JonB wrote:

A fortnight might be a bit much for this. It's a pretty standard arcade game.

The arcade game is certainly very hard. I'll sse how the MD version compares.

The Megadrive version is effing hard - harder than the arcade version - or at least is more annoying...

It's a solid enough port but it uses the muddier end of the MD's colour pallette so is quite dull looking - but I just find it so much tougher due to the longer levels with sparse restart points.

There is a longplay of the arcade game lasting 21mins.....a longplay of the MD version lasts over 70mins....

It's actually so hard I like it for some odd reason - and you can crank the difficulty up too - at the hardest level it would take monk-like devotion to get anywhere - so hard and unfair it's actually funny.

The MD game is multi-region - the title screen changes if you change the region on your emu or console - JuJu in JPN, Toki in the West.

If you want another game to try in a similar vein but isn't crap, take a look at Wardner by Taito. Splendid game - the MD got a port but its pretty rare - I've only ever played it via MAME though I can remember it in the student union arcade in my student days.

If you want a crap one then Beavis and Butthead (SNES) was highly regarded in that area by Super Play who got more fun out of the title screen because you could make them laugh on it.

I played to level 4 of the MD version of Toki. I quite like it. The level designs are more interesting than the arcade game and it's not as brutally tough (the bosses are especially easy in comparison), although the one hit death thing is always harsh. Perhaps there are shitloads more levels though, so maybe it's really difficult later on. The arcade game only had about 6 levels. But yeah, the movement speed is definitely too slow, and it's not as colourful.

I played the arcade version of Wardner not long ago. I always quite liked it but never put much time into it in the arcades. I got all the way to final boss, but found it impossible even with save states.

The mammoth boss took me ages earlier.  For some reason I thought you could only hit it in the face, by firing at the apex of your jump, so I spent ages (and a good few lives) timing that (whilst avoiding the projectile and getting a clear shot of the head when the trunk was lowered), but got squished every time as it repeatedly reached the left of the screen before I could kill it.  When I realised you could hit its stomach I saw him off within around 30 seconds.

Get your finger out, its Castlevania IV next week...

retroking1981 wrote:

I reckon with the play a shit game thing, there's no point in setting anything in particular for us to play - just play anything poor that you fancy starting next week.  The main reason I'm saying this is that I really don't want to suffer the first level of the Terminator game Retro mentioned at the top of the page again.

You need to get back to Super Metroid, no shit games for you this week!!!!

Shit games for me all week at work though, I can only play Metroid on the Wii U.

I'm thinking: Cyber Shinobi & Alf on the Master System (this month's Retro Gamer seems to imply the latter isn't a bad game - remember reading it was absolutely awful), and I think I fancy Jurassic Park on the Megadrive, which despite the 87% in MMS always looked too shit to buy.  This is coming from someone who loved the book/film.  Plus possibly Karate Kid on the NES if I have time.

Talking of bad games, I played DJ Boy on the MD last night. The arcade game wasn't great, but the half-arsed conversion makes it awful. Wouldn't have thought you could go so wrong on a scrolling beat 'em up.

I've gone off script and am playing Dynamite Headdy. It's still completely brilliant. Yeah.

davyK wrote:

For you wimps using save states who probably don't see the game over screen, the damsel is squeeling "help me" on it and it sounds like "text me"

Rumbled

Dynamite Headdy is incredible.  Completing it with the secret basketball numbers is one of my proudest gaming moments - it's a tough, tough game in places.  Spinderella, Baby Face, Twin Freaks - so many highlights.  Even the ending sequence is superb.  It's my pick of the 16-bit Treasure titles, for sure.

I've also gone off the menu, and have played a fair chunk of Pluseman on MD today.  I downloaded it on VC a couple of years ago and decided that I couldn't see what all the fuss is about, but it really picks up quite quickly after the first level, and has a Dynamite Headdy standard of inventiveness to the gameplay.

Christ, Dynamite Headdy is hard. Up to level 8 and had to use multiple save states on the last boss. The thing is I remember all of it so far, so I must have done all this the proper way about 20 years ago (although I'm sure I never did finish it). I swear there was a way of getting extra credits, but I don't seem to have any and am running out of lives. Might start again.

Edit: Ah right, just read up about the continues. That explains (a bit) how I could get so far before.

Moot_Geeza wrote:

davyK wrote:

had a quick play of Vectorman which is *very* nice - but I will have to put it away as that is for a future week....

I've only ever played a couple of levels of Vectorman.  I remember the staff of Diehard Gamefan working themselves up into a frenzy about the graphics, and how Blue Sky were at the cutting edge of MD development.  As a Segaboy, I viewed it as the response to Donkey Kong Country.

