Top 5 games of 2021

The usual rules apply; the game must have been on a physical media to count (unless there’s significant merit for it), 2021 must have been the year I’ve first time have had a copy of the said game, and the year of production doesn’t matter. As usual, these are not in any sorted order; the first listed game doesn’t mean it is better than the four after it. With all that laid out, I’ve noticed that I haven’t really played many new games this year, and have concentrated on older titles instead. theHunter: Call of the Wild ends up being my to-go stress reliever still from the last year, while certain other titles serve other roles on the side.

I admit that once again, I’ve found my resources being invested in other matters. A new home has taken a significant toll on me in many ways as has human relations. A broken PC Engine has limited my choice of games for it quite a lot. I’ve also found a certain lack of time to play games due to work and other necessities. It’s less than I’ve suddenly had more responsibilities and more that I’ve decided to not fuck around with things that will have longer-lasting consequences. Adversely, this has also affected my want to write more, but have lacked time for it. Ah well, there’s always the next year. Unto the list of games;

Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together 2011, PlayStation Portable

There’s not much to be said about Tactics Ogre or Ogre Battle that hasn’t been said already. It’s one of the best tactical role-playing game series that has been produced to date, which also spun off the best Final Fantasy title to date in Tactics. I decided to jump into the series this year after wanting to play something tactical and enjoyable for some time, and the Ogre series turned out to be a pretty good target. Now collecting those games into my shelf is another thing, so starting where the bar was lowest with the PSP remake of Let Us Cling Together was an easy choice. While a lot can be and has been said about the game’s historical inspiration in its narrative, with the dissolution of Yugoslavia and the end of enforced peace between Croatians, Bosnians and Serbians, the play really is its driving force in the end.

Building your own team and fine-tuning the synergy between your units and their skills is extremely enjoyable, albeit also very time-consuming. This is due to the need to grind as usual, but the end result often gives a strong, well-balanced team. Sure, the game can be somewhat easily broken even without the use World Tarot system, after which the Japanese subtitle Wheel of Destiny was given. In this, after beating the game you are able to skip back to story points in the game with your current units and make different path decisions.

Additional tweaks make the PSP remake somewhat easier game than the Super NES original, like being able to rewind back to max 50-turns, class rebalances that make their end-forms more breaking while being more crippled at the start, experience points are given as classes rather than individually, permanent death on the field has a 3-turn count with 3-lives backup and such. However, players can choose to handicap themselves and ignore most of the tweaks from the original if they so choose to. One of the best additions to the game is an overhead map, which hardcore fans like to equate to chess. Sadly, all this reminds us that the game got tweaked quite a lot, but visually it’s still the same title. Higher-resolution character artwork looks nice, but some sprite assets don’t really look all that good in comparison to the new higher resolutions portraits and even text boxes. It creates a mish-mashed look. Remaking the game from the grounds up with modern low-polygonal 3D assets for the playfields and perhaps even replacing the character sprites with proper 3D models would’ve made things less jarring. The overhead map becomes essential, as with the current sprite maps, you can’t rotate them, something that would’ve made the game that much more.

Nevertheless, Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together is a damn fine game independent of whatever version you are playing it in. The PSP version is still rather easy to find and not terribly expensive, while the English PlayStation version can break a wallet. Of course, Japanese versions are readily more available, but you’ll be faced with a language barrier.

Last Gladiators 1995, Sega Saturn

I can’t say no to a video pinball title when I see one. If we’re honest, making a good video pinball title is hard, and you’ve essentially got two choices to go with; either make it a simulation or embrace the video game format and go nuts what it could be. While the NAXAT Crush series of pinball games are more of the nature of video games, Last Gladiators embrace the simulation aspect. Surprisingly, where video pinball will always lack in terms of kinetic controls and that simple feel of real buttons on the sides of the pinball cabinet, the atmosphere and design have been nailed like no other.

Just by looking at the game’s footage, you can tell a few things it got so damn right. The field design is limited to one screen, but everything has been laid out as if it was a real table. No scrolling back and forth, no gimmicks that wouldn’t be possible on a real table, text and colours are appropriate for an actual table’s screen. The sound is spot on, with one of the best rock soundtracks from the era and the constant barrage of pinball sounds you can expect. Even when text is flashing on the screen above the playfield, it is short enough not to mess with your concentration. Different guides are positioned to the sides with arrows in a manner that’s not to obscure the field itself.

The game offers four fields, all of which have their own theming and concentrated gimmick. This might make an individual table somewhat short in gimmicks, but they’re rather concentrating on doing those few things right. Some modern pinball games like to throw tons of different kinds of gimmicks on one table without much balance, so going back to something that offers multiple tables with their own strong designs with less content per table is a nice breeze of fresh air. Designing a pinball table is stupidly hard and becomes geometrically harder with each introduced goal and gimmick. However, there is a slight over-reliance on ramps, so on a longer session that might become a dulling effect when jumping between the tables.

The most important bit in any video pinball game is in ball physics, and much like how I’ve sung NAXAT Crush series praises, Last Gladiator nails it. The visuals add an impressive heft to the ball, the sounds add to it even more and controlling the ball feels heavy and accurate. All this of course adds to the need for instant action and reaction, something that modern flat-screen televisions and screens still have an issue with. Playing with a good ol’ CRT is your best option, with a nice surround system to go with. Trying to run the game on an emulator didn’t really help. The latency of modern hardware just didn’t cut it.

The game is nothing short of a burst of pure energy. The way it is distilled fun and game in a package that we don’t get nowadays all that much throws it at the top of my list. I wish we had real pinball tables still around here.

Cotton Reboot 2021, Steam, Switch, PlayStation 4

The Cotton series of games is again one of those 1990’s Japanese exclusives that saw very little attention in the West. Mind you, even in Japan the series was more a cult classic than anything else after its arcade-original game. Yet it was kept afloat by fans and people who remember all these old games, and just like we’ve seen resurgence with Umihara Kawase (for the better or worse) Cotton and her lust for candy has graced us with one of the better remakes in some time. It’s one of the best kinds of remakes, don’t do too much for it, make it more what it already was, and give it a banging soundtrack. Cotton Reboot has without a doubt a year-defining soundtrack, with the first stage’s theme ringing in my head from time to time spontaneously.

Cotton Reboot is a rather standard horizontal shooting game, though its stage designs and Bomb mechanics are rather unique. Some stage layouts take advantage of Cotton’s magical broom having an afterburner-like flame and able to damage enemies right behind her all the while having loads of verticality. While the first stage is a sort of forward-push kind of deal, the rest of the stages mix and match the scrolling direction. Enemy patterns across the board shine, with some clever use of ground-only mooks with chasing Deaths. You get stronger and stronger Bombs, or rather Magical Spells as you level them up with experience points. An initial Fire Dragon may be anaemic, but level it up for multiple Fire Dragons or one massive, screen-filling monstrosity. Alternatively, just drop tons of rocks across the whole screen.

There’s so much you can say about a remake that nails the original’s tone and style, something that can turn people off. The game has that 1990s Japanese whack-humour, similar to Slayers or Battle Mania at their zaniest. Visually, the designs, shading and everything that’s presented to you is top-notch in production quality. The usage of modern tools to reproduce older styles has come a long way in the last decade or so and all of it looks glorious.

While the game is easier than its original versions and offers infinite continues, it does come with its X68000 version with no bells or whistles added. While not necessary, these sorts of things always add something special to the mix and preserve old games for new generations. Too bad we can’t reproduce the dancing keyboard the X68k version had. While some bad blood was born between BEEP and importers when they removed English support after Western localisation was confirmed, the game stands out as damn fine and worth the purchase.

Mega Man: The Wily Wars 1994, 2021, Sega Mega Drive

Retro-Bit re-published the somewhat rare compilation game Mega Man: The Wily Wars this year. After sitting down with it and mulling over whether or not it gets a spot here, or with the close-call-five, it gets a top-five spot just barely. The game was at one point much maligned as inferior to the NES original games (the first three Mega Man titles) but this has seemingly been due to most people playing the PAL ROM file, which runs at 50Hz. This does make the game run significantly slower and the music becomes droning. These aren’t really issues in themselves, but rather than the issues with development are visible across the board. Some of the sprites, while upgrades from the 8-bit originals, are of weird design at places. Proto Man’s sprite wasn’t redrawn either in Mega Man 3, which just looks weird with him being smaller and all. Numerous small sound effects are missing, but at places this is a blessing, as the first Mega Man has tons of ear-ripping sounds. Some mechanics are slightly different, like how there’s a slight delay in movement, Mega Man’s centre gravity centre is smaller than NES counterpart’s and glitches have been fixed. No more Player-2 pad debug features for Mega Man 3.

The game has some glitches due to the difficult nature of development that never got ironed out. These include the ability to re-spawn the final boss of Mega Man 3 by walking out of the room, which causes the ending to screw up too, using Ice Slasher in the first Mega Man to prevent spawning of certain flying enemies, DokuRobot’s Atomic Fire doing no damage under certain situations and stuff like that. However, outside very few glitches, a player most likely won’t be faced with these under normal playthrough. Speedrunners have used these for some benefit.

Nevertheless, this is your familiar Mega Man, Mega Man 2 and Mega Man 3. While I’ll still argue how MM1 is a rather bad game, the whole package really is still a great way to play these games. There’s a fair bit of challenge, as the games use a Save system over Passwords, and if you’re intending to get to the whole-new Wily Tower segments, beating the three games first isn’t the fastest thing in the world. Mega Man 2 is still a series-making game and once you get used to slightly different controls, 2 and 3 become somewhat a breeze for experienced players. Wily Tower might be the only new content, but it’s a nice challenge overall for series veterans, and something to look for during your first playthrough.

Even when contrasted against other games we’ve seen this year, The Wily Wars stacks well against them. While it is an unrefined gem, an uncut diamond of sorts, it still pulled me back to the early days of Mega Man when we didn’t have tons upon tons of cutscenes messing with the play and slew of bolted-on gimmicks that didn’t do the series service. Do note that the game was also included in the Mega Drive mini, and that’s the thing I would recommend you to pick up if you have interest to play this outside your usual emulation needs.

Undercover Cops 1995, 2021, Super Nintendo

While old arcade-to-console ports always lack something, they often retain that certain charm and pull that the arcade original had. Mind you, there are plenty of examples of failed home ports, but Undercover Cops isn’t one despite the lack of two-player mode. Sure, the home port doesn’t match the arcade original in sound or graphical fidelity, it sure as hell retains the charm and fun play. While it is your run-of-the-mill beat-em-up on the surface, the addition of hidden special moves alongside your usual desperation attack, clever use of the environment here and there (e.g. you can beat the first stage’s boss quickly by using a giant press rather than just beat it up) and superb controls make this a gem. I just wish they had managed to squeeze that two-player mode in.

Honestly, that’s all I should need to say, but the charm is strong with this one. Despite being one of the less colourful games out there, with loads of greys and browns with subdued colours in everything else, the character designs, animations and how they feel and act is just so damn nice. Backgrounds also pop-up like no other, but what would you expect from the same people that were in charge of Metal Slug? The converted spritework is superb and the large sprites sell themselves just fine. The designs are very much core 1990s, but in a manner that makes them nearly ageless; there are tons of cues taken from the sixties onwards in a blend that makes it hard to pinpoint any given era for the game’s world. The game does tumble with this by stating the year is 2043, which will sadly not look as rad as this.  It was great to have the re-released, as the American localisation never happened despite advertisement being pushed out. Retro-Bit made sure there were both US and PAL compatible releases to boot.

It’s short, sweet and fun to come back from time to time, but perhaps not up there with the absolute best in the genre. At a time, it was an underrated title, but with the Internet making everything available for everyone, even somewhat obscure games gain a strong following. Personally, I’d probably pop this in over Final Fight or Streets of Rage 4 any day, but then again, I do love swinging a concrete pylon every other Sunday.

Do note that I would still recommend gunning for the arcade version, but not the World version mind you. Go for the Japanese or Alpha Renewal version, as they retain all the background details and moves. We really need something like an Irem Arcade Collection one of these days, which would collect as much of their original titles into one package as possible.

