Music #1

Accidental Music Discovery!

My affection for Japan isn't just restricted to their videogame industry. The country has a rich and fascinating history and culture, of course, but I also have a fondness for their food, anime, music, and cinema too, and it is a combination of the last two that led me to discover this piece of music. One of my favourite Japanese movies is Azumi, a story of a group of assassins attempting to kill off warmongering rivals to their leader. Aya Ueto (pictured) plays the best of the assassins and looks right at home kicking everyones's arse (or rather, slicing them up with her sword!), something which belies her petite and dainty nature. After discovering her in this film and its sequel, I discovered that she is also a J-Pop singer. Since then I have been trying to find some of her music, but to no avail. After searching BeeMP3 for one of her songs, the only thing I could find is the song titled 'Aya', below. After listening to it, I think it's safe to say it's not a J-Pop song, and is almost certainly not anything to do with the lovely Aya Ueto either - I've no idea who it's by, where it's from - but it was a pleasant surprise! Now, I'm not usually into this kind of music, but give it a listen and see what you think! In the meantime, my search for Aya Ueto's elusive music continues. Anyone?

	aya - Aya - Aya .mp3
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

Crush Series - Part 2

Devil's Crush (a.k.a. Devil Crash) (1990)
By: NAXAT Soft Genre: Pinball Players: 1-2 (alternate) Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: NEC PC Engine / TurboGrafx-16 First Day Score: 18,756,300
Also Available For: MegaDrive / Genesis
Download For: Wii Virtual Console

If you cast your mind back to the first time you noticed pinball videogames, there's a good chance you'd think of this game. Digital Illusions had some success in the early 90's with the realistic but playable Pinball Dreams and Pinball Fantasies, and sure, Alien Crush was popular, but it was this sequel, which arrived approximately two years later, which really got the genre noticed among the console gaming fraternity. Brought to us by Naxat again, the basic premise is obviously very similar to before. Instead of the evil aliens from the first game, however, this game is based, perhaps somewhat controversially, on the occult! The main table, for there is only one again, is three screens high this time, medieval themed, and is crawling with hordes of satanic demons, dragons, and monsters beyond description!

The top section of the main table...

As before, each section of the main table has its own flippers and is home to its own features. The bottom section, for example, is home to a large skull (who mocks you by laughing every time you lose a ball!), a fire-breathing dragon, a tower, which gives you a blocker if you get the ball through its gate, and several other features. The middle section is dominated by a woman's face, which the ball can enter for bonus points, and it also gradually mutates into a dragon every time the ball enters a pocket! The top section features a rotating pentagram with eight sorcerers standing around it, and looming over them is the Dragon's Gate (a large skeletal demon thingy). All sections of the table are also populated by various bugs, soldiers, and scary creatures who wander around helping your score multiplier increase as you destroy them with the ball.

The middle section...

Devil's Crush, like its prequel, again features bonus tables too - six this time - and the main table is festooned with pockets through which you can enter them (when the pocket is open). On each of the bonus tables, the object is to take out the evil creatures that dwell within. These range from large dragons, skeletal heads, undead knights, and all manner of smaller, but equally malevolent foes. The only way to end this game it to max out the score counter, which, if you can manage it, would be 999,999,990! It's not as impossible to achieve as you might initially think though, for if you thought there was a lot to do in Alien Crush, then you've not seen anything yet! There are even more ways to increase your score here, including various tricks, secrets, and all sorts of ways of increasing your multiplier. Not only that, but there's now a password option to resume play later too, so I think it's safe to say there's plenty to keep you occupied!

The bottom, and probably busiest section...

Graphically, the game is even more impressive than its predecessor. The dark, gothic, demonic theme is superbly presented here, with excellent definition of the sprites and backgrounds and great use of colours, which are nicely contrasted. The table and monsters are mostly dull greys and browns compared with bright reds and greens for the explosions and various flashing lights. There's far more happening at once than there was in Alien Crush, too. There's a near-constant stream of evil beasts of some sort wandering around and they look suitably demonic, though their animation still isn't particularly impressive. The table itself appears to be based around an ancient castle of some sort, compared to the sci-fi inspired, organic appearance of Alien Crush's, and looks very much like the kind of place evil is likely to dwell. All this is supplemented by a fantastic soundtrack featuring a mixture of fast, rock tracks and moody, mysterious sounding tunes. Add to this the great, loud, arcadey sound effects, and your ears will thank you for playing this!

Bonus Stage 3, believe it or not!

