Home//Retro Gamer/No. 233/In This Issue
Retro Gamer|No. 233EVERCADE INDIE LOVEBlaze has announced a new Game Of The Month scheme for Evercade VS owners. For the remainder of 2022, new retro-inspired indie games will be delivered for free via the console’s Wi-Fi connection, with the available games switched each month. These are available for a limited time only and you won’t get to keep your saves, and you can’t play them on the Evercade handheld. However, all ten games will be compiled on the Indie Heroes Collection 2 cartridge later in the year, allowing permanent ownership for both handheld and VS owners. April’s game, if you missed it, was Tapeworm Disco Puzzle.…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Pure and simpleAccording to researchers at Germany’s Max Planck Institute – whatever that is – The Beatles’ Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da is the perfect pop song. It’s apparently something to do with the placement of the chords, and the levels of joy they bring to the ears of the listener. If those researchers applied similar principles to Space Invaders, I’m certain they’d draw the same conclusion as me. To wit: I think Space Invaders is literally perfect, and arguably has never been bettered. I’ve surely argued before in this column that Taito’s 1978 arcade classic is the single greatest videogame of all time. Not because it was first in so very many ways, but because of its purity. It’s utterly peerless. However, there’s another game that, for me, comes close. In 1981, or thereabouts,…3 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233NEWS AUGUST 2005AUGUST 2005 – How do you quickly quell E3 excitement? Why, with a standard summer software slump, primarily pepped up by the presence of Killer 7’s multifaceted murderer Harman Smith. Nick Thorpe fires up the time machine to relive the thrills Two prominent British politicians died within days of one another in August 2005. Firstly, on 6 August, Robin Cook passed away at the age of 59 after suffering a heart attack. Cook had served as a Labour MP since 1974, and became foreign secretary under Tony Blair in 1997. He became leader of the House Of Commons in 2001, but resigned from the cabinet in 2003 due to his opposition to going to war in Iraq. Mo Mowlam had served as Labour MP for Redcar from 1987 to 2001,…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Dig Dug II» ARCADE » 1985 » NAMCO If you’re a long-term reader of Retro Gamer, you may well know that Darran and I hold different opinions of Dig Dug – he’s not a fan, as he prefers Mr Do! and feels it deserves the spotlight Dig Dug has, whereas I greatly enjoy Taizo Hori’s first game. I might play it up sometimes to wind him up, but the truth is that as one of the very first videogames I ever played on my dad’s Atari 2600, Dig Dug does hold a special place in my memories. With that in mind, I remember being very surprised to learn that the 2005 DS game Dig Dug: Digging Strike combined mechanics from both arcade Dig Dug games, mostly because I hadn’t been aware that…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233STAGES OF EVOLUTION: AWESOME ARMAMENTSWIPEOUT The Shockwave weapon in the original WipEout could be seen as the predecessor to 2097’s Quake Disruptor, in that a ship on the receiving end of a shock wave shakes and becomes uncontrollable for a short while. This doesn’t look as impressive, but it can be more effective. WIP3OUT Although based on a simple mechanic of topping-up your ship’s energy by draining another’s, Wip3out’s Energy Drain projectile adds strategy to the game’s races. Timing is everything, in that the optimal time to make full use of it is when it will take out an already failing craft. WIPEOUT PULSE The great thing about WipEout Pulse’s Repulsor is that it affects every ship in your immediate field of view. As well as draining some of their energy, a Repulsor will…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233WIPEOUT COURSE GUIDE:SILVERSTREAMBRANCHING OUT Just after the opening straight, there’s a Y-junction. The left track is trickier but shorter, so take that. After the upward slope steer left with the left air-brake on to make the tight turn, then hit the right air-brake just before the foot of the downward slope to stay on the track. ROUND THE BEND Silverstream’s first cave has a nasty S-bend, although the first turn just requires you to ease off on the accelerator. The second turn is insanely tight, however, so dodge the speed pad just before it and then cut your speed down to a minimum in order to avoid hitting the cave wall. SPLITTING UP There’s not much between the left and right branches of Silverstream’s second Y-junction, they’re both short paths up and…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233The Adventures of MAJOR HAVOC THE PROMISED ENDAlthough Major Havoc is fondly remembered today for being a wildly ambitious game that’s utterly stuffed to the brim with content, it didn’t start out that way. Inspired by the classic Star Trek episode Thollian’s Web, Major Havoc began as a simple game where players had to guide their spaceship out of a perilous labyrinth of death. The game’s creator, Owen Rubin, thought the concept was interesting, but it just wasn’t enough and, worse still, it was more of the same. Owen’s earlier games, such as Space Duel and Tunnel Hunt, were fun, but relatively simple affairs. To be fair, most games were at the time, but Owen yearned to create something deeper for a change. “I often found videogames to get boring very quickly,” Owen confessed to us, “I’d…13 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233MAZE MASTER■ The level editor first started as a basic tool that allowed Jess to visualise the binary data that made up each level of Major Havoc. Over the years, Jess evolved it into a full-blown development program – largely coded in hotel rooms or high up in the sky as he travelled for work. While he got to a somewhat functional state, it was far from perfect. Jess then hatched a scheme to rope his friend Bryan in to help truly fine tune it, “[Bryan] wanted to make a Tempest level editor. [I told him,] ‘You should take my Major Havoc level editor and make it also do Tempest. By the way, it’s really broken. Do you want to fix it?’” While Bryan still hasn’t gotten around to modifying the…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233KONG MASTERKLASSFLOWER POWER ■ If you’re aiming for a high score then you should prevent the Buzzbees from stealing your flowers. You get points for each plant that remains at the end of the round, plus a bonus if you protect all five. You also get rewarded based on the time remaining on the clock. SNAKE PASS ■ The gold scene requires a little strategy. If you shoot indiscriminately you’ll temporarily stun the Creepies on the vines and this may prevent your shots from hitting DK. So keep one eye on the Creepies and only fire off shots when they’re well out of the way. SUPER-SPRAY ME ■ Once per life the Super-Sprayer will appear on DK’s vine. Blast him until he knocks the precious item loose, then catch it and…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233CONVERSION CAPERSZX SPECTRUM ■ The original version introduces the concept: players ski down the slopes, through all of six gates, being sure not to thrust when flying through the air to qualify for the next piste. Sounds easy? Not a bit! The action is fast yet jerky, the sprites lack detail and, because everything is so blue, numbers are used to identify who is who. AMSTRAD CPC ■ Far more colourful thanks to good use of the CPC’s Mode 1 graphics, this port made it easier to identify the skiers and see where you were going. It was otherwise a faithful conversion with some great digitised speech and slightly smoother scrolling. Its slower speed made it a little less frustrating. COMMODORE 64 ■ Developed by The