Honourable Mentions for those who didn’t make the cut

R-Type Final 2 2021, Switch, Steam, PlaySation 4 , Xbox One

It’s an unfinished product, by all means. R-Type Final on the PS2 was the last curtain call for the series as a shooting staple. Final 2 was supposed to be a glorious return, but instead, it is more retreading the same waters. It was delivered in a lacking stage, with only a third of those 101 ships found in Final. Extra Stages ended up being purchasable DLC rather than on-disc, which more or less means the game isn’t the advertised ultimate shooting game experience, but again ends up being a DLC hell cashing-in for nostalgia.

There’s very little that adds to the experience since R-Type Delta, and in the end the game feels a letdown in every respect. The new stages for the game don’t provide as much a challenge as previous games, no interesting mechanics have been introduced to make the game stand out in the marketplace and even the music has no real pull. The series stagnated right after Delta, and nothing has really managed to pull the series out from the rut. The Tactics games were interesting, but the overt masturbation on how difficult they supposedly are and how much a slow slog both titles ended up being, it would’ve been better to forget the series and forge for something new.

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2 2020, Steam, PlayStation 4. Xbox One, 2021, PlayStation 5, Switch

If you haven’t played the original games, or don’t have access to them any longer, do yourself a favour and pick this collection up. 1+2 updates both titles to the series’ latest mechanics and standards, and that’s also the fault here. The stages and challenges weren’t exactly designed to work under post-THPS3 mechanics and you notice that rather quick. However, you can rever the controls back to their original settings, and that’s who you should play the game; no reverts, spine transfers or wall plants. Nevertheless, it’s a faithful recreation of those two games, with some very minor changes to physics and mechanics. Most people won’t notice how it feels slightly different from the originals, but just like the Crash remakes from earlier, seasoned veterans will notice and will have to take some time to adjust themselves.

However, that’s all there is. It doesn’t exactly expand anything further, but it doesn’t really need to. It plays in the same ballpark as the 2001’s THPS2x, which was an enhanced re-released of the same games for the Xbox. It’s more of the same, but not really adding anything to the mix. It’s a damn good title nevertheless that I’d recommend, but not a Top 5 candidate.

Super Robot Wars 30 2021 Steam, PlayStation 4, Switch

The first mainline Super Robot Wars to be released in the Western frontiers, and plays like a sequel to a game we never got. DLC characters have nothing to do with the main game and are there to take up space in a game with plenty of units to choose from already. Because the game introduced a non-linear progression system inspired by the Compact series scenario system, which was also seen in Impact, stages have less a flowing feel and more something you’d play episodically. Honestly, the game wastes the Ultraman debut in SRW as DLC-only and based on the Netflix CGI show, and that rubs the wrong way. Loads of the sprites have a plastic sheen to them, which makes them more at home on your mobile phone than on a console or PC. Ever since SRW games have been getting closer to getting rid of the Super-Deformed designs, the further away we’ve been getting from well-animated sprites. SRW Alpha 3 has tons of SD sprites that have terrific animations, exaggerated and full of life, and in contrast, we’ve been getting animations that are stiffer by the year with more reliance on cut-ins. At this point, SRW might as well abandon scaled SD sprites altogether and present everything in so-called 1:1 design and have people wondering why the hell is Mazinger Z so big compared to a battleship. The series is going in the wrong direction.

Cotton Guardian Force Saturn Tribute 2021, Switch, PlayStation 4

This could’ve been a good collection, but after Cotton Reboot, this is just a lacklustre attempt to cash in. While the best way to get your hands on Cotton 2, Cotton Boomerang and Guardian Force, it falls in the same category as many other collections that they do nothing else or special with them. In addition, the initial version of the game has notable input lag, which has been rectified to some degree via patch, but really, Beep’s just riding on Cotton Reboot‘s success with this.

Blaster Master Zero 2017, Nintendo 3DS, Switch, 2019 Steam, 2020, PlayStation 4, 2021, Xbox One

I don’t know who wanted or asked for this game. Take a popular NES game, don’t give a modern face-lift but instead remake the game in overly used retro-sprites style and try to incorporate tons of story elements. Sadly, the graphics aren’t all that special and have issues with collision detection at places and plot’s forced down your throat while being poorly written. Serving both as a remake and a reboot of the original Blaster Master, you probably would end up having a better time with the original NES game due to how much the game holds your hand and halts the game with plot sequences. You’d think nailing a NES game revival’s controls would be easy, but yet they made them lacking. The revised designs are also pretty terrible, playing the most tired anime-esque tropes you can find out there. It’s IntiCreates went overboard where they could to compensate for the otherwise lacking design and detail in the game. In the end, the game ends up being a chore to play, but I admit, it at least is colourful.

Top 5 Games of 2020

This year has been rather poor when it comes to games to put on this list. Partially because I’ve been concentrating on other stuff outside games overall, partially because not many titles have ultimately caught my eye that I’d like to get, and then that one last sin I seem to repeat every single damn year; I forget to list the games I played the first time this year. We should have a full list anyway, but before that let’s revise the rules. Firstly, a game produced in any year qualifies. Secondly, it has to be a physical release, so no digital-only stuff on this list, unless the game has some merit to warrant this, e.g. it’s a mobile phone game. There is a precedent for this. However, if it’s just a game released on Steam or DLsite, it doesn’t qualify. Thirdly, there is no order or a top slot. It should probably be mentioned that it doesn’t in what language the game is. Unlike the industry awards, I don’t discriminate against games for their language.

 

Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin 2020, Switch, PlayStation 4, Steam

Sakuna is a hard game to recommend without caveats, but it’s a game that makes you want to play one more in-game day. A combination of 2D action and rice farming sim, there’s quite nothing like it on the market. It’s not Harvest Moon when it comes to farming, but at the same time, it’s a level more hardcore with pretty much everything that affects real rice farming affects in the game as well, from water’s height and temperature to everything you use in the compost. About a week later the Japanese release, I read some news around that the Japanese agricultural ministry had seen multiple spikes in the number of users as Japanese players went to check pointers on growing rice. The farming is intentionally made somewhat longwinded at first without any skills, as there are no real shortcuts. From picking up the stones from the field to manually hack the ground with a hove is all done manually. You could leave it for someone else, but that affects the rice’s quality and level. Similarly, there is no quick way to cut the rise. Get in there and start scything. Little things get piled up with each passing in-game year, which really creates a weird fixation on making the best rice you can all the while appreciating the stuff even more.

The action part comes in when you gotta get rid of demons inhabiting the island where Sakuna and company are exiled, as well as when collecting materials for your new tools, weapons, and clothing… and compost. The battle system is less refined than the farming part, which really shows which part got more attention. The action suffers from the usual 2D-action using 3D models, where you’re not exactly sure where the hitboxes are, and the ground being all roundish in most places sometimes causes you to misjudge a jump. Despite the game’s action being rather fast-paced, the controls themselves don’t really support this. The best example of this is what I discussed in the previous post about the jank in doujinshi games. Here it’s the inability to turn around if you’re using the attack button and in the middle of an animation. Rather than automatically changing the side you’re facing to with the next attack’s animation, the game will keep you faced to that direction as long as you keep tapping the Attack button regardless of the direction pressed. It is an overtly strict system that forces the player to be aware of the animation priorities and the way the game handles them rather than allowing the player to swish in an effective manner. This alone makes the action janky, as well as Heavy attacks being mostly useless. Well, if there are any enemies on the screen, it’s just better to play bowling with them, as you can rack up better damage by throwing small-fry enemies across the screen with the godly raiments Sakuna has, which also work as a Umihara Kawase-lite kind of tool when navigating stages.

Despite being butt-puckeringly frustrated in the action mechanics and how jank they are, Sakuna has an incredible amount of charm in every aspect. From worldbuilding to philosophical discussion among the characters to the best soundtrack of the year, in every point Sakuna fails it succeeds in two. It’s also one of those games that you play only a few rounds, but then say One more day, I gotta finish the rice before it gets cold and you find the clock hitting four in the morning. I truly hope that Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin will gain a sequel in the long run. Not perhaps with the same characters or the same theme, but still a combination of farming and action. Much like how Senran Kagura went from utter shit to one of the enjoyable fast-action games out there, Sakuna‘s sequel wouldn’t need to do much but to expand on farming and polish the action to silky smooth combat. As it is, Sakuna is a rough diamond that’s been cut but in a masterful way. Still, even a diamond with a failed brilliant-cut can yield surprisingly satisfactory results.

Also, play it with the Japanese voice acting. Nothing against the English cast, but holy shit Naomi Ōzora as Sakuna makes this game 15/10 will buy another copy.

 

Power Rangers: Battle for the Grid 2019, Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Steam, Stadia

Outright the best fighting game that’s come in a while. The early builds were rather lackluster in pretty much every term, but the play was solid. It was called shit by most people who only looked at the skin and saw low-budget graphics and simple looking play. Even some long-term fans disparaged the game without giving it a chance. Now with more development time and many, many patches and updates later the roster has been expanded alongside everything else. While its controls seem limited and simple, all that is there just to accommodate the ability to do almost whatever the player wants to do with their characters thanks to the freedom of action and movement, something that’s seriously lacking in most modern fighting games. In all seriousness, Power Rangers: Battle for the Grid has become of the top tier fighting games because its system is stupidly fun and challenging in all its beginner friendliness.

If you’ve ever played Capcom’s VS series of fighting games, especially the Marvel games with tag-teams, you should know what to expect as that exact same blood is in here. While the buttons are simpler, similar to what the Smash Bros. series uses, the complexity comes from the proper usage of the different tiers of attacks and their timings. Team synergy is also stupidly important and experimenting with what you can do with your teammates is about as important as learning to use your main fighter. While I was initially afraid of the auto-combo system in the game, as that has been the death knell of so many fighting games in the past, the system isn’t what I expected. It’s more akin to having standard weak, medium, and strong combos in one button. While you can move from one tier to another, it must be done well before you’re in a certain spot of that tier’s autocombo. Which isn’t even an autocombo. It’s a new kind of system that doesn’t have any other fitting description. It forced my Guilty Gear ridden, Darkstalksers taught chaincombo brain to stop tapping forwards for hit per each button and become far more considerate of timings and positions in strange ways, something that was a must when learning to play Lord Zedd.

Cross-play allowed me to play people who had the game on Steam and other platforms, so that was a nice plus. It shows that this game is wanted to be a success, and with each update, the game has become more and more robust. In terms of visuals and content the game was hampered severely by its budget game status, and in few ways still is, but the core play is absolutely solid. Hopefully, this won’t be a one-off time as we haven’t had a properly well-made Power Rangers game in a long ass time.

 

 

Aleste Collection 2020, Switch, PlayStation 4

While it may be a bit underhanded to put a collection to this spot, Aleste Collection gets on the list for two reasons; bringing a semi-affordable way to play otherwise expensive as hell shooting games for all, and making the GG Aleste a trilogy by introducing a completely new Aleste for the game Game Gear, which you can only play via the collection on modern consoles, or if you got the version with Game Gear Micro, on the tiniest screen gaming has seen. GG Aleste 3 is very much worth the admission with the caveat that you’re a fan of shooting games. It’s not the most difficult game out there, but in every respect, the game is polished and shows how well M2, the game’s developer, understands the genre and the series itself. As the game runs on M2 developed Game Gear emulator, it’s nothing short of accurate with optional slowdown and waits to fully emulate GG experience, which shows in quite the many paces how much a shooting game can demand from a console.

As a GG Aleste game, this third entry shows how something than peak even thirty years after the last game was out. It also puts a lot of expectations on Aleste Branch, which probably will make the devs sweat a bit. They put a high bar for themselves to beat with this single entry alone. As for the rest of the games in the collection, the original Aleste hasn’t aged all that well, all things considered. There’s just something about it as a series started that doesn’t play well, while Compile’s previous game, Zanac, outclasses it in few aspects. The same can’t be said for the other games. Power Strike II is a rare and well-regarded shooting game for good reasons. Its stage designs, enemy placements, and play balance it top-notch, offering good tunes to boot. The GG Aleste games may be the easier one of the collection, and overall when it comes to shooting games, though that can be seen as them being started friendly. Nothing prevents the player to drop the Life count and kick up the Difficulty, something that does have a significant effect on how you can approach the stages and encourages to properly learn the weapon usages. This is a blessing in disguise in some games, where stages consist of multiple static mini-bosses, which turn these momentary sections into a slight slog in the long run. Nevertheless, all these games are the kinds you’d find yourself coming back to challenge that one more round until you finally frustrate in the lack of skills.