It looks nice but the control is super swish.....

Iirc the only way to beat the final boss without a huge dollop of luck is to take the mini Headdy pickup whenever possible, despite the fact that you can't hit him in that form, otherwise the falling ceiling will get you unless it decides to give you the large gap right next to your character.  I'd agree that it's the best platformer on the machine - although they're very different games it's within touching distance of Yoshi's Island for me.

There's been some sort of massive virus meltdown in my office at work, so while the rest of the company was beavering away at the disaster recovery site halfway across London, I managed to get some bad gaming done in an empty office between 10am and 12pm (apologies, retroking). 

I focused on the Megadrive today, and played enough of the following to attribute a score (which I'll do out of 10 today).  I mainly picked games that I remember getting panned by the gaming press:

Dark Castle [1]

This really was exceptionally bad.



Obviously, the noise those enemies make gets irritating after a few seconds.  You throw stones (I think?  Maybe it's a gun) by slowly rotating your arm to the correct trajectory before pressing fire, which just doesn't work.  Awful.

Final Blow [3]

Never liked this in the arcades either.  I couldn't tell you if it's a better game or just rose tinted specs, but I'd take Heavyweight Champ on the Master System over this all day long.

DJ Boy [5]

Not a terrible game, but the decision to give the player one life is ridiculous.  I expected this to be worse than it is from its reputation, but without save states it would have been dire.  I got to level four before I gave up I think.

Last Battle [4]

Fist of the North Star in Japan, but censored for PAL release, so instead of enemy heads popping when you punch them theie bodies just fly off the screen intact.  Add a point before the removal of the gimmick, but after an OK-ish start (the gameplay isn't the worst, and it has multiple routes) this got tiresome quickly, and I gave up after getting lost in the fourth stage I played.

Revolution X [4]

The Aerosmith Operation Wolf style game.  The most memorable thing about this for me was how bad the sound was - you'd expect them to have at least given a decent chunk of memory to the quality of the tunes considering it's they're using the license of a rock band, but nope.  Destructible scenery adds 1 point, but far worse than the port of Terminator 2: The Arcade Game.

Street Smart [6]

I moaned about this the other day.  I always liked the look of it in the mags, but it got poor reviews (< 50%).  I can see why (it's only marginally better than Pit Fighter), but I've got to admit I really enjoyed my save state assisted run at this today, and stuck with it to the credits. 

Sword of Sodan [0]

By far the worst game I played today.  It has absolutely no redeeming features, unless 'big sprites' is something that floats your boat, in which case add half a point.  I walked from left to right, slowly getting massacred by enemies who only occasionally fancied getting hit themselves.

Jurassic Park [5]

Poor.  I'm shocked this was made by the same team as Vectorman.  Some effort seems to have been spent on the animation and cut-scenes, but there was very little to like about the basic sub-Prince of Persia meets Alien 3 gameplay.

Rise of the Robots [3]

The intro was nice, and the rotating graphic of the next enemy is snazzy.  Otherwise it's pretty dire.

Shaq Fu [6]

I didn't mind this at all.  It's a notoriously bad effort from Delphine Software (of Flashback fame), but I think the mags were a little unkind to this.  It's a well animated fighting game that's probably on par gameplay-wise with Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story, which received marks in the low-80s.  Obviously the fact that it stars Shaquille O'Neil as some sort of mixed martial arts expert did it no favours whatsoever, but I thought this was alright. 

Strider 2 [5]

I spent the first five minutes on this wondering why the original is considered infinitely superior.  Firstly, I wasn't overly keen on the first one when I played through it for a few months ago, and secondly, US Gold really do seem to have replicated the controls nicely.  However, it didn't take long to realise the levels are messy, overlong, and rely too heavily on trial and error.  Still, this wasn't anywhere near as bad as its reputation suggested it would be. 

Rastan Saga 2 [5]

Laughably bad animation and gameplay far worse than the original can't stop me having a soft spot for this, as it came with my Megadrive and I completed it as a kid.  Knock two points off if you're in the least bit sensible.  I remember thinking it was odd that Rastan holds his sword in his right hand whilst facing right, but his left hand whilst facing left.  In hindsight a lot of games probably just reversed the sprite for stuff like that.

Oh - Fantasia - I actually have the cartridge - must give that a try. I pride myself by not having physical copies of anything really crap but I forgot about this one...

Nice reviews moot, want to know how you rated some of those in the games nights we did?

lol, you gave Revolution X a 4.5

I'll leave it at that.