Gameplay-wise, like Alien Crush, not everyone will enjoy playing this, simply because it's pinball, but those who do play it will discover one of the most immediately entertaining games ever! This is without doubt the best pinball game I've ever played on a console or computer and even puts many actual pintables to shame, too! There is again an option to choose between fast and slow ball speeds and on fast, which should be everyone’s choice really, the ball can sometimes rocket around the table at awesome speeds – reactions are everything here. The ‘tilt’ option is also present once more, and ball physics and play mechanics are flawless too – this is a game that takes genuine skill and lots of practise to be proficient at. There’s a hell of lot of demons to keep you occupied (a near infinite number, in fact) and a great many targets to hit and objectives to meet, and the length of time you play for is more or less entirely dependent on your competence rather than your luck.

See if you can guess which one this is...

Most pinball videogames have tried to be authentic pintables rather than taking advantage of the limitless creative potential that computers and consoles offer. Alien Crush was the first to try something different, and Devil's Crush upped the ante ten-fold! Naxat have produced a frankly remarkable game here, and one that remains the definitive example of its genre, as well as one of RKS’s all-time favourite games. It’s as simple as pinball should be, but at the same time has so much more to it. This game should, theoretically, last you forever.

RKS Score: 9/10


Red Parsley - Crush Pinball Series:
Part 1     Part 2     Part 3     Part 4     Part 5     Part 6

Game Music #1

Star Control 2 - The Precursors Remixes

Anyone who's played the awesome Star Control 2 (a.k.a. Ur-Quan Masters) will be familiar with the high quality of its audio. Not just music, but many fantastic and memorable sound effects, and hours of speech from the game's various races too. But, yes, the music was particularly grand and has been a permanent fixture on my Cellphone/MP3 Player. Whether it's making the long journeys across hyperspace more interesting, increasing the already prevalent feeling of fear when the pack of anonymous ships chasing you turns out to be a fleet of Kohr-Ah Maruaders intent on 'cleansing' you, filling you with a sense of determination as you face enemies in battle, or making you feel like a pioneering explorer as you discover new planets in the furthest corners of the galaxy, all the music in Star Control 2 is fantastically composed, atmospheric and suits the situation it's used for perfectly.

The Precursors project is the brainchild of a Finnish gentleman by the name of Riku Nuottajärvi. He was the composer of some of the original songs from Star Control 2 itself, and he had the idea of remixing all the 69 (giggity) songs found in the game. This would of course be a lot of work, so he recruited some help from the fan community. Although many helpers came and went while the project was underway, the core group of composers would eventually become Riku, Jouni Airaksinen (also from Finland), and two Norwegian fellows called Espen Gätzschmann and Tore Aune Fjellstad (I'm guessing SC2 is popular in Scandinavia!). Between them they have remixed over 40 full-length songs, as well as various shorter tunes and ditties from the game, and as far as I know, the project is ongoing. I hope so because the results so far have been outstanding!

The remixes so far are mostly in a dance/trance/techno style, which suits the game pretty well. They are a mixture of alien race theme songs, and other songs such as the hyperspace, quasispace, battle themes, etc, and are free to download, so you have no excuse not to listen to them! Granted, neither game music or dance music are to everyone's tastes, but those of you who enjoy either are advised to check them out. It just goes to show how dedicated the Star Control fan community is!

Click below to hear one of the remixes:

	Precursors - Mycon - Rebirth .mp3
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

The Precursors remixes are free to download from their homepage here.

Further fan remixes (non-Precursors ones), not to mention loads of other Star Control-related stuff, can be found at The Pages Of Now And Forever here.

Overhead Racers #1

Super Sprint (1986)
By: Atari Genre: Overhead Racing  Players: 3  Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Arcade
Also Available For: NES, Atari ST, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum

The overhead viewed racing game certainly didn't start with Super Sprint - the genre goes right back to the ancient pre-microprocessor, black and white games of the 70's - but it's possibly the most fondly remembered example of this all but dead genre. In the eighties and early nineties, there were a lot of these games around. Some were variations on Super Sprint, such as Super Off Road, others experimented with games that only showed a small part of the course at once, such as Motoroader for the PC Engine and, of course, the popular Micro Machines series which required lightning reactions by the player, and there were some which were viewed from an isometric viewpoint like Rock 'n' Roll Racing for the SNES.

