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GW Retro Review Megathread

Smacktard

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Inspired by @Crazy Jamie's suggestion (and by the knowledge that more than just me and FR care about retro game reviews), I decided to make this thread. I've organized the review by Company (age) > System > Reviewer > Game (alphabetical). If you can think of a better way to organize them, let me know, but I think this system is pretty good. For one, we're not likely to have much overlap in the games reviewed, and for two, each reviewer has their own style, which might be considered more important than organizing by, say, genre.

In order to be posted here, reviews don't need to be formal. They can just be a short blurb with your impressions of the game. I've noticed my reviews are kind of inconsistent, so I'm going to try to put more time and effort into them. I'll also maybe try to write some reviews for other games I've played and missed.

If I missed any of your reviews, or if you post a new review, please link them here and I'll add them to the thread. I think there's probably what can be considered reviews by people like @BigDaddy, @Ants!, @VashTheStampede, @Fire Queen and others, made in some of the console draft threads, if anyone feels like digging around for them and sharing them here.
 
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let me go ahead and whip up my first one. i played an NES classic (not to be confused with the NES Classic) for the first time recently and i walked away a changed person. which one, you ask? why, none other than Action 52. i am very interested in UFO 50 so i decided why not play one of its most direct inspirations first.

for those of you not in the know, which i assume to be very few of you since this is a video gaming forum after all, Action 52 is the grandaddy of them all, where "them all" refers to those 300-in-1 shovelware CDs that opt for quantity over quality. Action 52 is a bootleg compilation of games with a troubled development history, an investor who thought it would be able to spin off an entire media franchise, and some randomly rockin' tunes.

when you boot this bad boy up for the first time, you are greeted by a Yeah! Woo! sample (as heard most famously in It Takes Two) that for sure was not legally used. one screen says LIGHTS. the next says CAMERA. and then you are greeted by one of the cheetahmen (more on them later) as the screen proudly says ACTION 52. a man tells you to Make Your Selection Now. and then you are given a list of 52 games across 3 pages to pick from. i played all of them in order and am here to report back to you.

1. Fire Breather. this the only traditional two-player game on the cart, i.e. the only one that actually allows both players to play against each other at the same time. the other games just alternate if you choose two player. my wife and i tied after eight rounds on eight different maps. it was the kind of game you would play in a dream. it wasn't good. which sets the tone!
2. Star Evil. sounds badass. is not badass. is one of several games that are piss-poor attempts to ape Xevious. as soon as the first level starts, if you don't move within the first second you immediately hit an obstacle and die.
3. Illuminator. a platformer! you're fighting vampires! it's dark! you can only turn on the lights when you shoot a vampire with a flashlight! or something!
4. G-Force Fighters. where star evil was trying to mimic xevious, here we have a horizontal space shooter and therefore one that is desperately trying to take after Gradius. it didn't work. on the main menu screen they only hav eenough room to render the title of this game as G-FORCE FGT. my wife and i had a good laugh over that. see! this game can bring you mirth! by the way Action 52's original retail price was $199 which is over $460 when adjusted for inflation
5. Ooze. the game with the worst jumping mechanics i have ever encountered. there was a contest at the time to win money if you were able to finish all the levels of ooze. it crashes after level 2. classic
6. Silver Sword. this one is trying to be legend of zelda. i think. it didn't work.
7. Critical Bypass. i gotta be honest with you folks. i was never really able to figure out what the fuck is happening in this one.
8. Jupiter Scope. so, imagine space invaders, except it's meteors, and there's no danger of them destroying the city. music is a banger though. a broken game is good twice a day
9. Alfred n the Fettuc. known as Alfredo in the main menu. i really wanted to play this one. it crashes when you try to play it. awesome.
10. Operation Full Moon. another vertical shooter except this time it's a moon buggy. god i wish there was more to say.
11. Dam Busters. one of the more...unique ones. you play as a character who looks an awful lot like winnie the pooh. and you have to go sidescroll and do something. idk. none of these games allow you to backtrack because of the way the scrolling works so this one was hard to get very far in
12. Thrusters. another scrolling space shooter. you might be noticing a theme.
13. Haunted Halls of Wentworth. apparently this had a full-ass title in the manual? anyway this is one of a couple of games in this pak where you're playing as a woman and good god is she about as titted up as i have ever seen any NES sprite be. this is where i noticed that almost every enemy not just in this game specifically but across the entire multipak has enemies that constantly hone in on the player character's present location, making the difficulty curve very stupid.
14. Chill Out. something trying to pass as a snowball fight.
15. Sharks. oh fuck! sharks! if only i had an eye laser that could disintegrate them!
16. Megalonia. scrolling space shooter #458020
17. French Baker. it's like burger time but worse and french, which i know is redundant.
18. Atmos Quake. another space shooter. this one also crashes so bad it's unfinishable!
19. Meong. kind of a. puzzle one? it's like minesweeper plus a maze. it is one of the more playable games.
20. Space Dreams. okay we have another vertical scrolling shooter but this one is inexplicably baby themed. you are a pacifier and you shoot lasers at such things as safety pins and raggedy anns and the letter A. anyway i'm using an action 52 wiki as reference for the order of these games and the article for this one has uh
1737127005120.png
i believe all of this wholeheartedly
21. Streemerz. no this isn't about twitch. you're a clown or something. balloon dogs will kill you. dogg i am not even halfway through these
22. Spread Fire. shooter.
23. Bubble Gum Rossie. the second game to feature a female protagonist. there's even a driving sequence! i did not make it that far.
24. Micro Mike. maybe it was a bad idea to review all of these individually
25. Underground. but the thing is that i am nothing if not willing to commit to the bit
26. Rocket Jockey. especially if the bit is stupid. oh wait i should be reviewing these. this one's a side-scrolling shooter. you're a cowboy on a rocket. also if you don't move within the first couple of seconds of starting you die. it's so fun that there's multiple games here where that's the case
27. Non-Human. one of my favorites of the whole bunch, in whatever sense the word "favorite" applies here. just look at this
F7eD4-3XgAASTwD

this kicks ass. i don't even need to know what's going on or be able to play it to completion. i fuck with whatever they were trying to do here
EDIT: seeing the sprite this big makes it evident that the player character is intended to be a guy in a walking mech rather than a geometric baddie with lidded eyes, which is what i thought. i have chosen to accept my reality as the truth
28. Cry Baby. you play as a baby who i guess doesn't want to go to bed. boring. bring back the sea of evil green bald elton johns
29. Slashers. finally! a beat-em-up! the funniest part is that you don't even need to fight any of the enemies. they just walk right by you after trying to hit you once
30. Crazy Shuffle. i deadass don't remember this one and the page on the wiki has no screenshot so oops
31. Fuzz Power. i hate the guy you play as in this one
32. Shooting Gallery. it's a sidescrolling shooter that doesn't scroll. you can't die or be attacked and you never run out of ammo. we are stretching the limits of what makes a "game"
33. Lollipops. platformer where you are a kid bashing pieces of candy with a lollipop. again i wish there was more to say. or maybe i don't
34. Evil Empire. oh i wonder who the evil empire is. oh wait the background is a bunch of minarets. well time to exit this game. i sure hope there arent any other weirdly racist or xenophobic games in this collection
35. Sombreros. ah jeez
36. Storm Over The Desert. hey wait that sounds a lot like
Storm_over_the_Desert.jpg

well shit
37. Mash Man. remember the guy i hated in fuzz power ? well here he's back and he stomps on guys unless he can't in which case he dies. thank god
38. They Came.... 😏
39. Lazer League. another one i don't remember at all. probably a shooter.
40. Billy Bob. platformer. indiana jones attempt i think? can you tell i'm running out of steam at this point
41. City of Doom. we're so far away from the cheetahmen
42. Bits and Pieces. platformer. you're a zombie? i have no idea
43. Beeps and Blips. well if i'm running out of steam so are they. this is shooter #5802402052
44. Manchester Beat. this one tries to be both a platformer and beat-em-up and fails at both
45. Boss. yet another one i have no memory of and no screenshot on the wiki to help me. yes i could google it but i don't feel like it i'm so close to being done
46. Dedant. you wish this was SimAnt and so do i
47. Hambo's Adventures. fuck yeah! hambo! this one is a donkey kong clone kind of and also you only have one life. good luck!
48. Time Warp Tickers.
1737128551891.png
me too man
49. Jigsaw. like alfredo this one is also broken. sad!
50. Ninja Assault. one of the more playable ones, kind of, unless you get too far in which case the sprites just completely break down lol
51. Robbie N the Robots. ok platformer shooter whatever it's time for the mother
fucking
52. CHEETAHMEN. this is probably the thing that most people are familiar with from action 52. this is the media franchise that some random investor thought would be a huge hit. clearly it wasn't. remember earlier how i said a broken game is good twice a day? and i posted a song that was actually kind of good? well of course they had to give another inexplicable banger to the cheetahmen. also saddam shows up in this one too for some reason

anyway that was stupid. hope everyone liked it!
 