 

 

Umihara Kawase Shun PlayStation, 1997, 2000

By my own technicality, I can drop this here. Haven’t I played this game before? Many times on Umihara Kawase Shun Second Edition Kanzenban and digitally, but for the first time I got my paws on the actual first edition disc. The game is still the best in the series and shows how far it has dropped in quality since the first two games. The series has had a wild run over the last two decades since it became a cult classic in the West via emulation. It has never gotten popular per se, but with the release of Sayonara Umihara Kawase and all the ports it saw, Umihara Kawase finally got the recognition it deserved. With that came all the negative side effects that changed completely how the series would be structured and how the game’s play would advance. Long gone are the days of straight-up level-design to tackle, replaced by non-linear action with a heavy emphasis on story. All that still doesn’t stain what is a crowning achievement in rubber band physics coding and level design of Shun.

It’s not just the physics though, despite the game being all about them. The music is just the right kind of soothing you need when you’re sweating over a jump you’re trying to desperately make to happen and Umihara is swinging wildly, almost out of control. Graphics are spot on with nothing excess or minimalistic about them. They serve the need of the game perfectly and their visual style is still bizarre. It’s one of those things that never needed expanding upon, we never truly needed to know why or how. The world of Umihara Kawase was a strange mystery where tadpoles give birth to frogs and fish have legs to walk on.

I’d like to say that Umihara Kawase Shun is a rare perfect game, but they already did that with the first game, so this is the second hit in a row with the series. It’s a game of pure skill and play, with a skill ceiling not even the fastest speedrunners have managed to reach. Just don’t play the PSP port, it’s a buggy mess.

 

 

theHunter: Call of the Wild 2017, Steam, PlayStation 4, Xbox One

Another one by a technicality, I owned and played a physical copy for a few days before gifting this one away. I didn’t expect to like this game one bit. I expected to play to for few hours with friends who got me into it and drop it as one of the misfortunate purchases everybody makes. Maybe because the game promises a lot would let me down, wouldn’t fulfill any of my low expectations and I’d mull over the twenty euro I spend on it until I forget it exists until I get a message of new patches. Well, I ended up spending far more time than it was healthy. The Hunter: Call of the Wild is my new The Legend of Zelda; you’re dropped in the middle of nowhere with the very basic equipment and the whole world to explore and get around. It’s an adventure of the best kind and everything it does is game. While sure there are story missions in each map, the real meat is when you gather your equipment and simply explore the map and find an animal you want to take down. Tracking an animal based on its prints and marks left on the vegetation is something I expected to see in Monster Hunter World, and the same goes for the map sizes. They’re humongous and full of varied detail as well as hidden collectibles.

Of course, when you want to hunt, you want the right weapon for it. There’s a rather wide variety of rifles to choose from, less so in bows and handguns. Lures, scopes, and so on need to be purchased and most equipments require some leveling up in order to be unlocked. This applies to skills that help you, for example, keeping your arms leveled so that the scope won’t wander off all the damn time. That is honestly the game’s biggest fault; it starts slow and hard. It is most enjoyable when you get the kind of build you want and then go after the prey. Each prey is ranked by their size, and using the wrong rank weapon gets you penalties. Shooting a rabbit with a 7mm Regent would yield minced meat rather fast while using buckshot against a bear prolly would get your ass whooped.

This sort of simple idea, yet hard to realize, makes Call of the Wild a game that keeps pulling me back. I might get mauled by a bear and ragequit, yet after a day or so I come back with better equipment and take cover in a hunting hut, calling it in for some time. Then see it walking towards a lake just beyond the vegetation so you barely see it, and then make pin-point accurate shot straight through its neck. The game is full of these moments that you make through each and every decision, and they end up being hunting stories with other players. This is storytelling through play at its finest, where the framework allows player to realize their own stories within the game.

Something about this game is breathtaking. The graphics may not be top-notch, but often I end up simply wandering through the unknown forests and see vegetation I’ve never seen before, listen to one of the best sound design I’ve heard in a game, and just suck the atmosphere in. There’s little music, which only serves the notion of being there in the wild. You may hear crunches in the snow in the distance, and the hunt begins anew.

 

Honourable Mentions for those who didn’t make the cut

 

Metal Wolf Chaos XD 2004, Xbox, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Steam

A game everyone wanted localised, and then everybody seemingly forgot about. Metal Wolf Chaos XD is a fun short romp full of memorable one-liners and moments to take from, but ultimately the game suffers from being an Xbox game ported to modern machines. It’s not bad by any means, but something about its controls makes the game unsatisfying to play despite everything else being pretty damn spot on. It’s a recommended game for sure, but hype and joking can carry it only so far.

Shubibinman 2 1991, PC Engine

PC Engine games are full of jank. You can see what they want to with many of the games and somehow fail with them. Subibinman may not be a Mega Man clone, but if it was, it would be for the better. The game is charming, but it also exhibits what was the mediocre play design of the time. However, the game feels almost unfinished, something that could use a few rounds of polish to tweak jumping arcs, weapons, hitboxes, physics, and pretty much everything outside graphics and charm. It’s a game I really want to love and like, but ultimately ends up being a middle-of-the-road game that tried really hard to be a nice 2D action game, but just can’t hold the candle against the big boys in the genre.

The Wing of Madoola 1986, Famicom

Before Sunsoft hit gold with their games, they had numerous games that just fell short. The Wing of Madoola might be a cult classic, but it’s janky controls and combat makes it a curiosity at best. A significant curiosity though, as its place in the popular culture scheme of the time fits like a glove. Magical girls with bikini armours were all the rage at the time, after all. While its stages are linear, it also plays with non-linearity with some of the stages, though often this ends up with the player having to make a separate detour to a dungeon for items. It’s one of those games where you should never stop either, as enemies spawn constantly and swarm to your current location. This is severely hampered by Madoola being significantly underpowered early in the game, but at least you can defeat enemies fast with a Turbo Controller. While the Famicom had started to see quality games by 1986, The Wing of Madoola sadly can’t cut it no matter how much I’d like it to throw it up there.

Panel de Pon 1995, Super Nintendo, Satellaview, Game Boy

No, I don’t have a copy of Tetris Attack. I have the Japanese original with cute girls innit. Panel de Pon has been remade and remastered few times over, with Pokémon Puzzle League on the N64 being one of the more famous examples of its reskins. The format of the competitive puzzles was already perfected in this entry. It’s the best puzzle game I’ve played this year in a physical form, but it doesn’t ask me to return to it at any point. I don’t feel a need to throw it in at any point and give that five-minute whirl or so. While it is a fun game, it is kind of meh. Works better on the DS though.

Akumajou Dracula X: Chi no Rondo 1993, PC Engine, PSP

Also known as Castlevania: Rondo of Blood, the game was one of the additions to PC Engine that was a must. A very generic decision I know, but also one that was done very deliberately. While it’s often played out as the best of Castlevania next to Symphony of the Night, that’s overstating it. Both of them don’t hold the candle of the top spot, but that’s neither here nor there. Rondo of Blood is still a top list game because of its branching paths and stages, stellar music, and spot-on controls. The voice acting, anime scenes, and story are garbage, but that matters none. However, it got dropped to this latter list simply because it’s not Castlevania III and ultimately it’s not as enjoyable as Super Castlevania IV. It stays in a spot where it wants to be that best classical Castlevania but at the same time falls short for small reasons. Things like small irritations in the stage designs, how the enemies work or simply how there’s sheer lack of evolution in how a Castlevania plays out. It’s still an enjoyable game to play, but I’d rather pop in some other game in the series, like Lords of Shadow.

 

Happy new year to you all, see you on the other side.

Review: Streets of Rage 4

A very Sega cover

The original Streets of Rage games are a prime example of how Sega of Japan mishandled the Mega Drive in the Western markets. The three original games were never really popular in Japan or in Asian markets in general, but they were hits in American and in Europe. The whole thing about Streets of Rage series being cool at the time, hitting the rights spots with the popular culture phenomena in especially in the America with influences taken from the then-current music scenes across the pond made these games stand out, though the third game’s music splits opinions harshly due to its experimental nature. Sega was extremely good with this for a short period of time in the late 1980s and early 1990s as numerous of their projects managed to capitalise what was way cool. Sonic the Hedgehog is without a doubt their shining example of this, blending polygonal visuals that were popular in advertisement at the time with a great soundtrack, with emphasize on environmental themes that were around to a point and mixing them all in a blender to produce the most attitude ladden mascot to that point. Streets of Rage harkens a bit further back to the 1980s than Sonic, with the movie Streets of Fire being a heavy influence thematically. Other contemporary games, like Final Fight, were a massive influnce, with Street Fighter II being played at the developer Ancient Corp.’s offices and having a great impact on Streets of Rage 2. If the second game was evolution of what made the first game a success, introducing more moves and wider variety of enemies, the third game took that and gave more emphasize to the stages themselves. Branching paths became a more common thing, further moves were introduced, and for better or worse, the game’s story got more emphasize with cutscenes and dialogue. Unlockable playable characters made their first entry in the series.

 

However, the fourth game didn’t materialise for some two decades. 1994 was the deathknell of the Mega Drive, advent of Sega Saturn, Darkstalkers saw a release in the arcades among other things. Streets of Rage 3 didn’t even scratch the top ten most sold games for that year. Despite the third game attempting to push everything the second game layed down, in most terms it was a commercial failure. The beat-em-up as a genre was moving out from its golden days with Konami and Capcom still making some of the best entries, leaving Streets of Rage behind both in terms of game play, design and visuals. The fourth game in the series was attempted few times around, one of which ended up as the PlayStation/N64 game Fighting Force, or Metal Fist in Japan. One of Sega’s attempts turned into Dynamite Deka series, which was used as the basis for the Die Hard license. Ancient had been working on a Streets of Rage 4 for the Dreamcast as well, but supposedly, execs at Sega of America closed it down very early in development. Nevertheless, the DNA of Streets of Rage was carried over various directions. Ultimately, these kind of 3D action games would end up as being similar to Devil May Cry, which are a far cry from the first Final Fight and Streets of Rage.

 

The reason I wanted to include this whole bit is to show that despite all fans and fanfare the two original games got, the third game was a miss despite it taking the series further. The genre moved onwards with other games and Streets of Rage was mostly used a launchpoint. Fans have been making their own games based on the IP, and all things considered, Streets of Rage had become a dead franchise. That was until 2018, when DotEmu announced they’re working on a new entry with Lizardcube and Guard Crush Games.

The initial trailer split opinions, some liking the new style while other hating it. It showed nothing too much on the play outside few seconds, but the later DotEmu would release more footage as the game’s release was closing in. However, from the very first on, it was rather apparent that the game wouldn’t push forwards what the franchise had been back in 1994. That’s probably the whole review in a nutshell.

A revival like this can be don in two ways. First is to stick to the guns and not change much, or anything, about the formula and roll with that. You won’t disappoint anyone and you know you’re catering to the core fans who just wanted a new entry no matter what. This is effectively what Capcom did with Mega Man 9 and 10, and Nintendo with the New Super Mario Bros. line. This kind of catering to nostalgia first and foremost works few times around, but it can’t be milked. The other option would be to take core essence and see how far you can push it. With two decades and then between the SoR3 and 4, it would be rather easy to see what sort of design innovations the beat-em-up, or action games in general, have made during that period and how they could be implemented. Both are very different routes, and DotEmu and co. ultimately decided to stick with the core guns of the franchise and not deviate.

Good amount of research into the characters was apparently done

When it comes to SoR4‘s play, it’s as pure action as you can get. It’s methodical and orthodox and even fights against players who want to blitz. Timing is everything in these games, alongside positioning. The wide variety of enemies use different tactics to get away from the player, with some having moves that allow the to traverse across the screen or move in the air the way the player can’t. If you’ve ever plaued, or even watched footage of a beat-em-up, you already know what to expect from the play. However, the player is ultimately limited in their actions, even if the new control scheme does dedicate a button for picking up items and such. There is no running or dashing, nor there is a dedicated button or combination for sure certain grab and throw. You can only punch and jump, and grab when you’re close up. In terms of play and controls, there’s nothing pushing the Streets of Rage forwards. At the same time, once the slow pace clicks to you few stages in, the game becomes a bit more open. You can’t really device your own ways of approaching and playing it, however, as the design doesn’t provide the tools for that.

