Here we go again! This time I've got two different types of reviews. My usual review style where I go over a game once I've seen the credits will be here as expected, but I also will be including a bunch of what I'm calling Quick Impressions. This review type is for arcade games I played in compilations or at Funspot. I only tried many of these games briefly, and they usually don't have an ending, but I'll still share my thoughts on what I saw, and I'll also have a "Insert Token?" rating, where I decide whether or not I would give up a shiny Funspot token to drop in the machine to play it again - either "No", "Maybe", "Sure", or "Absolutely".
Quick Impressions
After Burner
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Absolutely
Without the cabinet, After Burner is just your average behind-the-back 3D-in-2D style shooter. I had a lot of trouble navigating around incoming fire and my lives were often measured in seconds. But with the addition of the giant moving cabinet, After Burner goes from lame to unforgettable. This was my first time sitting inside an arcade game with a moving cockpit, and it was incredible! I'd gladly dump a piggy bank's worth of tokens into this game so I could see it through to the end, but tragically I only got to play it once - when I returned to the machine later the same visit as well as during our second Funspot trip a few months later, After Burner's coin mechanism was jammed and wouldn't accept tokens, leaving it unplayable. I sure hope that's fixed when I return for trip #3 this year.
Akka Arrh
Played Via: Nintendo Switch (Atari 50)
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Sure
Akka Arrh, an arcade game that made it to the testing stage but was deemed "too complicated" for a full release and shelved (only two prototype cabinets exist), is included in Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration! It's kind of a shame this game wasn't properly released in its' day, it's a pretty nice little game and I don't think it's that terribly complicated. The idea here is that you control an immobile turret (named Akka Arrh) in the center of a base. Enemies invade the base, and Akka's job is to shoot them down as fast as possible. The main gimmick that sets Akka Arrh apart from other shooters of the golden age is the ability to flip between two views of the action - a far-away one that shows your entire base and an up-close one depicting the room in the center your turret is in. When attacking in the zoomed-out view, your attacks target entire rooms of the fortress, allowing you to take out multiple foes at once, but when zoomed in the turret fires more typical pew-pew shots that can only eliminate one foe at a time. When enemies are just coming into the base, you want to use the zoomed-out view and fire long-range attacks to quickly destroy them. However, these attacks can't harm enemies who manage to slip by your assault and get into the turret room, so when you see the alert that your turret is at risk you must quickly switch to the zoomed-in view and attack the enemies directly before they destroy your turret. Once the room is empty of threats you can go back to fighting from long range. It's an interesting concept that keeps you on your toes, and the turret fighting differently depending on which view you're using helps Akka Arrh remain fresh for longer.
A side note: Akka Arrh has also received a fully-fledged remake in the style of the recent "Atari Recharged" series, though it isn't called Akka Arrh Recharged, just Akka Arrh. It's nice to see this unique game finally given its' due so many years after its' creation.
Oh yes, and if you were wondering, the title is a modified acronym. It stands for "Also Known As Another Ralston Hally", after the two designers Dave Ralston and Mike Hally, who had worked on numerous previous arcade games before teaming up once again for Akka Arrh. It also used the title "Target Outpost" at one point, a fitting but boring name.
Battlezone
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Tank Game
Insert Token?: Maybe
Here's another game that's enhanced by playing it on a real machine instead of emulation. Battlezone features a visor you press your face up to in order to play, and it does a good job even today of being immersive and sucking you into the action. Unfortunately the action feels a little out of your control, as you do your best to shoot down enemy tanks and avoid return fire, but movement is clunky and inevitably you'll get hit and lose a life. A game of Battlezone is likely to end quickly, but it's a cool little experience while it lasts.
Black Widow
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Twin Stick Shooter
Insert Token?: Sure
One of the first twin-stick shooters! I've always thought vector games looked really cool, and they're very slick-looking for the time period they were made in, with vector graphics looking much smoother and cleaner than the super-blocky sprites of the late 70s and early 80s. In Black Widow you play as a spider defending her web, defeating various invertebrate enemies, and... collecting bags of money dropped by your foes. This last detail adds a bit of hilarity to an otherwise straightforward title. Black Widow is solid fun and the twin-stick setup helps it a lot, keeping the action high-octane. Black Widow was never given a contemporary home port, so for a while it was kind of hard to experience, but thankfully it's been turning up in Atari compilations like Atari 50, so people can finally own a copy of it. Definitely worth a play.
Chicken Shift
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Puzzle
Insert Token?: No
Chicken Shift is a puzzle game all about timing. Honestly the best layman's comparison might be the Mario Vs Donkey Kong games where you guide Mini-Marios to the exit? It's a weird one for sure. Basically, you're given two buttons, a red one and a blue one. The cabinet helpfully explains the the red button shifts red things and the blue button shifts blue things. In practice this means stuff like changing the direction of a pipe or turning a platform on and off. This is done to help guide eggs (and in later stages, baby chicks) around the level to get them safely to a goal. In practice I found this game to be very difficult to grasp, and things quickly escalate to the point that it feels overwhelming just trying to wrap your head around which eggs to tend to and in which order. Chicken Shift seems to recognize this, as generous allowances are made for mistakes, but it was all a bit much for my brain.
Chiller
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shooting Gallery
Insert Token?: No
Chiller is a shooting gallery game where you man a prop gun and fire at targets onscreen. You need to score a certain number of hits under a strict time limit. The first stage isn't too bad, but you need to be an expert at aiming and shooting to advance further than stage two. The hook with Chiller is that it's horror-themed, and the levels are different locations in and around a haunted house. Chiller's claim to infamy is the torture chamber level, where you get to take potshots at people trapped in medieval-style torture devices. Playing this grody, somewhat uncomfortable game was certainly an experience, but not one I'm eager to take again.
Computer Space
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: No
Who could pass up an opportunity to play the first mass-market video game ever? At over fifty years old, Computer Space is practically an antique, but Funspot has a lovely red cabinet in excellent condition available for play. It's absolutely worth trying for yourself... but only once. The gameplay is rudimentary even by classic arcade game standards and Funspot's certainly not hurting for shmups so you're surrounded by better options. The real killer, though, are the terrible controls. It's understandable, since Computer Space was a trailblazer and game developers hadn't yet figured out how best to control a game, but the awkward control setup makes playing Computer Space difficult for anyone used to a joystick or control pad.
Cosmic Alien
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Maybe
Cosmic Alien feels like something out of a nightmare. I think the best comparison I can make is it's a video game that would appear in an episode of an 80s horror anthology, like a game they made up to use as a horror monster a la Polybius. On the surface, Cosmic Alien is simply a blatant rip-off of Galaxian - the aliens fight similarly, in a similar formation, and break off from the group one or two at a time to divebomb your ship. However, the creepy cabinet art and uncomfortable sound effects lend the whole thing a darkly uncanny vibe, and when there's only one alien remaining, if you do not kill them immediately they will transform into a large demon (accompanied by a shrill scare chord) and attack you with sudden, jerky speed. It all adds up to a game that made me feel things I wasn't expecting to feel when I put in that token. Fans of Galaxian may appreciate this bizarrely unsettling take on the concept.
Cosmic Avenger
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: No
In Cosmic Avenger you control a spaceship and try to carpet-bomb a planet while they attack with their own forces. They must have done some pretty heinous stuff if you need to avenge this hard! I found this one very clunky and stiff, with terrible controls. Pretty generic and not much fun.
Death Race
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Driving
Insert Token?: Maybe
One of the very first video games to cause a "moral panic" of people fretting about The Children, Death Race is hilariously tame by modern standards but if you can put yourself in the mindset of someone from the 70s it might make a little sense why it made The Silent Generation upset. The goal of Death Race is to drive your vehicle around an arena and run over pedestrians. They're referred to as 'gremlins', implying they're monsters and you're doing the world a favor by wiping them out, but there's no mistaking the cross-shaped grave that appears in their place every time you hit one. The graves are solid obstacles, so the more you score, the harder it becomes to drive around in a play area that was originally totally blank save for the four outer walls. You don't have lives - instead, play continues for a limited time and when time runs out your game is over. Like Computer Space, Death Race is a historical curiosity and worth experiencing once, but it's not likely to keep you coming back.
Exerion
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Maybe
Exerion is a pretty typical early 80s space shooter. I played a lot of these at Funspot because of how simple the concept is to grasp and how even a generic shmup can still be fun for the couple minutes you get with it before your lives run out. Exerion does offer a couple attempts to stand out from the crowd at least. One is purely aesthetic - there's a scrolling background at the bottom of the screen that tries to add more depth to the experience, making Exerion look fancier than the likes of Galaga. The other, more important unique feature is limited ammo. Your ship in Exerion has a powerful rapid-fire gun, but you can only use it when it has energy, which depletes by one with every shot. Every enemy you kill earns you one unit of energy, so as long as you never miss a shot, you'll never run out of energy. However, you will likely miss a lot of your shots, and inevitably end up with no energy and thus no way to fire the cannon. To get energy in this situation, you have to kill enemies with your backup weapon, a slower but wider attack that isn't fast enough to properly deal with the hordes. Exerion therefore revolves around quick and accurate firing, swapping to the slower weapon when you need to build up energy but forcing the player to attack aggressively with the main gun to avoid being overwhelmed. Not a bad concept, honestly. I'd humor giving it another go.