Smacktard

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let me go ahead and whip up my first one. i played an NES classic (not to be confused with the NES Classic) for the first time recently and i walked away a changed person. which one, you ask? why, none other than Action 52. i am very interested in UFO 50 so i decided why not play one of its most direct inspirations first.

for those of you not in the know, which i assume to be very few of you since this is a video gaming forum after all, Action 52 is the grandaddy of them all, where "them all" refers to those 300-in-1 shovelware CDs that opt for quantity over quality. Action 52 is a bootleg compilation of games with a troubled development history, an investor who thought it would be able to spin off an entire media franchise, and some randomly rockin' tunes.

when you boot this bad boy up for the first time, you are greeted by a Yeah! Woo! sample (as heard most famously in It Takes Two) that for sure was not legally used. one screen says LIGHTS. the next says CAMERA. and then you are greeted by one of the cheetahmen (more on them later) as the screen proudly says ACTION 52. a man tells you to Make Your Selection Now. and then you are given a list of 52 games across 3 pages to pick from. i played all of them in order and am here to report back to you.

1. Fire Breather. this the only traditional two-player game on the cart, i.e. the only one that actually allows both players to play against each other at the same time. the other games just alternate if you choose two player. my wife and i tied after eight rounds on eight different maps. it was the kind of game you would play in a dream. it wasn't good. which sets the tone!
2. Star Evil. sounds badass. is not badass. is one of several games that are piss-poor attempts to ape Xevious. as soon as the first level starts, if you don't move within the first second you immediately hit an obstacle and die.
3. Illuminator. a platformer! you're fighting vampires! it's dark! you can only turn on the lights when you shoot a vampire with a flashlight! or something!
4. G-Force Fighters. where star evil was trying to mimic xevious, here we have a horizontal space shooter and therefore one that is desperately trying to take after Gradius. it didn't work. on the main menu screen they only hav eenough room to render the title of this game as G-FORCE FGT. my wife and i had a good laugh over that. see! this game can bring you mirth! by the way Action 52's original retail price was $199 which is over $460 when adjusted for inflation
5. Ooze. the game with the worst jumping mechanics i have ever encountered. there was a contest at the time to win money if you were able to finish all the levels of ooze. it crashes after level 2. classic
6. Silver Sword. this one is trying to be legend of zelda. i think. it didn't work.
7. Critical Bypass. i gotta be honest with you folks. i was never really able to figure out what the fuck is happening in this one.
8. Jupiter Scope. so, imagine space invaders, except it's meteors, and there's no danger of them destroying the city. music is a banger though. a broken game is good twice a day
9. Alfred n the Fettuc. known as Alfredo in the main menu. i really wanted to play this one. it crashes when you try to play it. awesome.
10. Operation Full Moon. another vertical shooter except this time it's a moon buggy. god i wish there was more to say.
11. Dam Busters. one of the more...unique ones. you play as a character who looks an awful lot like winnie the pooh. and you have to go sidescroll and do something. idk. none of these games allow you to backtrack because of the way the scrolling works so this one was hard to get very far in
12. Thrusters. another scrolling space shooter. you might be noticing a theme.
13. Haunted Halls of Wentworth. apparently this had a full-ass title in the manual? anyway this is one of a couple of games in this pak where you're playing as a woman and good god is she about as titted up as i have ever seen any NES sprite be. this is where i noticed that almost every enemy not just in this game specifically but across the entire multipak has enemies that constantly hone in on the player character's present location, making the difficulty curve very stupid.
14. Chill Out. something trying to pass as a snowball fight.
15. Sharks. oh fuck! sharks! if only i had an eye laser that could disintegrate them!
16. Megalonia. scrolling space shooter #458020
17. French Baker. it's like burger time but worse and french, which i know is redundant.
18. Atmos Quake. another space shooter. this one also crashes so bad it's unfinishable!
19. Meong. kind of a. puzzle one? it's like minesweeper plus a maze. it is one of the more playable games.
20. Space Dreams. okay we have another vertical scrolling shooter but this one is inexplicably baby themed. you are a pacifier and you shoot lasers at such things as safety pins and raggedy anns and the letter A. anyway i'm using an action 52 wiki as reference for the order of these games and the article for this one has uh
View attachment 26335
i believe all of this wholeheartedly
21. Streemerz. no this isn't about twitch. you're a clown or something. balloon dogs will kill you. dogg i am not even halfway through these
22. Spread Fire. shooter.
23. Bubble Gum Rossie. the second game to feature a female protagonist. there's even a driving sequence! i did not make it that far.
24. Micro Mike. maybe it was a bad idea to review all of these individually
25. Underground. but the thing is that i am nothing if not willing to commit to the bit
26. Rocket Jockey. especially if the bit is stupid. oh wait i should be reviewing these. this one's a side-scrolling shooter. you're a cowboy on a rocket. also if you don't move within the first couple of seconds of starting you die. it's so fun that there's multiple games here where that's the case
27. Non-Human. one of my favorites of the whole bunch, in whatever sense the word "favorite" applies here. just look at this
F7eD4-3XgAASTwD

this kicks ass. i don't even need to know what's going on or be able to play it to completion. i fuck with whatever they were trying to do here
EDIT: seeing the sprite this big makes it evident that the player character is intended to be a guy in a walking mech rather than a geometric baddie with lidded eyes, which is what i thought. i have chosen to accept my reality as the truth
28. Cry Baby. you play as a baby who i guess doesn't want to go to bed. boring. bring back the sea of evil green bald elton johns
29. Slashers. finally! a beat-em-up! the funniest part is that you don't even need to fight any of the enemies. they just walk right by you after trying to hit you once
30. Crazy Shuffle. i deadass don't remember this one and the page on the wiki has no screenshot so oops
31. Fuzz Power. i hate the guy you play as in this one
32. Shooting Gallery. it's a sidescrolling shooter that doesn't scroll. you can't die or be attacked and you never run out of ammo. we are stretching the limits of what makes a "game"
33. Lollipops. platformer where you are a kid bashing pieces of candy with a lollipop. again i wish there was more to say. or maybe i don't
34. Evil Empire. oh i wonder who the evil empire is. oh wait the background is a bunch of minarets. well time to exit this game. i sure hope there arent any other weirdly racist or xenophobic games in this collection
35. Sombreros. ah jeez
36. Storm Over The Desert. hey wait that sounds a lot like
Storm_over_the_Desert.jpg

well shit
37. Mash Man. remember the guy i hated in fuzz power ? well here he's back and he stomps on guys unless he can't in which case he dies. thank god
38. They Came.... 😏
39. Lazer League. another one i don't remember at all. probably a shooter.
40. Billy Bob. platformer. indiana jones attempt i think? can you tell i'm running out of steam at this point
41. City of Doom. we're so far away from the cheetahmen
42. Bits and Pieces. platformer. you're a zombie? i have no idea
43. Beeps and Blips. well if i'm running out of steam so are they. this is shooter #5802402052
44. Manchester Beat. this one tries to be both a platformer and beat-em-up and fails at both
45. Boss. yet another one i have no memory of and no screenshot on the wiki to help me. yes i could google it but i don't feel like it i'm so close to being done
46. Dedant. you wish this was SimAnt and so do i
47. Hambo's Adventures. fuck yeah! hambo! this one is a donkey kong clone kind of and also you only have one life. good luck!
48. Time Warp Tickers.
View attachment 26336
me too man
49. Jigsaw. like alfredo this one is also broken. sad!
50. Ninja Assault. one of the more playable ones, kind of, unless you get too far in which case the sprites just completely break down lol
51. Robbie N the Robots. ok platformer shooter whatever it's time for the mother
fucking
52. CHEETAHMEN. this is probably the thing that most people are familiar with from action 52. this is the media franchise that some random investor thought would be a huge hit. clearly it wasn't. remember earlier how i said a broken game is good twice a day? and i posted a song that was actually kind of good? well of course they had to give another inexplicable banger to the cheetahmen. also saddam shows up in this one too for some reason

anyway that was stupid. hope everyone liked it!
Hot dang! 52 reviews for the price of one! Sort of. What a bargain!

The Space Dreams controversy was hilarious. Fun read! Was there a single game you played that wasn't complete dogshit and could actually be completed and wouldn't break after a certain point?

I found an Action 52 in the wild at a flea market when I was like 19. I bought it, and my friend broke out his NES and we had a good laugh playing it. We didn't have the fortitude to play every single game, but every one we played was, of course, a piece of shit. In one platformer, the first jump is literally impossible. The obstacle is too high to possibly clear. We ran into the same problem with Alfredo, IIRC, crashing as soon as selected.
 
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The Space Dreams controversy was hilarious. Fun read! Was there a single game you played that wasn't complete dogshit and could actually be completed and wouldn't break after a certain point?
nope! even the ones that were slightly more enjoyable (relatively speaking) to play (non-human, slashers) don't have traditional endings and just bump you back to the start screen once you run out of levels to play. i think the cheetahmen does have a traditional ending but as much as i love the music i didn't feel like going any further than one level lol
 

Smacktard

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Gotcha Force (Gamecube)
Gotcha Force is a robot (borg) battler. It's a 3rd person over-the-shoukder action game that's kind of like a mix between Pokemon and Custom Robo. It's hard to find a relatable comparison since mech games are pretty niche, but I imagine it's sort of like Armored Core for kids.

This game was panned by critics when it was first released, and it's hard not to see why: the gameplay is repetitive, the story mode drags on, the story itself is minimal and poorly delivered, the voice acting is atrocious, the difficulty is all over the place, the music and battle arenas can get repetitive, and, especially at the beginning of the game, it can be a grind to unlock new borgs--and especially borgs worth using.

