Archive for the ‘Games You’ve (probably) Never Played’ Category
Rocket Knight Adventures Review
Platform: Sega Genesis/Mega Drive
Released: 1993
Developer: Konami
Publisher: Konami
Digital Release? No
Other Games in the Series: Sparkster: Rocket Knight Adventures 2 (Genesis/Mega Drive), Sparkster (SNES – yes, it’s a different game), Rocket Knight Adventures (2010 – technically a sequel to Rocket Knight Adventures 2)
Value: $13.51 (cart only), $29.99 (complete), $78.00 (sealed) – per Price Charting
Jam’s Take
Rocket Knight Adventures is one of those games that you’ve probably heard of but never played. Those that did play it generally spoke very highly of the experience and I found most other people say, “yeah, I really need to get round to trying that.” Now I personally have a lot of nostalgia for this game. This was one of the very few games I received for my birthday that was to my knowledge brand new. But more importantly a game for me and not my brothers. I had no idea what to expect when I unwrapped this game. But I immediately popped the game into my Mega Drive, heard that sweet Konami tune and lets just say things just got better and better from there. Now this is our game club for April and its time to revisit and see if it’s just as great as I remember or if it was one of those titles that looked better through my younger gamer eyes.
Strife: Veteran Edition Quick Look
Today we look at the recently released Strife: Veteran Edition from Rogue Software. This game pre-dates many of the most popular games today that utilize both FPS and RPG elements as well as mild stealth themes. If you’re a fan of Thief, Deus Ex, or even Skyrim, you might want to check out this archaic but fun title. This is merely the first 90 minutes or so of gameplay with running commentary from Fred, expect a full review later today.
Viewer Warning: There may be occasional adult language from commentary/gamplay and consistent graphic violence depicted in gameplay.
Retro Game Night: Night Slashers X
This week, and for the first time ever, we are using emulation to capture a Beats of Rage engine remake, Night Slashers X. This was originally a 1994 Data East arcade beat-em-up that got ported over with extra violence on the open source brawler engine, Beats of Rage. This also marks the first video in full 1080p HD! Watch for more HD videos, most of which should be in 720p or 1080p in the future.
Retro Game Night: New Ghostbusters II, DecapAttack, and Kid Dracula
This week’s late Retro Game Night features the Famicom title New Ghostbusters II by HAL Laboratories (they made Kirby and Lolo), DecapAttack for the Genesis, and finally the Famicom version of Kid Dracula.
Retro Game Night: Fire’n Ice and Skyblazer
This week the “$130 episode” features the NES sequel to Solomon’s Key Fire’n Ice and the recently featured Retronauts favorite Skyblazer for the SNES.
Video: Retro Game Night – Zillion
It’s taken a bit to get uploaded but this first part of Retro Game Night is going to be the “Metroid-like” (MetroidVania) title Zillion for the Sega Master System. Click on the image above to be taken to the video.
Review: Splatterhouse 2
Console: Sega Genesis (Mega Drive in Europe/Japan)
Released: 1992
Developer: Now Production
Publisher: Namco
Digital Release? Yes – Wii Virtual Console (US/Japan only), also as an unlockable on the 2010 Splatterhouse on 360/PS3
Price: $35 (used, cart only), $87-$105 (used, complete), No known New pricing (all prices according to PriceCharting.com), $8 (VC), $4-10 (used 360/PS3 copies of 2010’s Splatterhouse)
Now I remember very fondly getting this game with my brothers when we were younger. My dad deliberately chose it for us because of the title since he was a fan of horror and gore. A game, whether brand new or pre-owned, in our household was rarer than a UFO sighting when we were younger so we relished in any game thrown at us. Splatterhouse 2 shared a special place in our little hearts.