Highlanders, this port had cool…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE MAKING OF KRULLAt Retro Gamer, we go the extra mile. In preparation for this piece, we watched Columbia Pictures 1983 fantasy epic Krull for the first time. [I’d already seen it - Ed] It’s two hours of our life we’re never getting back. We wonder what programmer and game designer Matt Householder made of Krull on initial viewing. “I’ve never actually seen it,” Matt replies. “I would have gone to the premiere but I wasn’t invited. Many years later I saw it was on TV and watched… for five minutes.” It’s hardly a ringing endorsem*nt of the source material Matt was handed for his own premiere as an arcade game creator at Gottlieb. He had previously had a bit part in the coin-op industry at GDI, a company better known for producing…10 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Be Ball» PC ENGINE » 1990 » NOW PRODUCTION At this point, we’ve had retro plug-and-play consoles for a good while, and I’m utterly convinced that I’ve fundamentally got them wrong in my mind. See, I’m pretty sure that what’s supposed to happen is that if you buy one of those systems and find a new favourite, you think to yourself, “That’s good, I’m glad I own it via this mini console.” But that’s not what I do – I think, “That’s good, I will now go and buy a copy for the original hardware.” And while the PC Engine Mini certainly didn’t tempt me to drop ridiculous amounts of money on shoot-’em-ups, it did leave me convinced that Be Ball should join my HuCard library. PC Engine Mini and Turbografx…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233DRIVING AHEADA third Super Cars game was never made. The nearest the team got was Super Cars International on the PC which made use of the exact same tracks in Super Cars II, albeit with a heap of improvements. “We managed to improve the car handling to how I’d originally envisaged it – smooth flowing and realistic,” says Andrew Morris. “I also wanted to open up the multiplayer aspect so, in the absence of the internet, I introduced virtual drivers with personalities.” Yet Andrew is frustrated that the racing game came to a halt right there. “There was so much more we could have done and we have talked about Super Cars III several times over the years because there is still a lot of enthusiasm for the games, more so…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THESE MASCOTS DID HIT SHELVESONE STEP BEYOND FEATURING COLIN CURLY 1993, OCEAN The Amiga loved a mascot and it felt at times that it was riddled with them. Fans of Quavers will be well aware of Red Rat Software’s One Step Beyond as it featured Quavers’ canine mascot Colin Curly, making him proud by placing him in a rather entertaining puzzle game. COOL SPOT 1993, VIRGIN INTERACTIVE Where Fido Dido failed in games, Cool Spot succeeded and the iconic character with a love of sunglasses went on to star in several games. Many will argue that his first outing remains his best and when you watch him surfing on an overturn ed 7-Up bottle it’ll take you straight back to seeing a 7-Up can in a 1993 news agent. Good times. CHESTER CHEETAH: TOO…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233TOP TIPS FOR BASED BUBBLERSUSE CHARGE SHOTS! By holding down the bubble button for a few seconds, you can fire multiple bubbles at once. When your dino flashes, it’s ready to go! Each dino has a unique charge shot type, so play around a little to see how they all work, or check out the Choose Your Hero boxout for a quick guide. SEARCH ALL AROUND! You’ll need to get three musical notes of each colour (usually within the same world) to get one of the four keys necessary to reach the final world. One note is in a specific location on each screen. They’ll pop out when you touch them, but they can be easy to miss – many are hidden very well. LOOK FOR SPECIAL BUBBLES! When “Hurry Up!” appears, something else…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233HUMBLE BEGINNINGSThe Bubble Symphony prototype ROM, Bubble Bobble II 0.0J, shows us a glimpse of the game very early in development. Several elements seen in the final game are present at this point in development: four selectable characters, branching paths, and the musical theme – including hidden musical-note items in each game (that don’t do anything yet). Certain new attack bubbles, like the Rainbow Bubbles, are present in limited amounts. So, what got changed between this version and the final? For starters, the music and sound are extremely basic themes from the original Bubble Bobble with some nicer-sounding instrumentation. The stages are in a different order, though many level designs would eventually see use in the final. Numerous enemies and bosses are missing, and some that are present have different behaviour.…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233DON’T THROW STONESThe PC edition of Red Faction contained an exclusive level which allowed players to experiment with the full capabilities of the Geo-Mod engine. Titled Glass House, after the literal house within it, the sandbox tech demonstration has fully destructible walls, floors and ceiling with a variety of weapons including remote charges, a rocket launcher and an assault rifle. It’s within this tech demonstration that the true revolutionary applications of the Geo-Mod engine can be explored – players can create long, winding tunnels around the entire area; they can also witness the detailed textures of how glass reacts to bullet holes, shattering into thousands of pieces that rain down upon you. Technically, there is a memory limit to the extent of how far you can tunnel throughout Glass House – however,…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233MORE CLASSIC STREET FIGHTER ALPHA 3 MOMENTGrab A Friend We’ve already mentioned that M Bison is a bit of a pig to defeat, but there is a sneaky way to turn the tables on him. If you play Dramatic Battle mode, you can take M Bison on with a friend (a real one or an AI partner). It’s tremendous fun and you’ll soon forget earlier defeats as you give him the kicking he truly deserves. Rivalries Reignited Turning on Street Fighter Alpha 3, you’ll quickly discover that the PlayStation version has quite a few characters that didn’t appear in the arcade game. In fact, the additions make it the first game in the Alpha series to include the full Super Street Fighter II Turbo cast, ensuring that everyone can easily dive in with their old favourites.…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Kirby And The Forgotten Land>> This month we complete Kirby’s new adventure, find out how the latest game in The House Of The Dead series fares and watch Sonic The Hedgehog’s fun movie sequel It may have taken 30 long years, but Masahiro Sakurai’s lovable pink blob Kirby has finally appeared in a proper 3D adventure game – and it’s absolutely tremendous fun. The plot is as twee and as shallow as you’d expect for a Kirby game, centring around Kirby being transported to New World, a strange post-apocalyptic planet where he quickly discovers that Waddle Dees are being kidnapped by the dangerous animals that live there. He soon meets a cute critter called Elfilin and they decide to pair up in order to rescue the missing Waddle Dees and hopefully find out who…6 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Sonic The Hedgehog 2» Studio: Paramount » Cast: Ben Schwartz, Jim Carrey, Idris Elba With Sonic’s adoptive human family in Hawaii for a honeymoon, they’re trusting Sonic (Schwartz) not to get into trouble. Unfortunately, Robotnik (Carrey) has escaped from the mushroom planet and he has the fearsome fighter Knuckles (Elba) in tow, and they’re out to defeat Sonic and capture the powerful Master Emerald. Luckily for Sonic, he also has a new friend in the brainy Tails (Colleen O’Shaunessy), who aids him in thwarting the mad doctor’s scheme. This time around, the film employs much more of the iconography of the games, while making good use of the human cast in their less-significant roles. Elba’s portrayal of Knuckles is excellent – the proud and powerful echidna comes across as a credible threat to…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE CHOSEN ONES1ST NOTHING Sergei Smirnov <“One of my acquaintances told me about Nothing on PC, which is made in an aesthetic style. I started to get ideas on how to expand and develop the story.”