All of these variations on the original blueprint were exciting and good fun, esepcially in multi-player, and I'll be looking at some of them later in this series of features, but it's Super Sprint and its sequel, Championship Sprint, that old timers like me most fondly recall. There can't be too many people that don't know all about Super Sprint, and there's not really too much that you can say about it. It was a simple game, even compared to others of the time. It's based on either Formula One or Indy/Cart racing (probably the latter considering how unpopular F1 is in the US) and can be played by between one and three players simultaneously, whilst a fourth 'drone' car is controlled by the computer. This was before the days of linking machines together of course, so this is achieved by presenting each course in its entirety from an overhead perspective.

The races are contested over four laps by four cars regardless of how many human players there are. If there are less than three players, the remaining places are taken by additional drone cars. Though there are only eight courses, the competition can go on for as long as the player(s) like, since the courses just keep repeating over and over again. The object is obviously to finish in as high a position as possible, but only the first three positions score points; the higher the position, the more points are awarded, but if you finish fourth, you'll soon have to insert (giggity) more coins. As can be seen from the screenshots, each of the courses feature a wide track, and they pretty much fill the screen. Since the whole course has to be shown at once, however, there are lots of bridges and sharp corners (including some 180 degree, and even a few 270 degree turns!).

There are also a few features that are not exactly common on F1-style circuits. Some of them hinder your progress such as jumps (if you fluff it, at least!), tornadoes (which make your car spin around if you drive near them), and pools of oil (which do something similar to tornados), and some are there to help you like short cuts, bonus points, gold wrenches and gates. Not all courses have gates but when they are present, they allow you to take further short-cuts. Beware though - the gates aren't always open - they open and close in regular patterns (and often seem to favour the computer-controlled cars). If you head towards one at high speed and it closes just as you get there, you often can't avoid it in time and........ BOOOOOM!

When you start the game you don't get to choose which car you want to drive as they're all identical (except their colour), but every time you pick up three gold wrenches, you can choose one of four upgrades. Three of them - higher top speed, turbo acceleration, and super traction - can only be chosen up to five times each, but the other, which gives you bonus points, can be selected as often as you like. Be careful if you upgrade your speed too much though, as hitting a wall too fast will result in your car exploding. A replacement is soon 'choppered' in enabling you to continue on your way, but it all takes time. It's also possible to make the others cars crash by driving into them and knocking them into the wall, but, perhaps unsurprisingly, they can also do this do your car.

As mentioned earlier, Super Sprint was a pretty simple game, even back in 1986. There's precious little music (including none in-game) and a few weak effects, and, while the colours are bold and the title and presentation screens are nice enough, the graphics aren't particularly impressive either. The courses all look damn near identical (aside from their layout, obviously), the cars and other objects are all small and not especially detailed, and animation is almost non-existent, but this is one of those games that doesn't need flashy or detailed graphics to be playable. Even far more modern variations on the theme don't usually look particularly great - playability is all that counts here, and fortunately Super Sprint has that by the bucket-load.

The cars here handle very precisely and have tight and quick turning circles. In fact, since the track is mostly very wide (compared to the cars) it's easy to turn too sharply and end up driving backwards or something! This just adds to the fun when racing against friends though, and is rarely annoying. What is a little annoying, however, is something that's commonly annoying in racing games - the computer-controlled cars. They're inconsistent in their performance and are 'magically' unaffected by the hazards present on each circuit, like the tornados, but this was always intended as a multi-player game anyway. The courses are nicely designed for the most part though, and are varied enough in their layout to keep things interesting too.

Racing/driving games are among the most enjoyable multi-player games there are today. The strong sense of competition, not to mention the ability to fight dirty by making your friends crash, have helped to prolong the lifespan of many games that would otherwise have started gathering dust long before, and this game proves that this has been the case for almost as long as there has been videogames. They may have changed quite dramatically over the years, particularly as far as their appearance is concerned, but their roots run deep, so to speak. Super Sprint may be almost 25 years old but it has stood the test of time better than many much newer titles.

RKS Score: 8/10

Top Five Chocolate Bars

After a brief hiatus, I have recently regained my enthusiasm for eating lush chocolate bars and have been eating far too many lately, much to the benefit of local clothes shops. To that end, however, here is my top five favourite at the moment:

5.

A long, thin, caramal flavoured bar, this isn't strictly speaking a chocolate bar, but retains its status thus on account of its size, shape, and the fact that it's sold alongside all the more traditional bars. Caramacs have become increasingly rare, at least near me, and those that have been found appear to lost the bargain price tag they once held. Nonetheless, they remain a delightfully sweet snack. I wish they'd bring back the yellow foil wrapper though...

4.

