208 or gtfo

Could be a bus thing.

Master System memory lane ROM rush!

193. Alex Kidd in Shinobi World

The second best Alex Kidd game, and a lovely little bit of IP blending from Sega.  It's not just Alex Kidd in any old shinobi world, it's Alex Kidd in the world of Shinobi - with cutesified versions of familiar enemies/bosses and some shared tunes.  There are only 4 stages, and compared to the MS port of Musashi's first outing it's an absolute pushover, but a Kiddy version of Sega's notoriously brutal classic is does-what-it-says-on-the-tin stuff.  Great fun with some neat level design in places and good controls (the fireball fling is quality).  

Owned at the time: Yes.  
In 1991 I would've given this: 87%
Worth playing without nostalgia?  Yes. 



194. Sonic The Hedgehog

My first Sonic (the first Sonic I owned anyway - I played as much of the MD game as I could at a mate's house on numerous after school visits).  I was chuffed with the port at the time and absolutely rinsed this for a month or two.  It's a genuinely good 8-bit platformer that's very much its own thing, rather than just being a nerfed simplification of the Mega Drive game.  As a kid who only owned the older hardware I definitely appreciated the care and attention Sega put into this one.  Case in point: I think I'll stick my neck out and say that this has the best soundtrack of any Hedgehog outing.  There are bangers in all classic Sonic games, but in terms of tunes I don't think even Sonic 2 (MD) has a top three to rival Bridge Zone, Jungle Zone and Scrap Brain Zone here.  I've revisited this a few times on various retro devices, and it's still odd to play it with the 17.5% speed bump, which really makes a difference (to the gameplay and the music).  Oh, and Dante was right - you can hit Green Hill Zone Robotnik on the initial fly-by.

All emeralds get, go me.  

Owned at the time?  Yes.
In 1991: 95%
Worth playing without nostalgia?  Tough one.  If you're a Sonic fan chances are you'll have already played this, and if you're not a fan Sonic 2 or Sonic 3 & Knuckles would probably be the most likely OG titles to entice you...so I'm gonna say no, with a heavy heart. 


   

195. Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse

IIRC I got Sonic for my birthday in 1991, and I got this from Index for Christmas a few weeks later.  It's one of the very best games on the system imo, easily outclassing the (pretty good) Mega Drive version.  Considering the HW it's a near perfect platformer, whereas the MD version was merely a good platformer with hugely impressive visuals.  Rejigged tunes seem to suit the more limited sound chip too, and all things considered there's not much worth criticising with this one.  It could do with being a bit longer but every inch of it is gold - iconic stages galore and the bum-bounce core is legit.

Owned at the time: Yes
In 1991: 93%
Worth playing without nostalgia: If you're a fan of 8-bit platformers, definitely.



196. Vigilante

Arcade port I used to love as a kid.  The original game eventually became one of my most played Virtual Console retro titles, and definitely my go-to quick blast game on Wii.  Whichever way you slice it the MS version has aged terribly though.  Despite fond memories of it the Kung Fu Master 'swat oncoming foes to the left & right while edging forward on a flat plane' format has aged atrociously, especially when you factor in the delay on the controls for this version.  Unresponsive and glitchy (you can crouch and punch the second boss from a bus length away, for example), even nunchucks can't save it from eyes equipped with hindsight.  It's infuriating when the enemies grab you and slow-drain your health.

Owned at the time?  No, borrowed it regularly.
In 1990: I dunno, 88%?
Worth playing without nostalgia?  Absolutely not.



197. ESWAT

I played most of the MD version recently, and wasn't impressed to say the least.  Certain games on the Switch version of the Mega Drive collection suffer from terrible input lag, which probably didn't help, but I was still surprised at how poor it was overall.  I borrowed this version once as a kid and remember quite liking it, but I also have a vague recollection of a terrible review score somewhere.  37% maybe?  I could be mixing it up with something else (the 8-bit Shadow Dancer, perhaps), but I'll probably never know/remember.

Anyway, over 30 years since I last played it I was surprised to discover that it's actually quite good.  Graphics are merely okay and the audio doesn't do much to impress, but the walk 'n gun gameplay is fairly solid.  You mainly shoot horizontally, and aiming diagonally plants your feet to the spot.  It was the closest thing to a home version of Robocop I had access to at the time, so no wonder I liked it.  Some bosses are irritating and some sections feel cheap, but I'm putting this on the pretty good pile for Master System games.

