The Retrogaming Times
- The Bimonthly Retrogaming Hobbyist
Newsletter -
The
Retrogaming Times |
Thirty-Eighth Issue
- May 2022
|
Many years ago
the original Retrogaming Times would post a bit of a warning at the
beginning of a long issue, an alert that the webpage was going to take
a while to load on the average connection speeds of the time. Now
it's my turn to do the same - even with high speed online connectivity
currently being far more widespread. This is one of our largest
issues ever in volume of contributions, subject variety, and article
size. With everything on tap this issue I recommend that you
settle in, perhaps take a pause midway, and use the index for
navigation when you return... There's a lot of awesome stuff that
shouldn't be missed! Additionally if you or
ANYONE you know
has written for ANY "Retrogaming Times"
family newsletter over the past 25 years, PLEASE
e-mail me as soon as possible!
The
cover story leads things off with More C64 as Merman provides the
definitive compendium on skateboarding, skating, and related games for
Commodore 64. Even if you have a passing interest in the
platform, give it a look and see just how prevalent skateboarding has
been with retrogaming. Continuing to revisit his earlier columns,
Donald Lee takes a fresh look at current ways to enjoy Atari 5200 games
with Don's Desk. Enjoyably playing classic hardware on modern
televisions can be a challenge but a number of converter solutions make
it easier. An accurate but affordable approach is the RetroTINK
2X-MINI and it's covered in detail in this issue. Your ticket is
booked for adventure around the world as Mateus Fedozzi shares memories
of global gaming on the Master System. Sonic the Hedgehog was a
surprise box office smash when the blue blur made his way to live
action. Dan Pettis reviews the much anticipated sequel and leads
off the first of two film reviews this issue. Super Mario Bros. 2
had an interesting release history for a game in such a popular
franchise and George "mecha" Spanos gets to the bottom of its unique
history, crossing the Pacific and back again. Sega CD isn't often
regarded as a great platform but there were a few shining examples of
what the hardware could do. See why Popful Mail is one of those
examples and possibly an argument for owning the hardware itself.
One of the more unique fighting games of the 1990's, Virtual On
featured a control setup that could only be comfortably reproduced in
the home with a specialized controller. However when one of the
best home releases of the game doesn't feature a matching controller,
then it's time to build one yourself with a new modding tutorial.
George "mecha" Spanos returns to shed the spotlight on a few Midway
arcade games that failed to take the industry by storm but remain
important in the history of Williams. Our
second film review this issue looks at the 1993 Super Mario Bros.
movie, nearly thirty years after its release, and it might not be as
terrible as you remember it to be. All that and more are ahead in
this issue of The Retrogaming Times!
I want
to
again remind our readers if
they
have comments or questions about anything covered in the newsletter, or
there is something they would like featured in a future issue of The
Retrogaming
Times, to contact me directly at trt@classicplastic.net!
Of course article submissions are also always open. If you have
something
ready to go, the address is the same, trt@classicplastic.net. "If
there is something you want to write about, send it in!"
NOTICE: Due to the ongoing
COVID-19 situation, many shows and events have canceled, postponed, or
modified their dates. For the latest on the events listed below,
please visit their individual websites or contact their relevant
customer support channels as the current situation continues to
unfold. Thank you.
Pintastic Pinball & Game Room Expo,
June 23rd - 26th 2022, Sturbridge, Massachusetts, USA
Pintastic is
the family-friendly pinball and game room show that's centrally located
in the six New England states. It has hundreds of games set on free
play, tournaments, seminars, an exhibition hall full of vendors
offering fun stuff for your game room, and entertainment for kids.
While pinball is the most prominent type of game, there will be arcade
and console video games, and always some surprises. This expo is 35,000
square feet of fun for the whole family. You can play games casually or
competitively. If you have a home game room, you'll see lots of ideas
to refresh and improve it. You can learn about pinball history and
current happenings in the business. The show is mainly about pinball,
but all about fun!
For more
information, visit https://pintasticnewengland.com/
KansasFest, July 19th - 24th 2022,
Kansas City, Missouri, USA
KansasFest is
the world's only annual convention dedicated to the Apple II computer
that revolutionized the personal computing industry. KansasFest
invites hobbyists, retrocomputing enthusiasts, and diehard aficionados
to gather from all corners of the world.
KansasFest is
about a computer and a camaraderie unlike anything
else. The Apple II attracts people of a certain mindset and
spirit who exhibit a rare creativity, resilience, dedication, history,
and nonconformity. The Apple II has lasted for more than 40
years, and the friendships and memories made at KansasFest will last
even longer.
For more
information, visit http://www.kansasfest.org/
~
~ ~
Classic Game Fest, July 23rd - 24th
2022, Austin, Texas, USA
The biggest
retro gaming event in Texas is back for its 15th anniversary! Enjoy 70,000 square feet of retro video
games and fun at the Palmer Events Center. The annual summer event will feature all
the expected attractions
including special guests, live music, free play games, a massive vendor
hall and more. Ticket information will be available
soon.
For more
information, visit https://classicgamefest.com/
~
~ ~
California Extreme 2022, July 30th - 31st 2022, Santa Clara,
California, USA
California Extreme is pleased to
tentatively announce the dates for this year's California Extreme
Arcade and Pinball Show. It will be held on July 30-31, 2022, at
the Hyatt Regency in Santa Clara, California. Please join us for our
26th show with hundreds of your favorite arcade and pinball games, both
past and present, all gathered for another fun-filled weekend of arcade
excitement for everyone!
We will announce later when
the hotel will be accepting reservations
(please don't contact the hotel as the block is not set up yet) and
when show tickets will be on sale.
For more information, visit https://caextreme.org/
~
~ ~
Retropalooza, October 22nd - 23rd 2022, Arlington, Texas, USA
A celebration of all things
retro! Retropalooza was started in 2013 in Arlington, Texas by a
couple of guys who enjoy all things retro; from toys to music, to video
games... especially video games. As video game collectors, they
spent a lot of time and money looking for retro games when they figured
it would be easier to bring the games to them. Thus, Retropalooza
was born.
The goal of Retropalooza is to bring nerds from all walks of life
together for an enjoyable, family friendly time. Good old
fashioned fun with like minded people where it will always be
affordable, and forever improving.
For more information, visit http://retropalooza.com/
~
~ ~
Sac Gamers Expo, December 17th - 18th 2022, Sacramento, California,
USA
A video game convention founded in
2015, created by gamers for gamers. Our show features special guests,
game vendors and artists, game developers, tournaments, free to play
games, a console museum, VR Setups, and so much more! Sac Gamers Expo
is a family oriented event for all levels of gamers!
For more information, visit http://www.sacgamersexpo.com/
~
~ ~
If there is a
show or event you would
like listed here, free of charge, please contact David directly at trt@classicplastic.net.
Please include a short official blurb about your event along with any
relevant
links or contact information and it will be published in the next issue
of The Retrogaming Times. The event listing will remain posted
until
the issue following the event date. Big or small, we want to
promote
your show in our newsletter.
Check out
these great events, shows,
and conventions and let them know you read about them in The
Retrogaming
Times!
|
More
C64! - Skate and Live! |
by Merman |
|
Skateboarding is the fad
that keeps coming back and is higher profile than ever thanks to its
inclusion in the Tokyo Olympics. The C64 has had many games based on
the sport (and roller skating), so let's get rolling.
720 DEGREES US Gold 1987 (UK) / Mindscape 1988 (USA)
The US and UK
covers of 720 Degrees.
This is of course a
conversion of the Atari coin-op, with its isometric graphics and
sampled speech. The action is centered around a town called Skate City
(what we would now call a hub world) that contains four parks. A map
can be accessed by riding into it to show where you are. Players earn
points in the town to collect park tickets (you start with three) and
then skate into a park to take on a challenge. There are four types -
Downhill Park (time trial down slopes), slalom (ride between pairs of
flags to light them all), jump (avoiding water hazards) and ramp (a
basic half pipe, where the player rotates the joystick to spin and earn
points). Each park has a medal target for manoeuvres / jumps completed.
Cash prizes for medals are then used for upgrades at the skate shops
(buying improved pads, board, helmet, and shoes to move and jump
better) located around town. Complete all four parks and the difficulty
increases (known as Class). Take too long skating around the town and a
swarm of bees descends, with the threatening message SKATE OR DIE. If
the bees touch you, it ends the game - although you can press Fire to
continue in the home version.
TRIVIA: In the UK, the
720 Degrees arcade game appeared on TV show First Class. This general
knowledge quiz for schools featured arcade games as extra challenges,
including 720's Downhill Park, Paperboy and Track & Field's
Gymnastics event.
Fleeing the
bees in the UK version, and people playing frisbee in the town.
There were two distinct
versions of 720 Degrees released for the C64, in UK and US flavours.
Programmer Chris Butler was responsible for the UK version, with the
suitably raucous cover of the arcade theme music by Ben Daglish. While
the sprites are quite blocky because they use expansion, the
backgrounds give a real flavour of the arcade game. The musclemen and
people playing frisbee are recognisable from the original too. Control
can be a bit sticky, and once you have seen all four parks the game
only gets slightly tougher with each Class. US Gold included a separate
audio cassette in the original game package with the arcade soundtrack,
and a pin badge. ZZAP! 64 awarded the game 85% in issue 34, calling it
"A faithful and enjoyable conversion." Commodore User's 7/10 was less
complimentary about the graphics, but it was still awarded a Screen
Star as "One of US Gold's best conversions to date."
The US version was
published by Mindscape and came on two disk sides. The graphics are
different, with a more realistic looking skater in bright colours. The
music across the events is different too, feeling less like the arcade
game than the UK version. The biggest problem is the multiload - going
to the map or entering an event means a load, and then returning to the
town means another load from disk. This takes up a lot of time. There
is also an extra graphic showing your board and the medals you have
earned from each event; while it looks good, it does mean another load
after an event. One little extra retained from the arcade game is the
loose coins around the town to pick up for extra cash, which did not
make it into the UK version. The events are generally similar to play
between UK and US versions - although the controls and collision
detection do not work as well, particularly in the Ramp event. It feels
slightly inferior all round to the UK version but is still a decent
effort all told. A short, pithy review from All Game Guide in 1998 sums
it up as, "720 Degrees is a waste of everybody's time. For an
entertaining skating experience on the Commodore 64 try Skate or Die."
That comes across a little harsh but true.
The medals
screen for the US version and buying extra equipment from a store.
CALIFORNIA GAMES Epyx / US Gold, 1987
The original
American cover and US Gold's cover for the European market.
After the amazing Summer
and Winter Games, this was a sun-filled exploration of six different
sports set in the state of California. Two events interest here, with
players able to practice each individually or compete - representing
sporting goods companies such as Ocean Pacific and Santa Cruz
Skateboards instead of countries.
The numberplate
title screen is accompanied by a cover of Louie Louie, while the
sponsors list replaces flags.
The HALF-PIPE SKATEBOARDING has much
simpler controls than Skate Or Die that would follow, relying more on
timing. The ramp itself is in front of the famous Hollywood sign. To
gain speed, the player pulls down or presses up as the skater moves
that way. Pressing "away" from the ramp (so, right on the left-hand
side and left on the right-hand side) will do a kick-turn low down or a
flip when in the air, but it must be carefully timed and held in
position before releasing the joystick to land. Pressing and holding
Fire as the skater reaches the rim of the pipe will go for a handplant,
but again the timing is critical. There is a time limit of 1:15 or
maximum of three falls.
The score is
higher the higher your skater turns at, and the handplant animation is
fluid.
Out on the boardwalk it
is time to go ROLLER SKATING,
with an interesting twist in that you are controlling a female skater.
The controls are clever too, with a "rotating" motion from up to down
and back gaining speed. Fire is held to crouch and then released to
jump over obstacles and gaps. While airborne the player can repeat the
rotations to spin, gaining points. There is no time limit,and a single
fall ends the attempt. Great animation and little touches such as the
beach volleyball game in the background make the beach setting come
alive. ZZAP! 64 awarded California Games a coveted Gold Medal and 97%,
stating "Epyx surpass themselves yet again with another incredible
sports simulation."
Jumping over
obstacles and spinning earns more points, while the skater's tantrum
when she falls is amusing. Notice the volleyball game on the beach in
the background.
TRIVIA: Each of the
events has at least one little Easter Egg, with the funniest being in
the Flying Disk. If you leave the thrower stationary for a while, a UFO
will fly in and abduct the catcher! The Half-Pipe gets shaken by an
earthquake damaging the Hollywood sign, and in the Foot Bag event you
can hit the seagull flying past for bonus points. The other events are
the tricky BMX obstacle course and Surfing, with a brilliant wave
effect and an ominous shark chasing a fallen surfer...There was no C64
(or planned Atari Lynx) release of sequel California Games II, which
featured hang gliding, jet-ski, snowboarding, bodyboarding, and
skateboarding. Available on Amiga, Atari ST, DOS, Master System and
SNES between 1990 and 1993, it did not live up to the success or review
scores of the original.
CHEAP SKATE Silverbird, 1989
The cover of
Cheap Skate from the Silverbird budget range.
This is a budget game
created for Firebird's budget label. It has an isometric view like
Zaxxon, the street scrolling towards the player from top right to
bottom left. You must prove yourself to the Street Hawks gang by
surviving a series of challenging obstacle courses. Ground obstacles
can be jumped, pipes can be ducked under, and fireballs dodged. Any
collision will cost you a life and precious time. Reach the finish line
before time runs out and move onto the next level. The graphics are
reasonable but not particularly special, there's an above-average David
Whittaker tune driving the game along, and gameplay becomes very
repetitive. ZZAP! 64 awarded it 64% appropriately, calling it "A cheap
skate for all the family - and you don't even need to be an expert."
Dodge the
fireball and duck under the bar.