Flower
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: No
One of the rarest arcade games in existence, only two Flower cabinets are currently known to exist, and with one of them in the hands of a private collector, the remaining Flower at Funspot is the only one available to the public in the entire world. Fortunately, Flower is also archived on Archive.org's Internet Arcade, so it's actually pretty easy to legally play Flower if you want. Thing is, there's no reason to play Flower beyond simply saying you played a really rare game, because it's a bog-standard space shooter where your ship shoots down waves of incoming flower-like opponents, and if you're hit once, you die and are sent back to the beginning - no checkpoints or instant respawn. A pretty lame game with a cool real-life backstory.
Galaga 88
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Sure
If you know what Galaga is, then the title of Galaga 88 explains itself pretty well - this is simply Galaga again, made on stronger hardware and therefore able to support numerous new bells and whistles. The gameplay hasn't changed much, at least not at first, but the deeper you play, the more new wrinkles appear. Things climax with a boss fight and a definitive ending if you can manage to play for long enough. Overall it's a solid evolution of the Galaga formula that puts it more in line with the shmups of the late 80s, which tended more towards finishable games with powerups and boss fights instead of endless ones where your arsenal is simple and there are no final foes anywhere.
Gyruss
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Sure
On the attract screen, Gyruss doesn't just command "Insert Coin" like so many games do. Instead, it politely offers itself to you with the message "Please deposit coin and try this game". Well, I couldn't say no to such an earnest appeal. I'm sure they worked very hard on this game and would appreciate it if I gave it a shot.
Gyruss plays as a fairly typical space shooter, but the perspective helps freshen things up. It's similar to Tempest in that you work with a behind-the-ship perspective and rotate it in a circle around the screen to fire up at enemies in the distance. The enemies come diving towards you a few at a time and then fly away to create a formation, similar to Galaga. I found Gyruss surprisingly mesmerizing and was able to get several minutes of play out of my token, which is better than I usually do. Would navigate the solar system again.
Hercules
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Pinball
Insert Token?: Maybe
I played just about every pinball game Funspot had to offer, and I enjoy pinball quite a bit, but I don't have much to say in terms of actually reviewing them. Most of them are older games where the theme of the table is surface-level and could easily be swapped out for a different theme with no changes to anything, even the sound effects. The exceptions are among the better tables at Funspot - games like Grand Lizard, Funhouse, and The Addams Family embrace their themes better than other, older games and benefit for it by being more memorable experiences.
Anyway, Hercules is one old table that does its' theme justice with a gimmick that ensures it'll never be mistaken for another table - Hercules is enormous. The world's largest commercial pinball game and one of the biggest coin-op machines you'll ever see, this gigantic behemoth of a machine uses scaled-up versions of pinball parts, like a cue ball instead of a traditional silver pinball and giant flippers to match. Hercules is a difficult game to keep healthy because of the custom parts, and the gameplay is slow due to the scale-up, but like several of the other games on this list it's definitely worth seeing at least once just for the sheer novelty factor. Many people, especially pinball fans, tire of the dancing bear quickly and move on to a normal table, but something about Hercules keeps me coming back to it, and I've played it at least once on each of my Funspot trips.
Jr. Pac-Man
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Maze
Insert Token?: Maybe
It's odd considering the title character, but Jr. Pac-Man is Pac-Man, but bigger. Pac-Man's kid finds himself in a far larger maze than what his parents dealt with, requiring scrolling the screen to the left and right to see everything. A couple more power pellets are added to the maze to help mitigate this, but Jr. Pac-Man is still a challenging title and is clearly meant to be played by people who have already played Pac-Man and/or Ms. Pac-Man and are hungering for something more.
I enjoy that their method of showing that this Pac-Man is a child is that they gave him a propellor beanie. It even spins as he moves!
Krull
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Action
Insert Token?: Maybe
An early licensed game, Krull is surprisingly ambitious for its' time with multiple screens that each play differently, but the perspective (a top-down action game) is the same throughout. The first stage sees you assembling a weapon to fight with, picking up the pieces while dodging rolling rocks. Once your weapon is complete, you can fight, so the second stage pits you against a gang of Slayers. You're supposed to "rescue your army", but there's no chance of that happening - there are tons of Slayers, and your allies just dumbly walk around until they are inevitably all killed, so no matter how well you play you aren't likely to actually save them here. If you can kill all the Slayers, the third stage has you recovering soldiers and getting them to safety by touching a moving hexagon. More Slayers attack during this mission to complicate things. In the fourth mission, you fight the hexagon, now enormous, in a sort of boss battle. The walls of the hexagon change colors while Slayers spawn in to distract you - shoot your way through the Hexagon by attacking it when the walls turn black. Stage five is the final showdown as you dodge around "The Beast" and his fireballs to reach the princess at the stop of the screen. Touching the princess sends out your army, who drive off The Beast. A victory tune plays and you are sent back to the rolling rocks level with the difficulty increased for another loop. It's a surprisingly good little game and I like the varied goals throughout, making it have more to it than the usual arcade game of this era.
Lady Bug
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Maze
Insert Token?: Sure
Lady Bug is a maze game with a difference. One of the stronger Pac-Man-inspired games to come out of the golden age, Lady Bug features several gimmicks to spice things up, such as deadly skull pickups that will kill you on contact but can be used against enemies by luring your pursuers into them. Another addition are gates that you can push against to change the shape of the maze, great for forcing an enemy to turn around. There's also a border around the screen that fills up over time to warn you when a new enemy is going to enter the maze, which is a really unexpected player-friendly feature that lets you safely collect items near the box where they spawn without worrying about getting ambushed with no chance to react. Lady Bug is an excellent take on the maze genre and is absolutely worth a try for anyone who likes Pac-Man but wants something different.
Lunar Lander
Played Via: Nintendo Switch (Atari 50)
Genre: Space Sim
Insert Token?: No
In Lunar Lander you try fruitlessly to safely land your craft on the moon only to watch it explode no matter how slow and gentle you are. With every death you are talked down to with insulting failure messages as punishment for screwing it up. Even the one time I managed to land well enough to not crash, it was a "rough landing" and the game mocked my effort by saying the crew was stranded because I damaged the landing gear. Well fuck you too, Lunar Lander. This game can go screw itself.
Lunar Rescue
Played Via: Nintendo Switch (Space Invaders Invincible Collection)
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Absolutely
What a surprise this one was! Lunar Rescue was much more fun than I expected, especially considering it starts out playing similarly to Lunar Lander which I hated. Your first objective is to land your rescue craft, navigating an asteroid field to drop onto a landing platform. You want to time the start of your drop carefully so you can easily weave through the space debris on your way down. Unlike Lunar Lander's realistic approach to landing, though, you just need to come down on the platform. You won't crash from dropping too fast or anything (though you can use your rockets to slow your fall if you need to). Once you land, one of the stranded people on the planet's surface will run over and board your craft. You then must return to the mothership with them in tow, slowly ascending back up through the asteroid field. On the way up, however, you can attack with a top-mounted cannon to blast stuff out of your way (and you can also perform a speed boost to help get away from incoming obstacles). This gameplay cycle repeats until you've saved everyone in the area before moving to the next stage. I found Lunar Rescue to be surprisingly easy and accessible, and played for a good long time on my first attempt (probably at least ten minutes, which is an eternity for a game like this). This is a great game to play if you want something a bit more forgiving than the usual brutality of golden age score chasers.
Also, similar to Gyruss, Lunar Rescue is very polite. The attract screen presents you with some Space Invaders making a surprise cameo, with one of them actually speaking in a speech bubble to you: "Please insert coin." This is followed by the whole row of invaders tilting their heads pleadingly. Adorable.
Majestic Twelve
Played Via: Nintendo Switch (Space Invaders Invincible Collection)
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Maybe
Majestic Twelve is Space Invaders' answer to Galaga 88. It's the same concept - take an old endless game and update it into a more modern game with bosses, powerups, and an ending. The title of Majestic Twelve comes from the fact that it has twelve stages, though you won't see all twelve in one playthrough. As you blast away the invaders, you'll come across a couple of boss fights as well as bonus stages where you defend cows from getting abducted by UFOs. Like Galaga 88, on the surface it's a simple and fun shmup that doesn't really make any major mistakes, and playing it via Space Invaders Invincible Collection lets you continue as much as you like to dampen any irritation you may encounter with enemies getting in cheap shots that were originally designed to make Majestic Twelve hard enough to demand multiple quarters from all but the best players.
