But enough about old embarrassing memories, the game itself does play in very confusing fashion and it’s nowhere similar to the card game so for those of you who know how to play the card game, forget those rules and listen to this. Each monster contains elements which you can combine to give you advantage over other monsters. It’s like when a type of monster is stronger than the other one like in Pokemon. You have to fuse your cards together to obtain stronger monsters. You can also use magic cards and trap cards. The rules on this game though only lets you use one card from your hand per turn. That means you can either fuse a bunch of monsters together or use a magic card, or set a trap card. This gives you a lot of headaches especially when you don’t know what the effects of some cards are. Believe me, you’ll be as clueless as I am.
Sonic CD
The graphics are top notch for a 16 bit Sonic game. The game not only looks beautiful but it also has a 3D view at times especially when Sonic runs through some ramps. The angle switches and almost gives it a 3D look. There is plenty of color to see and lots of graphical beauties to admire. Well done Sega. What can you expect from a real good Sonic game? Great gameplay of course. The levels get challenging along the way but not too challenging to make you throw your controller against the wall. The levels stay fresh and offer new ideas which is why this has been one of the more enjoyable Sonic games ever released. You have to search for all the secrets and even try to acquire all the stones. Can you accomplish such tasks?
Primal Rage: Gameboy
Here comes one of the more decent fighters for the forgotten portable handheld. Primal Rage brings you dino-busting action to the palm of your hand and even though our handhelds nowadays do this with ease, this was a tough task back in the golden age of gameboy. Lots of other fighters were introduced and failed misserably and although not that playable, they still manage to give you an experience to their console predecessors. Primal Rage is one of them. While not offering much, this little cartridge offers more than enough to keep you entertain for a good amount of time, the time of course is your choice. Like many of the old titles of the original gameboy, this game is as simple to pick up and play.
Kid Icarus
With the release of Kid Icarus it was only fair to pick the classic counterpart as the pick for this week. The game itself is not for beginners or crybabies. It’s one of the toughest NES games around and does rivals the difficulty of Ghost n Ghouls for the same console. The game does require lots of patience but does get a lot more bearable later on especially when you get the better weapons and level up. Yes, you do get more health bars and believe me, you’ll need them. So why not step back into the past and take a look at Kid Icarus for the NES.
Super Mario Land
The gameplay is quite good. Just think of Super Mario in a portable handheld and that should say enough. You jump, you get power ups and of course you stomp on bad guys. It’s sort of odd that when you jump on a koopa he turns into a bomb….totally odd indeed! Also, what’s with the flower power giving you one ball of fire that bounces all over the screen. I’m guessing they did it on purpose to help keep the gameplay from slowing down. Oh well, good nonetheless. With only four worlds the game is quite fun to come back to. There are secrets hidden everywhere so you can always accomplish your goals in different ways. The game itself is fun overall! A 2 player race mode would’ve made it supreme and increased its replay value in masses!
Pirate Games: Pokemon Stadium
The game consists of two modes, arcade mode and vs mode. I’m sure you can tell what these do but just in case you don’t know, arcade mode is like the story mode where you will do battle against the computer until you defeat all the pokemon. Vs mode is the mode to play against your friend and works the same way except the game won’t get you anywhere. The way to win in this game is quite simple. You power up your pokemon for an attack, when the power meter builds up you’ll be ready to attack. There are attacks that uses your whole power meter so you won’t be able to use them unless you are at your max. If your opponent gets to attack first, you’ll have two options to choose from.
Crystalis
This week I have one of my favorite picks period. Crystalis is the equivalent of an upgraded Zelda title. The game itself is jam packed with action around every corner. The story line is also very interesting since it takes place in the not so far future. The year is 1997, now back in the NES era this would have made more sense since we were in the early 90s but nowadays it doesn’t make much sense since the year has passed and well, just saying they should have made it the year at least 3000. Lets move on, the game is only one of few Zelda-clones which there weren’t many to begin with(The only other one being Faria as far as I know). SNK learned well on how to apply the Zelda-like mechanics.
Dragon Warrior
You take role of a warrior (Elwood?) in order to save the princess and slay the dragon. Dragon Warrior(Quest in Japan and lately here) is the one that started it all in terms of quest style games. If you get a chance to check out the library of games for the Famicom you’ll realize that there are a vast amount of Dragon Warrior(Quest) clones out there. Most of the good ones were translated by true RPG fans while some others might or not still be in the works. Either way, you’ll have your best bet playing this classic of classics as you take a quest in the most initiative way through a realm full of freaks!