Once one of the most popular chocolate bars around, the Wispa seemed to mysteriously vanish from our shelves sometime in the 90's. So steathily done, was it, that I can't even remember when. Appearing around the same time, Cadbury's Dairy Milk Bubbly, in essence the same thing, just wasn't the same, and such has been the clamour for the return of the Wispa (an internet campaign, amongst other things), it was formally reintroduced in 2007. And all rejoiced.

3.

One of the oldest chocolate bars still available, Fry's Chocolate Creams are available in three flavours - plain, peppermint, and orange. None of them has ever been common, and that remains the case today. The plain version (pictured) is the most common, but any opportunity to pick up an orange or peppermint flavoured chocolate cream should be seized immediately too. All are made with dark chocolate around a fondant centre, and there apparently used to be other flavours such as pineapple and strawberry. I want to try them. :(

2.

Proclaimed in a series of adverts to "have a hazlenut in every bite", the Topic's sold these days must surely adhere to this slogan, for over the years, I swear Topic's have been getting smaller and smaller (except in price, of course). Now barely three RKS-size bites in size, they remain ultra-lush, but their profile has fallen far since the days of national TV adverts and I fear they will disappear altogether in the not-too-distant future, so eat them while you can!

1.

And the winner, for a long time my favourite, the mighty Star Bar! One of the few chocolate bars to have a cult following (complete with dedicated fan website!), this caramel, crisped-rice, and peanut-filled beauty is fairly pricey for its size, but is worth every penny.

Plus, an honourable mention goes to this tasty little snack I discovered on my first trip to Brazil. The Chokito is a crispy rice and caramel fudge flavoured bar availble in both milk and white chocolate varieties. My subsequent trips to Brazil have involved a great deal of Chokito consumption...

Thunder Force Series - Part 2

Thunder Force (1984)
By: Tecno Soft   Genre: Shooting   Players: 1  Difficulty: Hard
Featured Version: NEC PC-98 
Also Available For: NEC PC-88, NEC PC-6001 Mk II, Sharp X1, Sharp MZ-1500, Fujitsu FM-7

During the course of my long struggle to finally see and play the original Thunder Force game for the PC-88, I saw some screenshots of the PC-98 version, which appeared to have fancier graphics, so I decided it might be a good idea to include that version in this feature too. I soon regretted it, of course. This turned out to be even harder to get to play than the the PC-88 version! However, after a long and arduous struggle, fraught with many problems, and once again with the help of some splendid fellows from the Retro Gamer forum, I managed to get it running.

For some reason, the emulator I used to run this game won't work on my desktop PC, but will work on my laptop. This in itself caused a problem. The emulator, you see, uses the numeric keypad for in-game control, and my laptop obviously lacks one of these. I therefore had to try and play by pressing the 'Fn' key as well as the other keys the emulator uses for in-game control. This proved diificult. With perseverance, however, I was able to play the game to a reasonable degree. Degree enough to determine that this version of the game is at least as insanely difficult as the PC-88 version, perhaps even more so! Everything seems to be the same, such as the level layout, and the sound is identical (i.e. near enough non-existent!), but the graphics, as initially suspected, are indeed quite a bit nicer. Definition is more or less the same, but many more colours are used here.

And that's pretty much it really. Aside from the graphics, the two versions are more or less the same. It's still really, really difficult, but is still playable and addictive too. The PC-98 must use a pretty interesting graphics chip though. The screenshots I managed to get of this game do not like to be resized or saved in any format other than png or they go all funny, so, as this blog automatically resizes pictures, the shots posted here don't look quite as nice as they should. Overall, I've been really happy to finally see what the original Thunder Force game is like, I just wish it was easier to emulate and play (the option of using a control pad would be nice, for example!). If at a later date, I'm able to have a more comprehensive look at this game, I'll definitely do so, but for now...

RKS Score: 6/10


Red Parsley - Thunder Force Series:
Part 1      Part 2     Part 3     Part 4     Part 5     Part 6     Part 7     Part 8     Part 9     Part 10

Crush Series - Part 1

Alien Crush (1988)
By: NAXAT Soft Genre: Pinball Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: NEC PC Engine / TurboGrafx-16 First Day Score: 11,173,400
Also Available For: Nothing
Download For: Wii Virtual Console

Pinball has diminished in popularity a great deal since the advent of videogames, and pintables are now rarely seen anywhere but decent sized arcades and specialist retro establishments, but thanks to the entertainment medium that saw their demise, they can continue to live on! Which brings me, in a typically long-winded RKS stylee, to Alien Crush. I’m a bit of a pinball fan and I frequently venture into my local pizza restaurant, which is the only place for miles that still has any pintables, but pinball videogames, in my view, too often tried to accurately emulate proper pintables rather than taking advantage of the fact that they are no longer governed by the sometimes-restrictive rules of pintables. That is until Alien Crush came along.