There also exists another version of this game called Super Space Invaders 91. It's identical to Majestic Twelve, except instead of choosing which stage to play, you simply play all twelve of them in a set order. Space Invaders Invincible Collection includes both versions, which is a nice touch, though it does make the collection seem a little smaller knowing one of the meatier offerings in it is just a duplicate.
Moon Shuttle
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Maybe
Moon Shuttle is yet another space shooter, though it's a bit different than most. You start off faced with a big asteroid field while your rocket slowly and uncontrollably eases itself towards the space rocks. You can move up and down and can speed up a little to fly forward faster, but you can't go backward, so you must blast furiously with your cannon to destroy rocks and clear a path. Once that's done, you engage in a dogfight with several enemy craft, who take their sweet time circling around before lining up a shot. Once they're all done, it's on to another asteroid field, and the loop continues until you're out of ships.
Moon Shuttle isn't anything special but it's worth a few minutes of mindless blasting.
Pac-Man Plus
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Maze
Insert Token?: Maybe
A bizarre novelty, Pac-Man Plus is Pac-Man with some minor additions and tweaks. For instance, the ghosts change shape when under the effects of a power pellet, growing squat with green flags sticking out of their heads for some reason. Bonus items can do weird things like make the ghosts vanish or even make the maze itself vanish, leaving Pac-Man to briefly collect dots and avoid ghosts in a black void filled with invisible walls. Gameplay-wise it pretty much plays the same, so it's good if you like Pac-Man but want a different twist on it.
Pong
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Ball-and-Paddle
Insert Token?: Sure
Not every super-old game is reduced to nothing more than a historical curiosity. Pong's simplicity actually works to its' advantage, and when I played a pair of two-player matches with my brother at Funspot on their Pong machine, I was surprised by how much fun we had going at it. The basic appeal of trying to hit that little white square made for a fun few minutes, and if he challenges me to Pong again next time we go, I won't refuse. (He won both times, by the way, though on our second game I managed to keep it very close.)
Quantum
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Action
Insert Token?: Sure
A unique game with vector graphics and a trackball wherein you draw lines to box in objects and enemies for points. This is a good game to play to learn how to handle a trackball with finesse.
Renegade
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Beat-em-up
Insert Token?: No
Poor me inserted an extra credit into this machine expecting a proper beat-em-up a la Final Fight or Streets of Rage, but instead I got a single room where enemies approached from both sides and my glacially-slow character could barely even attack before getting ganged up on and slaughtered. This limp effort lacks any of the fun, atmosphere, or energy you'll find in later brawlers.
Space Cyclone
Played Via: Nintendo Switch (Space Invaders Invincible Collection)
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: No
In Space Cyclone, your goal is to defeat an invading alien force by shooting them down as they hop from one space rock to the next in a steady descent towards the ground. Shooting them is extremely difficult because of their wild, flailing jumps and the small size of your projectile. Every time one of them reaches the bottom, they will run offscreen and a piece of a rocket will appear on the left. The more invaders get away from you, the more complete the rocket gets. Once it's finished, if one more alien slips past your attacks, they will get in the rocket and attack with insane speed and precision, practically guaranteeing your death. Space Cyclone is an extremely difficult game and I didn't have much fun with it. If you can manage to defeat a wave, though, you'll be given a very silly reward - a squidlike alien will waddle onto the screen and show you a real-life constellation traced out of the stars seen in the background.
Space Invaders Frenzy
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Maybe
Space Invaders Frenzy is placed front and center to anyone who takes the upper entrance to Funspot. With its' massive screen and cockpit with two big guns attached, SIF commands attention. It's a light gun game with a Space Invaders twist, the idea being to eliminate waves of aliens before they can reach the bottom of the screen, which will immediately end your run. There's a lot more going on here than in the original Space Invaders, with the sounds, music, power-ups, and flashing lights more akin to the Space Invaders Extreme games. This is also a ticket game - the better your performance, the more tickets you can earn to exchange for cheap junk at the prize counter in Funspot's basement.
This is a fun game, but the high difficulty, unforgiving single-life gameplay, and high price of admission (IIRC, it demands FOUR tokens while classic arcade games only ask for one and almost all pinballs request two) means it won't likely get regular repeat plays from me the way some other games at Funspot will get. Like some other arcade games, though, part of the fun is the novel presentation that can't be replicated at home - this game would lose a lot without the guns, giant screen, or tickets.
Space Invaders Gigamax 4 SE
Played Via: Nintendo Switch (Space Invaders Invincible Collection)
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Maybe
Here's a home port that we're fortunate to have. Space Invaders Gigamax is a gimmick game meant to be played on massive projector screens, and as such it's never been easy to play. Including it on the Space Invaders Invincible Collection does remove some of the awe from playing a game on such a huge playing surface, but it's a cute little title that was worth preserving.
In SIG4SE, you begin by playing a normal game of Space Invaders - except there are hundreds of the aliens in formation, stretching out along the entire screen. You only get a limited time to blast the massive army before a mothership arrives to suck them up and retreat, and as the game continues into other stages you'll deal with fast-moving size-changing invaders and several massive bosses, some of which are guarded by infinitely-respawning invaders serving as meat walls. This game is designed to be played multiplayer, with up to four people able to join in, but you can do a single-player run just fine. However, the bosses are timed as well, and instead of ending when time runs out, you die and have to use a continue, so the only hope of chewing through their gargantuan HP without timing out is to play multiplayer.
S.T.U.N. Runner
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Racing
Insert Token?: Maybe
This 1989 arcade game features crude 3D graphics as a major selling point, along with the sit-down cabinet to encourage immersion. In S.T.U.N. Runner, your goal is to reach the finish line as fast as possible under a strict time limit. Once you finish the first course, you get a cool little scene of additional parts being grafted onto your car, including a gun so you can shoot vehicles in your way. Games like these are always punishingly tough and require memorization, so avoid it if that's not your cup of tea.
The End
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Maybe
This space shooter has a cute concept. The invading space bugs are only mildly interested in killing you - their true goal is to steal pieces of the barricades you can hide behind and start building with them at the top of the screen. They're building the word "END" - if they complete the word, you get an instant Game Over. Your goal is to shoot the bugs and keep them from taking pieces to build "END" as long as possible. It's interesting to see what weird gimmicks and twists companies would come up with in the early days of gaming when technology was still so limited.
Tunnel Hunt
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Rail Shooter
Insert Token?: Maybe
This 1979 title does its' darndest to make you feel like you're flying through a tunnel in first-person. Your goal is to shoot down anything in your way, but care must be taken to not scraping against the tunnel walls or letting your gun overheat. Tunnel Hunt is nothing special today but the effects are cool for a 70s game.
Video Pinball
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Pinball
Insert Token?: No
The precursor to the perhaps-more-well-known Video Pinball on the Atari 2600, this arcade game was one of the first to mimic pinball. While games of this type were handy for introducing the concept of video games to a curious audience who had never heard of such wizardry, a pinball game built with 1970s video game tech isn't going to be all that thrilling. The physics are decent, but it's not much to look at (aside from the nice playfield, which is merged with the actual video game display via some trickery with mirrors) and gameplay is simple and basic. It's not awful, but these days you're better off playing a real pinball machine or a digital recreation of one - advances in technology have rendered this game's purpose mostly pointless.
Zero Hour
Played Via: Funspot
Genre: Shmup
Insert Token?: Maybe
If Zero Hour's title implies a sense of urgency, good. This particular take on the classic golden age shmup emphasizes speed over all else.
Your ship isn't particularly fast, but it can shoot a healthy spray of bullets. The enemies can do likewise, single grunts capable of absolutely spraying out bullets in thick wads, making passing under them risky business. But you'll want to take risks and play aggressively, because the whole time you're playing, a hefty point bonus worth far more than the enemies is counting down rapidly. Starting at 3000 points and dropping with speed, it's impossible to get the full bonus, but if you can take care of things quickly enough you can earn over 2000 points. It takes more than just killing all the enemies to get that bonus, though - every level begins with a scene of your ship launching from a little red tower, and once the mission is complete you need to bring the ship back in for a landing on that same tower, the bonus continuing to drain all the while. Once you land the rocket, you finally get your bonus.
Zero Hour's extremely heavy emphasis on the bonus above all else gives it something to help differentiate itself from the usual space shooter crowd, and the fast action keeps it from getting dull too quickly. Not bad.
Full Reviews
Mechstermination Force
System: Nintendo Switch
Genre: Run-and-gun
Full disclosure - I did not beat Mechstermination Force. Aside from the Quick Impressions you just finished reading, I make a point of not reviewing games I don't finish, but I'm making an exception for this one because it's the perfect opportunity to talk about my own struggles with trying to enjoy video games, and my greatest gaming fear that has led me to play games the way I do.