There is a "world map" so to speak, but it's no more than a glorified menu where you select your next battle. Plot and character developments and are delivered via short speech bubbles before and after certain key battles.

And yet, despite all its flaws, it's actually a pretty good game! To be clear: the repetitive nature of it means that it's probably best played in short bursts. The lack of variety in stages and music can be annoying, but the music is pretty catchy, and the gameplay becomes surprisingly deep and complex as you unlock more borgs. You can become quite creative with your team, and every single enemy you encounter can be unlocked and made part of your team--from gigantic, slow-moving, ice-breathing dragons, to tiny little bomb bots that die if you fart in their general direction, to intercontinental ballistic missile launchers.

There are some pretty creative levels that test your team-building ability and knowledge of various borgs' strengths and weaknesses, but, in truth, these ability tests are fairly few and far between. Most of the game is spent mowing down scrub teams, and punctuated only occasionally by battles that really give you a run for your money.

This game is ALL gameplay. You don't play it for the story, for the minimal amount of awful voice acting (okay well maybe this is actually a good reason to play it), but for the nonstop, balls-to-the-wall, punching, drilling, shooting, slicing, bombing, nuking, zapping, slapping action.

I can understand why this is some people's favorite game on the cube, but too many flaws hole it back from greatness. Still an absolute blast to play, however. And if you have 3 other friends to play against in some competitive couch play, you're in for the time of your lives.

7.5/10
 

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A Hat in Time (Switch)

Ok, I've completed the main game 100%. Haven't touched the DLC yet.

I feel it's a decent modern collectathon platformer. It's good enough for it to be the first game I've completed in years, not including Diablo 3 (which you really don't "complete"). The artstyle is solid stuff. The Hat Girl's facial reactions remind me a little of Windwaker, but it's not as in depth as Windwaker. I like some of the locals and themes. Alpine Skyline is especially eye catching, even on the switch. I loved the chapter's theme, reminds me of the City in the Sky in Twilight Princess, but not as lonely feeling, and doesn't have those weird fucking creatures. I've seen some footage of the Subcon Forest on PC, and it looks AMAZING with all the lighting effects and floating embers in a section of the map. Battle of the Birds probably has some of the best music in the game. Love the Mission Impossible type theme in the first chapter. Most of the hats are fun to use. Some get more use than others. The Sprint hat is really only useful in Subcon to get around faster, as there are a lot of "flat" sections that allow you to take advantage of it (the scooter badge is super helpful). The explosive hat lets you blow up shining boxes, but there are only ever Pons in them (in game currency) and there's rarely an instance where you need to use it (there are Pons everywhere). The Time Stop hat is only good for a single objective, and it's a race where you cheat by stopping time (because the oppenent is cheating by using a rocket). I'm sure, you could use them in boss battles, but I NEVER had a need to use that hat. The dweller's mask is used the most in the game, as they are able to incorperate it into platforming sections. They do a really good job at using the dweller's hat in inventive ways. I do think they could have used it more often, but they chose to put in sections where you ring a bell and it uses the effect of the hat in a specific area. The Ice Hat was my personally most used one... not because I used it a lot, but because it was easily the cutest one. I unlocked the varient that looks like she's wearing a cat beanie, and it instantly became my staple hat. There are some temporary hats, but they're not useful outside of the objectives they're designed for. You can unlock them for permenant usage after completing certain Death Wish challeneges. These temp hats are not just hats, but complete costume changes. One is a detective, one is a parade outfit, and the last is a mail carrier (it turns your scooter into a mail carrier bike). The detective outfit is adorable.

You have the ability to unlock colors, alternate soundtrack themes, and hat flairs, but they're locked behind a fucking gacha machine type device that uses RNG and it can only be used when you have 3 coins. The coins are found in sections of the maps and are limited in quantity. Why can I not buy these things with the pons?! Once you buy all the badges you need and all the levels you need, the pons are useless. It seems that you literally cannot unlock all of the customisables in the game because of the stupid system they use. Also, all the colors I got are shit. Default color seems to be the best, IMO.

The graphics take a hit in the Switch version. I mentioned the embers in Subcon Forest, but that's not the only thing. A major issue I found was the poor anti-aliasing. There are far too many jaggies for a game released in 2019 (the Switch version, mind you). The draw distance also seems to take a hit. I think the distance blur is much shorter on the Switch than on PC from what I've seen.
Not related to the Switch version itself, the character design and animations are very budget release. Obviously, this was a budget title that was made by a small team of people off of donations from a Kickstarter campaign, and not even a massive campaign, either. This was no Mighty No 9 thing. I mentioned Hat Girl's facial expressions being similar to Link in Windwaker, well, that's the ONLY character thay thas any facial animations, and her animations are very lightly detailed. Every other character has very limited animations and almost no facial animations. Mustache Girl seemed to have a couple, but she isn't in the game much and they still didn't animate her much. There is no lipsynicing of the dialog. Hell, character movements don't even fit the dialog. It's just basic movements. The Metro DLC supposedly has better character animation on the main antagonist of the DLC, so they definitely worked to improve on it, but it's disappointing that the animation is so lacking.

Controls are MOSTLY responsive. Running and jumping around works really well. Once you get the hang of the controls, you'll be jumping and skipping through Mafia Town super fast. I say MOSTLY, because there are two issues I had... well, three, but two are focused around a single element: The homing attack. TECHNICALLY, if you are above a foe, you can press Y (on Switch) and you'll dive onto the enemy. You'll know you can do this whenever you see the button prompt pop up on the screen. It's not a quick time event, but a timed button prompt if you want to use it. There's a problem. Sometimes, the button prompt doesn't show up at the time you think it should. Sometimes it still works, but then sometimes it doesn't. It can lead to many instances where it seems like I should have dove on an enemy but I didn't or I dove when I feel like I shouldn't have. This isn't THAT much of an issue as combat isn't that big a deal and most of the time, it's never really a major issue. It didn't make boss battles frustrating, so that's nice. The bigger issue, is when they make that homing attack an aspect of the platforming. It's only done in one section of Alpine Skyline, and it was BY FAR the most frustrating part of the game that didn't involve the tight rope sections.
Speaking of the tight rope sections, this is the other control issue I had. Ignoring how the camera can ruin depth perception causing you to completely whiff on hitting the lines, there are still issues. You can jump on the ropes/lines. The more times you jump, the higher you go. That's all fine and good, they sometimes give you an electircal spark on some of the electrical lines to give you a reason to jump. My issue is that it fights the double jump mechanic. The first jump is very short, so it's pretty easy to get off back to back jumps on the line, no issue. But when you get higher, you want to try to time the jump so the next jump is higher. My brain is conditioned to press and hold the jump button on the way down so I don't mis-time the jump. Therein lies the issue. If you hit jump after jumping on a line, you do your second jump. If you don't let go and repress the button, you land on the line looking like a fucking moron. This is DEFINITELY a skill issue, but goddamn if it wasn't frustrating, especially when you have to deal with the irritating camera, jumping betwene lines and avoiding the shocks. Also, while you can just walk onto a line. you can't walk off a line, even if it looks you should be able to. You have to jump off the line. Super dumb. Also, there was a weird section in Alphine Skyline where I step onto the line, Hat Girl did the tight rope animation and then just fucking phased through the line. Had to be a glitch, as it was the only time I had that happen. Should have been easy to patch out, but it's there.

I've mentioned the camera. It fucking sucks. It's not late 90s 3D platformer or Drake of the 99 Dragons insanity (or worse... Batman Dark Tomorrow), but the camera was still a major source of frustration in some areas. In a perfect world, the camera would constantly aim in the direction that helps you perform platforming easily. It sure tries sometimes, but man it does a shit job. The Camera assist is supposed to be that auto cam that puts the cam in the best possible spot, but it moves FAR too much when you don't need it to, and it is not gentle even when you have the camera smoothing at very slow. Then, it doesn't help you in sections where you NEED it to give you a solid angle, forcing you to turn the camera yourself, but the assist will move back to a position it thinks you need it at. I turned that shit off for almost the entire game becuase it was ACTIVELY making it harder to play. I tried turning it back on for a certain section thinking it would help me but the moment I noticed the awkward movement, I turned it right back off. I do wonder if it would have helped me during boss battles, but outside of the excessively long battle against the Conductor, I never really had much of an issue with the bosses. So, since I have to manually move the camera, there are many instances during platforming where I have to stop and adjust the camera real quick in order to give myself a better angle, it can be irritating when it's a time sensitive jump. There are also instances where the game refuses to let you move the camera. Often it's when your back it to a wall. There's also instances where I'm trying to move the camera to get a wider view and a moving object crosses in front of the camera... except it doesn't, it forces the camera into Hat Girl's face, letting me see the dithering.... annoying. Finally... there is no first person free look. EVEN SUPER MARIO 64 had that shit in 1995. WHAT THE FUCK?! I would LOVE to be able to look at observe where I may want to go. This isn't an issue if I want to go down, but if I want to go up, I can't do that. The camera does not let me look up. I don't know why they decided that looking up was prohibated. Literally the only time you can look up is if you're wearing the default hat and you have a defined objective. (Default hat's ability is to look directly at an objective. That's literally it.)

