video game reviews – Page 6

J.U.L.I.A.

J.U.L.I.A. is a science-fiction game, casting you as Rachel Mannors, the sole survivor of a space expedition gone spectacularly wrong. Rachel, an awkwardly 3D modeled yet decently voiced character, is woken up from cryo-sleep by J.U.L.I.A., the spaceship’s AI, only to discover she’s all alone in a malfunctioning ship light-years away from Earth and apparently stranded in a solar system with dully named planets. What’s more, something has gone spectacularly wrong on said planets. Something that eventually led to the death of the rest of the crew and the endangerment of alien life.

NES

Matt McKee

Lee Trevino’s Fighting Golf

The Masters got me thinking about this game, although ironically, Lee never won that tournament, his only Major fail. But, I put a lot of time into it back in the day, and like real golf, you find you never really master it.
LTFG is a 4-player game, with only 4 characters playable (conveinent). There’s Pretty Amy, the accurate-conscious lady in the pink skirt; Miracle Chosuke and Super Mex (Lee’s happily-embraced racist nickname), who have a good mix of accuracy and power; and my favorite, Big Jumbo, who has the pop in the club, but has a 3-click meter that runs faster, making it more difficult to hit the perfect shot.

NES

Eric Bailey

World Games

One odd side item worth mentioning is a humorous glitch in the Sumo Wrestling game: Although normal gameplay would not reveal it, the wrestling ring level wraps. In other words, what goes off one side of the screen will appear on the other. While it is not possible to walk outside the bounds of the ring without losing the match, there is a move that throws the opposing player backwards. If done at the very edge of the ring, the flung opponent will reach the edge of the screen; or, at least, his head will. This means that his body will be laying still on one side, while his head suddenly jumps over to the other, creating the appearance of a decapitation! Other weird visuals can be achieved with other games, such as the weightlifter who holds the barbells too long and falls through the floor after turning blue.

Game Boy Handheld Games

Luis Zena

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.

Atari 2600

Matt McKee

Superman: Atari 2600

The first part that bothers me (and there’s a big list), is there’s actually no proof that Luthor had anything to do with The Great Metropolis Bridge Explosion of 1978. Whatever reason, I felt Superman was just picking on him a bit. All Luthor does is fly around the entire game with a propeller coming out of his head, and for some reason, wearing Aquaman’s Underoos. As embarrassing as that is, I’m guessing he committed no crime. Also, why these random 6 criminals? Only reason I see is they’re carrying these huge tommy-guns (what year is this anyway?), but they never actually use them.

TurboGrafx-16

Chris Bucci

TaleSpin

Released by Radiance Software in 1991, TaleSpin follows the adventures of Captain Baloo and Kit Cloudkicker from the Disney animated series. In the game, you are after the lost treasure of Ionia, but an evil Witch Doctor called Watusi stands in your way.

NES

Eric Bailey

Adventure Island

The power-ups are interesting, and provide the key motivator. Taking the form of eggs, when they are bumped into, they reveal themselves. The most common is the axe, always gathered first to provide a means of attack. But if Harry runs into other eggs once he has the throwing axes, he can gather further power-ups at the same time, such as riding a skateboard that not only moves forward quicker but also means he can now take an additional hit without dying; or the fairy mentioned before, which provides added protection and a temporary period of differing music. The idea is to make players want to see how many power-ups they can continue getting in a row, until they build into this unstoppable SuperHarry and crash through to the end of the level.

Arcade Games

J.A. Laraque

Dangun Feveron

So you have pretty much a typical shooter. One of the major differences to note is the soundtrack of the game which features various disco music. I assume this is to further confuse you as you fight against a horde of enemies ships with no real chance to avoid the incoming hail of gunfire. There are some added features to the game that helps it stand out a little including being able to select how fast you want the ship to move. Therefore those who are really twitchy can select the highest setting while others can select a slower one. Like most other shooters you can select the type of ship you want and its special weapon.

NES

Luis Zena

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.

