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Die-hard survival-horror fans might possibly get a quick fix from this game, but even that's questionable. If great games were made of things like a mediocre story, oddly conical character shadows, and lead characters whose eerie grins just won't go away, The Ring would be a real winner. Alas, these are not the criteria by which we judge, and thus the game is hardly what you would call "great." In fact, it's far from it. The Ring is loosely based on a Japanese movie of the same name, in which a cursed strip of 8mm film dooms anyone who views it to a seven-day-long death sentence. Yes, it's hokey. The game version of The Ring supplants this film with a computer program that, when booted, has basically the same effect. Yes, this is even worse. You play as CDC researcher Meg Rainman, whose boyfriend Robert recently died of unexplained causes. Meg boots up Robert's laptop and, surprise, encounters a program that displays only the word "ring." Doing so introduces Meg to a sort of dark alternate dimension, and she finds herself wearing soldier's gear, armed with a pistol. After she escapes this reality, a sudden phone call informs her that she'll be dead in seven days. Your subsequent duty is, of course, to unravel the mystery of the Ring and save Meg's life. The Ring really wants to be Resident Evil, but then, so do a lot of games - and none of them (with the possible exception of Dino Crisis) has succeeded yet. The crux of this matter is that Resident Evil is already fundamentally flawed. Survival-horror games in general are plagued by awkward control problems, camera angles that obscure the action, and arbitrary puzzles like "pull the statue's earlobe to unlock the secret door." However, Resident Evil consistently succeeds with its wonderful sense of ambience, great story, and the endearing charm of its characters. The Ring has none of this. Its story is bland and often inexplicable, its characters are flat, and the only atmosphere it creates is one of sheer cheese. Gameplay in The Ring is nothing new to survival-horror fans - movement, combat, mapping, and inventory are all identical to Resident Evil or any of its clones. This doesn't mean the game actually plays as well, though. The controls are stiff even for this type of game, and collision detection is often clumsy, occasionally requiring you to circumvent what looks like an otherwise passable walkway. These technical issues make getting around something of a chore, since the game is heavily based on exploration. Triggering a new event or story sequence is often dependent on being in the right room at the right time, and clues are rarely given about exactly what room that is. This leads to a fair amount of aimless wandering between some amazingly similar environments. There are a handful of other problems with The Ring. Its translation isn't great, or even good - just serviceable. Dialogue sounds stilted and unnatural, and the text is rife with typos. The voice acting is so hilariously bad it's almost unbearable, but fortunately it's used sparingly. Some (but admittedly not all) of The Ring's music is an aural horror to behold - the looping first track is so grating that you might even compulsively turn the audio off (as this reviewer eventually did). And finally, the question must be asked: What's with that smile? Regardless of the situation, Meg wears a disturbing, Jokeresque leer throughout every scene of the game. Her boyfriend died the day before? She's all smileRead full review
As a Resident Evil clone, and as a Dreamcast game, it's on the VERY low end of objective quality. The value that come from it is that it's inspired by the Ring sequel book: Loop. Going in knowing about it does help avert disappointment. It also helps going in understanding Japanese culture and the workplace in Japan Otherwise, you are in for a hilariously cheesy Z-grade descent into madness (as opposed to it's superior B-grade contemporaries like Blue Stinger and Illbleed, although Illbleed is my favorite of the horror Dreamcast games).
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: Pre-owned
Seriously, if you like horror games and don't want to have a headache for the rest of your life, avoid playing this game at all costs. The only reason I purchased it was to review how awful it is. This game rips of Resident Evil in every way possible, and then mixes it all into a blender that already has enough crap in it to cause it to overflow with a horrible stench. Of course the taste in your mouth is just overwhelming and you never want to take another sip in your life. The voice acting was awful. It sounded like they took the clean-up crew of the company's building and had them voice the characters, the graphics make the Playstation 1 look like a god, and the music sounds like my little 6 year-old brother pounding his head on a keyboard. There is nothing good about this game. My YouTube account will have a full video review on this awful experience (http://www.youtube.com/user/mmntw26) if you really want to see the true horror of this. Avoid at all costs. (Thanks goes out to polyflock for selling it for a great price! Check the seller's page here: http://myworld.ebay.com/polyflock/)Read full review
It's an absolutely terrible game with many flaws ranging from the controls to the voice acting. However, it does have a good story and is somewhat fun to play if you don't take it too seriously. The Ring: Terror's Realm is based on the franchise - "The Ring” and borrows many elements along with mechanics from other popular franchises. Most notably, the Biohazard series. However, it does this very poorly. The familiarity will help new players though and that's a plus of sorts. Personally, I feel you should give it a shot if you can find it cheap somewhere. To me, the story was good and that's why I play it every now and again. It's one of those "It's so bad, it's good" kind of games.
What I like most about the game is it follows closley to its orginal source materal for the story line from the movies,hust switching the tape for a pc game.What i dislike abou the game is that it is a little hardre to control the charcters when compared too a game like resident evil code veronica for the dreamcast.I decided to buy this game to add to my collection plus I thought it might be a nice game to play and see how it stacked up too the orginal Ring movie its based off of.
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