/> 1ST TOKIMAL Antonio Perez, Pat Morita Team <“Tokimal was about 50% done and it was already a demake, so this was a nice opportunity to have a deadline and focus on it.” We’d say the team’s hard work certainly paid off./> 3RD SHOVEL ADVENTURE Antonio Perez, Pat Morita Team <“Shovel was almost finished for CPC, and the Spectrum version was also in progress when the competition was announced. We thought we can easily make it fit into the rules.”/> 12TH MECHWARS: CENTIPEDE Sergei Yakimovich. <“I figured out that I could add something new to Centipede –…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233MONTEZUMA’S REVENGE<INFO BY: NORMAL DISTRIBUTION LLC (ROBERT JAEGER) FORMAT: NES PRICE: TBC VISIT: BIT.LY/MONTEZUMA-NES /> <BODY> The NES never got this classic Eighties platformer, something original programmer Rob Jaeger wanted to put right. The Kickstarter is funding physical versions for backers, including a ‘Pedro’ USB stick (named after the original version of the character, including lots of extras and photos) and NES carts. Panama Joe is aiming to get rich by gathering jewels from the pyramid of Montezuma II. Unfortunately, there are many hazards, including fire pits, snakes and skulls. Coloured keys open corresponding doors, the sword allows you to kill the next enemy you touch, and the torch is needed to light dark rooms at the base of the pyramid. Nine floors made up of ninety-nine increasingly difficult rooms make…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233PROCESSING<BODY> Snuggsy187 reveals his latest Acorn Electron project. “Over the Christmas/New Year holidays I investigated an old disassembly of Blagger by RS Goodley, to see what made it tick, and [if there was] any way to speed up gameplay. Other performance gains in Mode 2 were found by rewriting the procedure that prints the rooms, printing all moving sprites at VSync (vertical sync) to reduce flicker, rewriting collision detection and streamlining. No changes to gameplay were made, except for sound effects – and how you could jump/stand on the edge of a poisonous plant! I just need to tidy some things up.” You can follow @Snuggsy187 on Twitter for more updates, including his forthcoming Electron Dare Devil Dennis and Zaxxon projects. Mexican designer César Arminio (2think Studios) is funding his…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233OFF TO THE RACESWhile we’ve often featured collectors who collect games based around specific genres or franchises, we’ve never had a collector like Jon Gage before. Jon actually has two collections. One has morphed into the Norwich gaming cafe One Life Left the other is focussed around Formula 1 games and it was fuelled by two things. “As a ten-year-old in 1991, my first console was a Sega Master System 2, and with it came my first ever game: Super Monaco GP,” Jon tells us. “Monaco was the one game that made me fall in love with games and indeed, driving games in particular.” That passion for racing was fanned further due to Jon’s father, who introduced him to real-life Formula 1. “I have fond memories to this day of sitting with my…3 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233HOW DO YOU DEAL WITH HARDWARE FAILURES?jeffsretrogaming I knew this was an inevitability so taught myself how to do console/system repair including soldering and now can fix pretty much anything. I also spend time every year opening each system to clean out dust, check capacitors, etc. A little preventative maintenance goes a long way. Simon Plumbe Something I use regularly I get repaired, but if it’s a system that just gathers dust then I just give it to someone who can make use of it for parts or wants to fix it up. I never throw retro hardware away though. Tim Surman It’s the main reason I mainly use emulation. Although I’ve got a number of GameCubes and GC parts in just as backup. Joel Reimer If it’s something simple, like a controller, there’s a good…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Your sayWhat’s your favourite WipEout game? Ben Wilson It’s a boring answer, but it’s 2097. It was the first game soundtrack I remember that really blew me away in terms of quality and quantity. The gameplay was second to none for racing games in 1996. N64 Memories WipEout 64. I know it’s not the best – 2097 probably is – but the hype for this was unreal. A WipEout game on a Nintendo console! I played it over and over and over. I still enjoy a playthrough today. Ste92gamer WipEout 3: Special Edition. It had the best music and prototype mode as the ship goes so fast. Keldon WipEout Pure is my top pick. I remember playing in a PSP launch tournament for the game and getting second place! Flashed Back…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Pac-Man Championship Edition» XBOX 360 » 2007 » BANDAI NAMCO STUDIOS While I’ve never been much cop at Pac-Man, I’ve always enjoyed the game itself. I think I ultimately prefer the more interesting maze designs of Ms Pac-Man, but Namco’s original game still entertains me whenever I play it. It has a timeless quality to it that is both a blessing and a curse because I’d imagine it causes Namco no end of headaches whenever it wants to update its flagship series for a new generation of gamers. Many of those headaches were solved in 2007 when Namco decided to make a new version of Pac-Man exclusively for the Xbox 360 (it would later head to numerous other systems, including PS3, iOS and the 3DS). Directed by Tadashi Iguchi, producer Nobutaka Nakajima…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233LOADING…It has taken me 48 years to realise I’ve never been cool and I’ve never been hip. I never frequented nightclubs much as a youngster and you’d have to pay me to embrace dance music – clubbing just never appealed to me. Unlike myself, the original WipEout is cool and impossibly hip with it and its dance-enhanced soundtrack saw clever marketing bods showcasing it to eager 20-somethings in UK nightclubs during the Nineties. It wasn’t just coolness or clever marketing that allowed Psygnosis’ game to soar as effortlessly as its anti-grav vehicles did on WipEout’s crazily constructed tracks, though, it was a bloody good game and it was succeeded by some bloody good sequels as well. In addition to revisiting the original WipEout and its many sequels, we also converse…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233SCREENS OF RAGEMovie website Deadline recently broke the news of a new Sega movie project, this time based on the Streets Of Rage series. Derek Kolstad, the creator of the John Wick franchise and writer of Nobody, reportedly wrote a script for the adaptation on spec. The project is also said to involve dj2 Entertainment, which produced both Sonic The Hedgehog movies, as well as Escape Artists which worked on The Equalizer franchise. The movie has yet to be officially announced, and no actors are currently known to have been cast for the film. We’ll keep an eye on this project. Who would you want to play Axel and Blaze in it?