The story of Splatterhouse 2 will depend on your familiarity with the first game released in arcades and the TurboGrafx-16. The basic plot is you are Rick and you have a mask which looks a lot like the Jason Voorhees hockey mask (he was the killer in the Friday the 13th series) and your job is to rescue your girlfriend, Jennifer. The mask is known as the “terror mask” or “hell mask” depending which version of the game you own. The mask gives you super powers and also sort of possess you as it talks to you during small cutscenes between levels.
PC Gamer Replays Hell
In the mid 1990s PC gaming was a bit of a wild world. Consoles were clearly embracing the 3D as an up and coming technology – Star Fox, Virtua Racing, and Donkey Kong Country were just a taste of things to come – and PC developers all had various approaches to making the next big thing. During this time a series of point-and-click adventures, often with embedded action sequences, made their way to your Windows 95/DOS platform that featured voice acting from stars, adult themes, and horrible early 3D renders.
Some of these games caught on and have quite the cult following. Sometimes it’s quality, like Tim Schaefer and LucasArts’ Grim Fandango, and other times it’s the creator’s reputation, like Roberta William’s Phantasmagoria. Still others are a complete anomaly, like D. One of the more buried projects that released was Hell: A Cyberpunk Thriller, and before you think of it as a victim of circumstance it really is a terrible game. Your guard should always be up when words like “cyberpunk” and “thriller” are in the title instead of the description and the big sticker that proudly announced voice work from Dennis Hopper was a red flag even back then. I spent a lot of time and chunk of change getting my hands on a copy of this game for the 3DO – I tend to grab old PC games on this console because it’s easier to just drop the game into my 3DO than try to get it to work on a Windows 7 device. Needless to say after one hour it was a dust collector in my game closet. Fortunately for all of us, Richard Cobbett over at PC Gamer covered the entire campaign and gameplay in a more-words-than-it-deserves addition to his Saturday Crapshoot series. If you don’t know this game, this well written piece is a much better way to experience Hell and I chose to cover it because there’s no way I’m ever going to review it. Check it out!
Podcast: Blue Stinger Game Club
This week Rob “Trees” (@treeslounge00) joins us to celebrate the launch Dreamcast title Blue Stinger. Our game club covers the complete campaign with gameplay elements, plot, encounters, and level design. Enjoy a fun and hilarious show that might arguably be better than playing the game itself.
Rise of the Triad Historical Context
Rise of the Triad is more significant than it initially seems in the annals of first-person shooter (or Doom clone) history. In fact, had it remained under its original title, Rise of the Triad: Wolfenstein 3D Part II it would probably have more awareness and fall under the pantheon of id titles still garnering praise on Steam and Good Old Games. Due to several disputes that arguably are the direct result of John Carmack, a co-founder of developer id Software and lead in milestone shooters Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, and Quake, the project was terminated in 1993 to avoid clashing with upcoming title Doom. This led to several disputes within the developer of Doom, id Software, and the planned publisher of Doom and previous publisher of several other titles, Apogee Software.
In the beginning there were two companies: developer id Software and publisher Apogee Software. For the most part Apogee was better known as its later developer 3D Realms, the team responsible for Duke Nukem 3D and originally Prey. Before that all happened, Apogee was making its money publishing id Software’s earliest successes including Commander Keen and Wolfenstein 3D. Apogee utilized the plan of “shareware” to market games, which is a method of giving people approximately 25-33 percent of a game to try out with the option to purchase the full game if interested. John Romero, the then lead designer on Doom at id Software, canceled Rise of the Triad and John Carmack decided to have id self publish so Apogee ended up not publishing Doom. id Software’s co-founder Tom Hall (Carmack and Romero were the other founders) left id to join Apogee. Apparently Hall had concern over the amount of violence and gore in Doom, a project he assisted greatly in creating. Ironically a year later when he completed work as lead designer on Rise of the Triad for Apogee, it would have even more blood and gore than Doom, including a random occurrence where an enemy would explode into gory giblets and “Ludicrous Gibs!” would appear on the screen.
Gaming History 101 