Speaking off bosses, the boss battle against the Snatcher was probably the most enjoyable boss battle I've ever had in a video game. It didn't feel cheap (like the Conductor) nor too easy. If I ever play through the game again, I don't imagine I'll fear his boss battle. An issue I've seen from people is that there weren't enough boss battles. Not every chapter has one, which I found odd. The first boss battle was utter trash, too. Not hard, just not fun. Boring.

Luckily, any frustration is mostly mitiaged by a generous checkpoint system. There are two types of checkpoints, there's one where when you "die", you restart at that point. Then there's the "you fell from a long distance" checkpoints. You lose one heart and respawn at the location. I've found that you can kinda cheese the respawn location checkpoints. I never purposedly fell (except to do a full restart on an objective because I was low in health and didn't want to spend more time trying to beat a section with only one heart), but there were some instances where the game has you backtrack and if you fall at a spot, it throws you back to a checkpoint that was designed for when you're not backtracking.

There's an issue with the full restart checkpoint, and it's the last thing I have yet to mention in this entire review: Load times. Load times are abysmal for the year this game was made in. Supposedly this isn't just a Switch issue. For WHATEVER reason, when you "die" and load a checkpoint, the entire level needs to be reloaded. All the pons you picked up previously are reset (not in you inventory, mind you, you keep that shit). Because it needs to reset the entire level, the loading time take an age and a half, even if they were literally going to drop you right where you've been spawning for falls.

If you are to get the game, wait for it to go on sale on the Nintendo eShop or Steam (or whatever M$ and Sony have on theirs), and buy the DLCs separately. Do not buy the Ultimate Edition. It doesn't go on sale and all it does is add the DLC to the main game. DLC packs are 5 a piece. Steam has all of the DLC. Consoles are missing the Queen Vanessa DLC pack for whatever reason. You can also get the PS4 release which has the first DLC on the disc and is pretty cheap, and then buy the Metro DLC for 5 bucks.

I hope that if Gears for Breakfast makes a sequel, they improve all of the nagging issues with the game listed above. They made a decent and often enjoyable platformer, but it's rough around the edges at times, and unnecessarily frustrating in sections.

Now, I'm on to Super Mario Odyssey. I saw someone refer this game to a budget Super Mario Odyssey. So, I'm hoping the gameplay found in Hat in Time gave me a crash course in Odyssey's gameplay. And since I expect Nintendo level quality from the game, it should feel MUCH more polished.

Oh, Queen Vanessa's Manor was SUUUUUPER disappointing. It was too short, not scary at all, and Vanessa was easily gimped by the simple mechanic of opening a door and going into another room. I can understand they didn't want to make it too hard for the kids, but man, there was NO challenge in that section. The lead up to the manor was FANTASTIC, though. If you time it right, the manor can come into view just as 1:55 in this track hits like it did for me. OMG, it was fucking awesome. Shame the manor was a total dud. There has been no better lead up to a scene in a game that thematically rivals that of the trip to Queen Vanessa's Manor, and for the actual manor to be a total dud is so disappointing.



It was not that bad...

Edit: I hopped on Odyssey and found that they have first person view set to the right thumbstick click. So, I went back to Hat in Time to see if I made the game harder on myself by not making 100% there was no first person view. Well, right click doesn't do first person view. It opens the sticker wheel if you have the DLC. Pretty sure it did nothing before. I pressed all the buttons to make sure, there is definitely not first person camera... R is the only button that does anything camera related and it's to put the camera behind you.
 
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I'm considering making a non-retro review megathread in the Gaming General forum. Maybe I can ask a mod to move this post there.
If you are to get the game, wait for it to go on sale on the Nintendo eShop or Steam (or whatever M$ and Sony have on theirs), and buy the DLCs separately. Do not buy the Ultimate Edition. It doesn't go on sale and all it does is add the DLC to the main game. DLC packs are 5 a piece. Steam has all of the DLC. Consoles are missing the Queen Vanessa DLC pack for whatever reason. You can also get the PS4 release which has the first DLC on the disc and is pretty cheap, and then buy the Metro DLC for 5 bucks.
After reading your review, I'm still holding out hope that the game gets a definitive physical release somewhere, with all DLC included. It's probably a fool's errand at this point. Maybe I'll eventually purchase it on Steam. But it doesn't sound like you had any Switch-specific issues with it, apart from a few jaggies. Thanks for the thorough review!
 

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Ok, actual Retro review. I haven't completed it (and might not), but I've played enough to have an idea.

Cool Spot - SNES (and to a lesser extent Sega Genesis)

This is a platform game initially released on the Sega Genesis from Virgin Interactive. It's a game where you play as the red spot in the 7-Up logo and you're job is to rescue other spots who have been locked in a cage for whatever reason. In order to unlock the cage, you need to collect a number of cool ppints (that kinda remind me of red Sprees) sprinkled throughout a stage. If you collect enough cool points, you can get access to a bonus level that let's you play for a continue. If you run out of lives, it's game over, but if you manage to collect one of the letters that spell out "UNCOLA" from the bonus levels, you get to continue from the level you were at.

I didn't play the Genesis version much further than the second stage. The controls feel slippery and the camera perks around too much, making it difficult to know where you're going. If there is one positive thing I can say about the Gen version over the SNES version is that the music in the title screen and beach level sounds better thanks to it doing better at replicating the steel drum sound effect. Oh, enemies don't respawn after you die, like they do in the SNES. It's like those crummy Bubsy games where enemies you've defeated stay defeated until you game over.

The SNES version feels really good control wise, the camera is a lot better, as it doesn't jerk around, and it has better graphical detail. Very easy way to tell is the cassette radio in the SNES version of the first level that isn't there in the Genesis level. The third level also has completely different lighting, to give it a more moody setting.

I understand that some don't like the resolution that causes "cropping" on the SNES version, but I didn't really have an issue with blind jumps. The game still let's you move the camera around while stationary to see where you're next jump is. Enemy placement doesn't seen to be as dense in the SNES version, though it might be because there's an "easy" difficulty level making it much more enjoyable to play.

The issue comes later. The first level is a very straight forward left to right platforming level and there's a single alternate path that has you jumping through the sky from balloon to balloon. The later levels have you going left, right, up, down, forwards, backwards, etc. It becomes a total maze. And annoyingly, some levels will have you progress through the whole level again if you miss a jump and fall all the way down. The checkpoints seem to be placed in random spots making it difficult to know which order you should be getting them in. Enemy placement is also kinda garbage. There will be times where you have little to no time to react to an enemy. The rats in the 3rd level are especially irritating because they throw shit at you and take multiple hits and are often placed near power cables (that act like climbable vines).

I stopped playing late in the 5th level, because my finger was hurting and I was getting annoyed that I was unable to progress past a certain point in the level due to lack of proper direction and difficult jumps. Running out of time should not be a thing one needs to worry about on easy difficulty...

Something odd I noticed is that if you pick up a 7-Up one-up item, it makes you impervious to damage instead of giving you another life. At least that's how it seems to work on easy mode.


Might have a review for Prehistorik Man in the near future. Initial opinion is very positive.
 

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Ok, actual Retro review. I haven't completed it (and might not), but I've played enough to have an idea.

Cool Spot - SNES (and to a lesser extent Sega Genesis)

This is a platform game initially released on the Sega Genesis from Virgin Interactive. It's a game where you play as the red spot in the 7-Up logo and you're job is to rescue other spots who have been locked in a cage for whatever reason. In order to unlock the cage, you need to collect a number of cool ppints (that kinda remind me of red Sprees) sprinkled throughout a stage. If you collect enough cool points, you can get access to a bonus level that let's you play for a continue. If you run out of lives, it's game over, but if you manage to collect one of the letters that spell out "UNCOLA" from the bonus levels, you get to continue from the level you were at.

I didn't play the Genesis version much further than the second stage. The controls feel slippery and the camera perks around too much, making it difficult to know where you're going. If there is one positive thing I can say about the Gen version over the SNES version is that the music in the title screen and beach level sounds better thanks to it doing better at replicating the steel drum sound effect. Oh, enemies don't respawn after you die, like they do in the SNES. It's like those crummy Bubsy games where enemies you've defeated stay defeated until you game over.

The SNES version feels really good control wise, the camera is a lot better, as it doesn't jerk around, and it has better graphical detail. Very easy way to tell is the cassette radio in the SNES version of the first level that isn't there in the Genesis level. The third level also has completely different lighting, to give it a more moody setting.

I understand that some don't like the resolution that causes "cropping" on the SNES version, but I didn't really have an issue with blind jumps. The game still let's you move the camera around while stationary to see where you're next jump is. Enemy placement doesn't seen to be as dense in the SNES version, though it might be because there's an "easy" difficulty level making it much more enjoyable to play.

The issue comes later. The first level is a very straight forward left to right platforming level and there's a single alternate path that has you jumping through the sky from balloon to balloon. The later levels have you going left, right, up, down, forwards, backwards, etc. It becomes a total maze. And annoyingly, some levels will have you progress through the whole level again if you miss a jump and fall all the way down. The checkpoints seem to be placed in random spots making it difficult to know which order you should be getting them in. Enemy placement is also kinda garbage. There will be times where you have little to no time to react to an enemy. The rats in the 3rd level are especially irritating because they throw shit at you and take multiple hits and are often placed near power cables (that act like climbable vines).