…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Neil ThomasIf you watch Youtube you’ll be well aware of Neil Thomas as he’s the host of RMC - The Cave, a popular YouTube channel that has become well-known in the community for showcasing retro gaming curiosities, as well as providing tips on repairing, restoring and upgrading classic hardware and even games. Now he’s embarking on brand-new ventures, working with Stoo Cambridge to create a new colouring book showcasing old machines, in aid of a permanent retro gaming exhibition space called The Cave. We asked him a few questions to find out more. Tell us about the inspiration behind The Colouring Book Of Retro Computers? The goal was to raise funds to complete the build of The Cave, a retro computer and gaming exhibition. Instead of asking for funds to help,…6 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233CHARTSPLAYSTATION 2 1 – Medal Of Honor: European Assault (EA) 2 – Juiced (THQ) 3 – Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith (LucasArts) 4 – Lego Star Wars (Eidos) 5 – Area 51 (Midway) XBOX 1 – Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (Rockstar) 2 – Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith (LucasArts) 3 – Forza Motorsport (Microsoft) 4 – Area 51 (Midway) 5 – WWE Wrestlemania 21 (THQ) GAMECUBE 1 – Resident Evil 4 (Capcom) 2 – Star Fox: Assault (Nintendo) 3 – Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (Nintendo) 4 – Mario Party 6 (Nintendo) 5 – FIFA Street (EA) MUSIC 1 – You’re Beautiful (James Blunt) 2 – Bad Day (Daniel Powter) 3 – All The Way (Craig David) 4 – Ooh La La (Goldfrapp) 5…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE EVOLUTION OF wipeoutEven among a strong line-up of European PlayStation launch titles, WipEout stood out from the crowd. The Psygnosis game’s techno soundtrack, futuristic polygon visuals and breakneck speed were such a novel combination that it seemed like an immaculate conception. This was far from the case, however, as its designer Nick Burcombe had borrowed the game’s mechanics from a SNES racer, and its concept artist Jim Bowers’ gravity-defying ships had made their debut on the silver screen, as former Psygnosis creative Nicky Place points out. “Nick Burcombe used to play Mario Kart while listening to really loud dance music, and he thought how ace it would be to develop a game that put those two things together,” Nicky recollects. “Around that time, Jim Bowers was doing a sequence for the film…23 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233STAGES OF EVOLUTION: TREACHEROUS TRACKSWIPEOUT PURE Citta Nuova is WipEout Pure’s least-forgiving course. It’s a string of S-bends and hair-pins with a few straights, but at least these sections are passable at a decent pace. Its pièce de résistance, on the other hand, is a right-angled turn that requires air-braking at a low speed. WIPEOUT HD Rather than one or two seriously tough sections, WipEout HD’s Metropia track is a series of taxing twists and turns, where air-braking and side-shifting is needed to stay on-course. The exception is a mag-stripped drop, where air-braking makes your ship barrel off the track sides. WIPEOUT HD FURY The series of narrow track sections in WipEout HD Fury’s Syncopia course basically count as platforming. They sit in a straight line, and you have to jump off each one…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233SPEAK TO ME■ As ambitious as Owen was, he never planned to include speech in Major Havoc back during the game’s development. Mysteriously and completely unknown to Owen however, someone in Atari’s hardware department tested adding speech capability to the game. Major Havoc’s PCB has integrated circuit locations specifically laid for Texas Instruments’ TMS-5220 chip. The chip was the cutting edge of speech emulation software in the early Eighties. Atari used it in a number of its arcade games, such as its smash hit Star Wars from 1983. With some work, Major Havoc could have joined those hallowed halls. The team is determined to make that a reality in The Promised End. As he decided how to add speech into the game, Owen reflected back on the media that inspired Major Havoc.…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Rescue Mission» MASTER SYSTEM » 1988 » SEGA I am writing this the day before going for a haircut. That would barely be a consideration for most people, but it’s a rare occasion for a deliberately hirsute chap like me, so it’s something I’ve been thinking about a fair bit. I’ve used the same barber shop infrequently but near exclusively since childhood, and while I don’t know the barber’s name, I do know that he’s extremely fond of the NES Zapper and Duck Hunt. It’s amazing how you can come to learn such specific information about people you barely know. I’d imagine that was a common first lightgun experience, but it wasn’t mine. My first lightgun game was Rescue Mission, and my memories of that aren’t quite so happy. Most lightgun…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Bucky O’Hare» PLATFORM: NES » RELEASED: 1992 » DEVELOPER: KONAMI You’ve got to give the Toad Air Marshall a bit ofcredit, really – the Red Planet is a perfect location for imprisoning captured enemies. Anyone brave enough to mount a rescue mission would have to contend with volcanic eruptions, deadly lava flows and craggy caverns full of sharp spikes. Of course, Bucky O’Hare is exactly brave enough and you’ve managed to deal with most of that, including a cavern where there was essentially no floor at all. When you finally make it out of the cavern, the giant green ball you rode in on isn’t far behind. It smoothly rolls to the other side of the screen and then opens up, revealing a toad inside. Yes, it’s boss time! If this…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233SIMULATE THISBMX SIMULATOR ■ Before founding the Codies, Richard and David Darling developed BMX Racers for Mastertronic, a game which sold 345,423 copies! They hoped to get Codemasters off to a ‘wheelie’ good start in 1986 so created this successor – a top-notch, top-down, single-screen arcade racer across seven mud tracks strewn with obstacles. GRAND PRIX SIMULATOR ■ With BMX Simulator riding high and becoming the number one best seller on the Commodore 64, the Oliver Twins created a version involving cars. Developed over two months, it adopted the same overhead view as the Darling’s game and had up to two players completing three laps around as many as fourteen tracks. FRUIT MACHINE SIMULATOR ■ This replication of a one-armed bandit had one clear problem: it could have been the best…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233WHO IS BOB DOBBS?Matt isn’t quite sure why Chris Brewer, artist, technician and programmer best known for his work on MACH 3, decided to create an alternative version of Krull, but it certainly raised a smile in the Gottlieb offices. In Krawl, the boulders on the first level became televisions, Prince Colwyn’s army now consisted of Girl Guides and Princess Lyssa is transformed into a coin-op cabinet. “It isn’t a Krull cab,” Matt assures us, “to avoid the horror of infinite recursion. The Beast became Bob Dobbs, a deity of the Church Of The SubGenius, a parody religion that was growing fast in the early Eighties. My wife, Candi, was an early member. I actually put a 16x16 pixel image of Bob in the Atari 520ST operating system font a few years later.”