This approach has cost the game’s design some points. While many of the normal enemies are fine tuned, some of them exhibit unnaturally large amount of invincibility frames in their moves, something the player is lacking. Benefits are given to the enemies to the point of game feeling annoying rather than hard or challenging. There’s no point trying to counter moves, when you can almost break the game by grabbing and throwing things around. This is further examplified with the bosses, as they gain similar Star moves the player has access to, but with the difference they can use them in a pattern willy nilly without thinking about their life being drained or such. Some of the bosses are just lacklustre, like the helmetted DJ that feels like an unnecessary thoraway just to have a boss in there, while others give a satisfyingly levelled challenge with their own twist, like with Shiva.

Outside Shiva’s bullshit-bunshin, the fight’s really on the even grounds

The game is also rather long, longer than it really needed to be for a beat-em-up. This is further emphazised but that slower paced game design mentioned earlier. Cutting one or two stages out and make it an even ten, or even just nine stages with multiple paths would’ve made the game more interesting on revisits, but in one sit-through Streets of Rage 4 begins to slog and overstays its welcome rather hard. However, the game has embraced modern sensibilities in that you are able to continue with the stage you left off with a save file, with 1 Coin challenge being offered in form of Arcade Mode.

In tersm of visual design, the game is top notch. It looks great with all the lighting effects and colours being used in proper manners. It looks like a French cartoon with heavy Japanese influences thrown here and there. In this the game is rather contemporary, slightly revolting against how the original games tried to level with realistic look. The way the visuals have been realised and executed is probaby the best part of the game, testifying how 2D is still the best way to realise the age-old dream of games looking like cartoons on telly. Animation work is terrific and nothing to be scoffed at, characters are easy to tell apart and while stage designs and environments can be lacklustre, they still come through strongly simply because how well they’re visually made. Despite all this, the edge in the visusal style is rather rounded and maybe even dull. The Y Twin, the end bosses, don’t really jump out in their design, and the fact that they utilise a giant robot during the end battle is uninspired at best.

On the music side, you have what we could call classic SoR tunes. It fits and doesn’t intrude on the player’s nerves. Some tunes stand out more than others, so overall a well done soundtrack that’s not too uncommon nowadays.

The story doesn’t matter. While I fully expected some scenes to be voiced, I found myself more annoyed by the cutscenes more than anything. The difference in visual style becomes drastically evident during these, which also emphasize how it ultimately doesn’t fit. Within the series narrative, it’s almost like the the early 1990s never moved onward, yet we see contemporary factors dropped here and there. Perhaps fully embracing that early 2000s aesthetic would’ve been a better option rather than create this sort of fetishised hybrid of 1980s/early 1990s nostalgia through rose coloured goggles.

This game sounds, looks and plays like a standard Streets of Rage 4 fare. We’ve played this three times before. If this game has been released in the 1990s, it would’ve scored low. Now, far removed from its setting, it stands out as a classical example of well made and polished game, but a game that offers nothing special on its own. Expecting this game to deliver anything else than that will be met with gross disappointment. It’s a game that does get the franchise, it fully embraces what it is, but at the same time, it makes itself rather hard to recommend if you’re already familiar with the series, or the genre overall. If SoR5 will be a thing down the line, it can’t surf on nostalgia and has to find its way to create its own indentity and expand on already-explored play of the franchise, or go bust. I can’t fault what the game was designed to be, as that’s extremely well realised. It’s just that design was already out of date twenty years ago.

Short Series Introduction: Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman

While NCS and Masaya are more well known for their strategy titles, mostly Langrisser, their library consists of multiple genres across the board. However, they are very different in quality, some topping at some of the best games in a genre, while others are outright trash. Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman, or Chbibinman if you want to use their own official romanisation, falls somewhere in between. All the three titles, and a spin-off of sorts, all fall into the same kind of 2D action as the genre’s golden standard, Mega Man, but due to numerous small issues the franchise never really hits the same stride. Not that it intends to, as one of the most peculiar, and perhaps series defining element, is that every game plays significantly differently.

For a 1989 PC-Engine title, Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman the game somehow looks pretty damn nice and has frustrating graphics at the same time. Some sprites hold up better than some, mostly the player and enemy sprites, but the game underachieves with inanimate projectiles, bland character portraits and some of the worst lava of the era. Colours tend to be muted and nothing really pops up despite being clear, but this means all the sprites are easily tracked. Can’t say the same about some of the stage obstacles though, some platforms are exactly the same grey and the background. All the sprites are showcased directly from their side without much dynamic posing or the like, making the game look cheaper than it really is. This doesn’t really help the sprites’ designs, as most of the stage bosses are effectively the same recoloured sprite with an additional dragon head. There are also only three stage archetypes that get used until the final boss stage, which overstay their welcome. Nevertheless, in comparison to most other 1989 PC-E titles, Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman does have tad higher calibre graphics, with flavour that fits more a Mega Drive game.

Music falls into the same category, with only handful of songs on the card, but outside of one particular stage theme, none of them are offensive to the ear. They all fit their designated stages, with with one or two of them being almost worth getting stuck in your head. Having relatively clear voice samples in a HuCard game is a minor achievement, and they’re sprinkled around the game in proper spots.

While the game looks more or less run-of-the-mill, it’s gameplay has some great elements that make it stand out. The game is split between a map screen and an action stage à la Super Mario Bros. 3, with shop and all. You can take a couple of different routes to the final boss stage. Each stage is effectively a type of a mission, flavour wise, with interactions with the city’s denizens popping up at proper times. The cash gained from enemies is spent on upgrades, which are your usual flare, ranging frontrols are what you’d expect, about as tight as the second games with few oddities herm more Life to a charged projectile attack. These upgrades are necessary in the long run, as the game likes to throw fast moving enemies at you all the while stage hazards move at the speed of sound. The player has to move carefully and with patience all the while he needs to push forward as fast as he can. The faster you can remove threats from the screen while dodging whirling spikes of death and jumping monkeys you can, the higher are chances to survive. It takes a bit of time to get used to how the game flows, as it is equal amount of split-second reaction and knowing what’s coming. The game’s design tries to emulate Mega Man to some extent in stage design, but it is significantly less on-point with its challenge-per-screen design. Oh, and the game has a time limit how much you can dilly dally in stages collecting gold for the upgrades. If you don’t beat the game in an allotted time, it’s an automatic Game Over.

The controls don’t exactly help any with the game, as player characters need to accelerate to their full speed every time you start moving, plus jumping is awkward at best. The jump arc feels rather unnatural and lacking, requiring somewhat precise platforming. With some stages having overtly bullshit hazard designs, enemies having jerky patterns and nothing really delivering satisfying feeling from being hit, the game feels and plays loose. However, it must be given props to the developer for allowing the screen to scroll forwards when the player is 2/5 from the screen’s left side, rather than other way around like in Valis series. This gives the player ample time to see and react to whatever the game is dishing at him.

Despite all this, Shubibinman went on to have three sequels. While the above seems to be all negative, as a whole the game comes together as a unique little title. It’s not exactly the lengthiest title, and allowing simultaneous two-player mode changes how the players have to approach the stages and bosses. While the two share the same Life bar, and the only difference between the two is their design and voices, the charged attacks become even more powerful when used in unison. All the things the game lacks in quality is met charm and personality. The game did come out during time when Japanese pop-culture media was going through certain kind parody phase towards 70’s and early 80’s media, especially old tokusatsu shows. Shubibinman, much like Battle Golder YUI, plays the whole android/cyborg angle that was the cornerstone of so many henshin hero shows and goes to have fun with it.

The game’s setting is, after all, about two cyborgs: Tasuke and Kyapiko. Tasuke was a fisherman before Doctor Goutokuji operated on him, much like how Kyapiko was a normal highschool girl. The two got mad over the doctor operating on their bodies, and promised to return both of them back to their old selves. Apparently the doctor is rather paranoid and predicted the incoming Akumadan invasion. With their modified superhuman bodies, Tasuke and Kyapiko venture forth to save the city, block by block. That’s pretty much all there is, but as I said, the charm-factor is strong. After every stage your chosen hero makes a pose and conveys its personality, and the same thing happens when being hit by a hazard and the like. Little things like that made the game go some extended ways, but you can easily tell that this game was NCS/Masaya’s first try at an outright action game, though development was done by Winds. The formula was interesting on its own already, and probably with some tweaking would yield a high-class action game, but seems like the staff didn’t manage to escape Mega Man‘s influence.

Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman 2: Aratanaru Teki (tl; A New Enemy) ditches the map parts from the first game and goes straight up level-by-level fare. Significantly more important is the complete loss of the sword and all close combat weapons, as the game goes for shooting action. Few stages do shake things up and are played like a standard vertical shooting game, though don’t expect them to play like Gradius or R-Type in terms of quality. The charge shot is still in there from the first game, with the player character yelling Shubibeam! every time its launched. It can get grating after a while. Pretty much everything from the first game has been upgraded, with graphics have more colour and variety in them, sprites having much better designs and animations all around. All the characters now showcase their persona much better, with some enemies being on point with the whole parodying things. Big eyed robots with silly faces are great, and they’d fit just fine with other games that parody tropes and genres, like Battle Mania.

Much like sprites, all the stages look pretty great with more variety in them. The shooting stages look significantly different from the action ones, though that can be said most of the stages and some of their respective areas. You go from cityscape to techno-mines and everything in-between. Some stages also scroll upwards, much like how Super Mario Bros. 2 did compared to the first Mario game. The layout design is not directly action, not all the time. The first game’s stages were almost all about the hazards and this has been carried over to some extent into the second game. They don’t pose the same head cracking challenge without any context though, outside few specific bits here and there. Many of the stages have dramatic moments built into their sections during play, but every stage also has a specifically designed spot to have story bits happening.

Music’s great, with more songs and some very memorable ones to boot. There’s not much to say about it, outside that the main theme of the game seems to be considered sort of unofficial theme for the whole series as it has seen the most remixes, with one of the famous one being in Dangerous Mezashi Cat’s 14th release, Newtype Destroyer.

In a straight up side by side comparison, Shubibinman 2 is the better game, but the play between the two is different enough to mention something about apples and oranges. Perhaps the improvements over the first game were enough to convince its release in the US a year later under the name Shockman. To modern players, and fans of the series, it’s less an issue whether or not one game plays better over the other, but which kind of play they like. The same could be said for the tone and the story of the game too.

While Shubibinman 2 still parodies, it does take itself tad more seriously. The whole silly side can be found in character’s expressions and enemy designs, as well in other silly matters, but the interactions are more serious in nature. This actually does follow up well with how the parodying was evolving in the early 90’s, peaking with comedic franchises like Slayers that don’t explicitly parody anything, but under the hood those in the know are having a good damn time. The story in itself is a cliché (intentionally though), with a new enemy and evil versions of Tasuke and Kyapiko, just because. Taking place some time after the first game, Tasuke is still working as a fisherman while Kyapiko is dealing with her classes. Despite his promises to put the two under the knife and return their bodies back to normal, Doctor Goutokuji has been putting that back due to him expecting a new invasion. After many wild goose chases, Emperor Ryo and his two Shubibinman Shades, Jeeta and Myu begin begin their attack. While Jeeta is played out like any generic black repaint rival that wants to destroy the original, Myu is that meek and somewhat forced in her role, wanting peace rather than war. Spoilers, but Emperor Ryo kills her bit over halfway into the game. Of course Jeeta thinks the player offed her, and after beating him and after some convincing, one of the game’s best moments hits when Jeeta joins the player for a stage, like you were playing with another player.

It’s hard to say whether or not the departure from the first game was met with split fandom, but whatever the case, the third game would mix things up again, this time with the power of compact disc.

