Jet Set Radio

Jet Set Radio was developed by Smilebit and published by Sega on the Dreamcast on November 24th 2000. This was the game which led the charge of cel-shaded graphics onto gaming consoles, and when first shown at the Tokyo Game Show in 1999, it generated a hive of excited attention from the press due to the beauty of cel-shading and loud pop music.
It is a mix of action and platformer, where you play (initially) as Beat, a rollerskating, graffiti artist who is intent on tagging local areas with his gangs tags. The player is also able to play as two other gang members (Gum & Tab) after the training stage.
The action takes place in 3 districts - Shibuya-Cho (shopping district), Benten-Cho (a night area) and Kogane-Cho (the residential area). But its not all smooth skating and performing sweet tricks because forever gunning for you (quite literally!) is the increasingly psychotic Captain Onishima and his enthusiastic SWAT team. Not to mention the rival gangs which are busy tagging their own areas. (The Love Shockers - an all female gang. The music loving Noise Tanks and the bezerk Poison Jam).
I discovered this beautiful title during my Dreamcast revival last year because I had stupidly ignored it when I owned my original Dreamcast in 1999. Now I realise how foolish I was as Jet Set Radio is an utterly fabulous game in every sense. It looks stunning, even today, thanks to the cel-shading and controls are intuitive and never fiddly.
My one and only complaint stems from what other fans think is one of its strengths, the music. It is pure pop in every tune, and this heavy metal lover cannot help to wonder how even more AMAZING this game would have been if only it had shunned the pop and replaced it with the likes of Slayer, AC/DC and Iron Maiden.
Still you can't have everything and im certainly not going to rubbish a truly great title because of its soundtrack. Amazing stuff which you NEED to play. Right now.