What is the number one thing that keeps me from finishing a game I've started? To follow, what is the number one thing keeping me from starting games I own but haven't played? These are tricky questions with several possible answers, but one of the top factors is, without a doubt, Fear Of High Difficulty. I really do not like it when a game stonewalls me with too-high difficulty and erodes my will to play to the point I quit and refuse to try again. My fear of high difficulty can go deeper, though. If I struggle with a level or boss but ultimately overcome it, I may still put the game down and not pick it up again for a long time, or ever, because I've had the terrible thought: If I could barely finish THAT, how will I possibly be able to handle the struggles to come? And so my fear of losing, and my belief that if I can't beat a game, all the time I put into it prior to quitting was a "waste of time", combine to become the main reason I can go long periods without playing many games, or only playing very safe games that I know won't be too hard for me to beat (like Pokemon). Occasionally, though, I can defy this, get on a roll, and start playing and beating multiple games in fairly rapid succession. In a two-week period from late March to early April I managed to take on and beat six games, almost unheard of for me, and you'll be seeing reviews of all six of them later in this post. After no further progress for a while, I was looking for something to play and saw Mechstermination Force on the Switch eShop, on sale for just two bucks. I figured "what the heck" and bought it.
You might be able to see where I'm going with this.
I was interested in Mechstermination Force for a long time. The concept is very cool: it's a series of Contra-style boss fights against a selection of huge robot bosses. No actual levels, just bosses. Sort of like Cuphead, actually. I read a review of MF that praised the "tight controls" and promised a "forgiving", less intense experience than the likes of Cuphead. Unfortunately, this was not my experience at all. The controls were not "tight". The controls were torturous. Doing anything more complicated than running forward and shooting felt like a struggle, and the simple act of jumping on platforms to navigate the hub area was a chore. Bosses are good at positioning themselves in just the right way so that your bullets won't hit them, and anything requiring agility from your character (there are four to choose from but they all play identically) feels like a big ask.
The first boss was a simple tutorial enemy and things went fine. My second opponent, a masked robot attacking a bridge, was several orders of magnitude more difficult and took many tries to defeat, which is when I asked myself that concerning question I mentioned above - if I can barely defeat the second boss, how am I supposed to defeat the endgame guys? But hey, I knew I could just grind for money on the easy intro boss in the training mode and use that cash to buy more health and new weapons at the shop. I had options. So I pushed on, and the third boss (a giant centipede) wasn't as hard as the bridge one.
Then I unlocked gloves that allowed the character to cling to certain walls. Naturally, the fourth boss, a gigantic snail, demanded skilled use of them for victory. But I still wasn't agreeing with the controls and found it a struggle to make my character do what I wanted, and as I failed against the snail again and again, a bad feeling started to set in. Eventually I was one hit away from victory (for the second time, after at least a half-dozen tries). All I had to do was get my character to the glowing core in the shell's center and whack it with my melee weapon and I would win. But I just could not navigate the character to the core, feeling helpless as my character flailed and got unintentionally further and further from the core until eventually the rolling shell squashed them and killed them. And that was it. I resigned myself to failure, acknowledged I'd made a terrible mistake, and closed Mechstermination Force, swearing to never again play it.
Did I give up too easily? How much of my failure was my fault? Are the controls actually fine and it's just that I suck? I'll readily admit to not being a pro. My two dollars had reminded me of the harsh truth that sometimes I'm just not good enough for my video games, and that's why I so often try new games with such hesitancy and worry. Because there's always that chance that I'm not up to the challenge, and it's a miserable feeling when something meant to bring joy instead just tells me I'm a loser.
Kirby and the Forgotten Land
System: Nintendo Switch
Genre: 3D Platformer
It's crazy to think it's taken this long for Kirby to get a 3D main entry. Previous games have dabbled with 3D movement, such as Kirby Air Ride and Kirby's Blowout Blast, but those were spinoffs. Forgotten Land is the first proper Kirby platformer to let the tough puff go adventuring in three dimensions. A lot of series are infamous for struggling with the jump to 3D (such as Sonic the Hedgehog), and others change drastically upon doing so even if they're still good (Mario is the classic example here, Super Mario 64 is a great game but plays very differently from his older 2D outings). But Kirby absolutely nails the extra dimension. Forgotten Land feels like a Kirby game, just in 3D. All the classic series hallmarks are here - there's a selection of copy abilities to use to fight enemies and solve puzzles, there are hidden collectibles in every stage, progression is straightforward but being a completionist poses a stiff challenge, there's minigames to play when you want some downtime from the main quest, and so on. It's everything you would expect from a good Kirby game and nothing you wouldn't, but at the same time it's a refreshing shakeup to the series after Return to Dreamland, Triple Deluxe, Robobot, and Star Allies all followed similar formulas and styles (though, granted, they all had their own gimmicks).
I want to give a shout-out to the theming and story of this game. The 'forgotten land' in the title is where Kirby is taken after being sucked into a dimensional rift: an abandoned planet overrun by animals, with strong post-apocalypse vibes. Kirby is well known for having much deeper and more mature lore than the appearance of the series suggests, but Forgotten Land does things you might not expect even if you're used to Kirby's usual glimpses of darkness. The beautiful yet melancholy look of the world as it's reclaimed by nature is fascinating and makes for splendid eye candy.
Oh, and we can't forget the coolest new addition to Kirby's repertoire: Mouthful Mode. Acting as basically a second set of copy abilities, Mouthful Mode is a new power for Kirby that lets him inhale certain oversized objects and hold them in his mouth, usually limiting him in some way but also giving him useful niche talents he can use to progress through the stage and find collectibles. It's a great way to keep gameplay diverse, since the number of copy abilities vastly shrank in this game from the usual selection. Only a core set of classic Kirby abilities are available, though they can be upgraded this time around with a special currency earned from doing bonus challenges to make them a little different.
Kirby's Adventure
System: NES (Nintendo Switch Online)
Genre: 2D Platformer
While I've played the heck out of Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland, I'd never before tried the original game NID was based on. Now that I have, I can report I am thoroughly whelmed. Kirby was still finding his footing at this early stage of his career, and Adventure lacks the spit and polish of later Kirby titles like Super Star Ultra or Triple Deluxe. While a lot more fair and reasonable than most NES platformers, there are some cheap hits and gotcha moments in this game, and Kirby controls much more stiffly here than in later games and lacks a lot of his usual options (there's no guarding and most copy abilities can only perform one attack, for instance). It's not bad, and as a very late NES release it shows off amazing technological achievement compared to the crude and basic games the NES had launched with almost a decade prior, but you can do far better than this for a Kirby game nowadays and it's recommended only if you've played all the newer stuff and are jonesing for more Kirb.
Kirby's Return to Dreamland Deluxe
System: Nintendo Switch
Genre: 2D Platformer
First appearing over ten years ago on the Wii, the third Kirby title I'm looking at this year has been given a fresh coat of paint and sent out again to appeal to a new generation. As someone who'd never played the original release, I was happy to get a "new" Kirby game so soon after Forgotten Land! This was the game that debuted a new generation of Kirby gameplay, with the next three games in the series all having fairly similar feels and motifs. Return to Dreamland Deluxe sees Kirby and his pals King Dedede, Meta Knight, and Bandana Dee lending a hand to Magolor, a traveler from far away whose ship crash-landed in Dreamland. Kirby is tasked with finding the pieces of Magolor's ship to repair it, and if he can track them all down, a grateful Magolor will take Kirby to his homeworld for a sightseeing expedition. Unfortunately, that's only the start of the trouble...
In addition to the main quest, you can also play in Merry Magoland, a theme park built by Magolor to celebrate Kirby. There's a healthy selection of ten minigames to play here - less than, say, Mario Party, but a generous allotment by Kirby game standards considering the average Kirby game usually has about three. Eight of the minigames are pulled from older games in the series and range from popular picks like Samurai Kirby to surprise obscurities like Egg Catcher, plus the Ninja Dojo minigame from the original Return to Dreamland is here as well. The other two minigames are new for Deluxe - an arena shooter called Booming Blasters and a game called Magolor's Tome Trackers where Magolor requests a book from his library and the four players must scramble to be the first to grab it in a small 2D stage reminiscent of the original Mario Brothers. There's also sort of an eleventh minigame in the form of a Samurai Kirby variant called Samurai Kirby 100 where you compare your reaction time with the most recent previous 99 players to attempt the minigame in a once-daily challenge. These minigames are solid fun, particularly in multiplayer, and they're given some extra meat by way of a set of 100 missions you can take on that ask you to perform certain feats in each minigame, like winning Kirby On The Draw without ever running out of ammo or being responsible for taking down all of your opponents in Booming Blasters. You can also unlock oodles of masks here that let you dress up as a legion of characters from Kirby's history, with dozens of characters represented. You can even wear the masks in the main mode if you wish.