The bottom-half of the main table...

Released by Naxat Soft exclusively on the PC Engine, Alien Crush is an original, not to mention supremely playable pinball game that would be completely impossible for an actual pintable to replicate. Its table, you see, is viewed from an overhead perspective, is two screens tall, and is awash with many scary alien creatures and devices! The bottom section of the table is dominated by a large alien creature with many eyes (which looks like the queen from the awesome ‘Aliens’ movie). All around it are various smaller aliens poking their heads out and insect-like creatures scurrying across the table occasionally, tempting you to destroy them before they scamper away, and further down the table on either side of the flippers are two cocoon things that act like bumpers, but if you hit them enough times they will open setting loose the evil monsters within!

...and the top half!

The top section of the table has two main features. In the top-left is a brain, which doesn’t really do much besides flash every time the ball hits it, but if you can get the ball right around the side and top of it, a blocker will appear between the flippers. The brain also opens up occasionally to unleash some horrific alien beasts. On the right of the screen is what appears to be a large mollusc or squid-type alien, into which you can also shoot the ball for points. Between these two objects at the top of the screen are three vertical dividers. Passing the ball through them turns lights on and off, and below them are three bumpers whose positions are determined by a mystical eye at the side of the screen. There are of course further aliens abound here too, to further complicate matters!

One of the bonus tables...

The last feature of note in Alien Crush is the existence of several bonus tables. These can be reached by shooting the ball into one of the pockets situated around the table, which are usually aliens mouths or something, when the arrow pointing at them is lit. The bonus tables are all one screen in size and the object of them is generally to destroy all the aliens that reside on them. There is one that’s devoid of aliens, however, and they are replaced by lots of bumpers arranged in various positions. It is of course possible to amass considerable points on these tables, but, as every pinball connoisseur should know, everything on a pintable does something, and there are countless ways to amass huge scores on the main table too.

And another one!

Graphically, the game is a real treat, especially considering this was an early Engine game. I think it’s safe to say that the Alien movies were something of an inspiration for the visuals this game, though! Still, if you’re going to be influenced by things, it might as well be the best things, right? The sound, too, is decent enough. There's the choice of two tunes before playing - Lunar Eclipse and the splendidly-named Demons Undulate, and the sound effects are suitably befitting of the game's style. Gameplay-wise, there's not really much more you could ask for. As with any pinball game, the most important thing is the ball physics, and happily that's top-notch here. Movement around the table is reliable and impact with enemy sprites is rarely too unforgiving. There's even a 'tilt' option for added realism! As you might expect, this is an awesome game for 'score attacks' too. New ways of achieving bonus points are seemingly discovered every game - I’m still finding new tricks and devising new techniques all the time! Overall, yes, some could argue that Alien Crush has been superceded now (by its own sequel, for one!) but it still plays a pretty mean game of pinball and is well worth a bash.

RKS Score: 7/10


Red Parsley - Crush Pinball Series:
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

Film Review #1

(500) Days of Summer (2009)
Director: Marc Webb Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Zooey Deschanel, Geoffrey Arend, Matthew Gray Gubler, Chloe Moretz

Certificate: 12 Running Time: 91 Minutes

Tagline: "Boy Meets Girl. Boy Falls In Love. Girl Doesn't"

I'm sure we've all been in the uneviable situation that faces Tom (Gordon-Levitt - 10 Things I Hate About You) in this unconventional rom-com from Marc Webb - that being, his unrequited love for new work colleague, Summer (Deschanel - Yes Man, Failure To Launch). He is attracted to her immediately upon meeting her, a new employee at the greeting card company at which he has an unfullfilling job, but thinks her out of his league. That is until a chance encounter in the office elevator which reveals they have the same taste in music (in this case, The Smiths). And so begins their relationship, building slowly from friendship. But will she ultimately feel the same way as Tom?

The story is told over the titular 500 days, which indicates the period of time since Tom met Summer. They are not followed in any order and the films flits backwards and forwards between them showing at the one end, the good times as the new couple enjoy drunken karaoke sessions, a magical Ikea adventure, and long blissful conversations about nothing in particular, and at the other end, Tom's broken heart and moping around after their breakup.