TRIVIA: YouTube user
Witchfinder1976 (Mat Corne) has recently completed an epic series of
videos detailing every single Silverbird release, following up an
earlier series on Mastertronic. His review of Cheap Skate is at:
https://youtu.be/ZSyCKa2CsGQ
NEIGHBOURS Impulze, 1991
Impulze's cover
for Neighbours shows Ramsay Street where the soap opera is set.
The Australian TV soap
Neighbours is ending after more than 30 years, but in its heyday, it
was viewed by millions every day. From the 1990s came a tie-in game by
British publishers Zeppelin on their full-price Impulze label. It was
also available on ZX Spectrum, Amstrad, Amiga, and Atari ST. The aim of
the game is a race around Ramsay Street, with the player racing as
Jason Donovan's character Scott Robinson on a skateboard against four
others - some of whom had already left the TV show by that time.
Charlene Ramsay (played by Kylie Minogue) rides a go-kart, her brother
Henry (Craig Mclachlan) is on a ride-on lawnmower, Matt Robinson has an
unfair advantage on a motorbike and Mike Young (Guy Pearce
respectively) on skateboard. In the garage before the race you pick
which opponents are taking part, and the speed of your skateboard
(slow, medium, or fast) affecting how quickly you turn and move. There
are eight races across four locations - Ramsay Street, the Lassiter's
Complex, Erinsborough High School, and Anson's Corner. During the race
you must skate through the pairs of flags for your lap of the track to
count. Obstacles include manholes, kangaroos, emus, and Mrs. Mangel.
The loading
bitmap does look like the cover, while the garage hosts the options
menu (and a kangaroo cuddly toy you can hide under a tarpaulin for some
reason).
The Neighbours logo at
the bottom of the screen shows how popular you are - falling off costs
time and popularity, but you can restore it by picking up litter. It's
a mediocre racing game and a very strange use of the license, with a
very average isometric view of the course, terrible sprites of the
characters and some poor sound. Even the iconic theme tune is not
handled very well by the SID chip. ZZAP! gave it a measly 32%,
saying "If the game wasn't in a Neighbours package, it's unlikely you'd
associate the monotonous gameplay with the TV soap at all." Commodore
Format gave a much higher 72% on full price release, explaining "As a
skateboard race game it's all good fun, and pretty damned addictive,
but you'd find it hard to really justify the asking price." That mark
raised to an over-the-top 80% for the budget rerelease a year later.
The game is worth nowhere near that.
Tie that
kangaroo down, before Henry runs over it on his mower!
TRIVIA: Many of
Zeppelin's games were published under license in Poland by the company
LK Avalon. They also put together a couple of disk compilations, and
after the C64GS was released, they put out some rare cartridges that
are much wanted by collectors.
The alternative
cover from LK Avalon.
NINJA SCOOTER SIMULATOR Firebird, 1988
One of the few
Firebird budget games to be released on disk, for which this is the
cover.
Technically a scooter
rather than a skateboard, but it feels like it belongs in this
round-up. At the time there was confusion over the name - why is a
ninja riding on a scooter? In fact it was named after the Ninja scooter
brand, popular at the time. It feels like a direct clone of the arcade
game Metrocross, programmed by Probe for the Silverbird range. Race
through each level, dodging enemies including skulls and avoiding or
jumping obstacles. You can spin (fire and left) or pull a stunt (fire
and right) from a ramp for more points. Collecting a clock adds extra
time to the limit. Arrows function as a speed boost, pushing you
forward. The gameplay is undemanding, only becoming difficult after a
few levels when the time limit is drastically reduced. ZZAP's verdict
was a damning 30%, with reviewer Paul Glancey sighing, "The lifeless
sprites drift about over bland, repetitive racetrack graphics and the
sound is so unrealistic it's pointless. The control also leaves a lot
to be desired. Often, I shouted at the computer in frustration, calling
it a cheat. Budget price or not, I still think that one poor version of
Metrocross is quite enough, thank you!"
You can perform
stunts off these ramps in level 2, but don't run into the skulls.
TRIVIA: The skateboard
has appeared as a bonus or power-up in many games. METROCROSS is a notable example,
with the skateboard giving your hero increased speed while riding on it
and acting as an extra "hit." Another classic appearance is in WONDER BOY, where you can open an
egg to reveal the skateboard. Picking it up makes our hero wear a
helmet and knee pads, and it is good to see he is safety conscious.
Both these games received playable C64 conversions, although the
graphics could have been done better.
Riding on the
skateboard in Metrocross makes you faster, while Wonderboy had better
jump over that boulder.
PIXEL CITY SKATER Digital Monastery, 2014
The original
Windows version of Pixel City Skater, and the C64 version's title
screen.
Here is a fun
single-button game, ideal to be played with the SIBUGA controller
(Single Button). It was originally an entry into the RGCD 16K Cartridge
Coding Competition, based on the original game by A Small Game for
Windows, Android, and iOS (http://www.asmallgame.com/pixelcityskater/).
There are two modes. The main game challenges you to skate through 50
static screens, moving from left to right without hitting an obstacle
or falling off the bottom of the screen. The Endless mode, selected by
pressing S on the title screen, scrolls obstacles endlessly towards
you, making the player jump and duck. Survive for long enough and the
speed increases. The graphic style is great, with a sci-fi cityscape in
the background, and some great music to help you skate along. Well
worth trying. Note that there are two versions; the C64GS edition is
designed for use with the C64 Games System (the console version of the
C64 which does not have a keyboard). Instead, you can press Up on the
joystick to play Endless Mode. Many RGCD games (from the official store
and in the coding competitions) are designed to be C64GS compatible.
Jumping high on
screen 17, and dodging obstacles in Endless mode.
TRIVIA: The SIBUGA
controller is effectively a single fire button in a small round case.
It makes an ideal "second button" for games that need the Space Bar, by
plugging into Port 1. There have been several games designed
exclusively for it. The boxed edition came with a tape of single-button
games and a special manual, which contained a type-in listing for a
BASIC game called Firefighter (an extended version of an earlier BASIC
10-liner competition entry). Check out the controller in my Scene
World video and the games here.
PROFESSIONAL SKATEBOARD SIMULATOR Code Masters, 1988
Codemasters put
lots of self-written PR quotes - such as "FEATURES AMAZING SOUNDTRACK"
- on their games.
Programmer Gavin Raeburn
made several Simulators for budget label Code Masters, with my personal
favourite being Rally Cross Sim (based on Sega arcade game Hot Rod).
This was his 8th commercial release (referred to as Gaxx Game 8 on the
high-score table) and he did everything - code, design, graphics,
sound, and music (with sampled instruments). This game has strong
echoes of 720 Degrees in its isometric display - and the name is often
shortened to Pro Skateboard Sim. The first level with the angled
perspective sees you collecting flags in a park before time runs out.
Reach the end of the level and you face the bonus round, a vertically
scrolling obstacle course where you must skate through pairs of
gates.In both level types, hitting an obstacle costs time as you then
get a cursor to reposition your skater and carry on. The two styles of
level then alternate with the time limits getting shorter, and extra
slopes and jumps making things harder. Reviewed on the same page of
ZZAP! as Cheap Skate in the 1988 Christmas Special, with both reviewers
finding the later levels difficulty. The 79% rating called it "one of
Code Masters' best Simulators yet, but probably more suited to the more
accomplished game-player." Commodore User gave a much more derisory 31%.
Completing the
first overhead course and jumping towards a flag in the second
isometric level.
TRIVIA: Hidden inside
the game is a bonus title, something Gavin Raeburn did for other Code
Masters releases. The hidden game here is called Mr. Naffo's Super Game
SLEEPWALKER and plays like
early Game & Watch title Manhole. There is a choice of three
difficulty levels. The sleepwalkers are heading for the gaps in the
platforms, so you must move your platform into place to keep them safe
and stop them falling into the lava below. The hidden game can be
accessed by using a reset switch or an SYS code.
Pressing reset
on the Pro Skateboard menu leads you into the hidden Sleepwalker game.
RAD RAMP RACER Virgin Mastertronic, 1990
Here is another budget
offering, this time from when the company was known as Virgin
Mastertronic. On the title screen you can choose the setup - one player
as skateboarder versus the computer on a BMX, one player as BMX versus
the computer skateboarder, two-player mode, or computer versus
computer. You can also press Space to get into the course designer,
where you can redesign one of the three different courses included.
When you start playing, there is a 2-minute time limit for each course
to rack up as many points as you can. This is done by riding over
jumps, between flags, doing stunts on the ramps (waggling the stick to
earn more points) and collecting flashing bonus objects. It's simply a
matter of pressing Fire to move faster, and then up and down to avoid
obstacles. While the small sprites are quite nicely animated, the
backgrounds are bland (and fall into that Commodore cliché of
using lots of brown...) There is little gameplay here and even the
course designer is not overly exciting to use. C&VG awarded the C64
version 79%, one percent more than the Spectrum equivalent, saying it
was "More colourful than its Speccy counterpart, and just as much
fun."ZZAP! were more realistic with 33%, saying "The game's most
'radical' concept is that you sometimes get points for crashing, while
the 'bonus' objects are apparently worthless!" The main criticism was
how quickly it became repetitive, even if the course designer was easy
to use.
The course
designer has the level on top and the parts on the bottom, while the
skateboarder is falling behind as he bails...
SKATE CRAZY Gremlin, 1988
We go onto roller skates
for this title, also available on 16-bit. There are two distinct game
styles here. Half of the levels are the "Car Park Challenge" set on a
large, overhead view that scrolls in multiple directions. Here you must
collect up the rubbish and find the flags. Skate between the flashing
lines to pass a flag but miss them and you are disqualified. Other
skaters, frisbees and marbles will knock you off your feet costing
valuable time. To qualify for the next level, you must earn cred (by
picking up litter and kicking cans) and points from the judges (by
doing stunts off ramps and cleaning up the level). The little judge
portraits bottom right will be replaced by numbers as you score. Reach
the end of the level and if you have not earned enough, you can make up
for it by collecting a set amount of litter in one minute from another
overhead section (with random placement of the litter making it more of
a challenge). Succeed and there is a small cutscene with a choice - you
can skate up a level to keep in the car park, or skate out to the other
type of level.
Go through the
gate to increase your time remaining, and then choose to stay in the
Car Park Challenge or go out to the Championship Course.
These horizontally
scrolling levels, the "Championship Course,"are where you must make
your way along jumping and ducking obstacles as well as birds that will
fly into you and smiling thugs that will cost you a life. You can pick
up more litter here, throwing them to hit enemies. The skating action
here is a little trickier, alternating left and right presses to speed
up depending on the direction you are going. Ramps, ladders, and gaps
make it harder, with your momentum being a factor. ZZAP! awarded an
impressive 86%, although reviewer Julian Rignall was much more reticent
than his two colleagues. The cartoon-style graphics came in for praise,
with good music and sound to back it up. The overall assessment was "a
smart skate-about which is well worth a look." The Games Machine gave
78%, saying "It certainly has graphic appeal, but gameplay is
exceptionally tough, and frustration soon builds up." Finally Commodore
User gave a similar 8/10 score and summed it up. "All in all Skate
Crazy offers bags of entertainment and represents great value. I'm not
going so far as to say you'd be Skate Crazy to miss it, 'cos that
sounds crap, and this certainly isn't."
Tripping over
an obstacle, and the dude in sunglasses will throw trash at you.
TRIVIA: The large
cartoon-like sprites use a technique called "sprite overlay." A
high-resolution single colour sprite (the black outline) is placed on
top of a multicolour sprite. And in Skate Crazy's case the main player
is made up of multiple sprites. The US disk release from Mastertronic
allowed you to select the game style from a simple menu before loading,
where the original UK release loaded in the Car Park Challenge
automatically and only switched to loading the Championship Course when
the player selected it after a level.
The game select
from the US disk version and picking up litter after missing level 1's
judging score.
SKATEBOARD JOUST Firebird, 1988
Less death from
above, more "death from sideways" in the odd Skateboard Joust.
Another cheap game from
the Silverbird budget range, but this time the skateboard theme is
quite tenuous. Set in the far future, the only sport left is
skateboarding - and you are a competitor. Locked into a series of
chambers, waves of enemies enter and must be disposed of by "firing"
your skateboard at them. Otherwise contact with the enemies is fatal.
(The poorly-drawn enemies are strange, including the Daleks from Doctor
Who riding on skateboards and flying turkeys!) Special coins give help,
including bonus points and freezing the enemies for a brief time so you
can kill them on contact. It is a very dull and repetitive game that is
not much fun. The way the player and enemy can "wrap around" the screen
edges is difficult to get to grips (especially as you can "drop
through" parts of the scenery) and the controls are awkward. The
biggest insult is that the quota of enemies to beat on each level
resets every time you die, prolonging the agony. Best avoided - it is
not "well radical" as the level complete screen says. You can see Mat
Corne's video of Skateboard Joust at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVPTunafFQ8
Turkeys and
Daleks are just some of the odd enemies you must defeat.
TRIVIA: There were also
Amstrad CPC and ZX Spectrum versions of the game from Firebird. ZZAP!
never reviewed the C64 version but the CRASH! review mark of 30% for
the Spectrum game sums it up - "Skateboard Joust is another
disappointing Silverbird effort, featuring very primitive graphics and
minimal sound." Firebird also released a game called Skateboard Kidz on
Amstrad CPC and Spectrum, where you negotiate a vertically scrolling
obstacle course on a board, but that never got a C64 version either.
You would be better off playing the brilliant BMX Kidz - inspired by
NES classic ExciteBike - on C64 instead.
This bitmap
that appears between games is probably the best aspect of Skateboard
Joust...
SKATEBOARD SAM Tronic Verlag, 1985
Marc Doinet wrote this
early German game. Get on your skateboard, move through the
flick-screen forest, and jump over obstacles. It's incredibly simple,
with basic presentation, graphics, and sound effects. While I played it
for the purposes of this round-up, I would not recommend it. In some
ways, it's the ancestor of Pixel City Skater but that game is so much
more polished.