…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE MAKING OF SUPER CARS IIIf you were a fan of top-down racers around the time when the world waved goodbye to the Eighties and welcomed the Nineties, then you were in luck. Developers knocked out the likes of Badlands, Super Off Road, Hot Rod, Nitro and Micro Machines – with Gremlin Graphics adding Super Cars to that list in 1990. In doing so, some devs were looking in their rear-view mirror at iconic titles released a few years earlier, most notably Atari’s Super Sprint. “It was definitely the inspiration for Super Cars,” says Shaun Southern, programming director of Magnetic Fields. “I used to go to the arcades in Rhyl a lot and I remember a huge imposing machine with lots of steering wheels on it.” Super Cars was a refreshing spin on the genre:…13 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233GET INTO POLE POSITIONUSE YOUR WEAPONS WELL When you begin amassing money, you can choose from a host of power-ups including weapons which can be assigned to the front and rear of your car (two weapons per race). Mines will keep rivals off your tail and Homing Missiles help you catch up by blasting a leading vehicle. WATCH THE SCREEN Try not to get stuck in a tunnel. For an idea of which way you’re facing, watch how the screen moves to get a sense of which way you’re going. If other cars are coming through, use a Super Missile which rotates around your car and blasts whatever comes too close. SNATCH A SHORTCUT If you spot a way of cutting a corner, go for it – even if a barrier is closing,…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233ULTIMATE GUIDE BUBBLE BOBBLE IIThe origins of Bubble Symphony can be traced back to 1992 when Taito introduced the F3 board – its new state-of-the-art 2D arcade hardware. In 1994, Taito developed the F3 Package System – modular hardware meant to compete with SNK’s popular Neo Geo. Taito pushed this new system hard, debuting it with its fighting game Kaiser Knuckle, but it knew it needed iconic game brands to really sell the new hardware in arcades. Taito soon announced new games in two long-dormant series: Darius Gaiden and Bubble Symphony. A shooter and a single-screen platformer may have seemed doomed in the fighting game-saturated market of 1994. Yet in a twist of fate, Kaiser Knuckle would become notorious for all the wrong reasons, while Darius Gaiden and Bubble Symphony would go on to…6 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE EXTRA PLAYERSCertain items will spawn an interdimensional door from which Taito guest stars will emerge. These characters are also controllable with your stick and buttons. Any enemies they manage to eliminate turn into point bonus items – but be careful not to manoeuvre your dino into danger at the same time. HIPOPO An intrepid platypus from Liquid Kids, a scrolling platformer from 1990. He throws water-filled bubbles to whisk foes away! BOB Not your blue dino dad! As another single-screen platformer veteran, Bob the dwarf comes to Bubble Symphony from the fantasy land of Don Doko Don. He’ll pound enemies into the ground with his powerful mallet. MR MIKATA Hailing from the delightfully bizarre avant-garde beat-’em-up Pu-Li-Ru-La, Mr Mikata is the character that sometimes emerges when Pu-Li-Ru-La’s kids use their magic…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Tempest 2000» SATURN » 1996 » HIGH VOLTAGE SOFTWARE After recently reviewing Tempest 4000 I was compelled to revisit the rather magnificent Tempest 2000, which originally debuted on Atari’s Jaguar. While I don’t own Jeff Minter’s Jaguar version, I do have High Voltage’s Saturn conversion, which was programmed by Nate Trost, and boy is it great. Don’t get me wrong, Tempest 4000 on Switch looks absolutely glorious on an OLED screen with its perfect blacks and luminous colours, but there’s something strangely hypnotic about playing Tempest 2000 on an old-fashioned TV, or in my case a gigantic 29-inch PVM. Let’s be honest, Jeff’s game was originally envisioned to be played on a CRT back in the Nineties, so that’s how I’m playing it today and it’s bloody great. I play Tempest…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233BEYOND MARSRED FACTION II 2002 Red Faction’s sequel saw Alan take over as lead programmer, learning from the difficulties of the original – Red Faction II’s world was indestructible by default, and instead Geo-Regions were brought in: these were specifically selected areas of levels that invited meaningful destruction. This made development of the sequel a lot more straightforward. RED FACTION: GUERRILLA 2009 Red Faction: Guerrilla was actually built on the engine of an unrealised Volition project rather than upgrading the Geo-Mod engine to the next generation. Terrain was no longer destructible as the team shifted their focus to a stress-based collapse model where buildings and cover would react in real-time to damage through a process of ‘shardifying’. RED FACTION: ARMAGEDOON 2011 The last Red Faction game would build on Guerrilla’s engine,…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233TOP 25 GAME CUBE GAMES25 Tales Of Symphonia ▪ DEVELOPER: Namco Tales Studio ▪ GENRE: RPG ▪ YEAR: 2003 Lloyd’s quest to save Sylvarant is a pretty standard RPG plot, but the first of the Tales series to make it to Europe impressed players with its lovely cel-shaded graphics and excellent battle system. 24 Skies Of Arcadia Legends ▪ DEVELOPER: Overworks ▪ GENRE: RPG ▪ YEAR: 2002 Sega’s sky-sailing RPG was already a classic on the Dreamcast, but this GameCube port is the definitive edition thanks to fewer random battles, brand-new sidequests and improved technical performance. 23 Pikmin 2 ▪ DEVELOPER: Nintendo EAD ▪ GENRE: Strategy ▪ YEAR: 2004 Building on the excellent original, Captain Olimar’s second outing ditches the time limit, improves AI and introduces new white and purple Pikmin, which resist poison…17 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233The House Of The Dead: Remake» System: Switch (tested), PS4, Xbox One, PC » Buy it from: Online, retail » Buy it for: £24.99 Right from the start, there’s one major problem with The House Of The Dead: Remake – it’s a lightgun game that doesn’t feature any way to use an actual lightgun. If you can get over that, this is broadly a decent remake. Underneath the new presentation, this is very close to the original arcade game – stage layouts, enemy placements and boss behaviour are all faithful, with the only slight change being to make some of the jumpier enemies a bit less mobile to compensate for the controls. While the visual update is pretty nice in general, there’s a certain plastic sheen to some models that can look a bit cheap.…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE NEED FOR SPEEDWhile numerous racing games are great for giving a rush of adrenaline, the sub-genre of futuristic racers takes the concept to obscene new levels. Nick, Darran and Tim, strap in and talk Rollcage, F-Zero and why we’ll probably never get a new WipEout on home consoles. DARRAN What does everyone look for in a futuristic racer (besides the obvious of course). NICK Typically, I’m after extreme levels of speed that exceed what you’d find in a conventional racing game, and some combat element. Death Race 2000 and Rollerball taught me that every futuristic sport should be violent. TIM Yep, it’s got to have some sort of destruction going on – the WipEout series had some brilliant weapons in it, especially the Quake Disruptor. DARRAN My earliest introduction to futuristic racers…5 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233BARGAIN HUNTTHE COVER STAR WIPEOUT PULSE/WIPEOUT PURE WipEout Pulse, which graces our newsstand cover is available on PSP from £3, with prices hitting £15 for a sealed copy. The PS2 version can hit £70.WipEout Pure (our subs cover) is a lot cheaper and rarely sells beyond the £5 mark on PSP. RESCUE MISSION This tough PAL Master System game can be found complete for under £9. It’s even cheaper if you’re happy with just a cart. PROFESSIONAL SKI SIMULATOR The 8-bit versions of Codemasters’ game rarely exceed £3. There is a variant of the Amiga version commanding a price of £72, but we’ve seen no recorded sales for months, so make of that what you will. TEMPEST 2000 Darran purchased this in May 2021 for £26. The PAL copy (which is…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233MAILBAGTWITCH PREFERENCES Hi Retro Gamer, Love the mag as always, especially the calendars – I put them up at work and get great comments from my fellow old nerds. I’ve been streaming retro on Twitch lately and with yet another way to play retro games out with The A500 Mini I thought I’d ask the experts. Do