By 1992, PC-Engine had saw the success in its CD ad-ons and so many games on the system took advantage of the larger space with CD-quality audio and animated cutscenes, and Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman 3: Ikai no Princess (tl: Princess of Another World) was there to fulfil the trope. It also changes how the game plays, though this time it’s a hybrid between the two first games. Fighting with a sword makes as return, and alongside the slightly numb feeling when you’re hitting an opponent. Shubibinbeam is still in as a charged attack, though this time it functions more like a magical projectile you have limited controls over, like how it moves up and down, left and right. However, keeping your character intact and moving the sphere around does require some skill. Controls are what you’d expect, about as tight as the second game, though some of the hitboxes can be wonky at times. The screen also scrolls only when you’ve passed the middle mark, making this one of those games where you can’t see where you’re going. The game also likes to employ the Japanese action game design of Throw everything at the player, where enemies spawn almost constantly and keep attacking until they’re defeated or the player scrolls far enough. This in turn makes the best strategy to keep hacking and moving forwards as fast as you can. If this sounds familiar, a lot of Japanese 2D actions games did this at the time. Luckily the sword swing hits both above and slightly back of the player character, so crowd control isn’t impossible.

Sadly, all of the bosses are one-trick ponies and none of them really pose any threat. They just take time to beat. Combined with the numb game play and lacking level design, the game is rather boring in the play department. Hell, there’s exactly one spot in the whole game you need to walljump, but you wouldn’t know that unless the game told you to do that. Whether or not the game was rushed is an open question, but the game lacks specific stage hazards that had defined the first two games. It’s also probably the easiest game in the series.

Visually, the game is more or less standard PC-Engine CD quality, though it does look significantly better than its two predecessors. Most characters are now built from multiple sprites that give them some extra movement and looks rather damn nice. Sprites are bigger to boot, which does give them more detail and appear more lively. The animated FMV sequences are nothing to write home about, but at least they’re fully voiced. Just like the game, the FMVs are middle of the road. Stages use colours to a large extent and the overall is very pleasant and crisp. Sadly, the stage’s designs themselves aren’t all that interesting, as most of them have been stripped of any platforming. Few of them feel like run-through fares. Still, the background and enemy designs do stand out, even if its a fantasy fare in a SF series. Some of the enemy designs are absolutely gorgeous though, and for a 1991 title, the game does look rather impressive.

As for the sound, the levels are a bit off, effects seem like they’re taken from stock archives and music’s surprisingly muted. Despite this, the soundrack is very much what you can expect from a PC-Engine game, full of synth rock and chips in the side. You’ll probably find something to like if  you have a preference for Falcom’s PC-Engine games’ soundtrack and the like.

It appears Hitoshi Ariga worked at Winds at the time. Ariga is better known for his comics, especially of his Mega Man Megamix series. Note the translation done,

As you’d expect from the title, the story is a generic another-world tale. Shubibinman are summoned to another world during their beach vacation (androids do find appreciation in vacations, apparently.) Shubibinman end up fighting the titular princess’ forces after being summoned due to misunderstanding (hilarity ensued), until they’re thrown into the underworld to fight Demon Lord Kargan and his troops. Right after Kargan is defeated, they’re thrown back to the beach, and the princess and her goons want that technology to gain more power. Even for a series that doesn’t put much emphasize on story outside comedy, this is rather out of place. The Shubibinman Shade, rescued at the end of the second game, only appear as an omake during the credit sequence.

Whatever transpired between the third and the fourth game has never been revealed, but Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman Zero was finalised in 1994, but was released in 1997 for Super Famicom’s Satellaview service, where users could download games and other material off a special online service. The game is, in all essence, a reboot with only Doc returning from the previous games. Tasuke and Kyapiko have been replaced with Raita and Azuki, and their designs look painfully mid-90’s anime. Columbus Circle’s recent re-release makes them look much better. Tomomi Seki’s designs usually are on the spot, but for whatever reason this time they’re a miss with the in-game graphics.

The game’s play of course is nothing like the previous titles’. Instead of characters only being visually different, now the two characters play differently. Raita smashes through generic mooks with his diamond tipped boxing gloves, while Azuki plays closer to classic Shubibinman heroes with a sword. Both still have Shubibeam as their charged projectile, but that’s pretty much the only thing that was carried over. In terms of play, the game plays like a one-lane 2D brawler, a beat-em-up, with a focus on platforming at places. The controls are tight, the best in the series, and the same goes for the level design. Most of the enemies are, quite literally, grey mobs you just hack through, with some interesting level specific enemies here and there. Bosses are much better than in the previous game, but they’re a joke if you’re doing a two-player run, as the Super Shubibeam is overpoweringly strong, taking care of some bosses in one shot. You also gain experience from defeated enemies, which upgrades your health meter

Sadly, this being a Satellaview game, as well as a Super Famicom game, the sprites have been toned back. There is a nice use of colours, but both characters and stages lack in detail, and this is due to size of the sprites themselves. Shubibinman 2 and 3 made great headway how the sprites look, but Zero had to take a step back and make them look like upgraded NES sprites. Some stages use a nice green, but there’s also an overuse of brown in couple of them. That said, some of the sprite designs to convey the characters’ personalities through just fine, though not to the same extent previous two games.

The soundtrack suffered as well, with some memorable tunes here and there, but Super Famicom always sounds like it’s played through a tunnel. Some samples are very Capcom-y in places and can even get you in the mood, but the overall soundtrack doesn’t really stand out too much from the rest of Super Famicom library.

The story doesn’t go out of its way to impress, concentrating on BB Gang’s criminal activities stealing stuff left and right while blowing stuff up, and Shubibinman are there to stop them. BB Gang has their own trump card in Kagemaru, a response of sorts to the Shubibinman, while Galko, the gang’s leader, is your classic high-class lady in hi-heels ready to whip and command every and all mooks.

While there is a minor resurrection with Masaya’s IPs, with Langrisser I and II remade, Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman probably won’t resurface. Columbus Circle re-releasing Shubibinman Zero made the game properly available for the first time, and you can still pick up a copy off your favourite import stores. The rest of the games have been easily available everywhere, as PC-Engine games have been ported via emulation, like on PSN. They’re always cheaper there than their original releases, as despite the overall mediocre quality of the franchise, Shubibinman did gain a strong following and is remembered as one of the better PC-Engine games overall. It might be an example of mediocre Japanese games, the kind of Japanese consoles are full of, but its charm and overall competence does make rise to the surface a bit more. It’s not an obscure or forgotten franchise, despite what Youtube might tell you. It’s just that many other games just did it better and it’s a perfect example of products of its time.

Top 5 games of 2019

I have to admit that I’ve slowed down when it comes to games. I’ve begun to prefer more and more games that don’t waste my time and allow quickly to start the game and quit even faster. Things like like making sure if I want to save after confirming Save. For example, every time I want to quit Earth Defence Force 4.1, the game has to make certain that if I want to quit, and then opens a new message telling me that game is about to quit itself. This is a topic unto itself and I’ll have to get back to it later, as holy shit modern games are huge time wasters in this manner. It’s like with that one Senran Kagura on PSVita few years back, where half of the game was sitting in loading screens and menus. Except, y’know, this is the game telling me to confirm things I’ve already told it to do. Sometimes twice.

Furthermore, this year was rather dry in terms of games of interest. Not many titles peaked my interest even on the retro front, so the list below is rather predictable. This has made me to decide ditching following most new game release news outside limited release titles, and concentrate on picking up some more expensive old games I’ve always wanted to play, but for whatever reason never did. Emulation, of course, is not really an option if you want to have the real thing in your hands.

The usual rules apply; any game from any year is applicable as long I’ve played it for the first time this year in physical form. This means if a game only has a digital release, it automatically gets disqualified. There is no top slot either, because that’s stupid. There is no One Best Game.

Mobile Suit Gundam Seed DESTINY GameBoy Advance, 2004

I feel that this CM has been stretched out of its proportions, it looks like it should be in 4:3 because how fat the Gundams are

The GameBoy Advance doesn’t have many good fighting games. Some Street Fighters, one Tekken, a downgraded port of Guilty Gear XX and few others. Derivatives and sequels of sorts. Mobile Suit Gundam Seed was a new entry to the console, despite being part of the whole long-running Gundam fighting game attempts dating at least to the 1993 Mobile Suit Gundam and 1994 Mobile Fighter G Gundam, both of which are largely trash. New Mobile Report Gundam Wing: Endless Duel from 1996 on the SNES really hit the mark, marrying Gundam with entertaining fighting game. Seed and Seed DESTINY on the GBA follow the example set by Endless Duel while adapting some of its elements for the smaller screen. This shouldn’t be surprise, as Natsume worked as the developer on these three titles. The first Seed game got localised in the US with the subtitle Battle Assault tagged to it in order to tie it to the previous Gundam Battle Assault titles despite having nothing to do with them. The sequel, which is the topic today, stayed in Japan. As a side trivia, Endless Duel uses a modified game engine from a previous Natsume fighting game; Power Rangers: The Fighting Edition,

The game everything you’d want from a fighting game; tight controls, easy-to-learn but hard-to-master mechanics, mechanics that are simple and only handful, yet they do great service to the game. It’s one of the best handheld fighting game experiences you can have because of this, not being bogged down by unnecessary mechanics just to add complexity for the sake of complexity and is simply joy to play.

The game’s a joy to see and listen to. GBA’s sound hardware wasn’t the best, but that shouldn’t really matter when tunes are somewhat catchy and properly hypes the player for needed matches. The game uses pre-rendered sprites, which works pretty damn fine on the system. All the 3D models had simple geometry and lots of smooth surfaces, and anything more would be a waste; it’d make the sprites far too clumsily detailed and be wasted. There are usual sprite trickery here and there you see on the GBA, but the overall package is just so satisfying and well made. Lots of unlockable units, few different modes thrown in and Link Cable VS mode really makes this a must-have title for the system. An absolute joy, and the last good Gundam fighting game we ever got. After this, it would be mediocre 3D action title after another and strategy games.

The game is criminally underrated, and worth checking out if you have a passing interest in Gundam and fighting games.

There are three good things that came out of Gundam Seed Destiny; its soundtrack, this game and Lunamaria Hawke. The show itself is garbage

Phantom Breaker: Battlegrounds Overdrive PlayStation 4, 2015, Switch, 2017

There has been loads of sidescrolling beat-em-ups, or belt-scrolling action games recently. Fight’n Rage is perfect example of modern take on this classic genre, which also hits just the right spots in both nostalgia and evolution of the genre with ton of playable characters and movelists. However, Fight’n Rage doesn’t have a physical release, so it can’t get on the list. Phantom Breaker Battlegrounds Overdrive however fills that slot just as well, with high production values.

For a belt-scroller, Phantom Breaker Battlegrounds Overdrive is surprisingly lengthy. Seven stages doesn’t sound a lot, yet these stages are long and split into multiple parts. There is also lots of story bits for people who want that, which is very much tongue on cheek. The game is also longer for completionists, as there is a  decent amount of characters, who also require to be played relatively extensively to unlock all of their Skill tree, not to mention unlockable characters. This goes down much faster after you’ve grabbed few friends and some extra controllers and have gay old time in multiplayer.

What else really needs to be said? It’s a great modern action game, though the pixelart style was already overused at the time of the game’s original release. Would’ve been nice to see smooth, high resolution SD sprites over what the game got, as used in the promotional materials and such, but can’t win always. It’s still a game nice to look at, with high amount of animation frames and stages having scenic changes often enough. Due to the SD-style, some of the attacks and moves feel rather limited in range at times, and there really isn’t much exaggeration to go around. Still, big colourful sprites makes most things clear, the different hit sparks and other effects sometimes obscure the action a bit too much. This has been a thing in multiple games I’ve played in these few years, where for whatever reason you can’t see the action and hits clearly and just have to trust that the enemy and player animations tell the tale that hit has been made. It would have been nice of all of the game was done in sprites, but some of the background elements use low-poly 3D assets that just don’t look too good.

Music’s nothing special per se, but fits the game just as well. Bit music as a throwback to the NES days, with more channels and such, the usual par for the course. Some of the tunes stand out far better than others, but that’s not said much. Optionally, you could get the FM sound pack, which harkens back to PC88 and X68k sound fonts. The two sound versions are like a night and day, and I can see some people outright disliking FM versions.

Advanced Busterhawk Gley Lancer Mega Drive, 1992, 2019, Nintendo Virtual Console, 2008

The fight for a spot to get a shooting game unto this list was harsh; it was either Darius Cozmic Collection or this. I didn’t manage to find time to play Battle Garegga.

Ultimately, despite being deeply flawed, Advanced Busterhawk Gley Lancer is just joy to play. Hard as balls, unforgiving at times, requires some very tight reflexes at times and learning some stage layouts, Gley Lancer is classic shooting gaming at its best. One of Masaya’s more neglected properties on their library of IPs, the re-release Columbus Circle put out this year should still be in circulation if you want to pick it up.