I stopped playing late in the 5th level, because my finger was hurting and I was getting annoyed that I was unable to progress past a certain point in the level due to lack of proper direction and difficult jumps. Running out of time should not be a thing one needs to worry about on easy difficulty...

Something odd I noticed is that if you pick up a 7-Up one-up item, it makes you impervious to damage instead of giving you another life. At least that's how it seems to work on easy mode.


Might have a review for Prehistorik Man in the near future. Initial opinion is very positive.
I've never understood the resurgence for this game came from. I never heard of it for the first 30 years of my life, then suddenly within the past 3 or 4 years I've seen it everywhere. It's so strange to me since it was just a one-off game that doesn't seem particularly good. I just looks like a Eurojank (I know it's not) platformer.
 

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Just finished Metal Slug: First Mission for the Neo Geo Pocket. Played via the Neo Geo Pocket collection for the Switch. It's quite easy and accessible. Not quarter muncher like the arcade games. I was surprised with how easy it was, but it wasn't a turn-off. I think I'd find it annoying and frustrating if it were much more difficult. The gameplay is less fast-paced and complex than the arcade games, but that's to be expected. I was surprised at how much slowdown there could be in the game. I know this is the Gameboy Color Era, but I was still expecting the Neo Geo Pocket to be more of a beast. The graphics are quite complex for a handheld game, but not especially beautiful. The sound is fine. Overall, it's a decent game. 7/10. I hear the sequel is much better, so I'll be checking that out, too.
 

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Just finished Metal Slug: First Mission for the Neo Geo Pocket. Played via the Neo Geo Pocket collection for the Switch. It's quite easy and accessible. Not quarter muncher like the arcade games. I was surprised with how easy it was, but it wasn't a turn-off. I think I'd find it annoying and frustrating if it were much more difficult. The gameplay is less fast-paced and complex than the arcade games, but that's to be expected. I was surprised at how much slowdown there could be in the game. I know this is the Gameboy Color Era, but I was still expecting the Neo Geo Pocket to be more of a beast. The graphics are quite complex for a handheld game, but not especially beautiful. The sound is fine. Overall, it's a decent game. 7/10. I hear the sequel is much better, so I'll be checking that out, too.
Neo Geo Pocket wasn't really a powerhouse or wasn't pushed far enough to truly show the power it might have had. SNK didn't have much third party support for their systems, so they had to pretty much do everything, and the late 90s had them stretched too thin with all the projects they were trying to do.

Hell, the Pocket Color didn't even have a backlight just like the Gameboy Color didnt. What it did have was that fantastic clicky stick.
 

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Metal Slug: Second Mission is much better than the first. Much less slowdown, more complex missions and a larger variety of weapons, and more fun bosses. The graphics have improved greatly too, with some really complex details in the backgrounds. The sound is a bit better as well. There are a few obnoxious trial and error type deaths, but (with the exception of one obnoxious section which I'll talk about below) plenty of lives as cushion to get through the entire game on your first play without having to use save states (though I did use them). There are additional difficulty modes, and a records area where you can attempt time attacks and see a list of all POWs rescued, with unique information for each one. The worst part of the game is a DKC-style mine cart part. You can slow down the minecart by pressing down, but that ruins all its momentum and makes some jumps over obstacles difficult. The too fast/slow speed and screen crunch make it a lesson in trial and error. Very annoying sections in an otherwise great game.

9/10
 

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Dark Arms: Beast Buster 1999 is much better than the title of the game implies. It's actually quite a good game for a handheld of that era. It's a top-down action-RPG where you customize a variety of weapons, improve them by defeating enemies, "evolve" them into a new weapon type, and power them up with one of three elements (fire, ice, electric). Different weapons work better against different enemies. The story and writing is hard to follow. It's all very obtuse and suffers from some Engrish moments. It's shoved down your throat a bit, but the gameplay makes up for it. There's some exploration elements to the game, a large variety of enemies to fight. Where to go and what to do next can be a bit confusing and ambiguous at times, but not extremely frustrating. I did follow a walkthrough at one point that, because backtracking aimlessly got to be a bit annoying. The game is suitably challenging, but it can be made easier by grinding your weapons. The extra end-game dungeon, a 50-floor ordeal with bosses every 10 floors, doesn't actually take that long to clear, and there are health pick-ups after every boss, but I still opted to use the rewind feature. I just didn't feel like doing it all again, and that last boss can be a real dick. The sound in the game is occasionally good, occasionally messy. Not terrible, though. All in all, quite enjoyed the game. It can be somewhat deep, and it was fun experimenting with the different weapon types. I believe there are about 20 different weapons, but I didn't see them all.

8.5/10
 

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Rockman Battle & Fighters is a great game. It's kind of like a fighting game, but in the style of 8-bit Mega Man. There are actually two games in this one: Fighters 1 and Fighters 2. In each game, you can choose 1 of 3 sets of bosses/enemies to fight against, so it's sort of like 6 fighting games in one (although the final boss will always be the same). You also get to pick between 3 characters in the first game (Mega, Proto, Bass) and 4 in the second (+ King?). There is some basic story line taking place in both games, but it's all in Japanese, so I wasn't able to understand. Zero is referenced in one of the second game's endings, though.

It's typical Mega Man style, so imagine defeating bosses, unlocking weapons, and then using them against bosses that are weak to them. The combat is fun and fluid, but it's not that challenging. You have unlimited continues and if you die against an enemy, you respawn immediately and they maintain their health. In the first game, bosses are selected randomly from a "set". In the second, you choose the order. Each "set" of bosses is from a different generation of games. Mega Man 7 is represented, and it's kind of cool to see those bosses made into 8-bit sprites. I just wish Mega Man 8 was part of these games, too.

Overall, pretty good way to waste an hour or so beating all modes in this game. There are gallery options where you can acquire bosses you defeat. They're occasionally awarded randomly after you beat them. Not a fan of RNG elements like that, and I couldn't read the Japanese text, so I had no desire to 100% it. Still, a fun game, overall.

9/10
 

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Ok, here are my thoughts on most of the NES games I own or owned. Um... I imagine there will be some disagreement with these "reviews"...

1943 - 1943 is a fun, easy to play SHMUP… as long as you have a turbo function on your controller/system. It can get repetitive, and the graphics are nothing special, but it plays really well and has just enough variety to keep one interested. Plus, it has an upgrade system that I don't really understand how it works because I only saw the upgrade menu at the start of the game. Oh, and this is a MASSIVE upgrade over 1942. Capcom actually developed this port, unlike the first game. It shows in the game's quality.

Adventures of Dino-Riki - This is a SHMUP from Hudson Soft (Bomberman) where you play as a caveman who shoots at his foes. The massive crux of this entire game is the fact that you can only have a limited number of shots on screen at a time. This means turbo functions are useless. Everything else wouldn't be as much of an issue if the game allowed you to continuously spam your projectiles. The game throws a shitton of enemies in your direction and you have a dinky weapon that can only shoot two bullets at a time. You can power up your weapon and it becomes much easier to hit and kill enemies and it seems to give you more projectiles to toss out, but you are still limited in projectiles. Also, while the game isn't OHK, it makes up for that by making it so that each time you take damage, you lose power. Riki moves like he's stuck in molasses. There is a powerup that allows him to speed up. However, like weapon powerups, if you take damage, you lose that speed boost. There's also platforming sections, for some reason. It's a top down shooter with platforming sections. In the first level, there's a section where you have to jump on a series of lily pads. Some disappear and reappear. Problem: You are constantly moving. Even if you aren't pressing the d-pad, you are constantly moving forward, regardless of where you are on the screen. Riki's movement and the screen scroll are not independent of each other. This wouldn't be awful if there weren't any platforming sections. As such, if you jump on a lily pad, you have to occasionally tap down to stay on the lily pads. Based on reviews, the platforming sections get even worse. Moving platforms, for instance.

Blaster Master - Blaster Master is the Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde of video NES games (and I don't mean like the ACTUAL Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde NES game). On the Dr Jekyll side, you've got the fantastic vehicle sections. On the Mr Hyde, you've got the top down on-foot sections.

The game starts you in the vehicle. You drive around in non-linear side scrolling map, akin to Metroid. The vehicle performs perfectly. It drives like a dream, and when you've got special weapons, you feel like you can take on almost any obstacle. Later on, you get access to a hover ability and the ability to climb down walls without falling down into gaps. Both of these allow you to access areas that you couldn't previously access, again, like Metroid. There is noticeable slowdown when there starts to be too many moving sprites on the screen as the NES does, but otherwise, it works flawlessly, and makes exploring fun. The graphical detail in the overworld as well as the animations in your vehicle (and when your little guy is outside of the vehicle) are quite good. The music, while catchy, can get repetitive as you explore the areas for long periods of time. Sound effects are effective if unremarkable (to me).