Going in blind, you'd never know this was a dolled-up Wii game. Everything looks great and matches up with the other Kirby games on Switch, and gameplay is smooth, clean, and free of waggle. There are some optional motion control options in Merry Magoland, but these can be safely ignored if you don't care for them and you can play with button presses instead. Return to Dreamland Deluxe is an easy recommendation for anyone who missed out on the original release. Kirby can usually be counted on to deliver a solid standard of quality, and RTDD is no exception.
New Pokemon Snap
System: Nintendo Switch
Genre: Rail Shooter, of sorts
It took way too long, and I'm shocked Nintendo didn't have any interest in making a gimmicky DS or Wii-controlled edition back in the day, but Pokemon Snap finally got its' sequel, albeit with one of the worst titles I've ever seen. Did we seriously not learn from the over-15-years-old "New" Super Mario Brothers that putting 'new' in your title is guaranteed to age poorly? "Pokemon Snap 2" was right there, guys.
Anyway, New Pokemon Snap does pretty much everything you would expect and nothing you wouldn't. It vastly expands the number of Pokemon to take photos of and stages to find them in, and brings back almost all the unlockable equipment from the first game (RIP, Pester Balls) while adding a few new tools of its' own. One of the nicest additions is the star system, where every possible pose a Pokemon can make is categorized into four different star ratings. The more stars the pose is worth, the rarer or more notable it is, and your photodex isn't complete unless you not only photograph every Pokemon, but catch them in enough different poses to cover all four categories.
Unfortunately the star system is also home to New Pokemon Snap's most glaring downfall. In the original Pokemon Snap, you could only submit one photo per species at level's end for evaluation. This is still the case in New Pokemon Snap, which means you can't fill multiple star ratings at once. You're forced to choose, and may end up having to leave a great and hard-to-replicate photo in the trash despite needing it for your album. This is blatant artificial length, forcing a completionist player to replay the same levels again and again. You already have to do plenty of replaying before taking this into account, as new levels often take certain score thresholds to unlock, and you may not have any new levels to visit, forcing a return trip.
There are also "boss fights" against Illumina Pokemon, who are rare and particularly difficult to photograph Pokemon that often require you to "hit" them with items multiple times before you can take a photo the professor will accept. These levels consist almost solely of trying to get a good shot of this one Pokemon, and require some deft hand-eye coordination (especially the second-to-last one - be quick with that camera!). All in all I found New Pokemon Snap quite fun, but the grind wore on me by the end and I decided I'd seen enough shortly after viewing the credits instead of trying to photograph every Pokemon in every pose.
Pokemon Violet
System: Nintendo Switch
Genre: RPG
Another new generation of Pokemon, another massive backlash. In 2019, Pokemon Sword and Shield released to widespread disdain from hardcore fans as despite the jump to a much more powerful system, Pokemon was the same as ever - or less, actually, since Swoosh featured almost no dungeons and only coded in about half of the full selection of Pokemon available (and that was only after DLC expanded the roster - it was originally more like a third). One of the more well-received aspects of the eighth generation, however, was the Wild Area. This was a giant open space you could wander about in search of Pokemon. There wasn't much to do, but this was clearly a test run for Pokemon embracing the long-awaited "open world" formula. They dived deeper into this concept with Pokemon Legends Arceus, which featured a series of open "levels" to explore. However, they were still unlocked in a linear manner. The world wasn't truly open. Pokemon Scarlet and Violet are the most significant step in this direction yet, with the entire region one enormous open map you can explore as you like - though, of course, certain things are still gated by obstacles or high-level Pokemon so you can't just run to the end and win instantly.
I wasn't sure how well an open world would translate to Pokemon, but I had enjoyed Legends Arceus so that game had made me eager to try something that further refined the concept. I think it was a success! It felt good traversing the map, especially with the refined Ride Pokemon system that gives you a single Pokemon that gradually unlocks new abilities like gliding and wall-climbing instead of the clunky system Legends Arceus used that required constant Ride Pokemon swapping.
So what's the problem? Alas, Scarlet and Violet had a rushed development and were not fully optimized for the Switch. Slowdown and graphical quirks can make Scarvi feel a couple generations out of date, not something that's running on current hardware. Some of the ground and wall textures can be downright ugly, looking like something out of the N64 era if you get too close (like when you catch a Pokemon and the camera zooms in tightly on the ball). There were also numerous reports (and viral gifs) of severe graphical deformities and animation errors, like bulging eyes and t-posing models. There are also plenty of shortcuts taken - there are still hardly any traditional dungeons, and the vast majority of buildings have no modeled interior - you either can't enter the building, or else your character goes inside and a menu pops up to use the building's services. And, of course, we still don't have a complete Pokedex. Many were enraged at the glitches and cut corners, and there was much complaining. Surely the world's biggest media franchise could do better than this for a mainline entry, right?
Honestly, none of it bothered me all that much. I never ran into the more severe issues (which some said may have been the result of emulation glitches from people who were playing pirated copies), and my game never crashed or anything that severe. The worst glitches I experienced were a couple minor cases of wild Pokemon getting stuck in walls or floors and the infamous Elite Four music glitch where the battle theme against these major bosses simply looped its' intro repeatedly instead of playing normally. The former barely matters and the latter was patched out not long after I experienced it, so big whoop. My biggest fault I found was actually the slowness with which Pokemon load when browsing the PC, which is a dumb problem considering many previous games had much less issue loading those grids of simple sprites. Do I agree that Pokemon deserves perfect, AAA games with top-of-the-line production values and no glitches or slowdown? Of course I do. Of course I want perfection! Who doesn't? But the reality is that this is what we got, and it does enough right that I just don't feel like getting mad at what it does wrong.
And the highs are definitely highs, as I found it easy to settle into an addictive rhythm of scouring the area for Pokemon and items, catching and training, and then returning to town to refuel. While Pokemon catching is more in line with Swoosh than Legends, you also don't need to catch multiples of the same species to fill your Pokedex any more. A lot of Legends' refinements and changes have been left behind here, with the more complicated and intricate Pokemon battle system returning. While I praised Legends for being willing to streamline Pokemon battling to get back to basics, I did miss abilities and hold items. Also, one of Swoosh's biggest mistakes has been corrected: while Swoosh only had some Pokemon visible on the overworld and hid others in random encounters, Scarvi makes all Pokemon visible on the world map and completely removes the random encounter system. You can scan an area quickly for the Pokemon you're looking for and easily just leave and come back if nothing you want is visible. Pay careful attention if you're a shiny hunter though - unlike Legends, which drew very explicit attention to shinies, Scarvi doesn't point them out with special sounds or anything similar.
I also have to praise the auto-battling system. You can quickly and easily train your Pokemon by sending them out and directing them at wild Pokemon, which they will instantly defeat to get them out of your path and earn a little experience. I leaned on this feature more as I got further into the game, using it especially heavily in the final area to clear the way forward past rambunctious wild Pokemon. It's also used in your battles with this generation's "evil team", Team Star, though for the third generation in a row the "evil team" is ineffectual comic relief.
The story of this game takes a while to get going but the payoff is very much worth the wait. I've noticed that ever since the fifth generation, odd-numbered generations of Pokemon tend to try harder in the storytelling category than even-numbered ones, and that pattern held true here for the ninth gen. In fact, the final area of Scarvi is one of my favorite locations in series history with top-notch atmosphere, and the final boss is one of my favorite final bosses of any video game. I enjoyed Violet so much I even bothered to finish the Pokedex "the hard way", catching and raising everything I could in-game and only trading for version exclusives and trade evolutions. That's something I haven't done in many years, having traditionally just hauled over my collection from the previous generation into the next, and when I skipped putting down money for Pokemon Home, that chain was broken and I simply didn't bother catching them all in any way in Swoosh or Legends. But Scarvi made catching them all much more achievable than the annoying barriers Swoosh put up (like how you'd need to hunt for Pokemon in certain weather conditions).
Overall, between Legends and Scarvi, I think Pokemon is on an upward trend from the lows of Swoosh and BDSP. The core formula continues to engage me and the team is still trying new things. I'm on board for the DLC and eager to see where my favorite game franchise is going next.
Disgaea 6: Defiance of Destiny
System: Nintendo Switch
Genre: Tactical RPG
Where do I even begin with this one? Disgaea 6 was a weird, weird experience of ups and downs, even more so than Disgaea 5. In fact, Disgaea 6 kind of exaggerates Disgaea 5's best and worst qualities, though one of the most notable things about D6 is one of the new mechanics: Auto-Battle.