Captain Tsubasa 2
The difficulty of the game increases greatly and keeps you coming for more. If you loose a match you will be sent back a game so you will need to replay that match and then the match that you lost. In the end, this helps you out because your team levels up according to their performance in the match so next time you meet that team that kicked your ass, it might have a different result. Moving on, the storyline gets very interesting as the game goes along, too bad I don’t know how to read Japanese or I would probably have had a bigger attachment to the game. The cut scenes are very well made for a Famicom game, at some times you must have felt like if you were watching a movie…
Gimmick!
The game is very simple. You are this toy, you can move, therefore you must beat the levels! At least, that’s what I could make up of it har har har….the game is not your average platformer. The game showcases the NES/Famicom graphics at its best. Sometimes you think you are playing a SNES game believe it or not. They bring the NES/Famicom to its limits and in some ways opened up new ones(sound chip).
Baseball Stars
This time around, Baseball Stars for the NES takes top honors as it’s a game well over due for a mention right here at Retro Gaming Life. The game itself combines the RPG elements with sports elements in a very satisfying way. You can start up with a horrible team and win games to earn money to buy steroids for your players so they will get stronger and run faster. Is this what the American past time is all about? You bet! You are also able to name your team whatever you want, as I would name mine the Chomps. We finished last in our first season of play but ended up buying enough steroids to strengthen for next season.
Gekitou Stadium
With the start of the Famicom Guide Youtube channel why not pick a Famicom title? Well, guess what? I just did! Gekitou Stadium!! is one of the reasons why baseball games are still fun on the classic console. The game is well balanced and has a very moderate setting of gameplay to help make the game fair. You have use the available strategy so that your pitcher won’t get beaten up by the opponent batters. You can hit the hitter if you don’t like him or just trick him to follow a ball outside the pitching box, you decide. The game has a very entertaining soundtrack that will not bore you and will keep you coming for more!
Bootleg Games: Street Fighter 2
The game’s music is just awful and deserves the mute button. This is what you can expect from a pirate though. This one is an original pirate that got hacked to different other franchises. I’m sure there is a Mortal Kombat that is a clone of this game just with a different title screen and a better character select screen but I could be wrong. Overall, you will get a good laugh playing this game with a friend after a couple of beers. You can also pick this game up for a good price of around 5-10 usd so at least we can be happy it’s affordable.
Bootleg Games: Super Donkey Kong 2
You play as Diddy Kong in the ship level but at the third and final level you’ll be the snake mutation of Diddy Kong. This one really creeps me out but being serious and all, it’s just the jumping snake you turn into in the game(Not sure what happened to riding the damn animals). The game does show signs of being incomplete especially since you can collect coins for the shop which you will never reach as the game only has three levels. You can also collect the 1-up balloons as well as the bananas. If you get hit once, you are a dead monkey so make sure you know the controls real well.
Bootleg Games: Earth Worm Jim 3
The gameplay was done quite well and is very responsive. The level design is decent and does its best to mimic the SNES version. They even added the select button function to switch from your head whip to your gun since the NES/Famicom controller doesn’t have as many buttons as the SNES controller, now that’s impressive. The bosses are awfully easy so you’ll be able to get through with ease. The music is so-so as they tried to copy the SNES sound score although they felt short from making it successful, it was a good attempt nonetheless. You will be able to tell which song is which so no worries there. For 8-bit music, it’s what you get for it.
Bootleg Games: TMNT 2
There is also the super move that each turtle has. They are all the same and as effective so it doesn’t matter which turtle you use, you’ll be alright with either one. There is an added movement that will work on the pirate which helps you hit both ways with the super move. it’s quite easy to do if you are quick with the d-pad. All you have to do is perform the super move and then as you are doing the move you’ll need to tap the d-pad to the other side of where your turtle is facing resulting in the double super move! Things like this makes you wonder if pirates really intended to leave this bug in there or if they were too lazy to take it out but I think I’ll go with the first one as the game was hacked to aide you into finishing it without cursing and throwing the controller out the window.
Bootleg Games: Tekken 2 (SNES)
Pirates come in crappy shapes and sizes. From the Famicom to the Nintendo 64 (Believe it or not) But there are some that just seem to good to be true. This is where Tekken 2 for the SNES comes in. Yes! You heard it! It’s Tekken for your 16-bit console. You might be getting all excited about this “gem” but it’s far from being a “gem”. The game is memorable in many ways and none of those ways are good. We are going to have a brief chat about Tekken 2 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.
Passwords of the Past
There were other games with the same situation like Kid Icarus which also got a Disk System only released in Japan and even Super Mario Bro 2J which was never released in the United States until years later. Super Mario Bros 2J would keep a track of how many times you beat the games by adding a small mushroom at the top of the screen, it was quite interesting because I bought a couple of those games for my disk system and found myself with a screen filled with mushrooms! Someone sure loves his Mario!
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Alone in the Dark
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