Indie Games

Patrick Scott Patterson

Spelunky

Spelunky is also an incredible challenge, yet somehow contains enough balance to remain charming. Personally, I am reminded of the very balance that hooked me on games like Lode Runner in the 1980s and the original Prince of Persia in the 1990s. Spelunky joins those titles on a short list of platformer games that have driven me just insane enough to demand that I have to try again, knowing that I’ll do better on my next go-around, only to dodge my previous mistake in favor of making a new one. Passing a level is extremely satisfying, even if you didn’t get any further than you have before by doing so.

TurboGrafx-16

Chris Bucci

Cotton: Fantastic Night Dreams

This week’s video review features the 1993 scrolling-shooter, Cotton: Fantastic Night Dreams. Developed by Success the gameplay consisted of guiding a long female witch on her broomstick while she avoided enemies and gathered power-ups to take down bosses. The game was similar to other shooters like R-type with a mix of Parodius thrown in. This video review features the TurboGrafx-CD version.

NES

Eric Bailey

The Adventures of Bayou Billy

And now we come to the reason why this game earned notoriety and an appearance on Captain N: It was overwhelmingly difficult! Rumor has it that the Japanese release was too easy, so for the international version they gave the enemies triple the life energy and lowered the ammo on shooting levels. Despite having practice modes for each of the three types of Bayou Billy levels, the entire ordeal is still excruciating and nightmarish. Only hardcore gamers should bother seeking this one out for its ardent, horrifying difficultly level. All others can safely stay away, leaving this to score a mild two stars out of five.

Arcade Games

Matt McKee

Donkey Kong

This seems like the work of a genius (not stupid) simian, possibly one of those in the old Flash comic books. For now, Mario can only jump over the barrels. When some of these kegs reach the ground floor, they have been known to catch fire (obviously from the alcohol inside). The odd part is it seems these firey barrels can actually defy the laws of physics and move upwards and EVEN CLIMB LADDERS! Along the way, Mario does find weapons in the form of an ACME oversized mallet. But, he never seems to use these on monkey, but to crush the barrels and put out the fires. When Mario eventually reaches the girl, Kong quickly grabs her and runs off. That’s a hell of a lot of work for no payoff, that’s for sure.

Game Boy Handheld Games

Luis Zena

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!

Spectrum

Simon Lethbridge

Jetpac

Developed by Tim and Chris Stamper, the founders of Ultimate, Jetpac is a simple game as you might expect, and it stars Jetman. It’s your job to guide him around the single-screen stages to reassemble his rocket and then refuel it by collecting the fuel pods that fall onto the screen one by one. On most stages after this he’ll just need to refuel it but every now and then there will be a new rocket to reassemble and he’ll have to repeat the whole process from scratch. Jetman can fly using the titular device for indefinite periods and is also armed with a laser to take out the endless swarms of aliens that drift across the screen attempting to stop him from half-inching their resources (such as precious metals and gems), which also drop onto the screen periodically and can be collected for bonus points.

Arcade Games

ausretrogamer

Bomb Jack

It’s not all easy going for Jack, he has to avoid various monsters and aliens that chase him around the screen. However, if you collect the powerball when it appears, it freezes the baddies for a short period of time, during which, you can kill them simply by touching them. There are other items to be picked up that give you additional bonus points or extra credits. The game starts to repeat after Level 18. However, you will be too busy darting around the screen, collecting bombs to notice. Bomb Jack is one of those old games that invoke memories of playing it at the corner shop or fish’n chips store across your school. I know, it does for me. Most of my pocket money went into playing this game. It kept me out of trouble, which is always a good thing.

Classic Windows Games Computer Games

Dan Epp

Hero’s Quest

You could play Hero Quest either as a Fighter, Magic-User, or Thief. The game’s puzzles were designed so that they could be solved in different ways by the different character classes, and you could improve your character’s skills and inventory as you played the game. It played as an adventure game, where your character completed quests and solved puzzles, moving the storyline to its epic finish. By today’s PC game standards, the graphics and sound are rudimentary at best, with your hero looking a bit like a stick figure jerkily moving about the screen. But a good retro gamer never judges an old game by today’s standards! The storyline is strong, and can still be fun to play today.