Unfortunately, while your time in the vehicle is great, the time you spend walking on-foot absolutely drags the game down. You see, there are parts that you can only enter on foot. When you enter these areas, the aspect changes to a top down shooter type game, akin to Commando. The issue isn't really the controls. It works fine for what feels like you're playing a twin stick shooter with a d-pad and 2 buttons (same with Commando). However, the issue is in regards to the level design and how the power leveling for your gun works. Firstly, when you switch to on-foot, you get a second meter on your screen above your power level. It's your gun power level. As you collect certain icons, you're gun power increases from a weak peashooter to a screen clearing weapon that hits everything you can see. However, if you take damage, you lose your power level. In order to up your gun power, you have to grind on-foot areas filled with items hiding under blocks and infinitely respawning enemies. This is also your primary way of getting secondary weapons for your vehicle. This is a practical requirement if you intend to do anything in this game that only gets harder and harder as you go, and as such, it becomes EXTREMELY tedious. To make matters worse, the only time you encounter bosses, it's in these on-foot sections… and if you die to the boss, your gun level is reset to the base level. Why not just respawn you at the checkpoint with the power level you were at?
Well, that's because the game has a limited live and continues system. That's right. A Metroidvania style game with limited lives and continues. They can't reset you to your previous status upon a death. As such, if you go back into that boss battle for another go, you're stuck with base level gun power, which makes boss battles seem to take AGES… assuming you can even survive. This adds to the games tedious-ness as you then need to go hunting for weapon power-ups again, which might mean an obnoxious amount of backtracking and mining.

The game is absolutely ruined by it's on-foot sections, and considering how much people talk about this game, I wonder how many of them just completely forgot about how awful the on-foot sections were. Future re-releases supposedly fixed the issues present in the NES game.

One last thing… no password or battery back-up saves. You have to beat the entire game in one go. A game that will take you about 90 minutes to complete if you know where to go and you get lucky with the random pick-ups.

Castlevania - Castlevania is pretty solid stuff. Solid controls. Detailed graphics. Catchy tunes. Fun weapons and items. NO TIME LIMIT. Fair boss battles. I would say that some enemies are cheap, and they love to respawn. This game uses a knockback when damaged system and it can lead to cheap feeling deaths because it turns a game with a health system into a OHK game in some areas. Also, while there's a host of fun weapons, the Holy Water seems to be the meta ability as it freezes bosses in place allowing you to spam your normal attacks on them. Also, you have to watch out to make sure you don't accidentally pick up a weapon you don't want because it replaces the weapon you're using. There are some times where a shitty item will drop in front of your face and/or you'll die at a spot that puts you at a checkpoint that does not give you enough time to pick up a special weapon. It can feel unfair and might force you to just kill yourself so you restart the chapter. TBH, I wish there was an option to reset to the beginning of a chapter. Sometimes, it takes a little time to find a place where you can quickly kill yourself. Also, I feel the whip is inconsistent at times, especially when you're attempting to kill someone that is in your face or are shooting projectiles at you. It can feel unfair at times, but because you can just restart at the beginning of a chapter when you game over, it's not too frustrating. Castlevania is a quality game. It mostly lives up to it's reputation and has mostly aged pretty well.

Commando - This is one of the early CAPCOM ports that CAPCOM actually developed and it MOSTLY shows. My issue with the game, though is that it's a twin stick shooter but you're using an NES controller. Enemies can spawn from all around you and forcing you to deal with people behind you. It's a pain to deal with when you only have a D-Pad and two buttons. Frustrating to play. Performs really well for an early NES game. On a technical side, Commando is really good. Just a shame it's on the NES.

Double Dragon - Double Dragon on the NES plays fine mostly, but the two enemy limit on the screen intended to keep the framerate from chugging makes the game a total bore. Also, in order to adjust to the NES' limited graphical power, they took the art style used in Renegade (and later River City Ransom). Hit boxes kinda blow and enemies can be kinda cheap. I'm not really a fan of this game. Just about the worst thing a game can be is boring and that's what the NES port of Double Dragon is.

Duck Hunt - You can't play this without the zapper. I can't remember the last time I was able to play Duck Hunt… There isn't much to the game, regardless. Shoot ducks or the dog laughs at you. There's also a skeet shooting mini game.

Duck Tales - Most of my experience with Duck Tales is via the Gameboy version, but from what I've seen and played, they're the exact same game, but the NES version has color. Duck Tales is really good. Unlike many Capcom games of the time, Duck Tales isn't too incredibly hard. Just learn how to pogo jump everywhere and you'll be solid. Like the Mega Man games, they let you pick which level to play, allowing you to just go right for the Moon to hear the classic Moon theme.

Faxanadu - This game is ugly, but that's the point. Your character has returned to a home that is practically desolate and dying. Gameplay is mostly comparable to Zelda 2's side scrolling sections. Early combat kinda sucks and your character can't crouch meaning you HAVE to use magic attacks on enemies. If you die, how much money you respawn with is dependant on your character's level. It's a pretty unique system. The platforming fucking sucks. It won't be long before you encounter jumps that will seem to be impossible, but you have to get momentum and pixel perfect accuracy. Super weird choice. I haven't gotten far enough to encounter this issue, but I've seen people complain about the limited inventory system and forced backtracking if you don't have the proper number of keys. Because they didn't invest in a battery backed system, you're stuck with a password system. Unlike many other NES games, where the passwords are just words representing a specific level, this game has long passwords that are just a bunch of random letters. It makes sense since it's an RPG, but they REALLY should have used a battery backup.

Gauntlet - The NES version of Gaunlet is unique in that it's not a direct port of the arcade game. It's got all of the elements of Gaunlet, but the levels are completely different and there are a LOT of levels. It's also technically impressive as it manages to have a shitton of moving enemies on screen with NO slowdown, because they made the enemies background items instead of sprites. The gameplay itself can be a little rough around the edges as it's gridbased, though you can attack diagonally (which will be important as some enemies and generators). You can't move while attacking, which can be a pain if you're trying to advance through a hoard of enemies to get to the generator that spawns them. You can technically brute force your way as enemies die when they touch you, but you take damage as well and there are a lot of enemies. Your health is also your timer. If you run out of health, it's game over. Luckily, there are healing items throughout the levels to help you stay alive but your timer is constantly counting down meaning you can't afford to take your time. Your health doesn't reset at the end of a level, either (except if you find the end of a bonus level). You can occasionally find pick ups that increase your max health. Unfortunately, while the NES was tecnically capable of 4 players if you had the extension, this version of Gaunlet only supports two players, which if you know anything about Gaunlet, you know that this game really excels in 4 player quests. Still, despite the repetitive (though catchy music), weak graphical detail (outside of the fancy trick to keep framerates consistent), mazelike level design, and dated combat mechanics, the game is a fun "pick up and play" type game and I don't think Atari has ever re-released this version on modern consoles, it was only ever the arcade version, making the NES version unique.

Golf (1984)- Golf is hard. Not just the game IRL, but this game, too. Actually, it might be harder to play in this game than IRL. This was co-developed by Hal Labs of Kirby fame. This game pioneered the classic 3 button tap process to determining the speed an accuracy that most golf games used until Tiger Woods 04 added a "true swing" function. First starts the swing, second determines the strength, and third determines how far your draw or fade goes (or hook and slice if you do it poorly). For an NES game it works just fine and since it was the game that pioneered the system, it has it's place in history. The issue is that after you hit the button the second time, you have very little time to hit it the third time, especially if you are waiting on the meter to come back down before you hit it the second time. If you only hit the button once, Mario completely whiffs. This isn't usually an issue… until wedges come into play. Wedges are evil in this game. I can't judge how on earth wedges fucking work in this. There's no consistency. The three button system doesn't work for this. Putting is two buttons, one to start the wing and the other to determine how far you launch it off the green. Green readings are fine. It's hard to putt, but the arrows on the green do it's job. It's a shame it's only one direction, but it's a 1984 game. Also, because it's a 1984 game, there are no drivers, and my guy can't hit the ball for shit. I had to use a 3 wood on a 220 yard par three just to get it to the green. Hell, because of the wind on another par three attempt, I whipped out the 1 wood and still barely made it on the green. The wind has TOO much input on where your ball goes. 10-15 MPH winds should not impact that ball THAT much… There's no music, the sound effects are limited. The graphics are fine for 1985. There's nothing special about the graphics. I wish there was a scale or something so you could tell how far the yardage was in each hole because not all holes have the same yardage but they all take the same amount of space on the screen. Also, it would be nice if they provided a "yards to the hole" metric. They only give the total yardage from the tee to the hole.

Gyruss - This is a "tube shooter". Sort of like Tempest. I quite like this game. It's not too hard at the start, but doesn't just stay easy. It allows you to get familiar with the game mechanics and feel comfortable with the game so that when the hard stuff comes, it doesn't feel like a brick wall from hell. The difficulty increases gradually. The graphics are nothing special, but it all looks very clean and easy to see things. The audio is solid, though based on the stereo sound I heard from the arcade version, it could sound a whole lot better. I also understand that the Famicom Disk System version has better audio as well. There isn't a whole lot of weapon variety. You have a single shot which upgrades to a double shot when you get the pick up. You have a select number of special attacks that are easy to come by through play and should definitely be used against bosses.

Kung Fu - This game did NOT age well. On a plus side, enemy variety is pretty solid, and spawns are random enough to keep it fresh. Unfortunately, controls feel sluggish, definitely feels dated. Attack variety is poor, only a punch and a kick (both of which you can also do while jumping or crouching). Music is repetitve, and sound effects are muffled. Graphics are colorful, but there's not much to backgrounds. There's two difficulty modes and multiplayer (alternating). There are only 5 levels. Once you beat those 5 levels, you restart from the beginning except it's harder. Still a classic, just a classic that has aged poorly.