It looks very
ordinary, plus this jump is going to end in disaster...
TRIVIA: Among Tronic
Verlag's other C64 releases are Die Festung (The Fort) where you use
cannons to shoot at pirate ships, and Pole Position (nothing to do with
the classic Namco / Atari arcade game, but a simple vertically
scrolling racing game where its title screen boasts about being in
machine code). We will gloss over the dated title Projekt AIDS from
1985, which had good intentions but now feels awkward.
SKATEBOB! Niklas, 2003 (Minigame 2003
Competition - 4K Category)
This public domain
effort is more of a platform game, an entry into a coding competition.
Guide Skatebob the hedgehog left and right as he tries to jump up the
moving platforms. Fall more than one level and a life is lost. The
closest comparison is to Mastertronic title Zub, although it lacks that
game's ability to move a platform you are stood on left and right. For
4K it is an undemanding little title that is worth a few minutes play
to see high Bob can get.
Get ready
little hedgehog, the background colours change as you get higher.
SKATEBOARDING KAB Software, 1987
The title
screen of Skateboarding also serves as the menu.
Here is a little-known
game from the USA. The main menu has a lengthy list of options,
starting with whether you want to play the game or change options.
There are three main modes. 1 Player against the computer gives you a
time limit (1, 2 or 3 minutes) to earn as many points as possible. 2
Player is first to a fixed number of points (50, 100 or 150). Tag
against the computer requires you to keep hold of the "tag" for 1, 2 or
3 minutes to claim victory. The Gravity level from 1 to 5 sets how
strong the pull of gravity is, 1 being low and 5 being high. Finally,
you can use F1 and F3 to change the colour of the two skaters (their
board and shirt). When you start the game, you are shown an empty pool.
The skaters enter and start to move around. The drain in the middle
opens periodically, swallowing anyone close to it. The gravity setting
affects your movement up the sides of the pool, with high/level 5
making things tricky. The vents at the side open to drop oil slicks and
black disks that will knock you over, but in one or two player mode
they also release coloured disks that can be collected for points.
Circling the edge of the pool are yellow dots, and if you touch one you
gain more points. You can perform a handplant on the rim of the pool,
but do not hold it too long or you will bail. The graphics are not
particularly sophisticated and there is limited sound. It is so obscure
it is worth trying once to see what it is like.
Avoid the black
oil slick and the middle drain, then try to score more than the other
player in two-player mode.
TRIVA: KAB stood for
Kevin A. Burk, the programmer and creator of Skateboarding. In total
the company released three games - Skateboarding, boxing simulation
Neutral Corner (in 1985) and Wrestling (1986). This is another unusual
game, in that it supported up to four players. This last game also has
code word protection, requiring you to look up a number in the manual.
Work had begun on a game called Karate, according to Games That Weren't.
SKATE OR DIE! Electronic Arts, 1987
The original US
gatefold cover and the later UK cassette cover.
After Summer Games and
Winter Games were a big hit for Epyx, members of the development team
(including Michael Kosaka and Stephen Landrum) moved on to EA and began
work on a skateboard-themed compilation of events. The result was the
stylish and playable Skate or Die, named after that speech sample in
720 Degrees. The action starts with your skater standing in the middle
of town, with Rodney's Skate Shop at the centre. Skate there and you
can change your board colour and choose other game options, as well as
getting advice from Rodney (who resembles the late stand-up Rodney
Dangerfield with a punk hairdo and USMC tattoo...) The player can then
skate down a side street to either practice or compete in one or all
the five possible events.
Move the cursor
around the shop to find some hidden messages from Rodney, then skate
the streets to choose your event.
FREESTYLE sees the player get ten
"passes" on the half-pipe to perform tricks including ollies, plants,
and grinds. The more difficult tricks require more "pumps" of the Fire
button in the shaded zones of the pipe. HIGH JUMP re-uses the half pipe,
challenging you to waggle the stick to gain altitude as measured
against the metre stick on the right-hand edge.
It's amusing
when your equipment falls off after a fall and tweaking your high jump
by pressing Fire can add to your recorded height.
DOWNHILL RACE sees our skater
attempting to get through the hazard-filled park, avoiding or jumping
over obstacles, skating through a big concrete pipe, and trying to beat
the time limit. DOWNHILL JAM
pits you against Lester or a second player, fighting their way through
back alleys. You can punch and kick your opponent to hold them up or
force them into obstacles (and there are lots of hidden ways to score
more points).
Falling in the
pond in the park and crashing onto the cop car in the back streets.
Finally, POOL JOUST is a head-to-head
challenge in an empty swimming pool. One player has the "boffing stick"
and attempts to knock the other player off their board, but if they
fail to do it in five passes then control of the stick switches to the
other player. This is a lot of fun against the three computer
opponents, giving three levels of difficulty - with the young punk
Lester (Rodney's son) being the toughest.
Choosing your
pool joust opponent, while performing a rail slide can get you out of
danger.
The graphics are
excellent throughout, with great animation on the sprites and very
well-drawn backgrounds. The little touches, such as the half-pipe
skater's pads falling off after a heavy fall or the player falling to
pieces after skating through a wire fence, are immaculate. Sound is
great too. It all starts with the classic intro tune (accompanying the
great bitmap picture of a skater) created by Rob Hubbard when he joined
EA in the States. This tune is famous for its sampled guitar sounds and
is still one of the best-loved SID tunes ever. Each event has its own
tune too. Control is sublime and once you learn an event it becomes so
much fun trying for higher scores or beating another player.
The classic
intro picture, and a poor skater gets shredded by the wire fence.
A true classic from
Electronic Arts, ZZAP! 64 awarded it a 92% Sizzler in the Christmas
1987 issue. "Without doubt a brilliant sports simulation, falling short
of a higher accolade due solely to the annoyingly slow loading system."
Indeed, playing from tape is a painful experience, reloading the menu
between events. The disk came in the excellent gatefold packaging -
like a vinyl record - that typified early EA games, with photos of the
team trying out a skateboard. ACE magazine awarded it 878 out of 1000
in their complicated rating system. The review commented, "There are
some stunning graphics and animation on show in Skate or Die. You don't
have to be Brain of Britain to compete... but who cares when it's such
fun."
TRIVIA #1: Skate Or Die
spawned a whole series of games, including a Konami LCD handheld game.
The original Skate Or Die also appeared on Amstrad CPC, Apple II GS,
DOS, NES and ZX Spectrum. The NES game eventually appeared on the Wii
Virtual Console. Follow-up Ski Or Die was not as well received with its
snow-themed events, but was available on C64, Amiga and DOS. Skate or
Die 2: The Search for Double Trouble hit NES in 1991, with a ramp event
and a skateboard-based adventure game where you must build a half-pipe
in your community with help from Lester. Skate Or Die: Tour De Thrash
(Game Boy, 1991) took the ramp mode from Skate Or Die 2 and added the
Thrash Tour championship mode. The final Game Boy title, Skate Or Die:
Bad 'N Rad from 1991, mixed between side-scrolling obstacle courses and
overhead viewed levels in more of a run & gun style.
The cover of
the NES version and the Konami handheld.
TRIVIA #2: In 2002
Criterion Games were given permission to create a 3D game based on
Skate Or Die aimed at PS2 and Xbox. However, difficulties in working
with Electronic Arts over the next 12 months saw the project canceled
in favour of working on Burnout 3: Takedown.
SKATE ROCK aka AWESOME EARL IN SKATE ROCK Bubble Bus, 1987
The original
Bubble Bus cover and the later Ricochet re-release.
This is a contemporary
of both 720 Degrees and Paperboy, taking a horizontally scrolling
side-on view of the action. The options on the title screen allow you
to adjust the time limit (beginners only, average skaters or thrasher!)
and the "trucks" of your skateboard (between loose, normal, and tight)
which affects your turning speed. The aim in each of the ten levels is
to collect the eight flags and reach the finish line before time runs
out. (There is a plot about local skateboard gangs falling out, but it
means little). You also have a number of lives. Hitting the kerb, a
car, a pedestrian, or a fellow skater will cost a life. There are also
dogs that will bite you, again costing a life. Some flags are on the
path, meaning you need to find a gap or a ramp to help you get there.
Oddly, you also lose a life if you are jumping and your board hits
something. Turning left or right while pressing Fire slides the board
to rotate quicker. Once you have completed a course, you can select it
from the title screen to play in any order. Any time remaining when you
cross the finish is added to the time limit for the next level you play.
Altering
options on Skate Rock's menu screen and jumping over a ramp on course 2.
The ZZAP! reviewers had
a mixed opinion of this, commenting that the graphics were ugly but
that there was fun to be had. The result was a 66% rating that may have
put buyers off (as it did to me). Having played it years later I found
it quite good fun if repetitive, but once you are used to the jumping
mechanic even the obstacle-strewn later levels can be completed. The
ZZAP! review called it "A rather enjoyable skateboarding game - worth a
look" and I concur.Commodore User's 6/10 review was similar in tone.
"Skate Rock is enjoyable, it won't take you long to complete, it won't
make you faint at its breath-taking graphics, it won't make you want to
dance to its astonishing soundtrack, it will however give you a few
hours... days even, of entertainment."
TRIVIA: UK company
Bubble Bus was based in Kent and published more than 20 games for the
C64. Their best titles were Starquake (converted from the Spectrum
original by Steve Crow) and Wizard's Lair (based on the Ultimate Play
The Game title Atic Atac). It's also worth checking out Tazz, an
unofficial conversion of the Stern arcade game Tazz Mania - a
Robotron-style maze game where the walls gradually close in on the
player. The budget rerelease for C64 was known as Skate Rock Simulator
on the Ricochet label, while the DOS conversion was "Awesome Earl:
Starring in Skate Rock!" There was an Amstrad CPC release, but the
Spectrum version was never finished despite being advertised.
Awesome Earl
cover art and a CGA screenshot from DOS.
SKATIN' USA aka Superkid II Atlantis, 1991
This is the follow-up to
Superkid, an earlier budget title from Atlantis. Tom Essex has woken
up, but his superpowers are gone! How is he going to clean up the
streets of New York? He jumps on a skateboard and grabs his trusty
catapult, using it to shoot the thugs. Tom only has limited ammo, and
any contact with the enemies will cost him energy. Food will top it up
again. To complete the level, Tom must collect enough dollar bills to
light up the letters of the words SKATIN' USA in the status panel, then
reach the far-right hand end of the level before time runs out. Reach
that in time, and he gets to play a bonus round collecting extra
points.Control is awkward, with Tom slipping off the ramps. There is no
way to jump over obstacles too, which feels odd in a skateboarding
game. The music is poor, and backgrounds are very ordinary. The sprites
are small and indistinct, although the ZAP! for being hit/hitting an
enemy looks all right. There would go on to be a third game in the
series, known as Superkid in Space. The trilogy was originally created
on the Spectrum by the Shaw Brothers and then converted to the other
formats by Atlantis. ZZAP! awarded Skatin' USA just 36% in February
1991. "As with Superkid, there's a severe lack of variety with later
levels having only different platform layouts - no new features
whatsoever."
The tiny
baddies run around the platforms, and getting hit is shown by the ZAP!
TRIVIA: Atlantis
Software were formed in London in 1984 and went out of business in
1992. Many of their games were never reviewed in the mainstream
magazines - either the publisher did not send them for review, or space
restrictions meant the (generally) poor-quality Atlantis efforts were
not worth reviewing. Superkid, for example, did not get a full ZZAP!
review at the time. One of the more intriguing titles Atlantis did
release was Dungeons, Amethysts, Alchemists 'n' Everything. This text
adventure was created with the Graphic Adventure Creator utility,
giving it a mix of text and graphics for some locations. It was
marketed as being for adults only, using adult humour for its puzzles.
STREET SURFER Entertainment USA, 1986
Here is a game that was
published by Mastertronic under its USA label for imported games,
originally created by Sculptured Software and then "enhanced" in the UK
by Binary Design. The player gets on their skateboard and rolls through
traffic. The aim is to pick up empty bottles and throw them in the
recycling bin at the end of the level. The distance left to the bin is
shown at the bottom of the screen, along with your health - which is
depleted by being run over or hitting obstacles such as potholes and
road signs. Riding on the verges too long will slow you down and then
make you fall. Fortunately, you can jump over the potholes by pressing
Fire. You also must watch out for chickens crossing the road, which
will knock you off your board. The player can also grab full drink
bottles from passing cars, drinking the contents to refill their
health, and gaining another empty bottle.For every bottle you put in
the bin you get a large boost of health too. The 3D effect is
reasonable, and the graphics are OK. The David Whittaker tune is good,
changing speed as the player does, and there are basic but acceptable
sound effects (cars sound their horns at you if you are in the way, for
example). In a macabre twist, when you run out of health the skateboard
rolls on without you, playing the Last Post. It can get a bit
frustrating when stuck in traffic that runs you over repeatedly and
there is not a lot of depth. With practice a game can last for ages, as
you replenish your health and keep going, and I found it fun. ZZAP!'s
29% review calling it "one of Mastertronic's weakest releases" feels
harsh. Commodore User's 7/10 rating was much better, calling the sound
"a funky little ditty" and saying, "Street Surfer is reasonable fun but
like most cheapos, popularity will quickly start to slide."
Drinking a
bottle you picked up from a car, and then throwing the empties into the
bin.
TRIVIA: Do you know that
Zombie Nation track they play at sports events? That started life as a
David Whittaker tune called Star Dust in the game Lazy Jones (check it
out, a clever compilation of mini-games inspired by arcade games - each
with their own subtune). Kernkraft 4000 would take the basic riff and
turn it into a dance hitin 1999 - and then tried to claim ownership of
the track, before paying a (small) undisclosed sum to settle the court
case. Listen to the original here, with a
clever oscilloscope view and hear the Street Surfer tune here.
