Game Reviews – Page 21 – Obsolete Gamer

One of the best Ameri-trash games I have ever played is called Arkham horror. This is a phenomenally themed tabletop game set in the Cthulu mythos. The game does an excellent job in making you feel like you are a paranormal investigator in the roaring 1920’s trying to stop this great evil from destroying the earth. When you sit down and look at this marvelous game set up on a dining room table you are intimidated into thinking this game is way too complicated for me to play. When you look through the rulebook it makes the game seem like it is more complex than it actually is.

NES

Simon Reed

Power Blade

The game itself though, is of the solid blade hurling action variety, with a decent range of enemies and obstacles to avoid/destroy. You can choose any of the levels from the main hub in any order you wish, except for the final boss’ lair. I’ve not made it that far though, admittedly. Some of the enemies however, such as faces that are bolted onto walls, don’t quite fit into the future-setting of the game. They feel like something more out of Castlevania or Megaman.

Mobile Games

J.A. Laraque

Samurai Shodown 2: Coming to Apple and Android Devices

Loved the series and love this announcement. Fans of the SNK classic fighter, Samurai Shodown 2 will now be able to play hit game on their Apple and Android devices. The game will feature all the weapon fighting fun you remember from the 90’s and will include support for Bluetooth controllers which is really good considering I never liked fighting games with the on screen directional pad. As of now there is no online play, but at least you do not have to wait long, the game will be released later this month.

Arcade Games

ausretrogamer

Galaga

There is one particular Galaga enemy ship that is special – these enemy spaceships take multiple hits before they are destroyed. If you do not destroy them, they can fly down the screen towards you and release a tractor beam to capture your ship. To free the captured ship, you must destroy the captor Galaga while it is attacking you, if you fail, your captured ship will be destroyed. When you free your captured ship, it will dock alongside your current ship, and you are thus rewarded with a dual firing weapon of mass destruction.

NES

Eric Bailey

Darkman

Darkman the NES game has both good and bad elements to it. In summary, some good aspects: Innovative stages involving photography and differing gameplay goals, differing characterizations based on Darkman’s ability to take on the appearance (and thus, apparently, the other physical traits) of certain foes later met as bosses, and an overall smooth, pleasing appearance. The bad components: Not-quite-polished physics resulting in overly slippery momentum and odd hit detection (battle is somewhat arbitrary in contact), rather difficult precision-jumping sequences throughout, and just an overall license-grade performance.

Arcade Games

J.A. Laraque

Robocop

So Robocop gives you the general feel of the first movie. You walk around the streets of Detroit shooting random bad guys and facing bosses, some you have never seen in any movie and others you will instantly recognize like ED-209. Like the Superman game, they had to make it way easier for you to die, so Robocop is a bit of a wimp meaning just gays running at him unarmed can cause him damage and bullets hitting him anywhere do why too much damage.

NES

Luis Zena

The Jetsons

The music is decent for this game. It definitely doesn’t make you feel like you are in the future but there is nothing more amazing like an 8-bit soundtrack especially if it’s upbeat and fun. The sound effects are also pretty decent as well. There is no voice acting although it’s possible in the NES but you do have some classic sounds. The music would be above average and some of the tunes actually mimic the cartoon’s music.

Indie Games

Konstantinos Dimopoulos

The Dream Machine

Stunning visuals aside, the Dream Machine is an impressively good and rather traditional indie game of the point-and-click sort, that is less traditionally played via a browser and somehow manages to save your process in a cloud; or was that clouds? I frankly wouldn’t know. Steam also sports some sort of a cloud they tell me, but I’m pretty sure I was once taught clouds are made of steam and, well, did I mention it’s a great game? It is. And it’s got a great and appropriate soundtrack to go with it too.

Xbox

Adam R.

Ninja Gaiden

I think my main deal with GoW or DMC is really just the combat. I think they are a bit too slow and sluggish and the enemies seem to take too much of a punch for no reason. With Ninja Gaiden, enemies take long to defeat only when you’re not skilled enough to take them out effienctly. The bosses were excellent, the combat smooth, and their was a little RPG-ish shop system that made the game a little easier after the game gets much harder.