The problem is, Tom is one of those people who believes there is one true love out there for him, a soulmate. Summer doesn't. Tom has spent his life patiently waiting for this one person he believes he will spend the rest of his life with. Summer casually goes from one day to the next without worrying too much about anything. Granted, it doesn't sound like the ideal recipe for a relationship, but upon meeting Summer, Tom believes he's met 'The One'. Knowing the relationship doesn't last from early on in the film's run time doesn't harm the enjoyment of the proceedings too much as the two main characters are appealing, and besides, the film starts off on 'Day 488', which still leaves 12 days for them to possibly reconcile!

Despite their diametrically opposing philosophies on love, both characters are very likeable. They each know how the other feels from the start, and neither makes any promises to each other. Helping to endear us to these characters are fine perfomances from the two leads. Joseph Gordon-Levitt will really have you rooting for Tom, and Zooey Deschanel, having recently progressed to leading roles, is making a career out of her, presumably natural, kooky deadpan demeanour, and her Summer, whilst not the quirkiest character she's played so far, is intriguing and has seldom been lovelier. They have able support too, with McKenzie and Paul as Tom's two best friends and, Rachel, his wise-beyond-her-years kid sister.

Overall, this is a really entertaining film with decent, if unspectacular, perfomances and likeable characters, which are equally important in my opinion. It has a slightly unsatisfactory ending, but it doesn't gloss over the imperfections of the protaganists and seems to flourish in the details that many other rom-coms skip over in favour of more grandiose set-pieces (although there is a fantastic song and dance sequence here). Also important, in my opinion, is the soundtrack, which, I'm pleased to say, is top-notch here. Featuring both songs by the likes of The Smiths (naturally), Feist, and Regina Spektor, as well as a decent score, it sets the mood well, although the film does occasionally also use an out-of-place voiceover which pops up now and then just as you've forgotten that it exists. This is the first feature from Marc Webb, formally a music promo director, and it bodes well for upcoming projects from him.

RKS Score: 8/10

See the trailer here:

Thunder Force Series - Part 1

Thunder Force (1984)
By: Tecno Soft Genre: Shooting Players: 1 Difficulty: Hard
Featured Version: NEC PC-88
Also Available For: NEC PC-98, NEC PC-6001 Mk II, Sharp X1, Sharp MZ-1500, Fujitsu FM-7

Yes, this is the title screen in all its glory!

It has long been my intention to cover entire game series' from start to finish here, rather than just odd games, so to satisfy my own curiosity, I thought I'd start with this classic series of shooters. Pretty much all Mega Drive fans must be familiar with the series, with the second game being a launch title for the console here in the UK, and the third and fouth games remaining particularly popular among shoot 'em up fans, but what of the original game from which the others evolved?

Soon after setting out to answer this question, I started to regret it! The original Thunder Force, you see, was, as far as I can tell, only released on a selection of obscure (to Westerners) Japanese 8-bit micros like the Sharp X1, Fujitsu FM-7, NEC PC-88, NEC PC-98, etc. Being a Japanese game, this is understandable. The problem, however, is the apparent difficulty in emulating these systems! Luckily for me, the Spectrum, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, and other popular micros from my youth are easy and painless to emulate, but the same cannot be said of the Japanese micros! After many hours of searching the 'net and messing around with my PC, I was still no closer to finally playing the elusive Thunder Force! Fortuntely, help was at hand. A kind and helpful user of the Retro Gamer forum called Oli_Lar, who apparently has a great deal more experience with these systems than me, was able to provide me with emulators and roms for both the PC-88 and PC-98 versions of Thunder Force. So, thanks to this kind gent, I was finally ready to see a game I had often wondered about.

The red objects are alien ships...

Not only did playing this game represent my very first experience of an NEC PC-88, but of any Japanese computer at all! So I had no idea what I should expect. If this game is anything to go by, first impressions of the PC-88 are that it's somewhat akin to our very own ZX Spectrum. Which is no bad thing. The title screen is very basic, featuring the title over a scrolling landscape from the game. In-game graphics, on the first stage at least, consist of blue and yellow monochrome, with a few extra colours used for smaller things like alien ships and bullets, but are nicely detailed and feature little in the way of clash. Sound, however, is almost non-existent. A few little twinkle noises indicate explosions, and that's about it from what I saw (or heard).

The game's antoganists are the same as in the subsequent games in the series, namely the evil ORN Empire. In this iteration, they have been up to no good building an asteroid fortress, the Dyradeizer, with which to oppose the heroic Galaxy Federation. It's your job to take a specially designed fighter, named the Fire Leo, and disable Dyradeizer's shield generators and destroy it.