Console shooting games rarely emphasised scoring, though nowadays it feels like that’s all shooting games are for. Gley Lancer balanced things out much better, standing somewhere between R-Type‘s survivalist approach to Gradius‘ laxed pacing. If you’ve ever played Gradius V and are familiar how to lock support satellites in place, this is the game Konami picked it up. The satellites, or Options if you want to call them that, can shoot to different directions from your ship’s movements. With multiple weapon  options, including the usual Auto-Targeting option, it adds slightly different layer to the play, which then requires changing the approach just enough.

Music’s rather solid, if you’re fan of FM music and Mega Drive sound overall. The first stage’s theme is a damn classic by its own rights, and few of the later stages are still awaiting remixes to find them. Graphics overall are nice, especially on the story sequences. Big, clear sprites like this were Masaya’s forte and go-to gimmick. Nine stages makes the game about medium in length, but due to some of the stages being rather empty Gley Lancer ends up draggin itself a bit. Not a whole lot, but just enough you to notice.

In the end, the PV shows what you get; that’s what you get; a solid shooting game. Sure, there are better ones out there, both on PC-Engine and Mega Drive, yet something about Gley Lancer hits the spot in a way most other shooting games don’t. There’s that kind of atmosphere, that kind of sound to the music and an era-specific look to the colourscape and design. Something just clicks the right way in Gley Lancer, and that makes it stand out from the rest of the bunch in a way e.g. later Gradius games just can’t make themselves stand out anymore. Maybe it’s because franchise fatigue or something else, but Gley Lancer has character to it.

Sadly, the player’s ship sprite looks very little anything like the ship on the cover.

The Ninja Warriors Once Again Switch, PlayStation 4, 2019

The thing about these Natsume’s retro remakes is that they’re not exactly needed, but the way they’re done is example how to do them. Sure, the base game is the same as it was on the Super Nintendo, but that’s the starting point. Revamped sprites, wide-screen support, local two-player mode, new game play elements, more playable characters and an extra mode all are welcome additions. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel again, just make it better, faster, stronger. The Ninja Warriors Once Again sets the bar for remakes like this rather high as all the areas the game aims to improve is spot on.

Controls are strict as usual, but there’s some every so slight to make them tight. The only reason you get hit is because you didn’t make a move at a proper time, the game’s design and controls are that accurate. No bullshit hitboxes like in Fromsoftware’s games.

The two new characters are the main attraction to the series veterans. Raiden being a hulking beast is very much to an extreme end from the rest of the cast, especially when the second addition, Yaksha, is small but requires very peculiar approach to her play. It’s a small miracle how different the whole cast of playable characters ends up feeling, with none of them replicating strengths or weaknesses. Despite the core game play staying the same, each of the characters skill sets impact how you approach to pretty much everything in the game, from base mooks to bosses. Well, except the final boss, which has always been a letdown.

This game, despite being a remake, is a standout solid title that does everything it promises on the box. It’s one of those games I’ve been coming back again and again since its release simply to enjoy how a game with limited but purposeful controls like this also allows stupid amount of technical execution.

Funny that, the Asian English release I bought had to be renamed as The Ninja Saviors: Return of the Warriors, probably because Ninjas can’t be warriors in China or Korea. I don’t know, but it’s stupid and renaming the game now implies machines made to assassinate and then nuke themselves are somehow saviours, when the game’s plot clearly implies the new regime that takes over the nation afterward are no better. I guess it’s a cycle, where you always get new robot assassins to kill the new totalitarian regime after another.

 

Alien Crush PC-Engine, 1988, Nintendo Virtual Console, 2006, PSN, 2010

While Peach Ball Senran Kagura is a very entertaining and fun pinball game, the lack of fields really brings it down. There’s not much to do in the game as it is, but that’s mostly because there has been genre defining pinball games in the Crush series. Alien Crush is the first in the series, succeeded and surpassed by Devil’s Crush, but still stands very well in direct comparison to modern video pinball as its field design and music is top notch. Despite technically having only one man field, the setup and moving back and forth its low and upper parts. It takes a while to get the groove on, but the moment the game’s pace clicks, you can easily rack up points in no time to finish the game. The ball physics are not perfect, but for 1989, Alien Crush nailed it the best. While there’s just one main table to play on, there are numerous one-screen sized secret tables that pose specific challenges. All of them are a welcome break from the main table and shake up the play a bit. While the later games would have more secrets to access, Alien Crush arguably has better balance, not elongating the main table beyond two screens and allows more focused scoring.

The Gieger-esque design is bit on the nose, and the game overall wouldn’t be too far off from easily being made into an Alien licensed pinball game. The little details make it live, pulsating and looking organic. Alien Crush takes advantage of it being a video game and doesn’t lock itself into what shouldn’t be possible on a real table. While music is sparse, both main tracks sound for the part. Though you can’t change tracks mid-game, they do get a bit grating after a while.

That said, it is a niche title, well forgotten at this point, but still available via some online services like PSN and used to be Nintendo’s Virtual Console. Goddamn the Virtual Console was a great thing, and Ninty just killed it. The Crush series pinball games are still top notch, and a very high bar to beat in terms of sheer distilled video pinball quality.

 

Honourable Mentions for those who didn’t make the cut

 

Darius Cozmic Collection Nintendo Switch, 2019

The definitive way to get into Darius as a franchise, though it lacks G Darius. The collection didn’t get into the Top 5 because A) there’s a retarded amount of different variations of this collection for no real reason outside sheer stupidity and B) the games themselves aren’t in the end up there. Some standard editions have less games, some other editions have more games, it’s all stupid. That said, the games run pretty much perfectly, but Darius is a franchise that rode on multiple screens gimmick and didn’t actually get all the competent until Darius Gaiden. All the previous games, while nice and all, don’t have the same impact on the small screen as they did in the arcades, and without a similar multi-screen setup where you could replicate that experience, playing these games on a console or PC is a waste. It’s nice to have stupidly rare games like Darius Alpha on the collection, but that doesn’t add much to the game itself. The collection and packaging itself, in the end, are more impressive than majority of the games on the collection. The aforementioned lack of G Darius makes this collection very much incomplete in terms of classic Darius, before the Burst era begun. Maybe they’ve lost the source code or can’t make a proper PlayStation emulator, who knows.

Peach Ball Senran Kagura Switch, 2018, Steam, 2019

There’s exactly one reason why Peach Ball Senran Kagura didn’t take Alien Crush’s spot; lack of fields. I can understand and get why a pinball game from 1988 only have one main stage, but the lack of multiple stages in Peach Ball is a hard drop. Instead, you get three different daytime variations on two stages, which is really just an insult. Rather than basing the fields on something that would be familiar to the series’ fans, the two stages are a generic circus-carnival type of thing and Japanese themed field. While this makes both fields pretty solid, in their own terms, there’s surprisingly little to do, and despite the ball physics being pretty damn fine tuned, there’s just something little bit off that makes it all feel just tiny bit lacklustre. The emphasize of course is on unlockable clothes and balls, which all really amount to nothing. It would have been fun to see different balls having different physics, like a rubber ball being more bouncy compared to a metal ball. They don’t even make a different sound, it’s just a visual difference. I can appreciate the naughty bits just fine, with the whole flipping life and hometown up and down being a thing, but the lack of recognisable fields and cramming the two full of visual clutter ultimately made this a disappointment. I wish the game would’ve included a mode, where you could’ve turned the Switch on its side, but the stages are not even designed for that. There’s potential, so much of it, but it just can’t get there. The game lives and dies through short sessions, which in it serves perfectly.

Capcom Belt Action Collection Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Steam, 2018

What should I say about this collection? It’s good, it has great titles, it has Armored Warriors and Battle Circuit, two games that two games that were never ported home before, but Capcom should’ve thrown just a bit more cash at this collection in order to include Cadillacs and Dinosaurs, The Punisher and the eponymous Alien VS Predator. Where’s titles like Mighty Final Fight or the SNES sequels to the original Final Fight? No Tenchi wo Kurau/Dynasty Wars or any of the Capcom Dungeons and Dragons games either. What’s on the disc is great, but Capcom’s beat-em-up history is so much more. This collection comes out as halfassed and janky, not even having any of the home console games they released in the past. Apparently, it sold decently well, but I hope Capcom will put far more effort and resources in future compilations.

Why the Japanese title? Because that’s the label on my copy.

Wonder Momo Arcade, 1987, PC-Engine 1989

Wonder Momo is a class example of pure core design of a game and never deviating from it. Almost every other official attempt to revive the franchise has failed, mostly because they were lacklustre and didn’t get that simplicity doesn’t mean simple in play and design. Wonder Momo straddles on the line of being just simple enough and being too simple with its stage setting and enemies, strict and limited controls. It’s very much like playing old Castelvania or that new The Ninja Warriors, where the game is fair but hard. It’s a damn classic, and it’s sad that official revivals never understood it enough to expand on it.  However, this is where Toushiryoku Kenkyujo’s Wonder Pink doujinshi games come in. Sumomo Theater is effectively an upgraded version of Wonder Momo in every way and manner, with the two other expanding the system to multi-level side scrollers. Sumomo Theatre is a perfect example how integral it is to understand and acknowledge the core of the game you’re remaking.

Rumble Roses PlayStation 2, 2004

For numerous years now I’ve been trying to look for a wrestling game that would not suck. The few pro wrestling games that I’ve played have been absolute trash, while some others are more like fighting games in a ring, like Capcom’s Ring of Destruction: Slam Masters 2. Nothing wrong in that, I’d be down for a new Slam Masters game if Capcom were ever to make one, but somehow almost all 3D wrestling games end up playing janky and feel as smooth as trying force spaghetti through a motor. I really wanted to love this game, I really did. Joshiprowres is something I’ve always loved on the side, but it’s never been my main interest. Blizzard Yuki’s a personal favourite, dunno why. Maybe it’s the comic. Playing Rumble Roses ultimately ended up feeling like so many other wrestling games; unfulfilling. The way these 3D wrestling games are designed and realised needs a total paradigm shift, something would move towards making the games play like silk rather than feeling like you’re scraping against the asphalt. Still, there’s a lot to like about the game, from somewhat nonsensical storylines to alternative versions of each character to nice designs overall. I’ll just have to keep looking for that one wrestling game that might sate this craving.

Review: Retrobit Sega Saturn style bluetooth controller

Nowadays it’s become somewhat hard to find new controllers for your old hardware. You mostly have options from third party producers, who may or may not have the best quality to offer. For example, you can find NES controllers that look just like the original, but then the buttons have a terrible feeling under the thumb, Start and Select are hard plastic instead of soft rubber and the contact rubbers underneath are mostly trash. It’s surprising how much a controller’s responsiveness and tactile feeling comes from how good the contact rubbers are, how well they spring up, what’s their depth and how much pressure they require to be pressed down. You can get proper molds from existing controllers just fine, or if a company still has the originals, they can use those. Nowadays it is easy to model the controller in a CAD program and mill it out, though even that costs some money. Still, faster than creating a whole new product design, and with something relatively simple like the NES controller, the costs probably are not all that high.

It’s a tall order to ask a modern replication of an older controller feel and function the same. Some materials may have been changed, some components may not even be in production anymore, things like that. However, that should be the minimum level a replication controller should be like, then have some additional bells and whistles like wireless functionality, RGB lights and the like. The Retrobit Saturn controller gets the Saturn experience almost right. It runs just short in few areas, and these areas are probably something they can’t help too much.

As a side note, the photos in this review will be updated at a later date for better ones. Embarrassingly I’ve misplaced my Nikon’s battery charger, and you’ll have to wait until I’ve found it, or my travel charger has arrived.

If you’re wondering why my copy is transparent blue, it was the cheapest option out there. At first it comes as a bit gaudy with the hard plastic casing and such, which just wants to be scratched and cracked. It’s still a neat case, easy way to keep track on your two dongles, one basic USB and for Saturn. It’d be a surprise if a controller like this would make the sync process somehow obtuse, but nothing special to mention here, except the small sync buttons on the dongles feel extremely cheap and something that could break.