you prefer watching people play on real hardware versus emulation? I don’t have a capture card so I’m emulating, but would love to hear your opinions. Keep up the great work, Scott G Thanks for writing in, Scott. Ultimately we both prefer real hardware whenever possible, but appreciate this isn’t always viable for streaming. Nick streams far more regularly than Darran and his viewers feel it’s not particularly important to their enjoyment. Do…4 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233ENDGAMEUN SQUADRON » Known in Japan as Area 88, Capcom’s SNES shmup is a conversion of its arcade game, which itself was an adaptation of a popular manga. Capcom’s game features three pilots who are tasked with ending the terrorist group Project 4, which is threatening to destroy the world. Right, that’s the history lesson out of the way, let’s find out what happens to Greg in the final showdown. » Greg whoops with exhilaration as Project 4’s huge flagship explodes. The celebration is short-lived however as he still needs to fight his way past enemy craft and now there’s a huge fireball approaching him from behind. » With Greg’s fate hanging in the balance we see Mickey and Shin escaping from Project 4’s base. The mission has been accomplished…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233RETURN OF THE DEADThe last five years have been an interesting time for Sega fans, as the company has been actively breathing new life into some of its dormant series. While some of these are internal projects, like the Sakura Wars revival or Virtua Fighter 5: Ultimate Showdown, plenty of others have been handled by external studios, such as the Panzer Dragoon remake by Forever Entertainment. Really getting into the spirit of raising the dead, the publisher and its development subsidiary MegaPixel Studio have turned their attention to The House Of The Dead. The lightgun series last shambled onto consoles in 2012, and the original 1996 game has been effectively dead and buried since its Saturn and PC ports in the late-Nineties. That arcade classic has now been exhumed, rebuilt from the ground…4 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233LunchtimeAs I’m writing this, I’m looking out the window and it is a beautiful day. The sun is shining, it’s great T-Shirt temperature and everyone looks happy. It’s absolutely stunning. Meanwhile I’m indoors bashing this out. Before I started writing something that will hopefully tickle your pickle, I spent two hours typing up a 4,500-word case study for the counselling course I’m somehow close to finishing. A wonderful spring day and I’m sat at a computer indoors. This is not new. I’m taken back to middle school (I only recently found out that hardly anyone knows what a middle school is. It’s in between primary and proper big school. For the sake of this story, I’m ten). There was a computer club every lunchtime. You used to be able to…3 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE LATEST NEWS FROM AUGUST 2005With the big rushof E3 news over, every camp got to compare its shiny new toys – or rather, fret over the future. Xbox owners got to worry about whether the imminent launch of the Xbox 360 meant a premature end for the big black box, with Microsoft’s head of UK Xbox marketing assuring users that “all the major publishers will continue to release lots of great games for a long time to come”. PlayStation enthusiasts worried over whether they’d really be using a big boomerang with buttons to play their next console, with the OfficialPlayStation 2 Magazine claiming that “nothing screams ‘the future of games’ more than the silver banana here”. Meanwhile, Nintendo fans were assured by NGC that, “Zelda: Twilight Princess will be out in the UK by…4 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THIS MONTH IN…Official PlayStation 2 Magazine When can we buy a PS3? “Sony says the machine will be out in spring 2006,” claims the magazine, “Don’t say, ‘Yeah that means 2007, really,’ just yet.” It also adds that “Sony did go on record to debunk a rumour that said it would cost over £400.” The PS3 launched in the UK in March 2007, for £425. Cube The well of optimism at Cube has officially run totally dry. Predicting an October 2006 PAL release for the Revolution at the very earliest, it claims, “In the best case scenario GameCube owners will still have a six-month period with no worthwhile releases. There’s no silver lining for this particularly evil storm cloud… it’s just the way it is.” Retro Gamer The latest issue of everyone’s…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233STAGES OF EVOLUTION: EPIC ENHANCEMENTSWIPEOUT 2097 Unlike the ships in the original, WipEout 2097’s ships can take damage, and can ultimately get blown up. The damage taken is reflected by an energy bar, and when it gets low your options are to collect shield power-ups or E-Paks, the second of which restores some of your lost energy. WIPEOUT 64 You might imagine the Piranha II team’s stealth power-up in WipEout 64 would make its ship invisible to other craft – and it does. But there’s more. The stealth enhancement also stops rivals from locking weapons onto Piranha II’s vessel, and allows it to fly through opponents’ ships. WIPEOUT FUSION There are a lot of interesting new power-ups in WipEout Fusion, and none more so than its Control Jammer. Quite simply, it reverses the steering…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233STAGES OF EVOLUTION: COOL CRAFTWIPEOUT 2097 Like WipEout, WipEout 2097 has four teams, although each has just one pilot to the original game’s two. To make up for this, 2097 has an unlockable fifth team named Piranha. Its prototype ship outdoes its rivals in terms of speed, agility and shields, but it doesn’t have any weapons. WIPEOUT PURE The Harimau ship in WipEout Pure has an interesting backstory, in that it has zero emissions and is owned by a humanitarian organisation and not a profit-obsessed corporation. Aside from its poor shields, the Harimau FX300 hits a sweet spot, in so much as it has decent speed and handling. WIPEOUT 2048 The WipEout 2048 Pir-hana prototype is tough to unlock, but it’s even tougher to fly! It has a chassis that’s so slim that there’s…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Hardware Heaven Super Cassette Vision» MANUFACTURER: Epoch » YEAR: 1984 » COST: ¥14,800 (launch), £120+ (today, boxed), £90+ (today, unboxed) The toy manufacturer Epoch was the first Japanese company to really achieve success in creating home consoles as we know them today. It had initially moved into home gaming with Pong-clone consoles in the mid-Seventies, and introduced the original Cassette Vision in 1981. This was a success, selling hundreds of thousands of units, but it was technically surpassed by Nintendo’s Famicom and Sega’s SG-1000 in 1983. Epoch returned with the technically improved Super Cassette Vision in 1984, but couldn’t catch up to rival machines despite the presence of popular licences such as Lupin III, Doraemon, Dragon Ball, Mappy and Boulder Dash. The machine was also released in France under the Yeno brand. The Super…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233STORM THE STAR CASTLE■ During the development of Major Havoc, Owen designed a particularly tough encounter with a space station dubbed the ‘Star Castle’. This was a reference to Cinematronics’ Star Castle from 1980, one of Owen’s favourites. Similar to that game, players had to blast through the space station’s shields before they could destroy its defences within. It was a tough fight, perhaps too tough even. When Owen and his co-workers at Atari tested the Star Castle, it took them upwards of three minutes to beat by itself. Owen knew it was too long and Atari agreed, it generally didn’t want arcade games lasting longer than 90 seconds per credit. In the end, the Star Castle became yet another casualty