Fur Fighters differentiates itself from the rest of the platformer titles already on the market with its cast of zany characters. On the surface, it all seems like a cutesy game we'd see from the likes of Nintendo, but underneath, it is a bit more sinister. From the depths of the city comes the diabolical General Viggo, who storms his way into the quiet village where the Fur Fighters call their home. Within minutes, General Viggo unleashes a weapon that renders the adults in the village unable to move. General Viggo then kidnaps all the babies in the village and whisks them into the distance. It's now up to the six adults (Fur Fighters) to set out on an epic journey to rescue their babies, and defeat General Viggo in the process.

At the start of the game you pick from six different characters: Rico, Tweak, Juliette, Chang, Bungalow or Roofus. Playing as one, single character won't last for long, however; much of the gameplay behind Fur Fighters requires changing between all of the characters. Each of them has a unique characteristic/ability, and the levels have been designed so that you are forced to switch between them in order to accomplish goals. Not only this, but babies that you find will only respond to the corresponding adult. This works for the game as both an advantage and disadvantage. In one corner, it significantly decreases the repetitiveness that can come along with platforms; every couple of minutes a new character is controllable. A nice touch is that they don't share a single health bar, and this can become quite a lifesaver in a particularly sticky situation.

But in the other corner, it ends up creating a whole lot of bad. The way the levels are set up, an incredible amount of back tracking has to be done in order to collect all the babies in a given level. It's possible to exit a level without collecting all the babies, but chances are - sooner or later - heading back to collect them is inevitable. It then ends up turning into a painful chore to find a baby that you can't rescue because you don't have the correct Fur Fighter, take five minutes to walk to the portal to transfer into the needed Fur Fighter and then go and collect him. Take into consideration that each level can contain over eleven babies, and while all the walking and collecting can be fun sometimes, it is when poor design choices were made with the portal locations that frustration sets in.

If it weren't for the constant traveling, Fur Fighters would be a much better game as a whole; that is basically the only real crucial gameplay flaw. Otherwise, Bizarre Creations has done a fantastic job at just about everything else. All the characters are interesting (even if their voiceovers - a bunch of repeated babble - are annoying) to meet and interact with, and exploiting each of their individual specialties is an engaging experience. It was also noticeable that there was absolutely no slowdown whatsoever, even when there were four or five enemies on-screen at once, blasting away at the stuffing and lining keeping my fragile character in one piece. And this is all while there is an immense landscape surrounding us, full of vibrant life and detail.

Bizarre Creations has also packed in a four-player multiplayer mode that keeps a constant frame rate, and is a total blast to play. There are even a load of secret cheats to be unlocked as you rescue more babies and complete a series of mini-games that are only available after progressing and taking out certain boss enemies.

There are a couple of problems here and there, but overall, Fur Fighters is a solid first effort on the Dreamcast from Bizarre Creations. It's nagging qualm falls in an area of utter frustration, but when compared to the great visuals, crazy multi-player action, wide range of characters and all the other positives, there is no doubt that Fur Fighters is an entertaining title. It isn't the best title in the genre, but it sure ain't the worst, either.