Overall, the controller is seemingly the same size as the original Saturn S controller, the one that really matters. The first Saturn controller is a slight monstrosity with really uncomfortable looking D-Pad, but I’d like to get my hands on one still for reviewing purposes. Of course, the 3D Pad was a thing, but mostly good only for Nights. It feels like a Saturn controller, which always felt like built from cheap plastic, hollow and clattered when shaken. Retrobit has managed to replicate all these, thought the battery adds ever so slightly more weight. It’s weird to call this controller feeling like cheap shit, because that’s part of Sega’s original design and engineering. It just works as intended. Even the face buttons moving about and making that rattly noise is part of the design. It doesn’t feel expensive or deluxe grade, it feels like something that’s made to fulfill its task.

Even the info labels are at the same spot.

I have to confess something though; you haven’t been looking at pure Retrobit Saturn Controller here. Instead, you’ve been looking at a slight hybrid.

Now the first one who tells me I should’ve put the rubber on its right spot above the face buttons rather than leave it off-center and crooked doesn’t get any cookies. Retrobit uses some kind of coloured rubbers, in my case blue, because blue case.

Whilst on the surface Retrobit’s controller looks like Sega’s original, the function is not there. The up diagonals are slightly too touchy and easy to push. C-Button, the most rightmost button on the lower row on the controller, got constantly stuck. There are three possibilities why this happens; the button itself is intended height, the contact rubber underneath allows the button to plunge too low, or the shells have just enough height difference that the button plunges too low. It may be a combination of these three. After quick measurements, the buttons themselves seem to be more or less accurate replications, so the problem must be on the rubbers, as tightening the screws at the back didn’t work.

This gave me an idea to try out; change D-Pad and rubbers from an old Saturn controller to this Retrobit one, as the shells are effectively the same with two extra slots. This, to my surprise, didn’t just fix the D-Pad problem I was having with the up-diagonals, but also tightened the button feeling, responsiveness and no buttons were getting stuck. It’s probable that some tolerances with the new parts are just slightly off, which is probably explained by them being manufactured nowadays. Something is a bit off, and throwing in older parts somehow fixes this. This isn’t an issue with using old parts per se, as I compared to a brand new Saturn S controller, which I really should’ve used in these photos and not the one I used as my daily driver with Saturn itself.

These parts go together so that the sides that are now up meet together.

These are the contact surfaces. One for your thumb, one for the rubbers underneath

The shell itself plays a role. It’s specifically designed to allow certain amount of movement all the while keeping the cross in the best position at all times.

One of the reasons Saturn controller is well praised is because of its six-button setup and the D-Pad. The D-Pad in itself is the best one any of the major companies have produced to this day. This is a combination of three elements; Disc shaped top layer, the white cross-shape underneath and the cavities both parts sit in. With a good underlying rubber, this setup is simply accurate and easy to use. It has the benefits of a round D-Pad in that it is easy to roll your thumb around and its softer corners are godsend in longer gaming sessions, but at the same time the clear cross-shape beneath makes all the eight cardinal input directions stand out as individuals. The main difference between Sega’s and Retrobit’s design is that while Sega’s design holds itself together with sheer force of friction, which isn’t a whole lot but enough, Retrobit’s parts are lose enough to necessitate a screw. Well, this lead me to change the D-Pad as well. This leads me to wonder if the main reason the controller has some issues are tolerances, things are just that sub-millimeter amount too loose.

Saturn original underneath, the Retrobit above

The most major difference in the controller, outside it being wireless, is the shoulder buttons. They simply are different. Sega’s controller has a button that has a very short throw distance, it feels like it clicks down less than millimeter down. You can brush the button and it clicks instantly. It’s pretty damn great how it feels. It’s precise. Retrobit didn’t use the same part for whatever reason, be it that the part doesn’t exist anymore or they used a button that was more readily available. The difference isn’t just in the width of the button, but also that it requires more pressure to press down, its click is far mushier and has notably farther plunge. In comparison, Retrobit controller’s shoulder buttons feel less responsive. In action, like in Street Fighter Alpha 2, I did notice how some timings were off simply because my muscles memory. While this seems like a minor problem, it is a problem in a spot that lives and dies in millimeters. That sharp click is also much more pleasant to the ear.

I can’t help but to recommend the Retrobit Saturn controller. Overall, it is an almost exact replica of Sega’s famous Saturn S controller. The diagonals and C-Button sticking might be issues just with my copy, and I haven’t read anyone else having these issues. I find it stupid that changing the the D-Pad and the rubbers from an older controller makes Retrobit’s controller is almost a perfect replica outside those issues, with the shoulder buttons being the only true gripe. Even that is more an issue of getting used to, though that can be modded with desoldered buttons from the Sega controllers. Sure, it lacks the second stick, but that’s now what this controller was designed to have. It’s best for games that don’t need a stick and should be one of your top considerations for emulation and 2D gaming.

Review; Darius Cozmic Collection Special Edition box

There has been some interesting development in regards of certain video game packaging as of late, if you’re someone who has a thing for package designs. Mainly that there has been a large movement to unify them under a generic design, especially if they’re from Limited Run Games or by a Japanese company. Two could be a coincidence or style chosen by a certain corporation. Three’s a company, but five starts to say there’s a standard going on. Game Paradise Cruisin’ Mix Special, Dariusburst Chronicles Saviours both JP and Limited Run Games release, Senko no Ronde 2, and now Darius Cozmic Collection all use the same kind semi-slim box design that can be used to house multiple types of objects by changing the inlays. With this basic design, the thickness of the box is easy to adjust as well to offer more room. People who like uniform shelves will like this direction quite a lot, as the boxes now are of same height and width, with some changes in thickness. Still, an evolution from the widely and stupidly different kind of collector’s editions boxes that just don’t really fit anywhere. I can’t help but feel that this homogenisation of boxes takes something special from these special editions.

If you read the review on Dariusburst Chronicles Saviours box few years back, you should mostly know already what to expect.

 

As you’d expect from the front, Darius Cozmic Collection Special Edition looks rather spiffy. Sure, the logo’s taking a lot of room from the cover, but all the six main images try to come through in a good balance. The only bit that ruins the Switch logo on the top left, with it being the largest logo on the box. Taito’s and CERO logos at the bottom are perfectly sized in order not to mess with the layout, but the Switch logo just hits your face. It’s a box front, and the back’s as you’d expect it to be. The layout’s nice, uses some of the game graphics and rather than trying to sell the game with overtly just vomiting text, the graphics are there to sell the package. They do that nicely. The usual required legalese at the bottom doesn’t interfere with the rest, as it functions like a some sort  pedestal for the rest of the back.

When you first open the package, you’re greeted with the miniature marquee plaques. This is an absolutely beautiful set, even if its just bunch of transparent plastic with layered printing on the back. The printing is sharp and of high quality. Nothing less would really suffice, if we’re honest here. Most often Japanese companies don’t sacrifice quality when it comes to limited editions, and know that the perceived value gained from putting the effort into stuff like this is enormous benefit. It works, and you could attach these to anything you’d wish. There’s a not much weight to them either, so just throwing some bluetac behind them would keep ’em in place, though they’d truly shine if you had something to light them from behind.

After lifting the plaques and two spacer sheets around out, the main book of the package reveals itself. Darius Odysseys have always been great source material books with some slight change in emphasize, with the previous Dariusburst collections emphasizing on listing enemies. This time we have emphasize on production, both the actual cabinets, prototype artwork to layout the screen scenes, packaging scans, preliminary sketches and all the that good stuff yours truly loves to see. Hell, even the scans for the game packaging are of great quality and highly appreciated in the wholesome box form they’re presented. It’s a nice and thick book with great production value to it. The only thing that could’ve made it better would have been hard covers. This is the kind of material we rarely see, and it’s a marvel to see production material like this.

Lifting the space the book is recessed in reveals the last bit at the bottom of the; the bog standard Switch game case and the soundtrack slot. Funnily enough, this game with two soundtracks, and only one fit inside the box. The other was just laying inside the box, but seeing that was more or less a seller’s special, it should impact on the value of the core box. It would’ve been better to use a different cover for the Limited Edition and standard edition cases, but I guess this sort of unifying look to the whole package has its benefits too.

A package like this really lives through prestige. Most of it is sturdy, can take a hit or two just fine, just like the rest of the boxes like it. Nothing’s flimsy here, not even with the spacers. It’s a bit weird that one of the two CDs, even if it was just a seller exclusive item, had not slot designed inside the box. Now it’s just floating around somewhere on my couch among all the other stuff. Still, a package design like this might be somewhat dull, but it’s extremely well thought out for multiple intended uses. If this has become the standard for limited editions in Japan, guess this is the golden standard we should compare the rest of the gaming packaging we come across in the future.

 

Review: Myst 25th Anniversary Kickstarter packaging is shit

The very first thing your customer notices about a product, be it on the store shelves, online pictures or when receiving the item in mail, is the packaging. Ignore the quality of the packaging and you lose the customer. It’s extremely easy to make a terrible packaging by making few low-effort choices, like choosing weak cardboard because its cheaper, unfitting box size because that allows items to rattle and be damaged during transit (be it from the store or via mail) or have no support for the item within the box.

Package illustration and text are a whole another dimension that add to the mix. Cheap printing will automatically spell how much the producer cares about the producer cares about the product overall. Some fanzines have better printing that some mainline comics nowadays. The logos, the catchphrases, the descriptions, everything that reads of the package has to be both up to legal standards and to attract and convince the customer that this is the product worthy of their money.

A worthy packaging takes money, time and skill. A package designer is well worth the money he gets paid and is a field of design that nobody really thinks about. It’s a thankless job that you only remember exists when you face a terrible packaging.

Of course you could ignore most of that and just throw some discs in a sleeve and call it a day.

Oh for fuck’s sake Cyan

The reason why Cyan Inc (and Incorporated they are) did this is because the higher tier backers on Kickstarter get a custom build book that houses the games. This is all fine and dandy, until you realise that these poor bastards will get their games in the same cheap bargain bin sleeves. Let’s get to the root why this packaging is shit to the core and nobody should do this, unless they’re releasing cheap shit to the market at the lowest possible price.

First of all, there is no protective support. Sure, the sleeves themselves support from some of the damage that dust or such could do, but that goes out of the window the moment you realise that everything will get in from the open side. There’s no mechanism to keep any of that out.

While these sleeves are an age-old way to house a disc, it’s also one of the worst ways. Compact discs like these have a tendency to moving and spinning inside their sleeves, unlike LPs and LDs that have some weight in them to keep them in place during transit. This causes chafing that will cause smudges, and sometimes with low quality rough cardboard, leave a permanent mark on the disc’s surfaces.

Then you have the fact that the sleeves can’t take any physical damage. These were delivered as you see now, in a stack with no protective box around them in a vacuum sealed bag. You can see the first sleeve has already given in and creased itself against the disc inside. The sleeve is already damaged by sheer act of being shipped. If it’s put on the shelf, the pressure from whatever is around it will continue to press the sleeve against the disc, further creasing it. It’s unusable as a long-term storing device, necessitating the customer to come up something on their own, like buying jewel cases for the discs. You don’t see it on the photo, but all the sleeves are also scuffed up already from chafing against each other, especially on the back.

This photo is intentionally bad with that lamp light on the left, because it shows how scuffed and creased the the backs are already just from shipping and sitting on my desk untouched for a day. Every back is the same, with the nice 25th Anniversary logo. Well, it would be, but repeating 25 like that is stupid and useless. Ends ups looking terrible the more you look at it and think about it. There are scratches that are directly from the production, handling and packaging.

Actually, some of the sleeves are already damaged from the production. Whatever company made these didn’t make sure that when the prints are separated, the cut would be clean. Instead you have those rip nubs, also slightly visible on the left of on the sleeve.

Let’s check the disc design and leave the sleeves for the time being.

The disc design in itself is nice, but far from what looks like what Myst should have. It’s effectively giant C and some low-effort text thrown in there. Apparently advertising Cyan Inc. was more important than creating a fitting look for each of the disc, or re-using the existing designs. Ubisoft’s Myst Collection beats 25th Anniversary collection in design and sleeves 1 to zero. Plastic sleeves at least protect the discs properly. Notice also that the print is ever so hazy on the disc, meaning this is once more one of those points where money was pinched out. The Big C is sharp, the text not so much. It’s far from the worst, but with minimalist design like this you don’t have any room to screw up a single element. Also how the platform text, Windows in my case, has a terrible positioning. It would have looked far better midway down the black Myst text and the legal text down there. That C is just too governing and taking too much room.