Owned at the time?  No.  Well, on a technicality maybe.  Iirc I swapped something for it (Fantasy Zone?) and the other kid sold what I'd lent him.  After hearing this my dad sent me round to demand my game back (or the money) and I returned without either, lol.  Ended up keeping this though, unless I'm confusing this with something else.  Last I heard Tommy Bull was in prison anyway, so someone definitely taught him a lesson at some point.  Chalking it up as a win.

Edit: Now that I've typed all that out I've remembered that Champions of Europe was the game that I lost and Fantasy Zone was the game that I gained, but the story can stay.  For the sake of accuracy I actually borrowed this from Gemma [surname forgotten] down the road, who was infamous for having run away three times.

In 1991: 80%ish?
Worth playing without nostalgia: Not really, no.  The first stage maybe.



198. Fantasy Zone II

Outstanding game.  I never played this one at the time but caught up in the retro club thread on here a few years ago.  The original is great, and has the iconic tunes, but this is superior on the whole, and also as close to timeless as 8-bit games get.  Destroy the bases, warp your way through levels with multiple zones, collect cash to spend on upgrades in shops and destroy the (always satisfying) boss.  Simple and near perfect.  It gets hugely difficult towards the end but this is a full classic.

Owned at the time: No.
In 1990: I probably would've been given 90%, or something at the low end of the 90s, due to being more of the same.
Worth playing without nostalgia: Fuck yes.  More so than any other MS game that springs to mind right now.  It's also one of the few games I can think of where the Rapid Fire Unit I owned would've actually been useful. 

Not buying the M2 rerelease is one of my biggest 3DS regrets, would've been a perfect fit for the console.  I really should treat myself to a playthrough of Super Fantasy Zone at some point.



199. Action Fighter

I think everyone has a certain review that winds them up.  I have to go back to 1990 for mine.  2/5 for this in Sega Power's The Hard Line review round up (which was in every issue and contained pretty much everything available on the machine).  Two out of five.  For a game that saw you take control of a missile firing bike that could turn into a car and a spaceship, that a) only cost £12.99, and b) absolutely banged.  It's even further into headwobble territory than The Goonies only getting 3 stars in The Radio Times (or The Water Babies only getting 2!).  This was brilliant, it still is brilliant, and every time I've played it between the age of 9 and 41 I've thought 'this is brilliant'.

Owned at the time: Yep, was one of my first carts.
In 1990: 2/5, APPARENTLY.
Worth playing without nostalgia: Hell yes.



200. The Terminator

I was obsessed with all things Terminator by 1992.  Imagine Tim from T2, minus the denim and ginger mullet, but instead of listening to Guns n Roses on a ghetto blaster he was listening to a walkman containing a TDK90 of the first film he'd recorded on a small tape recorder.  Cool points for days.  The fascination started when my dad told me how great the og film was (this would've been pre-T2), but deemed it unsuitable for a couple of months of pre-badger badgering.  He eventually crumbled and let me watch it after renting it from Ritz, but made the odd decision to fast forward the sex scene.  Not fast fast forward either; member the slow one with the lines through it?  So I got to see an unedited version of the film in all its glory, and was also treated to a sexytime romp played out at maybe 4x the normal speed.  Fantastic stuff.

I couldn't get enough of the franchise for years, and almost definitely got this on the day it came out.  It's crap, but that didn't matter because I finally had a game where you controlled Kyle Reese.  Then I got my Mega Drive later in the same year, and got to do it all again with better graphics (47% in Mean Machines?!?1).  I distinctly remember getting stuck on level 2 of this for fucking ages, as Reese dies if he falls from a certain height.  There was no ladder on the building I repeatedly tried to jump from, and as you only get one life it was back to square one straight away every time.  I eventually realised just walking off the building didn't kill him.  FFS.  It's a shit game, but I loved it.  You could kill the cops in this one too - the MD version had police officers that might as well have been Terminators themselves (they'd lie down for a bit after soaking up enough bullets, then flash and stand up again).  Not sure why the MS version escaped the censors - no-one gave a shit, presumably.  Was odd though.  As was the fact that Connor is spelt incorrectly in the cut-scenes, and the game ends with Reese victoriously machine gunning the endoskeleton into a hydraulic press, followed a split second later by a text screen telling the player he's dead.  Young me loved it all.