OTHER SKATING TITLES
Sk8!, public domain, 2008 - one of
eight minigames on the R8ro! Cartridge compilation from Simon
Quernhorst.
Skate and Destroy, Bombjack Ltd,
1988 - simple scrolling game created with The Shoot 'Em Up Construction
Kit.
Skateboarder, Mastertronic, 1984 -
early game from David & Richard Darling (the founders of Code
Masters), a sample game included with their Games Creator software.
Skate along a street jumping obstacles.
SkateRockMan, unknown publisher,
1988 - Italian bootleg of Metrocross preserved by GameBase64.
Skate Wars aka SkateBall, Ubi Soft,
1989/1990 - violent future sport with players on ice skates. Scored 45%
in ZZAP! and just 42% on its budget rerelease.
Skating Champ, Super Game 2000 Nuova
Serie, 1989 - Italian bootleg of Skate Or Die!
Superman Sam - The Skateboardin' Man,
M&M Software1985 - very odd and obscure BASIC game I only
discovered while researching this article. Check out a YouTube
video by sairuk.
TRIVIA: In Italy, the
copyright rules were different and there were companies publishing
bootlegs for sale in newsagents and other shops. These would typically
be in the form of a compilation tape with multiple games, the names and
loading screen changed and other graphics altered. The manual would be
translated, often badly, and the plot / character names changed too. It
was well into the 1990s before the Italian software industry began to
grow and take copyright seriously.
And If you are
interested in more skateboarding games, check out the Skateboarding
Games Timeline at https://timeline.mameau.com/
This site is aiming to catalogue every game that features
skateboarding, gathering images and video footage.
When I started this
article, it was supposed to be a bit of fun - I would sit down and play
a bit of Skate or Die and the other games I remembered, look up one or
two more and round out a nice article for The Retrogaming Times. Its
ended up at over 7000 words, 19 games and more than 200 captured
images! But I think you'll agree that it stands as a comprehensive
round-up of skateboarding (and roller-skating games) on the C64 and it
was fun to read.
I write this on a beautiful Sunday
Easter afternoon here in the San Francisco Bay Area. Continuing
on the theme for 2022, I am revisiting some of my past columns.
This month, I am revisiting my Atari 5200 Zone column. I actually
had already mentally planned this article a couple of months ago.
However, some additional ideas popped into my head and I am making some
additions to this month's column. In a past column I mentioned
that I would write about the Atari
Flashback Classics that I purchased for my Nintendo
Switch. I don't remember how much I wrote about the collection
but let me revisit my rationale for picking up the collection.
This collection included many Atari arcade and Atari 2600 games.
That normally wouldn't be a big draw. While I liked my share of
Atari arcade games, I didn't play the Atari 2600 at all. The
Atari 5200 was my first game system but surprisingly, this collection
included a good number of Atari 5200 games. The biggest draw was
RealSports Baseball for the 5200.
As most people reading my Apple II
Incider columns know, I had a love of baseball games. I've played
my share of computer and arcade baseball games through the years, and
today as I have Super Mega Baseball and The Show for my Xbox systems
and some others for my Switch. Additionally while I was trying
out Real Sports Baseball for the 5200, I got into the Tempest arcade
game. Since the collection included both the arcade game and the
2600 version of Tempest, I will discuss both. Lastly, my late
addition to the column is to talk about the JUM52 emulator. I've
probably talked about it in the past but will revisit this month.
Let's get started.
RealSports
Baseball - Atari 5200 (via Atari Flashback Classics on Nintendo
Switch)
Trying any game via emulation is a
challenge and RealSports Baseball was no different. The game was
built to map to the unique Atari 5200 controller and adapting the
various buttons to a modern system's controllers definitely made for a
different experience. It took some time to figure things out but
it wasn't too bad. The impressive thing about RealSports
Baseball for the 5200 was that you could see the whole field. The
graphics are nothing special if you compare to the modern systems but
at the time, it was pretty darn good.
To me the pitching was the easier to
figure out. You actually could select the different types of
pitches to throw which was a pretty cool thing back in the
1980's. Fielding was initially a challenge but once I figured out
how the game worked, I was able to field reasonably well but hitting on
the other hand was a challenge. I knew how to swing but with the
perspective of the game, it was difficult to know what pitches were
being thrown. So while I got some hits off the CPU, I didn't hit
all that much. Out of the games I played against the CPU, I did
not win one. May just be a matter of practice but I didn't have
time to figure out all the nuances. One thing that was cool about
Real Sports Baseball was that it had voice synthesis. A good
change of pace from the usual sound effects of a video game. The
game also had some limitations, I noticed there were only right hander
batters and you had no player names or a roster to pick from. So
effectively, you were playing an arcade baseball game with nameless
players and thus no managerial options like switch pitchers or pinch
hitters. But in reading the manual, there were options to steal
bases or reposition fielders that I didn't get into. All in all,
if I had played Real Sports Baseball back when I was young, I may have
gotten into all the options and figured it out. With today's
games, I may not revisit RealSports Baseball all too often but it was
definitely worth a look just to see what I missed.
Tempest
- Arcade and Atari 2600 (via Atari Flashback Classics on
Nintendo Switch)
When I picked up the Atari Flashback
Collection on my Switch, I went through all the games I was familiar
with. That even included going through the granddaddy of all
arcade games, Pong, but I played the more modern games like Asteroids,
Centipede and Missile Command. It may surprise many folks that
one game I did not play was Tempest. To be honest, I never played Tempest when I was
young. Tempest was released in 1981 and I don't think I was
playing at arcade until a few years later. For whatever reason
Tempest was not a game I played, although I played the other usual
suspects like Pac-Man and Galaga among others. However what
finally made me play Tempest were the various articles online about the
prototype Atari 5200 version that was discovered some years ago.
It was an exciting find though the prototype wasn't playable. Then I
saw that the original programmer (with some help) had
actually finished the prototype. So that got me thinking that
I needed to give Tempest a shot. Since it was part of the
collection, I jumped into the arcade version of Tempest. It
took me a while to figure out the gameplay but I have to say I was
impressed. The graphics, sound and gameplay were great. I'm
not sure if my Nintendo Switch super controller correctly mimics the
original experience of playing Tempest in the arcade but I had no
complaints.
The game is fairly hard after Level
5, I am able to start from Level 1 and get up to around Level 6 but
hard to advance. I started at the higher levels to test myself
out and I am occasionally able to get by the higher levels once or
twice but tough to advance beyond that. I'm sure there is a
strategy but I didn't look into it much. I just played the game
straight up and had great fun with it. if you've never played
Tempest it's worth a look. Heck, if time permits, I may try to
find Tempest at an arcade and try it with the original controls to see
how I do. At some point while playing the arcade version of
Tempest, I noticed that the Atari 2600 version was included in the
Flashback collection. I didn't know what to expect as I
never even knew there was a 2600 version that was released. Well,
if you have never played the 2600 version, I would suggest you stick
with the emulated version of Tempest or the completed 5200
version. It's unrealistic to expect the Atari 2600 to replicate
the visuals the Tempest arcade game had but this release is nowhere
close. I did play the game a few times and it was ok for what it
is but if you want a more realistic game experience, stick with the
original or the 5200 version. Maybe someone like Champ Games can
make a better version of Tempest for 2600 fans!
JUM52
5200 Emulator
https://www.bannister.org/software/jum52.htm
As I was about to write this article
today, I was reminded that I still had a version of the JUM52 emulator
on my iMac computer. I've had the emulator for a long time
now. In fact, I believe I used the emulator to play some 5200
games which I may have talked about in past Atari Zone columns.
As I was writing about Atari games this month, I decided to boot the
emulator up and see what I could still do with it. The good news
is the emulator (version 1.1.2) still works. I tried running
Pac-Man, Defender, Space Dungeon and Beamrider without issues.
However, I could not get the Lucasfilm games (Rescue on Fractalus and
Ballblazer) working, the theme music and title screens displayed but I
couldn't start game. RealSports Baseball also did not appear
playable as well. Controls were a bit hit or miss. JUM52 is
defaulted to keyboard controls and not joysticks or game pads.
For Defender, which requires a lot of different buttons, I couldn't
quite figure out which button to use for the smart bombs. Space
Dungeon is a two controller game (ala Robotron 2084). But JUM52
didn't seem to support the setup. Thus I could only control the
character and fire in the same direction I was moving which is a big
disadvantage. But knowing the emulator still works, I can try out
some of the games (like Pac-Man, among others) that may have simpler
controls and get some enjoyment of them if I wish. Worth a shot
of any 5200 fans who want to fire up some old games.
As I mentioned Space Dungeon, I also
wanted to say that if you have not played Space Dungeon before, it's
definitely a game worth trying out. If you liked the two joystick
controls of Robotron, Space Dungeon will be a similar experience, if a
tad less action oriented and more strategic oriented. It's a
shame Space Dungeon never really took off in the arcades, but there are
quite a few comments of how Space Dungeon for the 5200 was one of the
better games for the system. It's a shame I can't quite get the
full experience using the JUM52 emulator. I've seen Taito release
some retrogaming classics collections recently but haven't seen Space
Dungeon included. It would be great to get Taito to release a
proper version of Space Dungeon to play on today's systems.
That's all for this time. See
you in a couple!
I think
a lot of
retrogamers, especially those who grew up with what are now deemed
retrogames, keep at least one CRT television around. Large or
small, high end studio electronics or a thrift store beater, old game
systems generally work better on old displays. Some of this has
to do with input latency, some of it with visual tricks to utilize the
technology of the time, and some of us just think CRTs look better -
myself included. While modern televisions will take legacy inputs
they often do the bare minimum to display them - resulting in blurry
visuals, lots of dot crawl, and input lag that can make games
completely unplayable. A number of HD converters have been on the
market for years, most of them hobbyist products that have grown to
various levels of professional operations. These range from cheap
sub-$30 boxes that offer little improvement to $300+ solutions that
will accept virtually any input and offer enhancement features.
The upper spectrum of these can be a pretty big investment, with
limited after-purchase support and an expectation that the buyer has an
understanding of how their individual consoles output signal.
Additionally these have usually been marketed toward retrogamers that
are looking for the absolute best output possible, for use with
modified consoles paired with higher-end cables. While it's great
this is an option, and the push at the top has allowed a market to
manifest around the technology, it's not for everyone. At the end
of the day there are a lot of people who would simply like to play a
Super Nintendo or Saturn or PlayStation 2 on their regular modern TV,
both with ease and without breaking the bank - myself included,
again. Enter the RetroTINK 2X-MINI, a small HD converter that
offers excellent performance with stock consoles.
The RetroTINK 2X-MINI package includes a
2X-MINI in a color of your choice, a micro USB cable for power, and a
Nintendo 64 S-Video cable
Founded by
Mike Chi, RetroTINK is a boutique electronics company that has become
very well-known for creating quality HD converters for classic video
game systems, beginning in 2018 with the RetroTINK-2X. The
RetroTINK products that followed featured professional injection molded
enclosures, compact designs, and straightforward features that simply
worked right out of the package. If you were running component or
RGB these were ideal solutions but for those who top out at S-Video or
play a lot of older systems via composite, they were a bit of
overkill. The 2X-MINI seems tailored for this demographic,
featuring an even more compact design and allowing composite or S-Video
to be converted to HDMI in a small and more affordable package.
It's also available in a number of different colors.
With the
2X-MINI you get the converter, a micro USB power cable, and an N64
S-Video cable. The 2X-MINI is ideally powered off a USB port on
the TV and I've had no problems powering the unit off such. The
front of the device has inputs for S-Video, composite video, and right
and left audio. The back is where the USB power plugs in, a full
size HDMI output port, and a button to activate a smoothing
filter. I generally have the smoothing turned off but it's nice
that the option is there and that it is very easy to toggle. The
right side of the device has a small switch to set the comb filter
between "Auto" and "Retro." These don't make a tremendous
difference but most systems seem to look a bit better with it set to
Auto, which in my opinion makes the colors pop a bit more.
However I have noticed that some NES games shutter a bit in Auto mode,
where having the 2X-MINI set to Retro remedies the issue.
An example is with Little Nemo: The Dream Master, where jumping down
the waterfall in the first level will sometimes cause the image to
freeze and then catch up when in Auto but has no problem when set to
Retro. This is on an AV Famicom with standard composite output.
2X-MINI
is very compact but features all the connections you need to get your
classic gaming hardware looking great via HDMI
The included
S-Video cable is very nice and although I'm not big on the N64, it
works great with Super Nintendo, providing a beautiful image. I
honestly can't believe how good Super Nintendo looks and plays on a
modern TV on the 2X-MINI with the included S-Video cable.
I've also been impressed with AV Famicom and PC Engine over composite,
PlayStation and PlayStation 2 over first party S-Video, and Saturn over
composite. What I like most is how simple usage is - just plug it
in and go - no settings to mess with, no configurations to cycle
through. It's as easy as plugging into the TV but the performance
is so much better, both in visual quality and especially in input
latency. I've been able to play rhythm games without any problems
and that alone confirms to me that the 2X-MINI has very
minor real world latency. The only tiny complaint I can wage
against the 2X-MINI is that it's very lightweight and the
curved shape of the bottom means it slides around very easily. I
ended up putting a few rubber pads on the bottom to keep it planted but
this depends on how you integrate it into your setup.
Super Nintendo on
HDMI,
connected to the 2X-MINI using the included S-Video cable with a Super
Wild Card DX, something I still get mileage out of
Direct list
price is $89.99 and while I will admit that's still a pretty decent
spend, for the usage it's going to unlock I'd say it's worth the
money. Of course a lot of that depends on your retrogaming
needs. If you have high-end component cables, modded systems and
the like, the 2X-Pro at $129.99 may be a better fit you. That's
beyond how I like to enjoy my retrogames, so the 2X-MINI falls right
in line with my usage. Really that's what I see the 2X-MINI as,
an HD converter for your general retrogamer or someone who has been put
off by how their old games look and play when connected to a modern
TV. This particular product isn't for those seeking the absolute
high end, rather it's for those who want to play some games and have
them look and respond as originally intended. Additionally
the service from
RetroTINK was top-notch. The 2X-MINI was out of stock when I went
to order so I put myself on the notification list, got a notification a
couple weeks later, placed my order and it reached me in less than a
week. They were out of stock again pretty quickly after that so
if you can't get it right now, get on the notification list.
