This is one of the games on the recent Taito cartridge for the Evercade. I’m not 100% on the timings, but it feels very much like a precursor to Bubble Bobble – loads of single screen platforming, baddies to destroy, a particularly nasty baddie that appears if you take too long, and so on. It isn’t anywhere near as much fun as Bubble Bobble though. The main issue I had is that often, especially on later levels, some of the …
It’s been a while since I last completed a Picross game, but I’ve actually been playing this one off and on for six months or more. It is, as they always are, more of the same – a polished, Jupiter developed, game of Picross with loads of puzzles. The difference this time, however, is that it’s Namco themed. Specifically, 8-bit Namco games from the 1980s. Pixel representations of the likes of Dig Dug, The Tower of Druaga, Pac-Man, Rally-X, Mappy, …
New Evercade cartridges arrived last night! one of them is the Taito Arcade 3 compilation, the highlight (for me) on it being Puzzle Bobble. The original one! In the arcade! As I already knew, it’s great. Only, because it’s the arcade version, it only has 30 levels so I was done within an hour. 30 levels! I’m sure later home versions had many hundreds of them or randomly generated endlessly, but no.
Yes! I was one of those idiots that paid SIXTY SIX POUNDS for a piece of plastic that you put your Switch (or Switch 2) in, so you can sit awkwardly while playing games made for one of the worst consoles ever made! It’s like having two red-tinted Game Boys stuck in front of your eyes that you can only really play at a table (or, as I did, on the sofa with a teetering pile of lap cushions), all …
Yes, this again. For the record, this time I played it on my Retroflag GPi, and I played as Scarlet (the red one). One rival managed to make it to the Mother of All Battles at the end, and they were quickly dispatched.
It’s Mr Driller only on the Game Boy Advance, only on the Switch. It’s missing the many game types and variations from later games in the series like Drill Land, but it’s the same gameplay and just as much fun as it ever was. But hoo is it hard. The constant worry that you should just dash for the end rather than try to grab some air, or vice versa, when you’re low on oxygen. The all-to-easy way to miscalculate …
This is a bit of weird one. It’s mainly a side-scrolling shooter, only your big mech (or mecha? I can never remember the difference) can’t fly and at times you can move in and out of the screen which has a similar effect to flying because it’s all on a 2D plane. That’s not the only unusual thing though, as you can “build” your own robot from various parts for different weapons and legs and stuff before you play, and …
Yes, yes. We’ve all played Metal Slug before and own it on various compilations a hundred times over but that doesn’t stop it being good. And! This time I completed it in co-op with my daughter, which I’ve never done before. It has horrible slowdown, which I don’t remember from any other version but apparently even in the arcade it did that. Not what you’d expect from what was, at the time, the most powerful gaming device in the world. …
Ironclad is a pretty standard side-scrolling shooter, originally for the NeoGeo but I played it on the NeoGeo Arcade Evercade cartridge. I found it a lot easier than most games in the genre, which is especially odd for an arcade game, but I’m not going to complain! It’s got a nice weapon upgrade system, a floaty drone thingy and some interesting bosses (like a big train), but the biggest draw is the graphics. Backgrounds seem to be pre-rendered, and remind …
No, I don’t know why I played this either. It wasn’t that great, with very flickery graphics, was very short, and did nothing much other games (even at the time of original release) hadn’t already done far better. Probably a miracle it managed as well as it did on the Game Boy hardware, although, I suspect, impossible to see on the original device’s blurry screen – it’s bad enough on the telly – but still average at best.
I’ve always loved this game. It’s the Game Boy version of Donkey Kong, also sometimes referred to as “Donkey Kong ’94”. I talked about it more last time I played it, which I thought was maybe three years ago but it turns out it was FOURTEEN years ago. Cripes. This time, I played it on the Switch’s Game Boy game service thingy, but it’s just the same game as it ever was before. It’s still really slick, and plays well …
Since I had my Retroflag GPi out for the Mandatory Playing Of Mega-lo-Mania, I thought I’d play something else afterwards. Perusing those Mega Drive games I’d not really played before, but I remember having reasonable reviews, I came across Buster’s Hidden Treasure and gave it a punt. And you know what? It’s alright actually. The 8 and 16-bit console eras were drowning in character platformers, and yet none really touched Mario or Sonic. Even the big games like Dynamite Headdy …
Once more I was in the mood for some Mega-lo-Mania. I’ve gone into why I love the game before, but I just can’t stop playing it every so often. It is still The Best Game. This time, I chose Oberon (the camp yellow guy), and when I reached the final level not one but two other gods managed to squirrel away some people for me to fight! Which took about ten seconds as I had loads and they had very …
Another two player Evercade game. I’ve played Joe & Mac (Caveman Ninja) before, and the sequel, but hadn’t even heard of this. In fact, I thought it was the sequel when I started it up. As it turns out, it’s a completely different sort of platformer. Whereas the other two Joe & Mac games were sideways scrolling platformers where you club baddies, Returns is a two player Bubble Bobble/Snowbros/Rodland type single screen “clear the baddies” type game. You still club …
I broke out the Evercade VS for some games with my daughter, and this was one of those we played. It’s a Final Fight clone by Toaplan, and is very silly and badly translated. You’re wrestlers, I think, one of whom is Elvis Presley, and you have to fight your way through the streets and buildings to take down the bad guys, some of whom join your cause. It’s hilarious. But not (always) intentionally so. It’s just so ridiculous. Like …