Yes, Auto-Battle. Disgaea is infamous for being a series meant for people who love grinding levels. D6 makes it easier than ever before. Not only do all units you have on the field at the end of a stage earn experience even if they didn't do anything (and even KO'd units will get experience), but there's an extremely early stage that hands out grotesquely good experience in comparison to how easy it is to clear, especially if you use the in-game "Cheat Shop" to raise the levels of enemies, then use some of the numerous methods available to you to boost experience gain. Grinding this stage would normally still be an exercise in tedium as you click through menus to get all your characters onto the field, but with Auto-Battle you can set a team of ten units and have them play the stage on their own (and repeat it endlessly until you intervene) while you can go do something else. Do it right and in a single afternoon you'll have ten max level characters and any possible challenge the adventure could pose is wiped out.
There are other exploits, too. One involves the intermingling of several optional systems. First there's the D-Merit system, a series of achievements like "reach a certain level" or "kill a certain number of enemies in the Item World". These achievements are separate for every character in your party. There is also a Juice Bar shop where you can have your characters drink stat-boosting potions. Lastly, there's the Quest Shop, which has various missions with rewards. The game breaker? There's a series of quests revolving around earning D-Merits, with the final quest in the series rewarding you with over six million of the in-game currency if you achieve one hundred D-Merits after accepting the quest. Among other easy D-Merits, there is a series of D-Merits for drinking at the Juice Bar a given number of times. Nothing is stopping you from making tiny cheap drinks and dumping them into your characters, earning dozens of D-Merits and claiming the cash prize quickly. Do it once and you'll be set cash-wise for the entire rest of the main game, and these missions refresh every so often so you'll be able to repeat it in the future for even more almost-free money (and you can always make more generics to dump drinks into for quick D-Merits). Between the easy money and the auto-battle you'll soon find this game to be entirely lacking in challenge unless you purposely limit yourself. That said, I got really into the grind. Watching numbers constantly go up was exhilarating, even though the numbers felt a little more meaningless than usual due to the number inflation of this title compared to previous games (stats are much higher for everyone and level-ups are way faster, accelerating the numbers even more).
Then there's the story. Which... leaves much to be desired. Character interactions are fine and I found most of the protags to be rather likable (particularly Misedor the goofy rich king and Piyori the loud and enthusiastic sentai parody), and when the cutscenes are just your party members bantering with each other, things are fine (though sometimes a running gag overstays its' welcome). The real problem arises with the principal storyline that drives the plot. The adventure this time revolves around the main character, a zombie boy named Zed, and his efforts to defeat the "God of Destruction", a saiyan-like giant man who can only yell loudly and exists solely to destroy things. The first half of the story is an unimaginably boring slog, as every chapter proceeds via the exact same formula. Zed uses his reincarnation power to wake up in a new dimension. In this dimension, he fights through some grunts for handwavey reasons and encounters a new ally, who he initially dislikes but quietly grows to appreciate later. At the end of the chapter he fights the God of Destruction and dies, only to reincarnate in another new dimension. Rinse and repeat, again and again. And again. And again. The God of Destruction is the only boss in the entire game (aside from a handful of minibosses, who are all just recolors of other units, and the true final boss) and you will very quickly tire of effortlessly wiping the floor with it only for it to kill Zed in a cutscene and the cycle to start again. The ease with which the God is dispatched (it hits hard, but generally will only target one of your ten characters at a time) and the ludicrous number of times you fight it makes it a joke and impossible to take seriously, despite being played 100% straight in-game. It's a true contender for one of the worst antagonists I've ever seen - a one-note nothing that exists for no reason but to be evil, has no personality, and wins all the time through But Thou Must cutscene incompetence. Halfway through this cycle, you finish gathering allies, and then must go through the same worlds again to give those allies character development as they deal with various problems. This is a bit more interesting, but every chapter still ends with a shoehorned-in God Of Destruction fight. By the time you actually get powerful enough in-story to defeat the God Of Destruction for real, there's no satisfaction because it's the same crap you've already done a dozen times, except this time it arbitrarily stuck. Worse yet, this entire first half of the game takes place in the form of a flashback, and every time you finish a chapter we cut back to the present time where Zed is telling his story, having started it by saying he defeated the God Of Destruction, further deflating any possible tension or excitement the story could offer.
Fortunately, things do improve. Once the flashback mercifully ends (with the last two chapters of it being particularly grating and depressing, though we do at last get a bit of character for the God Of Destruction), the story finally, finally moves on to something somewhat more interesting, though there is still a lot of teasing and drawing things out as your new antagonist continually runs away and all your characters can do is ineffectually shout "Get back here!" as if they would actually listen, while standing there doing nothing to stop them (one of my most hated tropes). Unlike Disgaea 5's epic finale that helped make up for its' earlier low points, though, I found Disgaea 6's finale to be somewhat lacking, and while it's not awful it doesn't fully redeem the monotonous snoozefest you had to endure to get that far.
In sum, Disgaea 6 is best enjoyed as a tactical RPG idle game. Manage your squad, grind them and their items to kingdom come, and push through the story (most cutscenes can be skipped, which is nice) to unlock characters and features (for instance, you can break the level cap to power up your characters much more, but you need to clear the story and a postgame chapter to do it). Disgaea 6 is at its' best when the numbers are going up, and I had much more fun grinding my characters and getting rewards in the Item World than I did doing the story stages.
Pokemon Puzzle Challenge
System: Game Boy Color (3DS Virtual Console)
Genre: Puzzle
This is the GBC's installment of the block-swapping puzzle game that just can't seem to get a consistent identity. You've likely played some version or another of it over the years, but it seems every time it shows up it's got a different coat of paint on it. Originally released in Japan on the SNES as "Panel de Pon" with an exclusive cast of characters, the cutesy anime fairies were thrown out for the US version, the Yoshi-themed "Tetris Attack" (a ludicrous rename, since this game has literally nothing to do with Tetris besides also being a puzzle game). At the turn of the century the franchise was instead tied to the brand-new and red-hot Pokemon series, and it was later spotted on the GBA in the form of the miserably bland "Dr. Mario Puzzle League" cart that stripped any sort of personality or soul out of it.
Anyway, this is Panel de Pon with a Pokemon coat of paint. The N64 game, Pokemon Puzzle League, was based on the first generation anime, but Pokemon Puzzle Challenge is instead based on the second generation video games, resulting in a very different feel despite the similar gameplay. Just about all of the N64 game's modes were crammed into Puzzle Challenge, though there is a key gameplay difference - the smaller GBC screen forces use of a smaller playfield, and people used to playing other games in this series might feel cramped.
Including the word 'Challenge' in this game's title is apt. Pokemon Puzzle Challenge is easy enough to reach the credits of, but the requirements for actually completing any of the modes are daunting. Anyone expecting an easy game due to the Pokemon branding is going to be disappointed - Puzzle Challenge is out for your blood, and only the most skilled players have a chance of seeing everything Puzzle Challenge has to offer.
Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion
System: PC
Genre: Action-Adventure
Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion doesn't waste any time. The very first thing you do upon starting your adventure is read - and then rip in half - a tax bill. Ripping up of documents becomes a running gag throughout the adventure, with Turnip Boy tearing up anything that mentions taxes... even if it's a drawing someone made for him that depicts him as a tax-paying anime girl, or a love letter you were asked to deliver to someone's secret crush that asks if they wanted to do taxes together sometime. It's played for laughs, but Turnip Boy is kind of a dick - though his ultimate dick move is something he ends up doing by accident.
This game bears resemblance to old-school top-down Zelda titles. You get a sword early on to fight enemies with in simplistic combat, but the meat of the game is wandering around and solving puzzles or completing simple quests, as well as collecting silly hats for Turnip Boy to wear and, of course, looking for more papers to rip up. Turnip Boy starts out very simple and gradually escalates in complexity, but none of the puzzles are particularly tricky, with only a couple taking me more than a minute or two to grasp. Overall, the gameplay is serviceable, but the real focus of TBCTE is the dialog and story.
Right off the bat, there's a dark undercurrent to things. These cute goofy talking vegetables have realistic problems like struggling to pay rent or falling in love but being too afraid to approach their crush, and while the main antagonist, Mayor Onion, is a laughable foe, his iron fist does cause problems for the public and they're happy to share them with you. It's still nothing too serious, and the reveal of Turnip Boy's family backstory is a silly one, but eventually you start learning more about how this world came to be.
There has been, in recent times, a surge of interest in indie horror. Probably inspired by the likes of Five Nights At Freddy's and especially Doki Doki Literature Club (and, for the old-school among you, Eversion), a favorite topic of small indie horror games is the "cute on the surface, horrifying underneath" subgenre. These games present themselves as lovable and harmless romps, only to pull the rug out from under the player and reveal that they were actually horror games all along. These games are a dime a dozen on sites like Itch.io, and you'll find Youtubers like Manlybadasshero and Alpha Beta Gamer who adore posting videos of them alongside more conventional and straightforward horror games. Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion is not quite what I would call a surprise horror game, but it follows the same blueprints and is cut from the same cloth. The truth behind everything is grim, and the penultimate boss battle (especially the subtext of how the fight even happened) is probably as dark, horrifying, and brutal as it could possibly get without resorting to outright M-rated things like blood and guts. Probably the biggest difference between Turnip Boy and traditional "surprise, it's scary" horror is that once that nastiness is dealt with, the final leg of the adventure reverts back to being cute and silly and never again gets anywhere near that dark.