Legend of Zelda - This game is a fucking classic. This was the first NES game I ever played. The music and graphics are great, it uses a battery backed save system instead of a stupid password system. Yes, the combat system is limited until you get more items, and a lot of clues are extremely cryptic/useless and some secrets are in baffling locations, but I always found enjoyment just exploring the overworld.

Legendary Wings - I don't like this game. This is a SHMUP that switches between vertical and horizontal scrolling. I appreciate that if you have your weapon leveled up, and you get hit, you don't instantly die, but lose a power level. However, the early level weapons fucking suck forcing you to do more dodging than anything. I also think it's ugly. The animation of the character you play looks off to me. This is a well liked game by many who have played it, but I can't find myself enjoying it even with the Game Genie codes enabled (which don't even seem to work consistently).

Little Samson - Why Taito hasn't re-released this game in any capactiy is baffling to me. This is probably one of the best non-Nintendo games on the NES. I haven't played much, because I want to properly sit down and play through the game, but I've played through the first bit that gives you a sample of all 4 characters that you'll be able to swap to throughout the game, and these controls and game design are really good. The sound, music, and graphics are all fantastic, as well. The hook to this game is that all 4 characters play differently and have strenghts and weaknesses and some are better used in some areas. You can swap characters at any time, kinda like how you can swap abilities in the Mega Man games, but unlike Mega Man, you have access to all 4 the whole game after the introductory period. Little Samson may not be worth the nearly 3k the cart alone is fetching for, but it is a top notch NES game. Totally worth buying an NES everdrive or repro cart. Only problem I have is that it uses password saves to track progress.

Mach Rider - I'm a sucker for Mach Rider. The best comparison I have is Hang-On except in a Mad Max wasteland, with a course creator, something that Nitendo also used for Excitebike. I love the Mach Rider theme. The gameplay took me a bit to get used to, but once I had it figured out, the game becomes a lot of fun. There's not a whole lot of substance outside of the course creator, and the graphics are ugly (early NES game and all), some course obsticles are hard to avoid (especially later on), and there's only one tune, but this game holds a special place in my heart. I prefer this to Hang-On, too.

Ninja Gaiden - Ninja Gaiden is really good… until it isn't. There is a LOT of cheap bullshit going on in this game. Poor enemy placement. Enemies constantly spawning off screen. The knockback system that forces numerous insta-deaths, like Castlevania. Bosses are nearly impossible unless you have a special weapon, and you're left to the whims of the pick up system. The shurikens seem to be the most useful, but like Castlevania, you can only carry one special at a time and if you pick up one, it replaces the other, and unlike Castlevania, some items are on timers and once that timer runs out, you no longer have a special. For instance, both Castlevania and Ninja Gaiden have an item that freezes everything in place for a moment. In Castlevania, it lasts a couple seconds and you can use it again as long as you have hearts. In Ninja Gaiden, it's one time use and it's used the second you pick it up. I'm not a fan of the wall clinging system, either. Be nice if you could just climb or if your jumps got more air. It's fine in the first level, but later levels it becomes a hindrance and a way to pad out the length of the game. There also seems to be a delay after you do something. I feel like jumping and then turning around to deal with a foe quickly coming from behind is janky as fuck, sometimes I can quickly turn around, other times, I can't. The ninja's jump feels like shit. Attacking mid-air is inconsistent. This game feels difficult because of poor design, not because it was hard. The game can play fast if you know how do deal with the bullshit and avoid the useless items, but the game is suuuuper cheap and unfair. Also, levels have checkpoints, but if you die fighting a boss, you go ALL THE WAY BACK TO THE BEGINNING OF THE STAGE, not to the last checkpoint. For a mid-era NES game, this game is kinda ugly, too, though that might be by design. This game is considered a classic. I don't see it. Castlevania is MUCH better. It honestly feels like Tecmo trying to copy Konami's system, but making everything slightly worse. Also, I think the Game Boy Ninja Gaiden game plays better. Also, annoyingly, this version of Ninja Gaiden never got re-released so I can't even take advantage of save states. It got a "re-release on the SNES in trilogy collection and that version also made it's way onto the Ninja Gaiden Xbox reboot as a bonus, and the arcade version is on the Switch, but this NES version is not on anything.

R.C. Pro Am - I dislike isometric racing games like RC Pro Am. I can't tell where I'm going. It requires track memorization than anything, and that is not fun. Graphics and sound are nothing to right home about. I guess it controls fine, but that's not saying much.

Rad Racer - "Racing" game from Square. Mostly known for the 3D included. I don't know if it's the glasses or modern TVs, but the "3D" effect doesn't work. It's supposed to work with red-blue 3D glasses, but it doesn't. It uses a flickering style of 3D where it flickers between the two images. I don't really like the graphics outside of the 3D, either. The graphics are very plain looking. The screen shake effect when you're using turbo is pretty nice. Night track visuals are pretty cool, but the background scrolling is not very good, only half of it scrolls. The music isn't all that catchy, either. Game is kinda like Outrun without the branching paths. You have to make it through checkpoints before you run our of time. There is no one to race, just the time. There are cars on the road, but that's it. I don't like how your car just pinballs off of other cars. Time limit is FAR too tight, even with the "more time" code enabled. If it wasn't for the 3D, this game wouldn't have any notoriety.

Rad Racer 2 - IMO, a much better game compared to Rad Racer 1. It removes the 3D but the backgrounds have better detail and scrolling. Controls are tighter, and the sense of speed is much better. Also, I love the two music tunes they have in this game. The previous had 3, but none of them were memorable. The two in this game are much more memorable and catchy. Unfortunately, car engine and turbo sound effects are lost when the music is playing. Skidding and crashing sound effects are there, but not the engine. Must have been a tradeoff to make better songs. You still bounce off of cars like a pinball, but you aren't flung as far, making it easier to course correct. Time limit is still tight as hell. I haven't been able to finish any of the tracks. At least it's easier to choose a track. They have an in game cheat instead of forcing you to use Game Genie codes. Rad Racer 2 is not the best game, but it's definitely better than the first game.

Sky Destroyer (Famicom) - This game was only released in Japan. This is an on-rails shooter from Taito that might have been the precursor to After Burner. This plays like a very simple version of After Burner. You fly through the sky, and shoot at incoming planes and try to avoid incoming fire. There is no barrel roll move and no lock-on. You also only get 3 lives and no continues. You do get torpedoes to kill boats. You can also fly right into the water if you want (you lose a life). Because of the limited lives and lack of continues, it's hard to get far. It's not like the game is hard to play, but the shots from the enemy can seem hard to avoid sometimes, because of the weird hitboxes. Sometimes it'll feel like I should have gotten hit and didn't and other times, it feels like I should have avoided it and still got hit. Same goes for shooting enemies down. Just wonky hitboxes. The graphics are fine, but there's very little in the way of variety. It's mostly the same sky and water. The planes all look the same save for a different color. Based on the demo that plays, you eventually see islands but that's it. I did like the details regarding planes that are further away. Sometimes planes will pass behind clouds, and if you shoot down planes that are far away, you can see them careen towards the water instead of just disappearing like they do if you kill them when they're closer. At the end of the afternoon portion, a bomber flies overhead and starts to shoot at you. You can't kill it because the game doesn't let you fly high enough to kill it. Audio is acceptable, there's no annoying sound effects, but the events are very minimal. You mostly only hear your gun and your plane engine. There's only brief music in the menu and the start of a life. There is no in game music. When music is playing at the start of your life, you can't hear any sound effects. Oh… and there's no inverted controls. Up flies you up, instead of down like every other flying game, there are no options to change that. Another weird thing about the game is that there's no Japanese. It's all in English, despite this never getting a release outside of Japan.

Slalom - Skiing game by Rare. This game is on Rare Replay and a bought it before realizing it was a Rare game. It's nothing special. I don't like that I have to press forward on the d-pad to speed up. Makes it too easy to accidentally turn too much. Each time you miss the flag, your skier automatically slows down, and some of the gaps in the flags are minuscule. Other skiers can get in the way of attempting to navigate into the flag gates. Graphics are fine. Decent scaling effects for an NES game, but the mountains all seem to have the same background. Your skier has a big dumpy, though, and when he leans forward to ski faster, he's showing it to the world. Music and sound effects do the job. Nothing memorable.

Star Force - Dull lifeless space SHMUP from Tecmo. Only one upgrade and it only makes you shoot faster. Graphics and sound effects are dull. There's little variation in the level design. It plays well enough, but it's just so uninteresting. I also found an annoying problem with the game when I enabled infinite lives. Every time you die, you don't go back to the beginning of the stage to retry things so you can get familiar with patterns. It LOOKS like it because the spawning location is always the same, but the enemies that you see and the patterns used are completely different. It becomes insanely frustrating to play even though you know that your deaths don't mean anything. Also, there's a super annoying enemy that if you shoot it, it breaks into 4 pieces that descend towards you in a spread motion. If you don't shoot it, it just follows you around until it hits you. These enemies always come in packs, too. It's super annoying. Also, this game is one of those OHK games, where you get hit once and you die. This game is not worth holding onto. I feel like I've given this game too many changes to change my mind.