Owned at the time: Yes
In 1992: I probably would've said 90%
Worth playing without nostalgia: Definitely not, it's a terrible game with some criminal design oversights, and after the first stage the whole thing can mostly be won by just blasting, edging forward and occasionally ducking.  It's also only 4 levels long and can be finished in maybe 12-15mins if you know what you're doing.  That's what you get with games made in Croydon, I guess.



That might be me done for the year, but who knows.

Castle Of Illusion is the best one of that lot. I owned Action Fighter and Vigilante as well. I’ve booted them both up more recently and neither lasted beyond 5 minutes. Those two were the third and fourth games I ever owned. Behind Outrun 3D and the packed-in Space Harrier. The time penalty / life system of Action Fighter is genius.

Moot_Geeza wrote:

Is this a maths thing.

Won’t be playing it again this year, or maybe ever, so here’s number 6 for the year:

6. Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge (PS5) - 23/11 - ?hrs
First playthrough was online 4-player and was a bug-ridden mess. Extremely frustrating. Most of the time, screen got so hectic, we didn’t know what was going on and who was what and where. Cheap bosses, waaayyyyyyy too long, and not enough reason to anything but focus and super, focus and super.
Second playthrough was couch 4-player co-op. There were no game breaking bugs and we had a bit more fun, mostly from being in the same room and just having a laugh. Game was still average but at least we got something out of it.
[5]

Wariospeedwagon wrote:

200!  An insane man.

58. Rogue Legacy II [7]
It's hard not to be impressed with how much beefier this is than the original. It now almost feels like the first game was the prototype, and this is the fully formed vision. And it's considerably better for it, with more variety and twists on the roguelite formula, an endless drip feed of features, and more ingenious design spiralled inside its procedural dungeons. It's still, however, a bit of a pain in the arse. It likes a cheap shot, with mobs ambushing you as you flick to the next screen, barely visible traps, and missile lobbing bastards chucking stuff at you from just out of sight. Also, maybe there's a little to  much to upgrade and unlock, meaning any currency you gather is absorbed very quickly, and permanent advancement becomes absurdly gradual. Fiddling with the details of the difficulty level to suit is an option, but that equally feels like cover for a challenge curve that's too jagged by default. In some ways, then, this is one of the most complete action-platform roguelite experiences around, but that doesn't mean it's consistently enjoyable. 

59. Inscryption [7]
There's real genius here, in a 'card game' that's actually about all the stuff going on around the game itself, with some great narrative turns that send you whirling into places you'd never have expected to go. Perhaps if you're going to make a game that switches styles at certain points, though, you don't want to start with the strongest one, so that everything feels like a bit of comedown from there. The atmosphere in the first few hours is spectacularly suffocating and grim, you're surrounded by mystery, and while the card game is quite simple, the roguelike structure should have you thinking about how to build a competitive deck. But after that, Inscryption kind of exposes itself rather abruptly, and the early sense of anticipation can never return. Still, the story continues to be cleverly done, and there's plenty more to the card game than the first section suggests, even if it's tactically a bit limited. The final act also contains some real highlights, despite not matching the first one overall. I think once it's done and you can zoom out and look at it as a whole, it's kind of brilliant. But when you're in the thick of it, there are chunks where you feel like you're marking time before the next flash of inspiration.

Spent 5 minutes on another game already, eh?

I’m hoping to be at 8 completed before Sunday. 9 if I can push it that far.

I haven't got time for long games. 

208 for some reason please.

Alas that number is somewhat higher

I knew it was a maths thing!

I enjoyed Battle Axe but it's not a very good game. Proves that I'm a sucker for retro style graphics done well (was one of the best looking games I played this year imo). Well done waiting for 75% off though, I bit at 50.

Love a bit of Norm, only got into him after he died but I've spent hours watching YouTube clips this year.

Also, I must spend a good hour a week on the EShop but I'm pretty sure I've never heard of the Milk games.