Order a
2X-MINI directly from RetroTINK: https://www.retrotink.com/product-page/2x-mini
There's a fact about me that always
amazes those who hear me speaking English: I've never left my own
country. I mean, not physically... The Sega Master System showed me the
whole world even before I got my permanent teeth. And not because it's
the American version of a Japanese machine which made a lot of success
in Europe and South America, or because it had games made in Japan
which were modeled after the American market sensibilities, and later
in the machine's shelf life modeled after the European market
sensibilities. No, those are things that I would learn later, when I
started researching about the history of my dearest dear. As I kid, the
Master System took me around the globe in a much more direct way: by
showing me infinite cultures and colors in amazing 8-bit scenery (and
gameplay).
Obviously, the sports games are among
those that took me for these worldwide spins. World Grand Prix, with tracks that
are based on those from the 1976 Formula 1 season, made me drool over
such sights as the Eiffel Tower in Paris, Big Ben in London and Mount
Fuji in Japan. World Games, with uncommon sports that are only
practiced in specific parts of the globe, made me realize how different
the peoples of our little planet are, as are the places they inhabit.
The Great series of sports games reinforced this sense of foreignness
by always bringing countries where the sport in question was famous and
played by most people (Great Soccer has Brazil and Argentina, Great Volleyball has Cuba and China,
and so on).
But not only the sports games were
Great (pun intended) to make me travel to remote lands. The platform
games were also Great in fulfilling this mission: from North America's
darkest forest in Ren & Stimpy, to a lost Tasmanian valley in, huh,
Taz-Mania, passing through all of Europe and North Africa in
Astérix and visiting China in Kung Fu Kid, besides Japan in
games like Kenseiden, there was no geography left untouched by the Sega
and Sega-licensed developers. It helped that most Master System games
adhered to the same art style, in part because of the hardware
limitations, in part because there were really just a handful of Master
System artists and programmers. This made all the traveling more
consistent.
And I couldn't finish this article
without writing about the mother of all world-traveling lovers born in
the 80's. The one which made Apple II-infused students learn that the
country of Peru is smaller than Alaska and that the capital of Rwanda
is the busy Kigali while they searched for the elusive mistress of
crime, the unreachable, untouchable Carmen Sandiego. She landed on the
Master System with an incredible version of her game, one which let you
walk across the landscapes, not only read about them. It was truly
wonderful, reading about the countries, studying about them, and then
finally visiting them and falling in love with their unique building
styles and sky colors. Where in the
World Is Carmen Sandiego? took me to places I'll never forget
and made me forever love the alien, the unique. That's a great legacy.
|
Caught On Film - Sonic the Hedgehog 2
2 Fast 2 Furryious |
by Dan
Pettis |
|
The
first Sonic the Hedgehog movie was something of a sleeper hit. Released
on Valentine's Day 2020, a few weeks before the first wave of the
Coronavirus pandemic closed most movie theaters, it made over $300
million world wide and became the last movie many of us saw in theaters
for a while. Capitalizing on that success, Paramount Pictures and Sega
quickly made a sequel, the new film Sonic 2, and it recently sped into
theaters this April, just over two years after the release of the first
movie. Freed from the pressure of building Sonic's universe and
introducing the character to mainstream audiences, the second film
expands the amount of scope, scale and amount of fuzzy characters by
introducing Sonic's trusty sidekick fox Tails, and his former rival
turned ally, the red echidna Knuckles. The film also doles out lots
more Sonic easter eggs and plenty of references to the original Genesis
video games that longtime fans are sure to enjoy. It may not be a
perfect movie, but is a fun, family friendly film that kids and their
parents raised on the 16-bit games are sure to enjoy.
Sonic And Knuckles
square off in a match of power versus speed
When the movie opens we pick up
immediately where the last Sonic movie
left off, with Jim Carrey's Dr. Robotnik, featuring a much bushier
mustache and newly shaved head, stranded on a distant planet full of
mushrooms. It isn't long before the evil genius devises a way to get
back to Earth and attempt revenge against the speedy blue hedgehog who
defeated him in the last movie. Robotnik is not alone in his evil plot,
as he tricks Knuckles into helping him try to defeat Sonic and recover
a gigantic Chaos Emerald also located on Earth. Meanwhile Sonic is
still living in the cleverly named rural town of Green Hills by day
with his adopted human parents but sloppily trying to fight crime as a
vigilante in bigger cities at night. When Robotnik crashes into his
house with Knuckles in tow, Sonic escapes with the help of Miles
"Tails" Prower and the pair try to find the emerald before Robotnik can
use it to take over the universe.
As you can probably tell from the
plot, which mainly takes its
inspiration from the third Sonic game, the film goes for the
classic "bigger is better" Hollywood approach to sequels. After the
surprise success of the last movie, the film seems to have been given
an exponentially bigger budget by Paramount Studios. This allows for
much bigger action set pieces, more varied locations, more furry
friends and foes, and a much bigger climactic show down. However, some
of the small town charms and intimately lower stakes of the first film
are lost in this attempt to make the movie into a much bigger
blockbuster. The main humans, Sonic's adopted parents, played by James
Marsden and Tika Sumpter settle into their roles as Sonic straight men
and are wisely sidelined for a bulk of the movie, as they are sent to
Hawaii for a wedding. For a bulk of the middle of the movie the focus
is wisely put on our furry friends and Carrey's
sadistically manic and whacky take on Dr. Robotnik. Appropriately the
film whisks the characters and the audience quickly from location to
location as the race for the emerald is on. One trip the movie makes
involves an embarrassing dance contest that probably should have been
left off of the itinerary.
Dr. Robotnik sips on
a latte in a the perfectly named Mean
Bean coffee shop
Once again, Carrey steals the show as
the over the top maniacal mad man
Dr. Robotnik. Playing a mix of his classic Riddler and Grinch
performances, and wearing a much more video game accurate costume, he
unleashes a vintage 1990s Carrey style performance, clearly relishing
the chance to let his whacky side shine through. Sonic is once again
winningly voiced by Ben Schwartz as a hyper active and bratty only
child. Although Sonic spouts a few too many movie references for my
liking, this modernized sassy version of the blue blur clearly
connects with today's audiences full of children. In an inspired move
of casting, Knuckles is voiced here by Idris Elba. His deep gruff voice
is the perfect pairing for Sonic 2's take on Knuckles: a blockheaded
but boastful warrior. This is played for many big laughs, giving
Knuckles an almost Buddy The Elf style lack of understanding of human
customs. This is a good omen for the Paramount Plus Knuckles TV series
that is currently in the works.
Meanwhile, in another sign of
faithfulness to the games, Tails is
effectively voiced here by longtime Sonic video game actress Colleen
O'Shaughnessey. She plays Tails here as an extremely smart, bright, and
faithful Sonic fanboy. Lee Najdoub also drums up a few laughs in the
return of Robotnik's lackey sidekick created for these movies, Agent
Stone. Najdoub takes a lot of funny verbal abuse from Carrey's
character, but just like Mr. Smithers from the Simpsons, he can't help
but love his terrible boss.
Sonic and Tales visit
a mysterious temple
Although there have been some
commercially and critically successful
video game adaptations lately, the bar is still set pretty low. This
movie clears that low bar easily and delivers a much bigger movie when
compared to the original. It's a crowd pleaser stuffed full of lots of
great references to the classic games and other Sonic media that
long-time fans are sure to get a real kick out of. The success of the
first movie seems to have emboldened the creative team, and the movie
goes in weirder and wilder directions. While it doesn't always work
out, and relies on maybe a bit too much potty humor, adults will surely
find this movie to be perfectly acceptable family entertainment. Which
is perfect, since many of the kids of the 90s who grew up on the Sega
games surely have kids and a family of their own now. Judging by a
post credit scene, there is lots more live action Sonic to come and
hopefully the creative team can build on the success of this movie to
deliver another winning Sonic Adventure.
Shigeru Miyamoto's
contributions to the video game industry span many
decades. His journey began with Donkey Kong, an emergency maneuver to
overcome Nintendo's failed Radar Scope release in the United States.
The game had surging popularity during the arcade Golden Age, spawning
sequels with Donkey Kong Jr. and Donkey Kong 3 later. The original
game's player character, known as Jumpman, would later get a name and
an identity in a future release called Mario Bros. A 2-player
head-to-head game inspired by Williams' Joust had two plumber brothers
facing off against an array of baddies in sewers. Soon after though,
Miyamoto would then go on to create Super Mario Bros., a side-scrolling
platforming game that expanded the brothers' adventures into a world
called the Mushroom Kingdom. The game was released in 1985 to coincide
with the North American release of the Nintendo Entertainment System
(NES) and in Japan for the Family Computer (Famicom). A resounding
smash hit around the globe, and what put the NES on the map in a murky
consumer climate in the wake of the Video Game Crash of 1983, lots of
potential for alternate versions and future sequels emerged. Just prior
in 1984, Nintendo had released a new arcade platform known as the Vs.
System, which consisted of a game motherboard with modular capabilities
to switch games for less cost than that of a traditional arcade kit.
Vs. Super Mario Bros. was released in 1986 and received a few marked
changes from the console version of the game, notably ramping up the
difficulty in some levels to improve earnings potential for arcade
operators. It was there the seed for the next game in the series was
planted.
Japanese
advertisement for Super Mario Bros. 2
Super Mario Bros. 2 (Japan)
Nintendo went
forward in 1986 with a new Mario game on their Famicom
Disk System (FDS), a console that utilized proprietary floppy disks
rather than conventional cartridges sold only in Japan. While in the
original game Mario and Luigi contained identical gameplay attributes,
the new game gave them unique traction and jump heights. In the new
game, Mario retained his normal jump height but had better traction
when running. Luigi on the other hand received his now-trademark higher
jumps but at the penalty of slipping around on surfaces in the game.
Another change is the ability to choose which character to play as,
Mario or Luigi, as the game lacked an alternating 2-player mode.
Besides being built in the same engine as the original game and mostly
looking visually the same with minor aesthetic changes (the clouds and
bushes have eyes now), the game is probably most known for is its
increased difficulty over its predecessor. The concept for making a
harder game came when the Nintendo R&D4 team that made the original
game were retooling levels for added challenge, or effectively to make
players lose and drop more money in to keep playing. Miyamoto and
his team believed the added challenge was more fun and wished to make a
game for more experienced players. While not quite to the absurdity of
Super Mario Maker or Kaizo Mario Bros., it was chock full of falling
into bottomless pits and getting bombarded with enemies. Adding to the
difficulty, the new game added another Mushroom to go along with super
power or 1ups, with the Poison Mushroom. Looking incredibly innocent in
appearance, touching the Poison Mushroom results in an immediate loss
of a life no matter how powered up the player is. The game also
extended beyond 8 worlds, World 9 being accessible if no Warp Zones are
used, and Worlds A-D if you complete the game 8 times (represented by
stars on the title screen for each completion). Also, speaking of Warp
Zones, there is an incentive to NOT try to find them, as players would
be accustomed to taking them to advance further in the game faster, but
here there are some that go backwards too. In all, the second iteration
of Super Mario Bros. in Japan would effectively become its Master
Levels compilation. The North American market would ultimately not even
know this game existed for about seven more years, however.
Super Mario Bros. 2 (North America / Europe)
While Japan's Super
Mario Bros. 2 was in the can already, Nintendo had
already begun making Super Mario Bros. 3. Slated for release in Japan
in 1988, North America didn't have a second game yet. Nintendo of
America's Howard Phillips tested games from Japan to determine if they
were viable for the United States market to consume and deemed the game
cruel and too difficult. Within the scope also of the United States
still rebounding from the Video Game Crash of 1983, the game looking
virtually the same as Super Mario Bros. and advances in visuals
would've been seen as a turn-off. In Japan, Nintendo had hired a new
designer named Kensuke Tanabe to join Miyamoto's R&D4 team. The
team being encouraged by Miyamoto to be creative and come up with new
fun gameplay ideas, Tanabe experimented with a new vertical scrolling
gameplay mechanic. Deeming the concept too much for the NES hardware to
handle and not fun to play, the prototype was shelved. Nintendo engaged
in a deal with Fuji TV to produce a tie-in game for their upcoming
Summer 1987 festival, Dream Factory. Fuji TV supplied a sheet with
characters to implement into a game, and the prototype was resurrected
into a new game titled Yume Kojo: Doki Doki Panic. The game featured
four selectable characters, each with different speed, strength, and
jump attributes, with the ability to pick up objects and throw them at
enemies in contrast to the older Mario games, which consisted of mostly
squashing enemies. With Doki Doki Panic complete and being a success in
Japan, Nintendo submitted the game to Nintendo of America with an
inquiry of whether the game, with Mario characters, would be suitable
for sale in the United States market. The company finally had a
solution to their missing second game in North America and Europe,
releasing in October 1988.
The Localizations
Nintendo released
the Super Mario Bros. anthology titled Super Mario
All-Stars in 1993, one of the hallmarks of their "The Best Play Here!"
campaign (the somewhat failed precursor to the following "Play It
Loud!" campaign). Featuring graphics modernized to look more in line
with their previous Super Nintendo launch title Super Mario World, it
was probably about the closest thing you could get to a "remaster" back
in the early 1990s. It featured Super Mario Bros. 1-3 and an additional
game called The Lost Levels, which was the Japanese version of Super
Mario Bros. 2. The name was quite cryptic because without any real
internet to speak of then, or perhaps lacking a Nintendo Power
subscription, there was no way to really tell the origin of where this
game came from. Unlike the other games in All-Stars, The Lost Levels
has a more comprehensive save system in that it saves by world and
level (eg. World 1-3) as opposed to just the last world played, to aid
somewhat with the increased difficulty. Before the widespread advent of
emulators that would follow later, this was the only way to play the
game in the United States, making it a novel selling point to buy
All-Stars. All-Stars topped 10 million sales, while the original FDS
Super Mario Bros. 2 from 1986 reached 2.5 million.