on the cutting floor. When it came time to decide what to…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233ULTIMATE GUIDE DONKEY KONG 3To say that Donkey Kong 3 deviated from the first two games would be an understatement of gorilla-sized proportions. The platforming antics were out, replaced by an unsubtle shooter where newcomer Stanley has to blast waves of insects and repel Donkey Kong (who’s randomly descending the screen on vines, because DK does what he wants basically). Some have labelled it the ‘unkong’ game, on account of it intentionally disrupting a winning formula, and not necessarily for the better. Second-guessing designer Shigeru Miyamoto is a foolish endeavour, but let’s consider that Donkey Kong 3 was primarily sold as a conversion kit for existing Nintendo cabs. If an arcade operator was looking to refresh a tired Donkey Kong machine would they want another platformer? And if they did, Miyamoto had that covered…7 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE KING OF KONG 3How did your relationship with Donkey Kong 3 begin? The first time I saw the game was at a South Pasadena Boys Club in 1985. I was around nine or ten at the time. While I was OK in certain games I excelled at Donkey Kong 3. In 1986 I got a score of 1.45m. They had just put up a scoreboard and I had the highest score. I had to move at the time, and thought some older kid would eventually beat it, but when I came back six months later the score still stood strong. When and where did you register your Twin Galaxies high score of 3,538,000? I achieved the 3.53m score in Seattle in 2011. There are four difficulty settings and it was achieved on the…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE MAKING OF PROFESSIONAL SKI SIMULATORBrothers Philip and Andrew Oliver are known to be the most prolific 8-bit videogame developers of all time. They have an entry to that effect in the Guinness World Records, since they designed 35 titles between 1984 and 1992, including a string of number ones. Given how hard they must have been working (that’s one game every 2.7 months!), you’d perhaps think holidays were out of the question. But no. In the spring of 1987, the siblings were invited to join Codemasters’ founders Richard and David Darling on a skiing holiday in the quaint village of Kaprun in Austria – and they came back with an idea for, you guessed it, yet another game! At this time, the Oliver twins, as they became known, were on top of the world.…11 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233TurboVision» PLATFORM: TurboExpress » RELEASED: 1990 » COST: $100 (launch), £85+ (today, boxed), £40+ (today, unboxed) The TurboExpress was ridiculously capable by handheld standards, but it was definitely not a cheap console when it hit the market in 1990, so you had to either be rich or extremely serious about entertainment on the go to buy one. If you just happened to be both, you could augment the system further by adding the TurboVision – or the Japanese equivalent TV Tuner, if you happened to be playing a PC Engine GT. This add-on turned your console into a fully functional portable colour TV, for those moments when interactivity wasn’t what you were looking for. The TurboVision connects to the right-hand side of the TurboExpress and can be securely fastened to…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233A JOURNEY THROUGH KRULLMOUNTAIN Our hero must dodge boulders and collect the scattered pieces of the glaive, his frantic legwork suggesting he began the day with several espressos. “I used highlighting, shading and shadows to give the boulders a solid look,” Jeff says. “Back then I heavily relied on Eadweard Muybridge’s classic photographic motion masterpieces, as well as Preston Blair’s cartooning books. And no, I was not happy with the leg animation.” SWAMP Prince Colwyn gets his feet muddy rounding up his army stuck in a swamp, whilst dispatching evil Slayers with the glaive he assembled in the previous level. “I must have been sent some photos [from the film] for reference but I don’t recall particulars,” says Jeff. “Matt must have told me what he needed for this screen. I never got…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233CONVERSION CAPERSAMIGA Super Cars II was developed on the Amiga and it was a chance for the developers to include ideas that didn’t make it into the original. As well as introducing a two-player mode there were more tracks (each more complex than the original set), a greater emphasis on weapons and improved competitor driver AI. ATARI ST According to co-developer Andrew Morris, “The ST was always an irrelevant afterthought – we never compromised the Amiga version, we downgraded it later for the ST.” This version had poorer sound as well as less-detailed and noticeably less-colourful graphics yet the gameplay remained exactly the same. DOS Released in 1996, Super Cars International, as it was called, “Was kind of Super Cars 2.5 and the best version,” Andrew says. It boasted 256-colour VGA…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233WHATEVER HAPPENED TO…FIDO DIDOGAMES THAT NEVER SAW THE LIGHT OF DAY If you were around in the early to mid-Nineties, there’s no doubt you probably would have crossed Fido Dido’s path and even drank from the same can as him. The lovable hand-drawn comic-strip guy with the wavy hair appeared on everything from pencil cases to bomber jackets. Eventually, his creators Sue Rose and Joanna Ferrone would allow him to move away from the well-known fizzy drink 7-Up advertisem*nt campaign and begin other adventures – namely a videogame. In 1993, Kaneko USA was tasked with bringing Fido Dido and 7-Up to the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive with Teeny Weeny Games at the helm. The game was fully complete, shown at the 1993 Consumer Electronics Show in America and was even advertised in numerous magazines.…5 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233CHOOSE YOUR HEROBUBBLUN Average stats all-around. His charge shot fires three bubbles straight ahead in a row – great for trapping enemy groups. BOBBLUN Has the highest speed of the gang. He’s absurdly fast with the shoe power-up. Too bad his charge shot – an angled attack – isn’t very useful. For advanced players. KULULUN Her bubbles have the longest range, made even better after a candy power-up. Use her T-shaped charge shot to phase bubbles to both sides and through barriers below you. CORORON She’s got the highest default bubble-blowing speed. Her charge shot is the inverse of Kururun’s – it can phase bubbles upwards through walls, making it a lifesaver.…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233CONVERSION CAPERSIt took a surprisingly long time for Bubble Symphony to see any ports. Despite releasing in 1994, the earliest home editions wouldn’t debut until three years later and, in one case, a mostly finished port would be cancelled. SATURN Bubble Symphony on the Sega Saturn was released in November of 1997 and published by VING, a company known for high-quality arcade ports to PC platforms. VING shifted attention to console publishing in the 32-bit era, giving us ports of Taito classics like Metal Black, Night Striker and Elevator Action Returns. Sadly, the weak Saturn market abroad meant nobody wanted to pick it up for international release, so it remained a Japanese exclusive. The Saturn version of Bubble Symphony is a superb port – load times are minimal, graphics and sound…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233THE MAKING OF RED FACTIONWhen you think of videogame destruction, Red Faction most likely comes to mind. Its inception came from Parallax Studio, now Volition, and its desire to create a fourth entry in its Descent series, “We felt making another Descent sequel just made sense. One of the key ideas we had was a destructible environment. That was a core idea