I think this is the Dyradeizer...

Although now known as a horizontally-scrolling shooter series, the Thunder Force games didn't start out like that. Sure, TF2 featured both overhead and side-viewed levels, the overhead ones were dropped for subsequent games. This game, however, features overhead levels exclusively. The looping landscape is free-roaming, and scattered liberally over it are a large number of gun emplacements. Luckily, your ship is equipped with bombs to destroy these with, as well as a standard forward shot for taking out the periodic airbourne enemies. Hidden under random ground-based guns are two shield generators. Destroying these with a well-placed bomb disables the Dyradeizer's invisibility cloak enabling you to give it a good kicking until you move onto the next stage to repeat the process.

That's about it as far as the gameplay is concerned. It's not a complicated game but it must've been pretty original back in 1984. There were a few games of a similar style around, such as Xevious, but Thunder Force has a few ideas of its own. Once you get the hang of things, it's very enjoyable and really addictive, but it's really tough going. I must've played it 20-30 times straight and the best I managed was stage two, and there are apparently 32 stages (or 'scenes')! The emphasis, as far as I played at least, is very much on the bombing of ground targets, the enemy ships buzzing around are seemingly there only to hinder your progress. When you first start playing, you'll probably lose a life for every ground target you destroy, but you'll soon develop a few techniques to prolong your game, although the fact that you start with ten lives doesn't hurt! It would be interesting to see the later levels, but judging by the difficulty increase between stages one and two alone, that seems unlikely for now! I'll keep trying though...

Thunder Force 2 was one of the first 16-bit games I ever played. I really liked it and enjoyed the variety of overhead and side-viewed levels, but I've wondered for years what the original Thunder Force would be like. I suppose I never really thought I'd actually get to play it, even via emulation, but I'm glad I did. The Thunder Force series is a great one and I'm glad to finally see where they came from. Overall, this is a really enjoyable, albeit super-difficult game, and one that I'm sure I'll return to in the future. Not sure that'll make much difference though! It's difficult for me to give a rating to this game, being the only game on its host system, or indeed any similar systems, I've played so far. It's really enjoyable (the first stage, at least!), but also really tough, so I think:

RKS Score: 6/10



Red Parsley - Thunder Force Series:
Part 1      Part 2     Part 3     Part 4     Part 5     Part 6     Part 7     Part 8     Part 9     Part 10

Top Five Lady Gaga Outfits

Every time someone like this comes along, I usually take an automatic disliking to them. I don't know why. Perhaps it's a fear of being 'one of the flock', i.e. liking things, or pretending to like things, just to be fit in or be popular, leading in turn to a natural resistance to 'cool' and 'trendy' things. More than that though, most of these trends are generally so stupid I can't understand how they became popular to start with! Often, one of the biggest indications that someone/something 'new' has come along is that crappy tabloids like The Sun start saturating coverage of them. And so it was with Lady Gaga. She'd been all over the tabloids, gossip magazines, and TV for many months before I heard any of her music, so it came as a pretty big surprise when I finally did, that she's actually pretty good!

Songs like Paparazzi, Poker Face, Bad Romance, and Just Dance are catchy and infectious numbers in themselves, but Ms Gaga isn't just about the music, oh no. She's like a one-woman circus, and, ridiculous or not, her costumes have started making bigger headlines than her music! It's strange too. Based at least partly on them, I always assumed she would be one of those loud-mouthed, obnoxious, profanity-spewing 'rock stars', but she her image apparently belies her demeanour. On a rare occasion I saw something on TV, I saw her accepting an award of some sort, and she's actually (or appears to be) a humble, softly-spoken, gracious lady. It's so annoying seeing some of these stars trying their hardest to be all 'rock & roll', so it was a nice, refreshing change to see how she is. However, those outfits of hers do defy belief sometimes. She's actually pretty attractive, but you wouldn't guess it from some of the things she wears. She must spend all of her earnings having them made! When 'researching' this Top Five, I found more than 25 costumes of hers you could at least call 'unorthodox', but here are my five favourites:

5

4 

3

2

1

That's five pretty crazy outfits! Say what you like about Lady Gaga, but she sure knows how to make a memorable appearance! Back in a day or two with my next post where I'll be starting my look at the Thunder Force series. First up: Thunder Force for the NEC PC-88...

