Comparing the Cut Scenes of Conker's Bad Fur Day and Conker: Live and Reloaded

When Conker's Bad Fur Day was first released for the Nintendo 64 in 2001, I was a bit too young to play the Mature-rated title (I was only 16), but I did decide to try it out two years later. What many people said was true: it was Rare's last great masterpiece, with stellar graphics and sound, plenty of adult-oriented British humor, and all sorts of violent and mature content to the extent that it was surprising that the game was released on a "kiddy" system. I really like Bad Fur Day, but since I do not own an Xbox or Xbox 360, I have never played the remake, entitled Conker: Live and Reloaded. However, after viewing its cut scenes on YouTube, and comparing them to the ones found in the N64 version, I can say that, at least as far as the cut scenes go, the original version is far superior. My objective here is to compare a few cut scenes from the two games and state my point as to why I feel the N64 cut scenes are better than the Xbox movies.

First, in general, some of the swear words that went largely uncensored in the N64 version have been bleeped out in the Xbox version. Part of what made the N64 game so fascinating was that Rare was able to get away with including so many uncensored words. Granted, some of the nastier swearing was censored in that version, but hearing other curse words without any bleeps was proof that Nintendo was willing to go through with it to make their system seem more hardcore even as it was approaching its final days. Although the Xbox in general was designed with hardcore games in mind, a lot more bleeping can be heard. These bleeps can be distracting, and once amusing cut scenes tend to fall flat as a result. As I understand it, the bleeps were put in place so that more retailers could carry the game. However, Rare originally intended for the game to be completely uncensored. At any rate, it is jarring to know that the N64 version is less censored than the Xbox version.

Now let us focus on the tutorial portion of the game. In the original version, when Conker is chasing a key, he remembers that he had a frying pan with him and asks the player to press the B button to use it. With the pan, he can strike the key and use it to unlock the door to exit. Short, sweet, and to the point. In the Xbox version, after chasing the key for a bit, Conker suddenly notices several weapons hanging from the wall. He selects a frying pan, but before he can get to the key, some monsters pop up, and one of them grabs the key. The only neat part about this sequence is Conker's comment about how he thought the game was a straight port, but it has suddenly become a hack. Why Rare decided to extend the tutorial here is because they added a lot more enemies walking about that you must take out with your weapons. The N64 version was fine without these combats, as it allowed more focus on the humor that is one of the game's best known trademarks.

Onward to the scene where Conker takes on the stone gargoyle. The N64 version has our hero whacking him with the frying pan. At first, the gargoyle laughs at him, but he ends up losing his balance and falling off the bridge as Conker grins and thinks, "See ya!" This is a nice example of good comedic timing. The same cannot be said of the Xbox version, where when Conker uses the pan to strike the gargoyle, the creature merely insults him. He adds that the designers decided to change the tutorial area in order to make the players think that the rest of the game had likewise been altered. That is when Conker takes out his bat and hits the gargoyle. Once struck, the gargoyle says "Ow," and then a few seconds later, he falls over backwards and crashes into the wall. As a result, the once amusing cut scene falls rather flat.

It should also be noted that in the Xbox version of this cut scene, the gargoyle's voice sounds quite different than it did in the preceding cut scene, in which he refuses to step aside for Conker. In fact, there are several instances where the voices have undergone rather noticeable changes. When Conker gives out information based on the new features and controls, his tone of voice sounds a bit different. When he bumps into Gregg the Grim Reaper in the Spooky level and he is given a shotgun to deal with zombies, Gregg's voice changes briefly when he says "baseball bat" instead of "frying pan." I think that Rare merely recycled the voice acting used in the N64 version and made changes when necessary. While not necessarily a bad idea in and of itself, they should have made the new voices sound like the old ones so that the transition is far less jarring.

The Xbox version also ruined one of my favorite cut scenes. At one point in the It's War chapter, Conker finds a soldier strapped to a chair, and must try to pull the right lever in order to release him. Of course, the poor soldier gets electrocuted no matter which switch is pulled. The original version has Conker reacting to the electrocution right away. The electrocution lasts only a few seconds, after which the soldier has been burnt everywhere, but is still alive. Conker then races to the other switch, but realizing that he is a bit late, merely comments that the fried soldier looks great. Not only is the cut scene humorous, but Conker's quick reaction and the fast electrocution give you a sense of real drama at work.

When the game was ported to the Xbox, the cut scene was changed for the worst. Now the electrocution takes forever, and Conker's reaction is a bit slower. Rather than saving the poor guy, Conker merely stands around and waits for it to end. At one point, he even reads a magazine. When the electrocution finally ends, the soldier is not burnt, and about the only piece of evidence that something is wrong with him is that his eye pops out of its socket when he asks Conker how he looks. Meanwhile, it is only after the lengthy electrocution that Conker races to the other lever. If Rare was going for a funnier cut scene, they failed rather badly here. Perhaps it is little wonder that the quality of their games has been going downhill since their N64 days ended.

Another example of an unnecessary delayed reaction comes near the end of the game, when Conker's girlfriend, Berri, is killed by Don Weaso, the mafia leader. When Don shoots Berri in the original version, he starts firing immediately after telling her "Adios!", and it only takes a few seconds for her to collapse. Conker quickly begins to tell the weasel to watch where he shoots, and then sees Berri dying on the floor. He is helpless as he watches his girlfriend pass away. In the Xbox version, there is a brief gap between when Don shouts "Adios!" and when he begins to shoot Berri. Also, it takes forever for him to shoot Berri enough so that she falls to the floor, and Conker's reaction is slower as a result. Consequently, a perfectly sad moment in the game drags on a bit too long, and does not hit me the same way as the N64 version did.

As for other changes in various cut scenes, one particular boss battle has the boss singing with echoing, which along with the censoring and being out of sync at one point makes it far less amusing (you probably know which boss I am referring to). During the ending cut scene, Conker selects a crossbow which he says has double action, but it actually does not. The shotgun that he selected in the first game had double action, which is further proof that the majority of the voice acting from the original game was recycled. Some portions of cut scenes are divided by loading screens, which the N64 version lacked. Consequently, cut scenes that were put together seamlessly before now feel disjointed. The part where the Tediz base blows up is a perfect example of this aspect. While I commend Rare for trying to improve the cut scenes, in the end, they just made them worst and robbed them of their comedic value.

I had no plans whatsoever to ever play the Xbox version of Conker to begin with, and thanks to YouTube, where I could see how the cut scenes were butchered, I have even less incentive to check it out. Cut scenes that were funny and emotional before fall flat, load screens and censoring make things even worse, and as a result, what could have been a stellar comeback for Conker has, at least creatively, become a massive failure. If you do not have either version of the game, look up the cut scenes online and compare them. You might agree that the N64 cut scenes have been put together much better than those found in the remake. Let us hope that if another Conker game is made, Rare will make sure that it is filled with more comedy gold and less humor that falls flat.