from the get-go,” comments Red Faction’s lead designer, Alan Lawrance. While past games had allowed for limited pre-scripted alterations, or special triggered areas that would then add or remove certain geometry, Alan and his team sought to allow players to alter any level at any time. “We knew that destructible environments was a tall order because games hadn’t done it before.” This was a watershed moment for game development – fully destructible,…9 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Street Fighter Alpha 3» PLATFORM: PLAYSTATION » RELEASED: 1998 » DEVELOPER: CAPCOM You’ve enjoyed playing Street Fighter Alpha 3 in the arcades and now you’re planning to finish it at home as you’ve just grabbed the PlayStation version. Playing as Akuma (you felt Ryu needed a bit of a break) you’ve punched, kicked and fireballed your way to the final showdown with M Bison. Hell, you even managed to pull off that ridiculous special move along the way that looks cool as hell but really punishes your fingers. You’re ready, probably more ready than you’ve ever been. It’s time for the final fight. M Bison faces you and he’s significantly more imposing than when you first encountered him in Street Fighter II. You trade a few blows back and forth and your confidence…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233New Super Mario Bros» DS » 2006 » NINTENDO EAD It’s weird covering games that you once reviewed in earlier issues of Retro Gamer (issue 27 if you’re interested) but that’s the passage of time for you. The annoying thing about revisiting New Super Mario Bros today is that while I’ve certainly been ravaged by said passage of time, Nintendo’s game still feels as fresh and spritely as the day I first encountered it. Yes it’s a pushover compared to earlier games in the series and yes it doesn’t really push the Mario template in daring directions like the 3D games always manage, but it remains the best platformer on Nintendo’s DS and I doubt I’ll ever cut it from my collection. When I awarded Nintendo’s game 86% all those years ago my…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233Andro Dunos II» System: Switch (tested) 3DS, PS4, PS5, PC » Buy it for: £13.99+ (digital), £24.99+ (physical) » Buy it from: Retail, online Andro Dunos was a solid, if rather unspectacular shmup from the early Nineties, so this sequel has taken us massively by surprise. Aided by a fantastic soundtrack from Allister Brimble, PixelHeart’s shooter is an absurdly good sequel. Like the original there are four weapons to switch between, which can be powered up multiple times. New mechanics have been introduced, while the gargantuan bosses will push your trigger skills to the limits. There’s a real flexibility to the combat mechanics, allowing you to change weapons to suit each new area. A lack of customisable controls and no twoplayer option do hurt it a little, but this remains an excellent…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233SPECTRUM SKILLS<INTRO> ORGANISER IVAN SANCHEZ AND LEADING COMPETITORS TALK ABOUT THE RECENT ZX-DEV 2021 CODING COMPETITION </INTRO> <INTRO> THIS MONTH WE’RE HIGHLIGHTING THE SKILL IN REMAKING A GAME FOR OLD HARDWARE. THE RECENT ZX-DEV COMPETITION INSPIRED CLEVER ‘DEMAKES’ OF MODERN TITLES, WHILE A HUGE PICO-8 FAN SERVES US UP A MIXTURE OF GAME JAM AND SPICY STRATEGY. NES OWNERS FINALLY GET A PLATFORM CLASSIC TO PLAY, AND THERE ARE TASTY TITBITS FOR ATARI FANS. </INTRO> <BODY> “Every time I finish one, I end up feeling exhausted in terms of time invested,” says Ivan Sanchez (IvanZX) as he completes his fourth ZX-Dev competition. “I saw how the MSXdev was successful and brought a lot of action and competition, so I was wondering if I could do something similar for the Spectrum.” With…3 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233PAUL NICHOLAS<INFO FROM: ENGLAND WEBSITE: LIQUIDREAM.CO.UK, ITCH.IO/JAM/PICO-1K FORMAT: PICO-8 RECENTLY CODED: SPEED POOL, LO MEM SKY, SCUMM-8 DEVELOPING: UNDUNE II – LIQUIDREAM.ITCH.IO/UNDUNE2/> WHAT GOT YOU INTO DEVELOPING FOR PICO-8? <An animated tweet by PICO-8 creator Joseph ‘Zep’ White, which showed how to create a Snake-like game in just 79 seconds. I was intrigued with the ‘Fantasy Console’ concept. What sealed the deal was discovering the way games could be shared through .PNG files! That was five years ago, I still enjoy creating with PICO-8 as much today as the day I purchased it. /> WHAT INSPIRED THE 1K JAM AND ITS RESTRICTIONS? <The main inspiration came from #TweetTweetJam (created by Andrew Reist), which requires entries to fit into two Tweets (560 characters). I wondered whether a 1024 char/byte limit might be…2 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233SOUL OF THE BEAST<INFO BY: AERIFORM (DEVELOPED BY MICHAEL CHRISTOPHERSSON) FORMAT: ATARI 2600 (NTSC ONLY) PRICE: DIGITAL DOWNLOAD $5.00 OR MORE, BOXED CARTRIDGE PRE-ORDER $45.00 WEBSITE: AERIFORM.ITCH.IO/BEAST, BIT.LY/SOUL2600/> <BODY> The demon messenger broke free of his evil masters and must now rid the land of the sorcerer Rynkar. Evoking the essence of 16-bit showcase Shadow Of The Beast, your character runs along, fights or dodges enemies and picks up artefacts to help and heal. There are also wells and doorways leading to other areas to explore. Graphically it works well with clever layered scrolling and large sprites, but sound is simplistic and with limited controls the gameplay lacks depth – much like the original SOTB. A digital download is the best way to sample this, with the boxed cart (NTSC compatible only) perhaps…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233SPEED FREAKSElden Lord Francis F-Zero because each vehicle is associated with a well-built character. Dawid Venter I can’t decide between WipEout HD/Fury and F-Zero GX. Two very different futuristic racers. One is all about combat, and the other is about pure speed. I love both. TILLY WipEout 2097 blew me away when I first played it on PS1. A clever move by Psygnosis to include cool licensed tunes. Neil McEwan STUN Runner by Atari on arcade hardware, although the Lynx version was cool, too! [Agreed, it’s an excellent conversion – Ed] RabidWookie San Francisco Rush 2049. Still the best arcade racer of all time. And the best stunt game. And the best vehicle combat game. Mark Elliott POD. I loved the style, the range of tracks and vehicles it came with…1 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233FIGHTING FAILURESI had a rotten run of luck with consoles breaking last year. It all started when my Dreamcast gave out during a stream – those of you familiar with the console will know it can develop a tendency to randomly reset, and that’s what happened to mine. That’s an easy fix, but the hits kept coming in the summer. My Xbox gave up the ghost five minutes into a Jet Set Radio Future stream, and my PS3 only just struggled through a Tokyo Jungle stream, both of them suffering from failing disc drives. At the end of the year, I went to compare the Game Gear to the Analogue Pocket while reviewing the latter, and found that the old handheld had failed too. While it’s a high-maintenance machine, I’d had…6 min
Retro Gamer|No. 233IT’S ALL TOO MUCHDear Retro Gamer I loved the recent article about being more intentional about purchases and possibly selling those games that will not be played. I myself am a collector, but I also struggle with over buying, especially games I will literally never play. I genuinely feel it would be really nice to hear more from the team regarding this. I know for myself it was helpful to hear about Darran’s thoughts on the subject, and it helped me to understand that I am not alone, and quite possibly that I need to grow in this area as a person. Thank you for the magazine. I am a new subscriber, but I enjoy it. Many thanks, Nicholas Jankovic We’re glad Darran’s article spoke to you, Nicholas. If you’re new to the…1 min