My Favourite Games - Part 5

It's been a pretty busy last week or so here in RKS Land, so sorry for no posts for a while. I have decided in the intervening days that I should expand my Top 30 Favourite Games to a Top 50. I've simply thought of too many great games that would have to be left out of a Top 30! So, as the five games I'm posting here bring the total so far to 25, I think I'll take a break from the favourite game list for a while and try to establish some of my other planned types of posts. So, tomorrow (hopefully!), will be the first of my silly Top Five lists! In the meantime, here's the next five of my Favourite Games...

Gradius - PC Engine (1991)

Or Nemesis, to use its correct UK title, but I always preferred the Japanese name. Regardless of what you call it, no one can deny the effect it has had on the genre it helped to define. Some say it was the first shoot 'em up to feature power-ups; others claim it was the first to feature end-of-level-bosses. It certainly had unique and creative stages for such an early game. The PC Engine version is my favourite and is almost arcade-perfect. In fact, it even has a whole extra level and an awesome remixed soundtrack! For a while, the Speccy version was the only one that I'd played, and, based on that version, I steered clear of others. However, when I got it for free with my PC Engine, I figured I'd give it another try, and I'm pleased I did! Whilst very tough going, and suffering from a bit of slow-down when things get busy, it's a supremely playable shooter and features lovely crisp graphics, great music, and enough variety and hectic shooting action to keep any fan happy for a good while!

Bubble Bobble - Saturn (1996)

What more can be said about this classic? I first enjoyed this game when I received the excellent Spectrum version as a gift many moons ago. I found it really tough going but loved every minute all the same. Then, a good few years later, I got the Master System version which, for one reason or another, seemed to be quite a bit easier, and I got right to the end of the game. Maybe it was easier, maybe I was just better - it had been so long since I'd played the Speccy version it's hard to say! Then came the arcade-perfect Saturn version, bundled with Rainbow Islands, which gave me plenty of oppotunity for practise again. Since then, I've played through the game on MAME, grabbing a screenshot of each of the 100 stages in the process. Now THAT was hard! Still, it never seems to matter how hard this game is, it's always super-playable. That could be down to the highly intricate secrets, which sees bonuses and collectibles change depending on how you play, but it's most likely because it's simply such a great game. And that damn music!

Streets of Rage 2 - Mega Drive (1992)

It's testament to this game's greatness that countless Sega fans and fighting game fans alike still pine for another game in the series after all these years! It's little wonder too. I remember when the first SOR game came out - it was a revelation, intended to rival Capcoms Final Fight on the recently released SNES, but in the mind of many it was superior. After such a groundbreaking first game, I for one wasn't expecting a great deal from the sequel. But, as we all now know, it was amazing! Bigger, better graphics, another fantastic soundtrack by Yuzo Koshiro, more playable characters (including the lovely Blaze once again!), and an even larger game to play though. SOR2 is still counted among the greatest games of its type, and universally revered, and it's easy to see why.

Street Fighter 3: Third Strike - Dreamcast (1999)

Capcom sure took their sweet time with this! A lot of years, and countless variations of SF2 passed before it finally arrived. I haven't played either of the previous versions of SF3, but if this DC version is anything to go by, they'll certainly be passable! The character roster in this game is arguably less appealing (though also less sterotyped) than the fighters in the great SF2, but their nuances also take longer to learn, not to mention master, and be mastered they must, for this is a pretty tough game! I can just about finish it on default difficulty using the ever-reliable Ryu (now complete with a ruling new side-kick), although the final boss character, Gill, is a right bunghole! Various intricate new features also arrived with this sequel of the kind that I have trouble mastering, such as the much-praised 'parrying' system, but even if you're as crap as me, you'll still find a lot of hyper-fighting action here!

The New Zealand Story - Mega Drive (1990)

This is another one I first played on the Speccy. I still recall the time I was having a really good session one morning before school, so I paused it (using my fancy Multiface 3) so I could resume when I got home, only there was a big storm which caused a powercut! Grrrr! Anyway, a few years later, I was lucky enough to obtain this awesome Japan-only MD version from my friend Stu and his brother Darren. The first thing that struck me about it was that the levels were different! I'm still not sure why, actually, but I've played this version so many times now, I almost can't remember what the original level designs were! Anyway, I guess it doesn't matter too much. The key ingredient with games like this is the gameplay and addictiveness, and NZS has both in abundance! As Stu will testify, it can be a damn tough game, but it's also among Taito's most playable.

Yeay! :) I finally finished the next post! It's taken me a while due to certain unforeseen circumstances, but hopefully a more regular posting service will resume now! Next time, I'll try something a bit different and resume the Top 30 (now the Top 50!) another time...