Street Fighter 2010: The Final Fight - This is the second time I've attempted to play this "Street Fighter" game. I initially bought it because the title was "Street Fighter" and I thought this was the prequel to Street Fighter 2 (this was before I had easy access to the internet, I also thought that Street Fighter Alpha 3 ws the third SF game, not the third of the prequel series). It is supposedly set in the SF universe (somehow) and the main character's name is Ken. First time I had this game, I couldn't figure out what the fuck I was supposed to do. There is no indication as to how you're supposed to play, or that you can climb walls and shit. I gave up and got rid of it. I reacquired the game after I watched a video of a Youtuber named Ryukar who used to focus heavily on Mario Maker content while making obnoxiously difficult levels look easy as pie. He made SF 2010 look MUCH easier and more enjoyable than it definitely seems. The game's combat is janky and unwieldy. You start off pretty weak and have to look around for power ups, but if you take damage, your power level decreases. Enemies in the first level constantly respawn making it difficult to contend with the levels's "boss" enemy who has irratic movement. Even when I made my character invincible, it felt like a pain in the ass because of how the game plays and the constant stream of enemies. Also, the framerate is not consistent, it likes to dip all the time, which does not add to the experience. If you can get used to how the game plays, and avoid taking damage, the game seems like it could be fun.

Super Mario Bros - I've never been a fan of the physics in this game, nor the fact that you can't go back in a level. I grew up with Super Mario World and got more of my Super Mario Bros experience in Super Mario All-Stars. I will never say it's a bad game and I am definitely bad at it, but IMO, it didn't age nearly as well as the other two games did. I respect it for the impact it has had on the industry... but man, this game didn't age nearly as well as the other Mario games.

Super Mario Bros 2 - Anyone who uses Peach is a cheater. Also, tiny Mario is adorable. The graphics are a MASSIVE step up from the first game. Even ignoring the fact that it wasn't supposed to be a Mario game, this was by far the better choice than what became the "Lost Levels" here in the US. This game is good fun. I don't like the screen shifting when you move to a screen above or below you. Each time you move into a different screen, the enemies respawn. You have no idea how much I wish I new about the shortcut in the first level that puts you right behind Birdo when I was younger. I despised the vine climbing section.

Super Mario Bros 3 - Another game ruined by Super Mario All-Stars for me. Where's the fucking title screen music, Nintendo? Where? Otherwise, it's Super Mario Bros 3. Plays really well even today. I like that they show you that you can slide on your butt on slopes. Only problem is the fact that sound effects can interupt the music because of how limited the NES' sound chip is. Not really a game issue, though I feel like better sound choices would have helped. I think the GBA version is the best simply because of the e-reader cards.

Tecmo Bowl - Most will probably state that Tecmo Super Bowl is the better game. They might be right. Tecmo Bowl only has about a dozen teams to choose for, but there are no team names. You can't choose your opponent. You only have 4 plays on offense and defense to choose from. The graphics are fine. Tecmo Super Bowl proved it could be a lot better. And based on videos discussing it, "a lot" is underselling it.

Wrecking Crew - Classic Nintendo puzzle "platformer". You go through increasingly complex levels filled with enemies to avoid and need to destroy everything. There is no time limit, but there fireballs will start to come from the side and become another obsticle in your quest to wreck everything. You can easily screw yourself over if you destroy the wrong ladder, requiring foresight into which order you destroy stuff in. The music can get repetitive as there's only one tune during normal play and it isn't very long before it repeats. There's a bonus level tune, and a start and end level tune, but while playing normal levels, it's the same tune. Luckily, it's a catchy one. Graphics are fine for an early NES game. I'm not much of a puzzle game guy, but Wrecking Crew has a special place in my heart. Shame the Smash Bros level based on it sucks.


Games I'm still working on:

- Legacy of the Wizard
- The Guardian Legend
- Metroid
- Xexyz
- Section Z
- Excitebike
- Bionic Commando
 

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Hell yeah, those are some great reviews. I had no idea Master Blaster had limited lives. What an insane design choice.

I liked the description of Faxanadu, and despite the negatives, I'm still looking forward to playing it.

Little Samson may not be worth the nearly 3k the cart alone is fetching for
2k 🙃
 

Fool's Requiem

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So, I used my arcade emulation station to try out the original arcade release of Gyruss. The NES version may have slightly worse graphics and sound quality, but everything else is better. Arcade version has only one button, meaning that you only shoot your primary and there is ONE upgrade. The NES version makes the usage of both buttons giving players a secondary strong weapon with limited ammo. The arcade version also doesn't have bosses nor a feeling of level progression that the NES provides by having you progress through the solar system.

It might be a little easier to control the rotation of the ship via an analog controller but both versions worked almost exactly the same in that the direction you press on the controller will be the location where your ship will move to.

The NES version also has an alternate control config, which I feel has to be a rarity for the time. The alternate control config basically makes it so that pressing left or right on the D-pad determines whether you movie clockwise or counter-clpckwise around the invisible circle. I didn't like it, felt that the default controls worked really well.

Games like the NES version of Gyruss is one of those games that tells me that this quest for hunting for retro games is not pointless.
 

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Jumping Flash

Started this game a little over 1.5 hrs ago, and I've already completed it. I don't think that's a strike against the game, though. I love short, fun experiences that don't overstay their welcome, and this game is exactly that.

This game is unique in that it's one of the first 3D platformers ever. I believe it's actually the second 3D platformer ever made, after Alpha Waves, which is barely playable and looks like more of a tech demo than a game. It came out in 1995, a year before Super Mario 64 revolutionized the 3D platformer. In this game, you're in 1st person, and the game uses tank controls to move, though you are able to strafe while jumping if you hold the jump button. You can jump up to three times -- twice mid-air. You can also fire bullets, and special weapons you collect throughout the stages and from fallen enemies. You can also damage enemies by jumping on and bouncing off of them.

There are 6 worlds, each with three levels, one of which is a boss at the end, except for the sixth world, which has two boss levels. In each non-boss level, you have to collect 4 carrots (fuel tanks) and find the exit. It's a bit like a collectathon.

The controls can take some getting used to, but considering the game was developed for the OG PS1 controller, it's entirely serviceable. Hell, it's even quite good! After your second jump, your body sort of pitches forward and you can see your shadow, and where you'll land. The controls work pretty well, but there are two quirks to the controls that you need to be understand in order to get the most enjoyment:
1. You can strafe while jumping if you hold the jump button
2. If you try to double/triple jump from a height lower than your previous level, your jump fails. I don't think this is explained anywhere, but once I figured it out, I stopped whiffing jumps.

The music is kind of arcade-y. The graphics are pretty good. There's a radar that shows enemies around you, too. The draw distance is not bad, but sometimes it's unclear where some of the fuel tanks are because they're only highlighted once you get close enough, so some guess work is sometimes involved. It only gets bad in a couple of the later levels, though.

The levels are varied and enjoyable to navigate, and the boss fights are fun and varied too. There's never really a sense of unfair challenge. There's plenty of chances to get 1-Ups, and I only died two or three times (though I did almost die at a couple of the bosses). Still, I wouldn't say the game is a cakewalk. It has that nice gameplay feel where the action still feels tense, where you still have to master the controls and move with intent, where you sweat at some of the jumps.

Excellent game. I really enjoyed my time with it. It's an all-time classic, and a must-play for fans of the 3D platformer genre.

9/10
 

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Ghost in the Shell (PS1)

I wasn't even aware this game existed until a few months ago, but it got good reviews, so I picked it up. I popped it into my PS3 not knowing what to expect. I thought the game would be a 3D action game, but... not quite.

It's a mech game with, yup, tank controls! You have a strafe option that moves you around much faster though, and almost makes you untouchable in firefights. This game is more of a circle-strafer than anything. Still, the scenarios are pretty varied, there's plenty of enemy types, and it's another short game that doesn't overstay its welcome.

Besides the quintessential strafe buttons, you have a standard machine gun burst when rapid-firing square, or homing rocker attacks that build up and then disappear if not fired quickly enough. It adds a timing element to fights, which do require you to aim in the direction of the enemy to hit them, so it works pretty well to add a bit more challenge to the game. Another weapon is a bomb, which really doesn't do that much damage, but can be helpful at times. Of course, there's a jump button, but the most interesting feature is that you can also on walls, ceilings, etc. It works really well. In fact, all of the game's systems work perfectly together. There's even a radar that is quite useful for anticipating and dealing with enemies. Best of all, there's a compass that shows EXACTLY where to go next in the level. No vague directions, no "am I supposed to be on this floor?" It perfectly guides you from waypoint to waypoint in a 3D space that can sometimes be quite mazelike so that you are never feeling lost. It's an incredibly impressive and feature for a game from this era--really ahead of its time.

The game isn't too challenging, but it does demand some level of skill and effort. If you die, you get kicked back to the title screen, but you can start from the same level you died at using the level select.

The soundtrack is dope as hell, too. It's this 90s German-electric style music that fits well with the atmosphere of the game, and adds a feeling of urgency and danger. It's not the type of music I would ever choose to look up and listen to, but it's perfect in this game.

There are 12 stages, from maze-like levels to open world levels to timed "search and destroy" style levels, and even on-rails types. Each level ends with a boss fight that can be quite hectic. All in all, it only took about 2-2.5 hours to finish. Apparently you can unlock something if you finish the whole game in one sitting without dying, but I'll pass on that.

Great and often overlooked game. Very enjoyable playthrough.

8/10
 
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