TurboGrafx-16

Chris Bucci

Super Air Zonk

How Japanese gaming is this, you have a hero that belts out songs on his microphone, hurls sushi at enemies and morphs into all kinds of things in a shooting game. Well that is what you get with Super Air Zonk the follow up to Air Zonk which is a spin-off from the Bonk’s Adventure series. You got all that? Super Air Zonk was released in 1993 for the TG-16 by Hudson Soft. Like in Air Zonk you face a multitude of enemies and your overall arch nemesis, SandroVitch. You can power Zonk up with the meat item to eventually turn him into Ultra Zonk and Tyrano Zonk. In addition, after rescuing your friends from capture you can morph with them and combine your powers.

Sega Master System

Simon Reed

Assault City

The weird faces the humans pull when you blast them with lead are amusing though. (the robot’s death animations are boring in comparison). It’s almost like the designers wanted you to shoot the wrong targets… You’re then given a ranking for how well you did (I performed badly, predictably), and whisked into the first stage proper. Things get ugly quickly. Enemies fly around in the air, and a robot (which the game has taught me is certainly an enemy) walks along the bottom. All of them are rather uninspired and blandly designed. I shoot away at them, and their death explosions are as equally dour.

Xbox 360

Eric Hollis

Star Trek

Star Trek was always about helping your fellow man (or alien); the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one, ect. Apparently, the many all need to be repeatedly shot point blank in the face because other then a few random tricorder readings that’s basically all you accomplish. Sure, you are encouraged to set phasers to stun and then knock out your enemies, but when you can just dispatch them safely from behind cover with zero penalty then what is exactly the point besides painfully shoehorning some of the familiar trappings of the series?

Sega Genesis

Simon Lethbridge

Micro Machines

Unfortunately, this is where the problems start, at least as far as I’m concerned. The single player Challenge mode features a series of twenty four races which includes several courses based on each house location with corresponding vehicle type used. Races are against three CPU vehicles with very simple rules – complete the required number of laps and finish in the highest position possible. If you finish in the top two, you can move on to the next race. If not, you’ll lose a life. All the other play modes feature one-on-one races, whether that’s human vs the computer or another human.

NES

Eric Bailey

Bigfoot

Supposedly, the plotline (yes, those roaring engines really need an expansive plot for motivation) involves Bigfoot and his rival, The Growler, in a race across the United States of America. At certain stops, they will partake in a top-down race to try to reach a finish line first, whereas other challenges will take on a side view in the form of a drag race, tractor pull, hill climb, or similar straight-line challenges. After each event, the player can spend winnings on vehicle upgrades. When the player loses an event, the game is over. Well, sometimes. Other times, the game just keeps going anyway.

Pirate Games

Derek Heinbokel

GameBoy Color 23 in 1 Cartridge

I’m not going into great details of each game, but I will say Bonk’s Adventure and Bomb Jack are my favorites of the bunch, and my least favorite game would really have to be Minesweeper. I thought I would never have to see that game again, I was wrong. Ninja Boy is an interesting adventure game and Klax is great for those of you who love Tetris type of games. Stack things up in a row to get rid of them and repeat. The tennis game aint half bad either. Of course Battle City is a classic and everyone should give that a try. It’s even funner on 2 player.

DOS Games PC

Konstantinos Dimopoulos

The Syberia Collection

As for the misguided souls that haven’t tried any of the games on offer yet, let me just say they all feature excellent art -Mr. Sokal is after all a most talented comic artist- classic gameplay mechanics, great soundtracks, mostly easy but well-integrated puzzles, traditional interfaces, brilliant settings and pretty decent plots. The two Syberias in particular are played from a third person perspective and take place in a whimsical clockwork-operated world, whereas the first-person Amerzone is set in a fantastical version of a thinly disguised Amazon rainforest.