With a mischievously destructive main character and a horrific secret lurking near the end, Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion makes a big impression with its' short playtime, and even if the combat is mediocre and the puzzles aren't going to wrack your brain, you're not likely to forget your time playing it.
A Short Hike
System: PC
Genre: 3D Platformer
A Short Hike is adorable. Presented in low-resolution 3D (which kind of makes it look like a 3DS game), A Short Hike features a world of Animal Crossing-esque cartoon animals. The player character is Claire, a bird. You've arrived at a beautiful island getaway, with beaches, forests, and mountain climbing, but you're waiting on a very important phone call. Unfortunately, out here in the sticks, there's no cell reception... unless you happened to climb to the very top of the tallest mountain.
The goal of A Short Hike is to reach the peak, of course, but you'll need to improve your climbing skills first - by collecting a golden feather, you can do a tiny double-jump or climb a wall for a couple seconds. Collecting further feathers improves these skills, and after a while you'll be running all over the place with ease. Further, there are no shortage of distractions popping up along the way to keep you busy on your quest to get enough golden feathers to reach the top. Plenty of other people are visiting the island, and if you talk to them, you'll often get a little mission to do. You'll also steadily accumulate a large inventory of items, both collectibles and equippable tools that can help you get around the island or accomplish missions. By the end of the hike, you'll have likely picked up everything from a water-carrying bucket to a pickaxe, played a volleyball-esque minigame, and taken on a 'parkour race' or two that bring to mind Super Mario 64's races with Koopa The Quick. You'll also check in on various recurring NPCs as they reappear in new locations throughout the hike, often with some small arc or comedic payoff.
A Short Hike is an extremely pleasant game. Claire is a strong swimmer and doesn't suffer from fall damage, so you're never in danger. It's cute, funny, and heartfelt. I played this the very next day after beating Turnip Boy and it was a nice antidote to Turnip Boy's hidden tragedy.
Besiege
System: PC
Genre: Sandbox/Physics Puzzle
In Besiege's campaign, you are waging war against a medieval-style world. You're tasked with clearing 54 missions with a wide variety of goals. You may need to destroy a village, break down a wall, steal a precious object, or even just reach a certain point on the map. To do this, you build a vehicle using a snappy building system that lets you quickly throw together a basic design and then tweak it to your liking with custom controls and settings. Of course you can also save vehicles and reuse or modify them for other stages, and there's Steam Workshop support if you'd like to take someone else's machine to do your dirty work.
And the work is indeed quite dirty. It may take a little while for it to fully sink in, but eventually you realize that when you play Besiege, you are the villain. The little citizens are usually minding their own business, and some of your missions involve stealing gold, smashing monuments, destroying food, or even, in one case, dropping poison into a well to contaminate the water supply. Cleared islands are shown as devastated burning wrecks on the level select screen, and the subdued, ominous, and gloomy ambience of the OST underscores that what's happening is not a good thing. However, Besiege has a reputation not for being downbeat, but for being hilarious. That's because this game is a physics-based puzzle/strategy game first and foremost, and you are given a lot of freedom in most missions to make all sorts of ludicrous contraptions. If they can accomplish the objective, it doesn't matter how bizarre or impractical they are, and most every player is going to build multiple machines that look capable at first but instantly fall apart when you start the level due to some silly oversight.
Besiege often frustrated me on its' harder and less flexible challenges, but after turning it off and getting a breather I often found myself mulling over what to try next, and maybe if I just built something a little differently it would work. The addictive nature of building and testing is habit-forming for people who enjoy creating and scheming. If you're patient and willing to experiment, Besiege is a ton of fun, and even if you're less willing to spend significant time building something that doesn't even work when you finally try to put it into practice, Besiege is still a very solid game that rewards creativity but will make no attempt to stop you if you "cheat" and grab someone else's machine off the Steam Workship to easily clear levels with.
Probably my biggest gripe would be that Besiege doesn't teach the player very well. The method of steering your machine that it teaches you is probably one of the worst ways to go about it (the best method will vary by player but my favorite was mapping the left and right keys to the forward and back of your vehicle's wheels, which allowed it to control near-identically to a Robot Arena 2 creation). Worse yet, many parts like suspension, rope, and rockets are never explained, and there are quite a few I never bothered using because I was never given even a slight hint as to what they were for or how they should attach to things. Fortunately, two of the most important parts - pistons and grabbers - do get small tutorials. There are non-official ways to get more information like the Besiege Wiki, though, so confused players just need a little Google Fu to avoid getting too lost.
A Winter Adventure with Sanae Kochiya
System: PC
Genre: 2D Platformer
AWAWSK is a very short and simple Touhou game made for a game jam. You control Sanae as she bounces around a snowy area in search of large snowflakes (and I mean "bounces" quite literally, she hops everywhere and it's very cute). Some of the snowflakes are just hanging around out in the open, obtained via small platforming challenges. Others are earned by doing simple quests for other Touhou characters hanging out on the mountain. Lastly, there are 100 mini snowflakes to collect, and every twenty you pick up earns you a large snowflake. There are 18 big snowflakes in all. You only need ten to finish, but going for all eighteen earns you a bonus screen during the ending.
There's not a lot to Sanae's winter adventure, but there doesn't need to be. It's cute and wholesome fun that's worth spending a little time with. You can probably find all the snowflakes in under half an hour, and there's just enough challenge to the affair to keep it interesting.
The Complex: Found Footage
System: PC
Genre: Horror/3D Maze
People who know me are aware that I generally shy away from horror media, even if I am known to occasionally dabble in it and can take some darkness and scares in my stories as long as things eventually sort themselves out (unlike most conventional horror media, which tends to have a bad or ambiguous ending or at least kill off most of the cast). However, one horror story that caught fire on the Internet in recent years is something of a favorite of mine - The Backrooms. If you need a refresher that isn't tainted with my own ZFRP version of the concept, the general gist is that there's an alternate dimension of sorts, slightly out of sync with reality, that consists of an effectively infinite maze of rooms and areas that resemble real-world locations but make no practical sense. Miles and miles of twisting passages that pull at our memories, making us recall areas we briefly passed through years ago that stick with us. Office buildings, waiting rooms, school hallways, other people's homes, libraries, arcades, pools, gyms, grocery stores, and more. There's a strong overlap here with the concept of "liminal spaces", which are transitional areas we briefly spend time in but don't often think about, and which tend to look uncanny when empty or abandoned. There's a heavy layer of nostalgia to it all as well, recalling the aesthetics of past decades, primarily the 1980s and 1990s. I enjoy liminal spaces and retro content, so that part of The Backrooms appeals to me a lot. The horror comes from the fact that it's so difficult to escape and you may be condemned to wander endlessly, though a lot of Backrooms content can't help but add a scary monster chasing you to make the threat more immediate.
The Complex: Found Footage has a very simple framing device of someone in the real world watching a VHS tape that was filmed in 1990. The actual game is the footage itself, which is represented by your playthrough. Having fallen into The Backrooms, your goal is to find an exit in the form of an elevator, but it won't be easy. The initial maze you're dropped into is gigantic and it's very easy to get lost or turned around, not helped by how much of the scenery looks similar. You can eventually pick out landmarks and get around a bit more easily, but there's no map to help you. However, there's also no danger - while The Complex does include some subtle touches to imply that you're being watched or followed, and you may see an entity in the distance if you're lucky (or unlucky), you don't get attacked and cannot die. The challenge is solely navigating the maze, and you can do so at your own pace, though there's no save option, so you do have to solve the whole maze in one go. My playthrough took a little over two hours, but it's possible to get through a lot faster, especially if you know how to play - which leads to my next point.
Probably the biggest issue with The Complex is that you aren't told the controls, and while some of them are intuitive, others are not, so I'm going to include the controls here.
WASD, arrow keys, and numpad all control character movement.
The mouse lets you look around.
Left clicking and right clicking the mouse zoom your camera in and out (you have to hold it down).
Hold Shift to run. You can't start running while in water, but if you run into water and hold the button down you'll continue running, making water navigation much faster.
Press left Ctrl to duck. You can crawl through low passages this way, even in water. Press it again to stand back up.
You can't progress past the first floor without knowing how to duck. I was stuck for a while because I couldn't figure out how and kept coming across low passageways I thought were dead ends. Once I managed to press enough keyboard keys to discover that function, it wasn't too long before I found an elevator and escaped the first level. Once you've done that, things get a little easier. The later levels of The Complex are much smaller than the first one (some of them are incredibly brief), and your progress through them should pick up a good deal. You'll still need to pay careful attention to your surroundings, though - sometimes the way forward can be a bit tricky to find. Do keep in mind, though, that there is one actual jumpscare at the very end of The Complex, in the form of a loud noise, so be ready for that!
