Although it’s difficult to fathom today, there was a time when computers were not a ubiquitous household appliance, and it took a certain kind of person with a particular set of intellectual abilities to understand, design, and program primitive devices that today would hardly be recognized as a computer. At that time, the word “hacker” … Read more
Virtua fighter shares many traits with another Saturn game, Daytona USA, as both a Saturn launch title and a home conversion of a 1993 hit arcade game. The game is noteworthy in the annals of video game history for being the first fully 3D arcade fighting game, which in the early 90’s made it stand … Read more
Back in the good old days, most games didn’t come packaged in a box that was meant to double as a storage case. With the exception of games for Sega’s Master System and Genesis, cartridges generally came packaged in boxes made of card stock that were meant to be thrown away. Most first-party Atari 2600 … Read more
Often times, ports of classic arcade titles either include nothing that updates the game or change the game so much that the fun of the original is lost. Ms. Pac-Man for the Genesis does an excellent job of recreating the arcade experience at home while adding several new options that make the game an upgrade … Read more
Altered Beast is a side-scrolling action game in which the hero, a shape-shifting resurrected Roman centurion, must rescue Zeus’ daughter from an evil demon god. Through the collection of power-ups the protagonist grows incrementally stronger before finally turning into a non-human creature with special powers. Once the final shape shift has taken place, a boss … Read more
Written during the video game crash of 1983, Zap! has an interesting perspective on the world of home interactive entertainment. Common among analysts from that period, Scott Cohen spends considerable time questioning the viability of the home video game market, theorizing that the home computer and its ability to play games, along with the saturation of the … Read more
This, the first version of Tetris on the NES, was pulled off of the shelves only 1 month after it’s debut and is therefore one of the rarest NES games released by a major publisher. Atari had licensed the game from British software publisher Mirrorsoft, who themselves had been granted a home console license from … Read more
As the game that kicked Tengen’s Tetris” The Soviet Mind Game off of the shelves, Nintendo’s Tetris had a lot to live up to. Unfortunately, and perhaps because they had a monopoly on the market, Nintendo chose to release a decent but entirely unimpressive port of Alexei Pahjitnov’s classic puzzle game. Gone are the head-to-head … Read more
It is a little-known fact that Tetris was not originally intended to be bundled with the Game Boy. Henk Rogers, a game developer and founder of “Bullet-Proof Software”, convinced Nintendo of America president Minoru Arakawa that Tetris, and not Super Mario Land, would give the Game Boy broad appeal across multiple age groups. Mr. Rogers … Read more
Track & Field is a home port of the 1983 arcade game of the same name. Although the original arcade game never gained much notoriety, the release of the game on the NES popularized the series and spawned numerous sequels on multiple platforms. Track & Field features 8 events; the 100-meter dash, long jump, 110-meter … Read more
Joe Montana Football was intended to be the first football game available on the Genesis, but due to various development problems the game was released one month after John Madden Football. Developed by Electronic Arts, the game was not meant to be a direct competitor to their own Madden franchise. Rather, Joe Montana Football provides … Read more
Anyone who played computer games in the late 80’s or early 90’s should instantly recognize this classic city building game. SimCity was originally released on the DOS PC, Mac, Amiga, Commodore 64, and Atari ST, and arguably launched a whole new genre of video games. As the mayor/city planner, you lay out roads, rails and … Read more
As an avid retro sports gamer, I’m always picking up old sports games that I either don’t have or have never played. Doubly-so when they’re Ice Hockey, Golf, or Baseball games. Sometimes I find a hidden (at least to me) gem, and sometimes that dollar would have been better spent if flushed down the toilet. … Read more
Although Welltris was the official sequel to Tetris, Blockout seems like more of a logical extension of the classic puzzle game. Blockout features a top-down view of a 3D well. As with Tetris, Blockout pieces are made up of smaller cubes, and the object of the game is to clear completed levels made up of … Read more
Tetris Plus was one of only two Tetris games released for the Playstation (the other being “The Next Tetris”), and is identical to the Sega Saturn release of the same name. Along with the requisite “Classic” and “Vs.” modes, Tetris Plus features a “puzzle” mode (isn’t the whole game a puzzle?) that is really the … Read more
Tetris Plus was the only Tetris game released for the Sega Saturn in the United States, and is a port of the 1990 Japanese-only arcade game of the same name. Along with the requisite “Classic” and “Vs.” modes, Tetris Plus features a “puzzle” mode (isn’t the whole game a puzzle?) that is really the meat … Read more
I grew up playing Tetris. I got a Game Boy the Christmas after it was launched and played Tetris more than any other game on that system. The Tengen version of Tetris is one of my favorite NES games, and it is a crime against humanity that Nintendo forced it off of the market. Because … Read more
Sega Ages is an arcade compilation disc from Sega featuring 3 classic arcade titles; OutRun, Afterburner II, and Space Harrier. All three games are arcade-perfect translations and include options menus which allow you to alter the control scheme, adjust the difficulty level, and listen to music and sound effects, plus a few options specific to … Read more
The first time I played it, I really hated this game. It reminded me of one of those old-timey pinball machines that didn’t have flippers. You would put in a coin, it would dispense the ball, and your only interaction with the machine would be to pull the plunger. After that, gravity would take over. … Read more
This game makes the earlier Video Pinball for the VCS look downright awful. Midnight Magic’s colorful, high-resolution graphics and realistic ball physics make its predecessor look like something from the previous generation. The game features a single table with more plausible dimensions (long and narrow) and more realistic-looking round bumpers. The play field is still … Read more
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