With Super Mario
Bros. 3 on the horizon in Japan in 1988, Doki Doki
Panic served as the perfect foil for North America's needs for a second
Mario game. It was localized replacing its Yume Kojo storybook
characters with Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool. Several
graphical elements were altered from the strictly Arabian locales of
Doki Doki Panic and into more familiar items from the Mario universe,
such as the POW blocks (from Mario Bros.) or Star power-ups for
invincibility. One of the boss characters, Mouser, appeared three times
in
Doki Doki Panic, but in the retooled Western release the third
encounter was replaced with a new boss, Clawgrip. To properly complete
Doki Doki Panic and see the game's ending would require beating all the
levels with all four characters, this limitation was removed in the
United States version. One of the most important gameplay changes was
the addition of running, which was absent from Doki Doki Panic, making
some of the more difficult jumps easier to perform. With 3.5 million
units sold in the United States by 1990, the game was a huge success.
While Japanese players had access to Doki Doki Panic, they didn't have
the retooled and improved game to play. It would see a special release
in Japan under the title Super Mario USA in 1992, thus totally bringing
both variants of Super Mario Bros. 2 literally full circle. The game
proved so popular around the world that it saw another re-release as
Super Mario Advance for the Game Boy Advance in 2001 adding a multitude
of new features and characters. Depending which side of the world you
were on, you had a different Super Mario Bros. 2 experience. Once
isolated, both flavors crossed hemispherical barriers to cross into
other markets and continue to be debated in various media still to this
day. Shigeru Miyamoto continues to be a force in the industry, its
been fun reflecting on a couple bumps in his proverbial roadmap along
the way.
It wouldn't be
a stretch to say that Sega CD was a platform that never really found
its footing in any region. A quick glance at the library reveals
its bulk to be made up of not just poorly realized games - but poorly
realized games on expensive hardware.
However among all those horrible live action video games there were a
few titles that genuinely shined and restored some luster to the early
promise of CD based console gaming. Magical Fantasy Adventure
Popful Mail was originally released in 1991 on the PC-8801 platform in
Japan by RPG powerhouse Falcom. The title did well enough that it
was soon ported to other platforms, one of which was the Sega Mega CD
in 1994. This version was later translated and released in the
United States on the Sega CD platform a year later. The game was
completely reworked for the Mega CD / Sega CD and large, detailed
sprites replaced the tiny characters of the earlier releases. The
changes didn't stop there, as virtually every gameplay mechanic was
reworked, with the resulting game becoming a fast action platformer
that played much smoother. The Sega CD version was also the only
Popful Mail game to be officially translated into English. Not
only is it the best in the series, it also makes a good argument for
owning a Sega CD.
Popful Mail is
a cute little female elf with a rather large sword. Although
quite skilled in battle, she is also horrible at her job as a bounty
hunter. Rather than going after small bounties, Mail is always
looking for the fastest way to make as much cash as possible, which
usually leads to her biting off more than she can chew. The game
opens with her in pursuit of Nuts Cracker, a mechanical villain with a
knack for manufacturing explosives. However just before Mail can
capture Nuts Cracker he detaches his head, which works like a makeshift
grenade, and throws it at her to cause a distraction. With Nuts
once again getting away, the discouraged Mail takes his head into town
hoping that she can at least get something for her troubles.
Asking a shopkeeper where she may inquire about large bounties leads
her to the town square where a recent posting has been made. A
bounty of two million gold has been placed on the evil magician
Muttonhead. Unable to resist the call of big money, Mail sets off
to track down Muttonhead and make herself filthy rich.
As Mail
progresses on her quest she will gather the help of a wizard named Tatt
and a small winged creature that goes by Gaw. The game plays like
a traditional side scrolling hack and slash with a lot of platforming
elements. It's quite a bit like Cadash but much smoother and with
a higher emphasis on platforming. RPG elements are abound and the
plot is very much story driven with plenty of plot twists and a few
side quests. While each character doesn't earn stats, nearly
every enemy drops gold which is used in a number of shops to buy more
powerful weapons and armor. The shops also allow the player to
purchase trinkets that grant special abilities such as being able to
walk on spikes without incurring damage. Fruit may be purchased
in healing shops or found in chests throughout the landscape. The
more expensive the fruit, the more vitality it will replenish.
The importance of these items makes killing enemies and picking up gold
all that more critical and this functions a bit like building up levels
in an RPG. There are a number of boss battles at the end of
select areas and each one requires special tactics to defeat
successfully. A nice feature is that the game can be saved at any
time outside of dialogue sequences and boss battles. With three
save slots and the ability to save pretty much anywhere, one would
think the game to be a cakewalk. However Popful Mail puts up a
solid challenge and the save method does a good job at giving the game
a fair balance between taxing and fun. As with many localizations
at the time, the game was made quite a bit more difficult than the
Japanese original, with enemies dishing out more damage and player
attacks inflicting less. It doesn't spoil the experience but it
does make the game require a bit more strategy and precision than the
hop-and-bop presentation would suggest.
Nearly all main
character dialogue is fully voiced (left), cutscenes look great and are
nicely animated (center), everything has a lot of personality and
detail (right)
Throughout the
game the graphics maintain a high consistency of quality and a dead
solid frame rate. All sprites are beautifully rendered and well
animated, giving the entire game a cartoon look. The cutscenes
are fully animated and are some of the best work to be seen on the Sega
CD platform. All the full motion video titles could have taken a
lesson from this game. While the cutscenes don't take up the
entire screen, they do cover quite a bit of it and are truly
beautiful. It's hard to explain how incredible animation like
this was during the time of this game's release and it's a shame more
people didn't see it at the time. During dialogue scenes large
fully animated portraits of the conversing characters are
displayed. These contain a wide variety of expressions and are
synchronized perfectly with the spoken dialogue. Boss sprites are
big, colorful, and nicely detailed. This plays into the strategy
of how to defeat them, as watching for subtle changes in their
appearance is often the first warning of a specific attack or an
opening to counterattack. On top of that, each of the five main
areas has a very distinct look when compared to the others and even the
map screens are very nicely rendered. This is, without a doubt,
one of the most beautiful games ever to grace the Sega CD
platform. Nearly every shop has a different proprietor, all of
which are very well drawn. Additionally each town is populated by
a different species of creatures and many enemies are area
specific. It's simply all very well done and there is a great
deal of variety to keep things fresh and interesting, which makes
exploring areas enjoyable.
Working
Designs translated and published Popful Mail in the United States so
you know the audio work is going to be extensive, if not top
notch. Every character with spoken dialogue, no matter how minor,
is wonderfully voiced. This game was released during what was, in
my opinion anyway, the golden age for Working Designs and the quality
really shines through. The dialogue is funny when it's supposed
to be and serious when it needs to be. Without a doubt my
favorite characters are my favorites because of their voice work.
Nuts Cracker has a pseudo Italian accent and when he's going on about
"bomba" this and "a'bomba" that it's really quite funny. Sven T.
Uncommon, a villain in the later parts of the game, has been dubbed to
be a parody of Arnold Schwarzenegger. His dialogue mentions many
of Arnold's films in a candid and indirect manner but the humorous
writing would be nothing without the superb voice work. I know a
lot of people can take or leave the localization style of Working
Designs but for Popful Mail it perfectly fits the style of the
game. It would have been nice if they didn't increase the
difficulty and item prices but I really like the added humor they
injected into this particular title. The music is all generated
using the Genesis sound hardware but is still very nicely done and if
you didn't know any better, you'd assume it was being streamed from the
CD.
Control is
everything in a platforming game and Popful Mail does not
disappoint. The directional pad takes care of movement and
holding Down allows your character to defend. One button attacks,
one jumps, and one opens the options screen. At first it seems
annoying that the options screen can be brought up via one of the face
buttons. Yes, you will hit it a lot by accident early on but
after playing for awhile it becomes apparent why it's there.
Since healing, special item selection, and weapon equipping are all
accessed through the menu it is important to be able to gain fast
access. Even more important are the save and load options which
are also found here. This makes saving your progress extremely
easy and with a game that can become very difficult such as this,
that's a great feature to have.
The shop screens have
extremely detailed illustrations and a different attendant in each
Although it is
a fairly linear quest, I've always felt the pure enjoyment of Popful
Mail reason enough play through it again after completion.
Depending on what character you are using at specific times, the
dialogue will change during spoken dialogue sequences.
Additionally shopkeepers will address you differently depending on who
you are playing as. I suppose going through the game to
experience the differences is another reason for replaying the
game. Of course loading a save game just before these areas,
changing characters, hearing the differences, then doing it again with
another character is an option as well. If you want to have a
enjoyable time playing, talk to nearly everyone, hear all the audio and
be at proper power levels at the proper times - the game will take
between eight to ten hours to complete. That sounds short but
every moment is great and some of the boss battles are truly intense.
Admittedly I
didn't play Popful Mail until many years after it was released. I
stumbled upon a JVC X'Eye, which is a Sega Genesis and Sega CD in one
unit, at a local flea market in 2004 and began to explore the
library. I'll also admit that this exploration was conducted with
CD-Rs as the Sega CD doesn't have any copy protection. I played
through the more highly regarded games on the platform: Sonic CD,
Snatcher, Lunar: The Silver Star, Lunar: Eternal Blue and had a great
time. I noticed mentions of Popful Mail, grabbed the disc image,
and burned a copy not knowing what to expect. I was immediately
taken back by the presentation quality from the moment the game spun
up. The intro looked great and the dialogue actually made me
laugh. Then the game started proper and I was surprised how
colorful the world was and how well Mail controlled. After I had
a couple encounters with other game characters, fully voiced and
humorously written, I was pretty much smitten. Everything was so
vibrant and lively and from beginning to end I had a great time.
Popful Mail became then, as it is now, my favorite game on not only
Sega CD but the Genesis platform as a whole. If you own a Sega CD
there is absolutely no reason you shouldn't give this game a try.
Among a hardware platform that was plagued with bad games, Popful Mail
stands tall as a textbook example of how to do things right and utilize
the technology to provide a stellar experience.
Released
to arcades
by Sega in 1996, Cyber Troopers Virtual On carved out a niche as one of
the more unique fighting games to hit the scene. It features a
cast of colorful giant robots pitted against one another in one-on-one
battles, each armed with a variety of unique weapons. Essentially
a 3D arena fighter viewed from behind your combatant, it also contains
aspects of an action shooter and plays at a much higher speed than many
fighting games. In addition to quick reflexes, Virtual On also
requires complex strategy and a keen understanding of how each
virtuaroid (the game's mecha) operates, something that isn't always
apparent to newcomers. The spartan layout of the control setup
can also create a false assumption of simplicity on the surface, as the
game is controlled by two identical joysticks. Each of these has
a finger trigger and a turbo button (also known as a boost or dash
button) at the top, an arrangement similar to what was seen on Namco's
Cyber Sled from 1993.
Sega
Ages 2500 Vol. 31 for PlayStation 2 (left), the back of the Japanese
arcade flyer for Cyber Troopers Virtual On (right)
Virtuaroid
movement is controlled similar to a tank, with direction and rotation
dependent on a combination of twin-stick input. The left trigger
activates the left weapon, the right trigger activates the right
weapon, and both triggers together activate the center weapon.
Moving both sticks outward will cause the virtuaroid to jump and moving
both sticks inward while jumping will quickly cancel the upward
movement. This is useful as a jump will automatically reorient
you with the enemy and lock on, while quickly "jump canceling" after
will return control immediately. The turbo buttons allow a
virtuaroid to dash at high speed, with quickly dashing in the opposite
direction used to immediately cancel the movement. This "dash
canceling" is a core strategy to avoiding attacks and getting into
position for your own. Additionally, dashing changes how each of
the weapons are deployed and in some cases this is also affected by the
direction in which a virtuaroid is moving. Activating a weapon
while dashing also has the additional benefit of automatically
reacquiring positioning lock on the enemy virtuaroid. Each weapon
draws energy from its own power bank, which quickly deplete and refill
constantly throughout a match. Each virtuaroid also features
completely different weapons and movement characteristics, requiring
dedication to learn the specifics of each - both to use offensively and
to understand how to battle against. Later games in the series
would become even more complex, layering on additional modifiers and
tactics, but the elegance and visual style of the first game has always
made it my favorite of the series.
The Sega Saturn
Twin-Stick allowed for proper Virtual On play at home and continues to
be a fan favorite
With the home
release of Cyber Troopers Virtual On for the Sega Saturn, a premium
home version of the Twin-Stick was also released but only in
Japan. While the game can technically
be played without a Twin-Stick, much of the experience is lost with
a control pad. The Saturn version itself pales in comparison to
the visuals of the arcade original but it's still a pretty fun time
with the Twin-Stick controller. Subsequent sequel
games would be ported to their contemporary hardware, usually with an
accompanying Twin-Stick but the Saturn stick was always my
favorite. The original game, known as "Operation Moongate" in the
wake of the sequels, would have a few different releases as well, right
up to 2018 in the Japan-only Masterpiece Collection on PlayStation
4. Yet my favorite release of the original was another Japanese
exclusive, part of the Sega Ages 2500 series for PlayStation 2.
Released in 2007, Sega Ages 2500 Vol. 31 is a deluxe and extremely
accurate conversion of the classic Cyber Troopers Virtual On.
This release was handled by developer M2, known to be the gold standard
for studios converting classic games. The only drawback is there
wasn't a Twin-Stick for the PlayStation 2. Well, then we'll have
to make our own...