Overall I enjoyed The Complex. It was plenty frightening enough for a wuss like me without leaning too hard on anything but the simple loneliness and dread of navigating The Backrooms. Plus, it's a free game! The creator is planning on releasing a paid sequel that expands the range of player abilities (and may include both "monster chases you" and "you are alone" modes to satisfy people who prefer one or the other). Hopefully the sequel is better optimized, however. The Complex chugged badly on my PC even on the lowest settings despite the rather simplistic graphics (basic walls and floors look very nice and realistic, but many of the in-game objects look much more crude, like the sort of models you'd find in the background of a Gamecube game). Lag isn't too big a deal in a game like this, but smoother operation would have been nice.
(By the way, if you'd like a starting point for trying to grasp the massive and malleable amount of fan content The Backrooms has spawned besides playing this game, Kane Pixels is the established king of the genre, but my personal pick would be Lost In The Hyperverse's series. Both are good and both use jumpscares sparingly, though they are still present. Kane goes for deep lore and a revolving door of protagonists while Hyperverse goes nuts with wild setpieces and beautiful visuals while featuring a single guy enduring everything The Backrooms can throw at him.)
The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog
System: PC
Genre: Visual Novel/Adventure
This utterly bizarre concept released for free on Steam the day before April Fool's as an acknowledgement of how bonkers it is, but rest assured this is a real game. The concept is that Amy is having a birthday party and a bunch of classic Sonic characters (Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Vector, Espio, Rouge, Blaze, and Shadow) are invited to join her on a train ride. But this is no normal train - it's a murder mystery game, where each player is given a role to play. One of the characters becomes a 'murder victim', and the goal is for the detective and reporter (in this case, Tails and Amy) to investigate and find out who the 'killer' is. The player character, a low-level grunt whose job amounts to microwaving food when asked, wasn't originally meant to be part of the game but tags along with Tails and Amy as the three of them work together to solve the mystery (though Amy enjoys going off on her own, leaving you alone with Tails for a good chunk of time). As the title suggests, Sonic is the one picked to be the 'murder victim', and off we go into a cute little game that takes a few surprising turns before it wraps up with about a two-hour runtime.
TMOSTH was clearly made by people with a lot of love for the Sonic series. There are tons of little references and nods to Sonic lore sprinkled throughout the adventure, and the writing is fantastic with everyone being in character. I laughed out loud numerous times. The main gameplay is basic Ace Attorney-style investigating and questioning, which never gets very complicated or difficult. If you make a mistake you're simply funneled back to pick another answer, and you may want to choose wrong answers on purpose to see more funny dialog, especially during the segment where Rouge and Blaze recruit your character and Tails for a job. There's also a minigame you have to play almost every time you present evidence where you control an auto-running Sonic and try to collect a certain number of rings while avoiding obstacles. The gameplay of the minigame makes it resemble the sorts of Special Stages you'd encounter in classic Sonic titles like Sonic 2 and Sonic 3, but instead of a Chaos Emerald, you get the burst of insight you need to connect evidence to the case. These can also be retried indefinitely without consequence, and you'll likely need it as the later ones are tough enough that you'll probably have to learn the course through a failure or two before making a winning run. If you just can't beat the minigame, though, there are settings in the Options menu to make it easier by doing things like lowering how many rings you need or making Sonic invincible to prevent losing rings when hit.
I had a great time with Sonic getting murdered and since it's free it's easy to recommend for any Sonic fan. Thanks for dying, Sonic!
Pokemon Gold 97 Reforged
System: Game Boy Color (Romhack)
Genre: RPG
In 2018, the first of what would turn out to be several major leaks of old Pokemon games occurred. These incredible leaks revealed dozens of scrapped Pokemon and reams of other cut content from the first, second, and fourth generations. The first two generations in particular had long, tortured development histories, meaning there was lots of hidden treasure to be unearthed. Since then, a tremendous amount has been learned about the development process for those iconic games. One of the juiciest nuggets of info was the original leak, a prototype version of Pokemon Gold and Silver. This prototype dates back to Spaceworld 1997 (Spaceworld being a trade show hosted by Nintendo and held in Japan annually throughout the 90s). However, Gold and Silver did not actually release until 1999. Why the long development time, during a period when Pokemon was white-hot?
Once people got their hands on the Spaceworld 97 build, the reason why it took so long to get the final games became abundantly clear: the 1997 prototype bears almost no resemblance whatsoever to the Gold and Silver versions that actually came out. The towns and routes are different. The graphics are still very similar to the first generation and not optimized for Game Boy Color. There are unused trainer classes and different designs for existing characters. But most tantalizingly of all, the selection of new Pokemon is full of unused and prototype designs. Many of the final Gen 2 Pokemon are either not present at all (Heracross, Shuckle, Dunsparce, Wobbuffet) or are present, but in a vastly different form (Girafarig, Ariados, Noctowl, Aipom). Pokemon that evolve in the final version don't evolve here (Marill, Snubbull, Togepi) and vice versa (Qwilfish). There are evolutions for Pokemon that wouldn't get an evolution until years later, like Lickitung and Tangela, an evolution for Pinsir who only ever got a Mega Evolution in canon, and even an evolution for Ditto, who has never gotten any kind of power-up or boost in 25 years aside from an ability that lets it transform instantly upon being sent out. There are even entire lines of scrapped Pokemon that never saw the light of day, like an electric tiger, a dark-type cat with a bell theme, a deep-sea gulper eel/anglerfish hybrid, and a Water/Fire circus seal balancing a fiery bomb on its' nose instead of a ball. It was all very fascinating and spawned tons of fanart from people who wished the scrapped designs were real Pokemon, and the subsequent additional leaks did the same, but the Spaceworld 97 build of Gen 2 was special for being first, and for being so vastly different from what we actually got. But this build of the game was merely a demo - many things about it weren't properly implemented. New Pokemon had placeholder stats, maps were unfinished... Game Freak had not thrown out a completed game. It was maybe half done.
So what if someone took it upon themselves to make it all the way done?
Pokemon Gold 97 Reforged is an obvious but genius idea for a romhack of Pokemon Crystal. What if the contents of the Spaceworld demo were refined and polished into a complete game? And so, building off of the finished games' engine and mechanics, the 1997 build's world was brought to life, and the result is a surreal and fantastic alternate universe video game. Great care has been taken to make Reforged feel authentic. There are no fourth-wall-breaking "this is a romhack" moments, no memes, no point where Reforged is not taking itself 100% seriously in its' mission of presenting a genuine-feeling Pokemon game. Many of Gold and Silver's NPCs and locations have been adapted to Reforged to finish the world and fill it out, and you'll encounter an interesting mix of characters directly lifted from GSC, characters from the Spaceworld demo, and original NPCs with new dialogue. The only real immersion-breaking moments are from the occasional typo in dialogue that was written specifically for Reforged - 99% of the time, it looks, feels, and acts like it really did come out in 1999 as the second Pokemon game.
If you enjoy the second generation of Pokemon as much as I do, you will LOVE Reforged. It's both comfortingly familiar and wonderfully new at the same time, sort of a more extreme version of how Black and White 2 were evolutions of Black and White instead of being retreads, adding new locations and Pokemon that weren't previously available, but the overhaul of Reforged compared to GSC is much more complete. And getting to see these abandoned designs shine is wonderful. Yes, not all of them are improvements over what we eventually got (for instance, Spaceworld 97 Aipom is very basic and lacks the manic gremlin energy of the Aipom we know and tolerate today, and Sneasel is in a similar boat), but some of the scrapped Pokemon are truly tragic losses, and incredibly cool designs like the pelt-wearing clawed hunter, cursed voodoo doll, and the shark with an anchor for a tail deserved the chance to become "real Pokemon", if only via romhack. It's a wonderful ending for the story of these lost Pokemon designs that spent two decades locked away in Game Freak's vaults.
The only downside? By the time this romhack was completed, dozens more unused Gen 2 Pokemon were discovered in a later leak, and this time the designs were even wilder. Not to mention a horde of Gen 1 rejects were also found. We're gonna need another hack that gathers all three batches together for the ultimate scrapped Pokemon adventure...
I did have some nasty Scarlet glitches happen, particularly one instance where my game froze while I was buying a sandwich.
ReplyDeletePokemon Gold Reforged is such a cool concept for a Romhack. I don't think I'd ever try out the kind of hack that just tries to tidy up a game, but when you're basically creating a brand new experience like that, and one with such a strong concept beyond "remixed level pieces", well, that's where fan works really shine! Also, thanks for doing this again! As said in chat, it gave me a hankering to hunt down some of these games. I think I may even wait to try out Afterburner until I can get the cabinet experience based on that recommendation.
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