists somewhere between reality and punk fantasy.
Urban Legend of Zelda: With this many unlockable characters, it seemed natural at the time that Professor K must be playable — despite his incompatible character model. The same goes for the elusive Coin, too.
Professor K is an unlockable character in the GBA version though.
Villain with Good Publicity: No one makes the connection between the Golden Rhinos, a notorious gang of Asian killers, and Gouji Rokkaku, whose corporate mascot is...a gold rhino. Gouji's sheer wealth probably makes this a Justified Trope, though.
When All You Have Is a Hammer: The final boss of JGR coverts the roof of his office tower into a giant turntable. To defeat him, you must (Anyone?) grind rails to reach the adjoining towers and (Bueller? Bueller?) spray graffiti over his occult symbols.
You Are Number Six: The Rokkaku "Assassins" are each numbered from #1-6. They appear in the remixed version of previous levels after you cause enough trouble, essentially replacing the military.
on Xbox Live Arcade, Playstation Network, and PC in September 2012, as part of the Sega Heritage line on the PC.Not to be confused with Jet Set Willy, an unrelated game.
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