To be fair, the sleeves have a nice artwork on them, which each one of them having its own frame texture with a window. It’s not much, but at least it goes with the theme.

Cyan Inc. never stated how or in what sort of packaging their physical goods would be delivered in. This is something that any backer should make a note of in the future Kickstarters they may back and demand that the packaging must be up to standards. This isn’t. This is far from being what is expected from almost three million dollar Kickstarter. I might’ve given the Muv-Luv Kickstarter packaging some shit, but that’s a winner with platinum medal level of quality compared to to what Cyan has delivered with these.

This is the lowest and cheapest way to produce and pack their game collection, and if anyone wants any longevity from these, they are required to go out and purchase some kind of jewel case or one of those multi-disc packages, and then print their own sleeve to go with it.

Frankly, it’s shit.

Review: Mega Man 11

It’s been about eight years since we got a proper Mega Man game, though I’d go further back to pin point a true “new” title in the series. This isn’t the first time the franchise has been revived either, with the 8-bit throwbacks essentially serving the role and Battle Network being a kind of total reboot that essentially allowed a new generation to enjoy a Mega Man branded product. However, Mega Man 11 might be closer to the throwbacks, but thematically and in intention it leans more towards reintroducing the franchise to the field. As such, there’s three takes I could use to review the game; developer intention, as a Mega Man game and as a standalone title. However, splitting or choosing just one felt awkward. So rather than overthinking how to make this one stand out or be something special, I’ll just go in without much worries and say this straight out of the gate; Mega Man 11 is a good Mega Man game, but ultimately runs short compared in this modern era of games.

If you’ve played any of the NES Mega Man games, you know what you’re getting into, and MM11 is best argument against MM9 and 10 in that you don’t need to use throwback bit-graphics in order to make a “true” Mega Man game. The controls are tight, responsive and work exactly as you’d expect. The amount of control over Mega Man is perfect and pretty much everything can be put on the player in damage and death department. The PS4 version has the most control lag, with Steam and Xbox versions coming at top, which can only be blamed on Sony wanting to add too much post-processing on their games on PS4 Pro. Switch is somewhere between, closer to Xbox’s and that’s fine. Unless you’re crazy over NES-CRT level responsiveness, you’re more or less boned and should go for the Steam version. That’s probably the only significant difference between the versions, outside Switch’s Amiibo support that gives you items mid-game. It’s a nice idea, but really sucks when you realise how haphazardly it’s been implemented, much like in every other game out there.

For those who haven’t played a Mega Man game, the formulae is simple and solid. You’ve got eight stages, each with a Boss you have to defeat in order to advance to the final stages. You gain each Boss’ weapon and they have rock-paper-scissors mechanic going on, one being weak to another. Back when games were more or less strict on the progress, Mega Man was a breeze of fresh air, and modern stage-selecting was more or less inspired by the franchise. The franchise is famed for being difficult, but this has always been hyperbole at best. The six NES titles are easy enough for a five-years old to beat. The right word would be challenge, where the game offers some obstacles you to tackle, but with some try and experience, you’ll beat them in no time. The stages are overall designed to have a combination of environmental hazards combined with stage enemies, sometimes moving and sometimes stationary, which also gives all the stages their own little gimmick to work with.

The stages, of course, are the main meat themselves. Sadly, the game’s design did not escape the usual fire-water-grass thematic that has been overused in the series far too often. This time we’re getting both spikes-in-water and an ice stage, which shows that despite the series having almost a decade long hiatus and thirty years of history to learn from, the new dev team ultimately had to resort to recycling some old ideas. We’ve seen pretty much everything at this point in the franchise, from water purifying facilities to cityscapes, from forests to ancient stone temples and even space stations, thematically Mega Man is all spent. It doesn’t really offer anything new, and veterans feel it. Each stage offers their own challenges, like the aforementioned spikes-in-water stage that emphasizes on careful control. Each of their gimmicks should drive the player skills higher in order to beat the final fortress levels, but ultimately these stages don’t take all the advantages the eight main stages offer. The difficulty and challenge doesn’t exactly ramp up drastically, especially now that there is a total lack of Capcom gauntlet. A Capcom gauntlet is an old term for stages that come at a later stage in a game, where the player is unable to return or retreat to recover items, having to resort with whatever limited resources is found during the gauntlet. Boss Rush has always been part of this, with an additional twist or two in the mix. Mega Man games excelled in this by the natural design. However, Mega Man 11 allows the player to access the previous stages and create items between each of the fortress stages, making the gauntlet completely neutered. The ramping up element is now gone.

This of course begs the mention of the game’s gimmick, the Double Gear system. The stages have been designed so that there is no need to use use either Speed or Power function to beat them. Speed is naturally the more useful of the two, as its slow-down effect makes everything much more easier. The Power in itself is largely useless outside few situations, and is mostly used to use the powered up versions of the Special Weapons. However, because of all this the system works more or less as a build-in cheat, which can be further powered up with purchasable items. The game meanders between trying to appease people who want a more pure Mega Man experience and people who go all out, and ultimately doesn’t exactly fulfill the necessities to use the Gears. Even the speediest or smartest sections of the game are easy without the use of Speed Gear, and Power Gear makes some of the Special Weapons just absolutely bonkers, being able to wipe the screen of enemies, shield or not.  That said, the weapons themselves are pretty well designed and balanced, again fitting pre-existing moulds in the series e.g. utility weapon, movement option attack, full-screen weapon, a barrier and so on. Their powered-up versions, as mentioned, are overkill in most places, and make mid-stage bosses a laughing stock.

This means the game ends up being very easy to beat through the use of cost items rather than skill, but perhaps this is more or less about personal challenge than anything else. Mega Man games have always been welcoming, though the game does seem too accommodating rather than trusting the player to build enough skill to beat it. Resources are readily available for anyone to buy if the game puts a wall against you. The stages have some elements designed around some of the Special Weapons use, but their limited scope and length don’t make much use of them. The fortress levels even less so, and you can rely on Tundra Storm to wipe enemies off from distance.

Visually speaking, the game looks very much for the part. Colours are well used and detail can be found everywhere. There is a definitive Mega Man flavour to things, just aptly cartoony with clear and defined lines. It may not be the cutting edge of graphics technology, but it doesn’t need to be. The game stays true to the NES era’s designwork almost to a flaw, where certain amount of detail is lost on the designs. Backgrounds get the most detail overall, with some referencing past games. There is a definitive charm to everything, the same charm Mega Man used to carry. This carries to the Robot Master designs as well, with the Gallery mode expanding on their characters more than the game can properly convey on-screen. While pre-battle quotes have been around for a time now, the Gallery entries really make them shine even more. Mega Man & Bass’ CD Database gave a nice insight to all of the characters, but not to this extent.

The music, however, is t he game’s weakest point by far. It goes all techno on the soundtrack, with synth bweaaaing being the main instrument. It all ends in almost a cacophony, most stages ending up sounding the same and unmemorable. This is a far cry from previous’ games’ soundtracks, which made the songs stood out, either due to the more limited sound samples or simply because the songs were that superior. The pre-order downloadable soundtrack is not much better, opting the techno for nondescript jazz that sounds worse. Acid Man comes out the best in this, mostly due to the instruments working better with his theme, but overall you’d be better just muting the BGM and putting something better on. Rock and rocking kind of instruments have always sit the series much better, more so in the X-series. That said, sound effects are pretty much spot on and have an oomph to them, though Mega Man no longer makes a noise when he lands. In the NES games, there was a small te-det sound, which is absent here, but it’s something that isn’t all essential.

This review reads like a ramble, because trying to say anything definitive how it is fails to a point. The Mega Man 11 doesn’t innovate on the formula of the series and is a step back in terms of length and game design. However, on the other hand it is well made and intentionally open for everybody, concentrating on the core building blocks what makes a Mega Man game. However, that’s all it really is. We’ve seen this before. While there is a need for smaller games like this one the market now, retreading things once more like this works only once. Just as with Mega Man 9. If there is going to be a Mega Man 12, it must innovate, expand and push the envelope on Classic Mega Man as much as possible. As a standalone title, the game doesn’t exactly stand well against the swamp of other 2D action titles, but its sheer polish and execution ultimately lifts it just enough above the surface.

Retro Fighters’ Brawler 64 controller review Part 2; New Parts

Be sure to check the first part of the review here.

I’ll just assume you’ve red the previous part or overall know the issues that Retro Fighters’ Brawler 64 controller had. Mostly, it was the left shoulder button issue, where rocking the stick to the top left would lift it and make it move. don’t expect major revisions on any other department.

Let’s spend any time on the front for now, let’s jump willy nilly into the insides of it and see what changes were made to the mould to fix issues.

Whoops, forgot to take off that Turbo Button from the old shell

First of all, their solution was the expected one; retooling. Retooling is to change mould just enough to use it further for with minimum costs. This in itself is nothing to scoff at, as it usually saves time and money from the consumers’ pockets. At first, the differences in the shell are apparent, mainly that the extrusions for the build-in vibrators have been removed. They added to nothing else but teeny tiny weight, but it would have been nice to have build-in rumbling that could have been toggled on or off via a switch. No unnecessary expansion pack uses. This really would have added to the value of the controller.

The second change is in the shoulder buttons, which actually use leaf-switch mechanic to spring back up. If you look at the bottom of the L-Button, the one at the top right corner of the photo, you can see that it has no hook on it. The R-Button has it and so does the old mould. This is part of the solution in order to fix the problem I mentioned in the first paragraph. Now that the button is not restricted to stay in its slot, it can freely move about. This of course raises the question if the button can raise itself from its resting place, and it can. You’d need to deliberately lift it off though, but accidents happen. This is a solution, but without a doubt not the most optimal one. This shows signs of hurry and stress, something all designers can relate to, but this solution, despite fixing the problem itself, does degrade from its overall value. It’s a hatchet job at best.

Let’s take a look at the back half of the shell then.

For better or worse, they are clearly labelled 1 and 2 for our pleasure. Similar to the front half, there are no brackets for a vibrator motor. More importantly, the extremely lacklustre expansion lock has been upgraded and fixed. On the original, on the right, you can see the lock mechanism being in an angle, making inserting and pulling expansion packs out rather tiresome and at best infuriating. Now that the lock sits straight, the whole ordeal is as smooth as you’d expect it to be. This is a definitive plus.

The main difference between the new and old halves seems to be that the controller’s front half seems to be slightly raised in order to keep the stick from bumping into the L-Button. This has necessitated to include new A, B and C Buttons. I first expected the A and B to stand more raised from the surface, but this was not the case. However, quality often showcases itself with the smallest details, and the C-Button’s new moulds were not up to standard.

The C-Buttons are completely uncleaned. All that junk, both at the base and on the notches that guide them into their proper place, had to be cleaned with a knife. While this wasn’t a major deal, backers who opted to change their shells themselves might’ve found themselves slightly puzzled why their C-Buttons were jamming. Granted, Retro Fighers did post a Youtube video how to change the parts, but a customer shouldn’t have to shave plastic off from their spanking new buttons they just received three weeks later than everyone else in the world. I build models, so this wasn’t a problem, but knowing people already asked about this tells you how backers weren’t happy with this.

When put together, the controller doesn’t look any different from the old one, outside a different sticker on the back, so I’ll just recycle a picture from the first part here.

With the new parts installed, there are no buttons or stick interacting with each other and remind you that you overpaid for the controller. Yes, considering Retro Fighters had to put out new parts to fix something like this and didn’t deliver on the promise of full N64 support due to something they never explicitly stated, the controller remains as second option at best despite being better than the stock N64 controller in almost every way. The stock N64’s controller might be a bit awkward even after all these years and its stick is pretty janky piece, but its construction and build quality leave no room for guesswork. The same can be said of some other peripheral controllers released for the N64, some of which I’d like to get for the sake of comparisons, though putting money into a system I don’t play on a regular basis would be unwise.

However, I must admit that despite all the issues it has, it does make a good backup or secondary controller. If you can find it on sale, change the Not Recommended status into Worth Considering and hope that Retro Fighters have put more second versions out there than the first ones, and that they’re willing to change parts if you end up with the first version somehow. Otherwise, I can’t recommend this controller, it’s just not up to par standards-wise.