The idea is to take
the electronics from a digital PS1 controller (left) and install them
in the Twin-Stick (right), converting it into a native PlayStation
controller
The PS2
version of Virtual On has a number of different controller
configurations, including using the digital pad for the left stick, the
face buttons for the right stick, and the four L and R buttons for the
triggers and turbos. PlayStation 2 controllers are pressure
sensitive so I didn't want to use one of those for a conversion,
however an original PlayStation digital controller works fine with the
game and has a much easier to work with PCB (printed circuit
board). Of course there are plenty of modern adapters to allow
Saturn controllers to be used on other systems. However a
PS1 digital board gives you a lot more flexibility and easier
compatibility, with adapters existing for decades. Heck, I still
use an over twenty-year-old PS1 to USB adapter for pretty much all
emulation I do on my computer. I also wouldn't have to worry
about compatibility issues concerning the unique Saturn Twin-Stick PCB. With that in
mind, I ordered a spare Saturn Twin-Stick from Japan and got to work on
converting it to work with the PS1 controller family.
The Saturn Twin-Stick
has a clean internal layout and generous space, allowing for multiple
approaches to modification
The Saturn Twin-Stick is laid
out very cleanly inside, with good quality microswitched joysticks and
nice long wiring looms. Now, if you intend on being able to
reverse the modification to the Twin-Stick, the stock wiring
can simply be removed along with the Twin-Stick PCB and
the re-installed when needed. In my case the intention is to make
this a permanent PlayStation Twin-Stick, so I cut the stock wiring at the
plug ends. The one part of the Twin-Stick that
cannot simply be wired up to the PS1 controller PCB is the Start
button, as it uses a conventional membrane actuator on the Twin-Stick
PCB. I replaced this with a simple pushbutton momentary contact
switch that screwed right into the existing Start button hole.
Preparing the
PlayStation controller board for installation, the stock wires that run
up to the shoulder buttons have already been de-soldered
There are a
number of different revisions to the original PlayStation digital
controller, so your PCB may look a little different. I honestly
can't think of a better controller PCB to modify since there are nice
big through-hole connections for the L1 / L2 and R1 / R2 buttons, each
with individual ground connections, in addition to test connection
points for every input on the controller. Another great thing
with this board is it's pretty much laid out exactly as the Twin-Stick wiring
setup, with a common ground on each side. The most
important thing at this point is to carefully follow the traces around
and plot out where you're going to connect to each. I added a
little
flux and tinned each of the connection points prior to moving forward. Additionally
I soldered the connections for the triggers and their respective common
grounds prior to mounting the PCB, as I wanted to use the
through-holes. The wires may be different on your Twin-Stick but
as to what was stock on mine the color connections are as such:
Sticks
Black - Down
Brown - Up
Red - Left
Orange - Right
Yellow - GND
Triggers
Red - Boost -
L1 / R1 - PCB through-hole connection 1
Brown - Weapon
- L2 / R2 - PCB through-hole connection 3
Black - GND -
PCB through-hole connection 2
With the PlayStation
PCB mounted in the Twin-Stick the work begins (left), all connections
made (right)
Mounting the
PCB can be kind of tricky since the underside of the surface plate on
the Twin-Stick
is metal and will act as a conductor. What I decided to do was
use one of the original Saturn PCB mounting holes to mount the PS1 PCB
on one side, and then build up a mount out of hot glue on the other
side of the board. I then used hot glue to tack the board into
place. Hot glue can always be removed with isopropyl alcohol, so
it's not an irreversible installation. Remember not to use hot
glue on your solder work, it's a bad habit that causes more problems
than anything else. It is also
important that you rotate the PS1 PCB 180 degrees before tacking it down.
Otherwise your left and right stick connections will be reversed if
connected directly or the stock wires won't reach if you cross the
connections. This is because the PS1 board is upside down in
relation to how it would normally be held - that is the control inputs
are facing the bottom of the housing, not the top. I learned this the
hard way, even after writing a note to specifically remind myself of
this, and had to do some rework which made my right trigger leads
shorter than they would have been if I had done it right from the start.
As for the
controller cable, simply wind it back through the posts like the Saturn
original was. Don't force the controller cable when tacking
the PCB down or orienting the outward path, simply fold it around
different ways beneath the PCB until you find a position where it sits
naturally. Also be cautious of the clearances around the carriage
bolts that mount the upper plate to the Twin-Stick, as you don't want
them to come into contact with the PCB. I elected to
put a bit of hot glue on the controller cable to act as strain relief
of such but it's really not all that necessary and if you have a
snap-on strain relief that would look cleaner. As can be seen,
this goes over where the replacement Start button is mounted, so be
sure to get that installed and wired first.
The completed installation,
the right (viewer's left) button wires will be longer to begin with -
mine are shortened due to some rework before deciding on this final
orientation
The completed
conversion retains the clean layout and ability for maintenance that
the original Saturn layout had. This is very important with
controller modifications, as input devices will require repair over
time simply due to the nature of what they are. Once everything
was connected I made sure to check my work and then clean off all flux
residue (remember, even no-clean flux needs to be cleaned off) before
sealing the Twin-Stick back up. Connected in this way
the left stick matches to the directional pad, the right stick to the
face buttons (Up - Triangle, Right - Circle, Down - X, Left - Square),
the left and right triggers to the respective L2 and R2 buttons, and
the left and right boost buttons to the respective L1 and R2
buttons. The momentary pushbutton I installed functions as the
Start button. The only functionality that is lost is the Select
button but it could always be added by installing an extra button or
clever usage of the existing Start button hole. I don't need Select for any of the stuff
I'm going to do, so I'll live without it.
As a finishing touch, I added a PS
logo emblem off a spare PlayStation lid that I had kicking
around. I've given the modified Twin-Stick really
hard use since the modification and it has held up wonderfully.
I'm generally a Fei-Yen player when it comes to Virtual On, which
should tell those who are familiar with the game that I'm not easy on
my Twin-Sticks.
I've also used it on my PC with MAME to play games that use tank-style
controls. This includes Atari's Battlezone and Namco's Assault,
which were both designed to utilize this type of input. It's kind
of strange how complex the inputs are for something like Assault, when
the game seems so simple. In reality a Virtual On Twin-Stick has
twelve individual inputs on two sticks (four directions and two buttons
each), all the reason why it simply cannot be played well via any other
type of input, even a modern dual analog control pad. Anyone who
has tried to play Virtual On in Yakuza Kiwami 2 can tell you that small
thumbsticks simply cannot replicate the fast and precise input that a
full size Twin-Stick gives you.
From the outside the
modified Twin-Stick looks as if it was always designed for PlayStation
The Saturn Twin-Stick isn't as
large or robust as the arcade original setup, it is a consumer-grade
product for home use and is downsized both in profile and layout
distances. Even with those differences, it's still my favorite of
all the Virtual On Twin-Stick setups that have been released
since. It seems designed to embrace home usage from the ground
up, with a perfectly sized profile and comfortable grips, rather than
have been built around cost compromise as the primary target.
It's also one of the few arcade style controllers that doesn't take up
a lot of space, something ignored by every Virtual On Twin-Stick that
would come after. With this simple PlayStation modification it
opens up a lot of additional possibilities for arguably coolest
peripheral Sega ever made. Sure this mod is a bit crazy but
Virtual On was "my" game in my teenage years, being the regular
seat-two resident at my local arcade, and it has remained one of my
favorite games to this day.
The arcade coin-op
experience went in so many phases going as far back as the 70s through
the early 2000s. The Williams-owned Midway brand in the 90s however had
such a long string of hits with Mortal Kombat, NBA Jam, and NFL Blitz
it's difficult to imagine the company ever having any "misses" along
the way. The company's rare flops are all seemingly rooted in other
games that were resounding successes for the then-branded Williams
Electronics Games, which relaunched its video game division in 1988
with the release of NARC.
Strike Force (1991)
Williams released
Smash TV in 1990, intended as something of a
reimagining of Eugene Jarvis and Larry DeMar's brainchild from 1982,
Robotron: 2084. The game featured bigger and bolder graphics and much
deeper gameplay spanning multiple rooms with bosses at the end of the
waves. The formula here worked extremely well but being developed
somewhat alongside it was another game titled Saurian Front. Saurian
Front was to Smash TV what Defender was to Robotron: 2084. Defender put
Williams' fledgling video game division on the map in a huge way back
in 1981, making it one of the golden age's vaunted billion-dollar
earners. The game possessed an intimidating control scheme with five
action buttons and a joystick that only moved up and down, meaning in
order to move forward you had to press a Thrust button and Reverse to
change directions. What became the third iteration of Defender in the
guise of Saurian Front eliminated the Thrust and Reverse buttons,
making it so you could move the ship with only the joystick. The game
also enabled the ability to select and fire different weapons and even
Transform the ship into a smaller orb shape, that gives the ship 8-way
directional firing.
Approximately six
Saurian Front cabinets were produced for location
testing, coming in dedicated trim in the style of the 25" monitor Smash
TV and another in what is assumed to be Arch Rivals with kit art
applied. (I had the luxury of owning the 25" monitor Smash TV style
Saurian Front for a few years.) The game was not very well received,
presumably because it deviated from Defender's aggressive and
well-known formula too much. The general public were apparently also
confused as to what a "Saurian" was, as if no game previously ever had
a fictional character referenced in its title. Considered to be doomed
and not the runaway success that Smash TV was on location test,
Williams would go on to shelve the game for a little while. Before the
release of NARC, Williams Electronics Games had purchased its rival
Bally/Midway and would go on to release a few titles under their brand
name including Arch Rivals, Tri-Sports, and Trog (the latter two were
in-house projects just using the newly acquired brand). The company
would subsequently bring the Bally name back in 1990 as a second
pinball nameplate under Midway Manufacturing and for 1991 would do
something totally outlandish and rename their video game division
Midway. The Saurian Front location test games emblazoned with the
Williams W were each given to the members of the development team and
the game itself was renamed Midway Strike Force and distributed as a
kit game instead. One of the developers told me that it was effectively
given away for free with the purchase of another Midway game at the
time (presumably Terminator 2: Judgment Day or Super High Impact). All
was not lost however in the game's location test collapse: the Mortal
Kombat character Reptile was given a backstory that his race were the
Saurians. In all, probably just a novel idea (or formula) executed
poorly.
Total Carnage (1992)
Not enough great
things can be said about Smash TV, it was a brilliant
concept with excellent aesthetic flare to keep people pumping their
last remnants of quarters in it. One of the Evil MC game show host
character's callouts was "Total Carnage! I love it!" and even one of
the rooms was titled "Total Carnage 7/91" particularly alluding to the
possibility of a follow-up. I call it a follow-up, not a sequel (which
was a huge misnomer with the first game where people believed it was a
sequel to Robotron: 2084) because it's seemingly only set in the same
universe and was intended all along to be a different concept entirely.
Gone was the combat confined to single rooms, and instead it became
more like Smash TV meets Ikari Warriors where the player fights in a
scrolling environment instead. In contemporary 1991, the Gulf War was a
hot topic and the game became a parody of the war with the character
General Akhboob (voiced by Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon) being the
evil tyrant. The game was large enough in scope that it incorporated a
password system which may have been the first arcade coin-op
application of such a feature. There were portals scattered about the
world that could teleport you to hidden rooms with the potential to
score big points. Chock full of blistering boss battles, with my
personal favorite Orcus, the game undoubtedly sounded like a winner.
The game was
outfitted in a large 25" monitor cabinet with a control
panel of 4 player size, but for 2 players, to give more space to its
occupants to play comfortably. Unlike Saurian Front, Total Carnage
fared better on location test and was put into wide release. Everything
up to this point has sounded positive, right? That was of course until
arcade operators, approximately less than 1000 of them, started putting
the game in their locations. Being a dual joystick game just like
Robotron: 2084 and Smash TV, all the player controls were to be handled
by the joysticks, with no action buttons. Total Carnage added a very
handy feature where you can pick up Bombs and they can be set to
explode by pressing… the Start button. The Bombs give you about a
second and a half of temporary invulnerability, so they become
important to stockpile and have on hand in boss fights or when you're
surrounded by baddies and need some way out. The Bombs are also used to
explode enemy vehicles, which you will be bombarded with instruction
text explaining what to do very often, especially at the start. Some 30
years removed, I can only speculate what the general public then
thought, but to me it looked like the game was too ambitious for its
own good, trying to cram in too many features. The familiar phrase,
less is more, comes to mind, which was the formula its predecessor
employed to great effect. I personally find the game to be a stroke of
genius, something I didn't come to appreciate until Sound Designer Jon
Hey bestowed his first-off-the-line prototype to me back in 2013. To
the casual onlooker that enjoyed Smash TV, it appears that Total
Carnage's only real flaw was that it just wasn't Smash TV.
Judge Dredd (1993)
Try to imagine a
time in the United States in the early 1990s where
saying the words "Judge Dredd" elicited high amounts of confusion. In a
period after the heavy metal band Anthrax produced a song, I Am The
Law, based on the British comic books, but before the Sylvester
Stallone film vehicle surfaced, there was Midway buying a licensing
deal to produce a video game based on Dredd. After Terminator 2:
Judgment Day was a major win for the company, they began to pursue
other properties to build games around. The game's lead designer was
Jake Simpson, a UK native that was a huge fan of the Judge Dredd comics
tasked with producing a video game. Built on the new Midway T-unit
hardware, one of the significant technical advances over its Y-unit
predecessor was sprite scaling, giving the illusion that characters on
screen were closer or further away from the player's perspective.
Mortal Kombat had reached the arcades and was possibly one of the
greatest sleeper hits in arcade history. Up to this point, Williams had
a strong string of great games to their credit. Dredd employed the same
digitized graphics that had been made famous by the company since NARC,
and would you believe, the game even recreated NARC's button layout.
Improvements had been made with the digitization process, resulting in
higher quality graphics, and even the printing process for the game's
art had gone beyond the traditional four-color scheme, utilizing way
more
colors and definition. It sounded like Dredd had all the makings for
being an innovative and unique title.
Alas, this is where
matters get literally complicated. Bally/Midway's
Tron had multiple game types in it, that were user selectable to a
degree, but was like having four different games in one. Judge Dredd on
the surface appeared to be a standard affair beat-em-up, a genre that
was made popular by Technos' Double Dragon or Konami's Teenage Mutant
Ninja Turtles (which Dredd was inspired by). Unlike the simplicity of
those other games, Dredd employs individual punch and kick actions and
a very confusing 8-way attack scheme, as well as a duck and punch to
produce a Mortal Kombat style uppercut that does almost no damage.
Except after completing the first Willis Power Tower stage you're
greeted to a shooting practice bonus stage. Then the game is suddenly a
side-scrolling run-and-gun platformer in a robot factory where you
don't kick and punch anymore but fire a gun, where the game gives you
no instruction on the changed controls. The final stage is the Block
War which lets you move up and down in the world again, but you only
fire the gun like the robot factory stage. Upon completion of the Block
War stage, the game ends, as it was a prototype that was never finished
because the game was a catastrophic failure on location test. After all
the time, money, and assets that went into the project the team
believed they should have been given more time to polish it up more and
see it through completion, but Midway pulled the plug instead. Despite
its glaring flaws, there was a lot of potential to be had, but the
inexperienced development team had an array of struggles trying to put
it all together.
Nobody knows where
the dumped ROMs for the game to be used in the MAME
emulator came from, as they're believed to be an older version of the
game than what went out on location test. What was salvaged from the
project was the better cabinet art printing process (well, except for
the prominently fading red when exposed to sunlight until about 1994)
and the better digitized graphics recording process which was next used
on Mortal Kombat II and all other games that followed. A playable Judge
Dredd cabinet can be found at Galloping Ghost Arcade in Brookfield, IL
if you would like to experience the real thing up close and personal,
along with Strike Force and Total Carnage.
|
Caught On Film - Super Mario Bros. (1993)
The Lone Chance at an Adult Super Mario Story |
by David
Lundin, Jr. |
|
Super Mario
Bros. had been redeveloped for the small screen with reasonable success
in 1989 as The Super Mario Bros. Super Show. Featuring both live
action segments and a traditional kid's cartoon, Lou Albano and Danny
Wells portrayed the plumbers as a duo who would have short comedic
exchanges with a celebrity guest, before moving on to the animated
adventures. It plays out like a children's show from the golden
age of television: not a lot of substance but plenty of improvisation
and slapstick, with a couple of actors up there trying their best with
what they have. For better or worse, the Super Show live action
segments didn't move beyond showing the Mario Bros. as a couple of
plumbers living in Brooklyn, leaving the crazier stuff to the cartoon,
which itself was simply an adaptation of the first two Super Mario
games. A film adaptation could have followed either of these
paths, both of them rather family-friendly, however when it came to the
silver screen things would go a totally different direction.
"This Ain't No
Game" was the tagline for the 1993 Super Mario Bros. movie and no
matter your opinion of the film that followed, they weren't
lying. Starring Bob Hoskins as Mario and John Leguizamo as Luigi, the film
presents the scenario of a meteorite impacting the Earth during the age
of the dinosaurs, creating two parallel dimensions - one where the
dinosaurs continued to evolve, and our dimension where mammals became
the dominate species. Mario and Luigi run a small plumbing
business in Brooklyn and cross paths with Daisy, a college student
working at an archaeological dig site, whom Luigi falls for.
Daisy is kidnapped and while giving chase to her abductors, the Mario
brothers travel through a portal into the other dimension, arriving in
a fungus-choked city known as Dinohattan. It turns out that Daisy
is the lost princess of the dino dimension and the only person able to
use the power of the dormant meteorite to merge the two
dimensions. Such is the desire of President Koopa, played by
Dennis Hopper, who serves as the tyrannical dictator of
Dinohattan. It's up to the brothers Mario to rescue Daisy and
prevent Koopa from ruling both realities.
Dinohattan's
sprawling multi-level set is a highlight of the film and is an
impressive piece of visual design
On paper this
still seems reasonably like it could be what one would expect from a
Super Mario movie: the Mario brothers attempting to save a princess (in
this case Daisy, who first appeared in Super Mario Land) from
Koopa. However the film does a complete one-eighty from
expectations right at the start. Dinohattan is like a combination
of Blade Runner and Beetlejuice, with set design that rivals
both. It's dark, dirty, neon-lit, and inhabited quite literally
by creatures of the night. Most of the storefronts and
establishments take cues from items and characters in the games but
it's as if everything has been twisted and altered into a perversion of
the bright and colorful video games. I think this works as it's a
counterpoint to the vibrant and lively world that Brooklyn is portrayed
as at the start of the film. The
allusions to Blade Runner are understandable as its art director,
David Snyder, was the production designer for Super Mario Bros. The sets are
just insane to look at but unfortunately not enough time is spent
showing the incredible scenery, as the movie is always zipping forward
at a breakneck pace from one scene to the next. To sour this
further, that screaming action pace makes the few slower scenes feel
overly slow or stand out as possibly from a different script
revision. In addition to the spectacular practical sets and
effects, there are also some pretty cool special effects that were
actually industry pioneering. The effect used when the dimensions
are merging is essentially the disintegration effect that everyone
couldn't get enough of at the end of Avengers: Infinity War, although
there are 25 years between that film and Super Mario Bros.
The comedy
generally falls pretty flat although there are a couple decent jokes
here and there but not a lot of it really works. However much
of the
film that does work is largely due to the chemistry between Bob Hoskins
and
John Leguizamo, a camaraderie that may well have been forged by
reports of the two actors drinking before and during each day of
filming. As strange as the film can get, as ridiculous as some of
the
dialogue can be, they never slip away from their roles and genuinely
feel like Mario and Luigi - at least the Mario and Luigi that inhabit
the world of this film. There is a very brotherly relationship
between the two of them on-screen from beginning to end. Also
even amid all the crazy and otherworldly stuff going on, there is a
surprising amount of actual plumbing that takes place! There's a
lot of talk about pipes and tools and Mario's experience coming from a
long line of plumbers, which shows there's a solid script buried in
there somewhere. The film had one of the rockiest
development histories of any film that actually made it to production
and release. From endless script revisions, constant fighting at
the top of production, budgetary and distribution issues, you name
it. There is a wealth of knowledge to discover on this subject
that goes far beyond a review of the feature film.
The Mario Bros. don
their signature colors - but not until half way into the film and as
with everything else their outfits have been redesigned
Something that
is truly criminal about Super Mario Bros. is how poorly it has been
made available on home video. In addition to the original VHS
release it
has been released on DVD a couple of times but the print is of low
quality and it's one of those discs where the absolute minimum was done
in its mastering. Things have fared better in the UK and Japan
with
Blu-ray releases that included a better print and some special
features. There's also a deluxe restoration currently in the
works as
a fan effort for planned official release in North America with no set
release date. I believe a quality release of the film on Blu-ray
in North America would sell very well - especially with the 30th
anniversary coming up next year.
Similar to The
Wizard, this movie hit at a time when I wasn't getting out to the
movies much as a kid. Although I was in the middle of the media
blitz for the film, I didn't see it until a video rental later
on. I
didn't know what to expect, in fact most of the advertising I can
remember had to do with promotional Slurpee cups at 7-Eleven and a
small article in Nintendo Power. Upon finally watching the film
for
the first time the only thing I didn't like was the strange animated
opening with a couple of dinosaurs taking to one another. Aside
from
that I thought it was really cool, something totally unlike the games
or any of the other Super Mario productions I had seen before, but
still familiar enough to follow. I saw it as a more action-heavy
take on the characters as a complement to the comedy of the Super Show
that I had watched as a younger kid. Sure it was strange, but so
is a game about a plumber who doubles in size after touching a mushroom
and can throw fireballs after coming into contact with a flower.
Mario and Luigi
arrive in the dinosaur dimension and begin the search for Daisy - yes,
the DVD is this grainy
Is this a good
film? No, not really. Is it entertaining? Oh
yes. Did it have the potential for being a really great, amazing
movie? Absolutely! All the trappings are there, all the
potential is there to make a very stylized and neo noir take on the
Mushroom Kingdom - but it never quite comes together to be that.
That's a really terrible shame, as this was honestly the last chance
the subject matter would ever have to be adapted as such - that is, as
its own thing. As I grew older and would watch the film again
from time to time, I realized what a missed opportunity the whole thing
was in hindsight. As Mario and company have become more and more
cutesy with each passing game, and as Nintendo has once more
established itself as the most family-friendly of gaming companies,
such an experimental take on their most treasured property will never
be manifested again. Some say this film is a snapshot of the
times, both in gaming and in Hollywood, and truth be told I think
that's what makes it important - and worth watching still.
Every Friday on The Retrogaming Times
Facebook
page (facebook.com/theretrogamingtimes),
we present a Weekly Retrogaming Trivia question. This
just-for-fun
trivia challenge provided each week is an opportunity to test your
arcane
and oddball retrogaming knowledge. The answer to the question
from
the previous week is posted along with a new trivia question every
Friday!
Below is the recap of all
questions and
answers posted between this issue and the previous issue:
02/25/2022 - WEEK 252
Question: What is
the name of Pitfall Harry's niece?
03/04/2022
- WEEK 253
Question: Keeping
it in the family: What is the name of Pitfall Harry's pet mountain lion?
03/11/2022
- WEEK 254
Question: Moonbeam
Moss is an item acquired in what adventure game series?
03/18/2022
- WEEK 255
Question: Who
designed the Soliton Radar System in Metal Gear Solid?
03/25/2022
- WEEK 256
Question: In Space
Channel 5: Part 2, Pine is an officer in what association?
04/01/2022
- WEEK 257
Question: In
Parasite Eve, what police station does Aya Brea work at?
04/08/2022
- WEEK 258
Question: Known as
the Sega Master System in most of the world, what was the console's
original name in Japan?
04/22/2022
- WEEK 259
Question:
Surprisingly, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 was a final release for what
system?
The Sega Mark III was
redesigned into the Master System (left), in addition to the cartridge
size being reworked most game packaging was notoriously redesigned
(right).
Answers:
Week 244 Answer: Rhonda.
Week 245 Answer: Quickclaw.
Week 246 Answer: Neutopia (PC
Engine / TurboGrafx-16).
Week 247 Answer: Mei Ling.
Week 248 Answer: The Eastern
Venus Space Police.
Week 249 Answer: NYPD 17th
Precinct.
Week 250 Answer: Sega Mark III.
Week 251 Answer: Nintendo 64,
in the North American region.
Mei Ling talking
about the hardware she designed (left), official Nintendo 64 releases
rolled to a halt in North America after Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 (right)
Don't
be left out! Be sure
to follow
The
Retrogaming Times on Facebook or The
Retrogaming Times Info Club on Twitter for a new retrogaming trivia
question every Friday!
We
need your questions! If
you have a trivia question you would like to submit for possible
inclusion
in the Weekly Retrogaming Trivia question pool, e-mail it to trt@classicplastic.net!
If you question is selected to be featured, you will be entered in our
year-end prize drawing!
There aren't a
lot of channels on YouTube that I watch on a regular basis. The
few that I do watch generally pertain to hobbies and interests outside
of video games but there are a couple gaming shows that I really
enjoy. My favorite for many, many years has been Turbo Views - a
program that eventually settled into the goal of reviewing every North
American release for the TurboGrafx-16 and Turbo CD. Show creator
and host Chris Bucci grew up playing the system and that nostalgia
really shines in every episode. It's not just rose-colored
retrospectives however, as he also gives every game a fresh play -
usually a full playthrough - so that his reviews are from a current
perspective. In addition Turbo Views features information on
TurboGrafx-16 hardware and releases, import reviews of Japanese PC
Engine games, and a whole bunch of extra content that represents the
TG-16 in a positive and honest light. After twelve years he
completed reviewing the entire North American library, all 135 games,
quite a feat indeed.
In addition to
content on YouTube, Chris also created special DVD releases of the
individual Turbo Views seasons as they were completed. Now, I
never buy YouTuber merchandise, ever - it's just not my thing.
However I enjoy the show so much and find it to be so professional and
genuine, that I started picking up the DVD releases at Volume 3.
They feature additional content as well as the episodes contained
within the season bracket and are really fun to kick back and
explore. I bring this up now as with the final episode being in
the can, the final DVD set is being prepared for release. Chris
has said that after it's completed and starts shipping, sales of the
DVDs will eventually be wound down and discontinued. If you're
new to the series and would like to pick up the entire thing as a
special five volume box set, he is offering that currently as
well. You can find more details and links to watch every episode
of Turbo Views on YouTube at TurboViews.com. I think it's
something our readers may enjoy watching, I certainly have for years.
Thank
you once
again for reading The Retrogaming
Times. We'll be back on July 1st with our next
issue, our second to last!
Be sure
to follow The
Retrogaming Times on Facebook and join our community for the latest
updates and information! Additionally The
Retrogaming Times Info Club on Twitter features up-to-the-moment
news
and notifications for all things The Retrogaming Times! I
sincerely
hope you enjoyed this issue and that you will return to read the next
issue
and possibly submit an article yourself. Remember, this
newsletter
can only exist with your help. Simply send your articles
directly
to me at trt@classicplastic.net or check out the submission guidelines
on the main page. Submit an article today and join a great
retrogaming
tradition!
See You
Next Game!
Content and opinions
on this
page are those of their respective writer(s)
Assembled and
published
by David Lundin, Jr. on May 1st, 2022 at ClassicPlastic.net
© 2022 The
Retrogaming
Times. All Related Copyrights and Trademarks Are Acknowledged.