Scrolling Fighting Games #16

Rival Turf a.k.a. Rushing Beat (1992)
By: Jaleco Genre: Fighting Players: 1-2 Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES Also Available For: Nothing
Download For: Nintendo Virtual Console

There are many reasons old games may be remembered today - being great, being crap, doing something new, costing a bomb to buy now, etc. In the case of Rival Turf, is was (and is) for having hilariously bad cover artwork (the US version, of course, the Japanese one is pretty decent). Actually, 'artwork' is the wrong word as it's actually just a photo of two normal guys who are presumably meant to be badass gang members or something, but they just look like two typical 90s youths. Nonetheless, the backstory is the usual rival gang/kidnapped girlfriend business, and there are two characters you can choose from - Jack Flak who seems to be just some regular dude who can't protect his girlfriend, and his cop buddy Oozie Nelson who apparently has no qualms about putting his career/pension on the line to help Jack. Pick either one of them (or both in a two-player game) and proceed to kick the crap out of all the hoodlums that stand between them and the creatively-named Big Al who is currently enjoying Heather's no-doubt radiant company. And boobs too. Possibly.

Bomberman Series - Part 15

Super Bomberman 2 (1994)
By: Hudson Soft  Genre: Maze  Players: 1-4  Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES  First Day Score: 38,500
Also Available For: Nothing

I was a big fan of Bomberman right from the first game of his that I played, namely Super Bomberman for the SNES, so it was a significant surprise when I found out years later that there ended up being four more games in the series! The fourth and fifth games were only released in Japan so I kind of have an excuse there, but the second and third ones? How did I not hear about them? I blame the pesky magazines of the day which must have failed to cover them. Yes, that must be it. Hmm, anyway, this of course means I've never played this particular Bomberman game before, nor any later games in the SNES/SFC series, which makes them among the few games in the traditional style I've not played. Happily, things looked very familiar from the moment I started it. There is of course a silly backstory to facilitate the action, this time involving the 'Five Dastardly Bombers' who apparently want to take over the universe - an ambition that has prompted them to take over five worlds.

Must Learn Japanese #2

Zig Zag Cat (1994)
By: Suntory / Den'Z Genre: Bat 'n' Ball Players: 1 Difficulty: Hard
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES First Day Score: ???,???
Also Available For: Nothing

ZIG-AH! ZAG-AH! CAT-OH!!

While it's true there's only so much you can do with the bat 'n' ball (or 'brickbreaker' if you prefer) genre, there have certainly been some interesting attempts to breathe a bit of life and originality into them over these long years. This one is a rather obscure example, to Western gamers at least, not least because was it a Super Famicom exclusive, but it was also a late release meaning many players, even in Japan, may have missed it. It's also one of those really weird games that probably wouldn't have received an overseas release anyway! Lord only knows what the backstory is about (for there is indeed one) but you play as a young boy who has a pet cat - a cat that apparently has shape-shifting abilities! As most of us would probably do if we found ourselves with the companionship of a shape-shifting pet, this boy makes use of his unique cat (who we'll call Rex and Freep respectively for the purposes of this review) by having him turn into a ball who he then hits with his green bat into an apparently-invading octopus horde. Obviously.

New Arrival - SNES Classic Mini

I suppose it's a bit ironic that, out of all these trendy 'mini' consoles that have been doing the rounds recently, the only one I've covered here at Red Parsley prior to its release has been the PS1 Classic... which has gone on to be the only one to receive almost universally bad reviews from critics and owners. It's a shame really, as it does look like a nice piece of kit. The mini consoles to have earned the most attention and many positive reviews, however, have been the Nintendo ones.

While admiring both from afar, I'm not sure I ever expected to own one of them, especially given the startling prices they had started fetching almost straight after their respective launches thanks to the dastardly scalpers. Happily, things seemed to calm down eventually, but even the fairly-reasonable £70 RRP was a little high for me at the end of a financially challenging year. As it turned out, I needn't have worried, for Santa Claus had a very jolly surprise in store for me (no, not that sort of surprise - groo!). Actually, there's a chance it might've been my wife rather than that porky, mince-pie-eating oaf, but it matters not. What matters is that my Christmas morning was made all the more joyful that it might otherwise have been when I discovered the very SNES Classic Mini pictured here under my tree!

Top Five Mode 7 Games

I think we can safely assume the Super Famicom/SNES would've been a big success no matter what it was like - the overwhelming dominance of its predecessor in most territories guaranteed that - but that didn't stop Nintendo from kitting it out with a few bits of special new tech that might end up converting a good few non-believers as well. Undoubtedly the most impressive of these was its 'Mode 7' graphics which even managed to tempt me into a brief foray into Nintendoville from the long-held safety and comfort of my firmly established home in Sega Land.

Many games featured the odd use of Mode 7 here and there, from the new system's launch right up until its demise. Often it was just used for scaley special effects as with Contra 3, Super Aleste, and Super Mario World, while a certain few other games had Mode 7 sections like the vertical stages in Axelay, several stages in the splendid Super Star Wars series, the mine-cart stage of Super Mario RPG, or the overworld areas of various RPG's, and it worked very well, but where I've focused my attention for the purposes of this post is on games that were based around Mode 7 as a whole. There were a few of these and most were racing games. This makes perfect sense of course, as the scaling abilities of Mode 7 were ideally suited to such a genre - simply draw a road in 2D, flip it over, and scroll it really fast! It seemed like a revolutionary step in home racing games but, surprisingly, it wasn't used as much as you might expect. Nonetheless, I've still enjoyed several such games, and have discovered a few previously unknown ones since starting this post as well! Here's a look at the best ones in my view, but which was your fave?

Simulation Games #1

Pilotwings (1990)
By: Nintendo EAD Genre: Simulation Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES First Day Score: ???
Also Available For: Nothing

Despite playing the crap out of my SNES in my younger years I never really had that many games for it. One of the classics I kept meaning to get around to playing at the time, and in the intervening years as well, was Pilotwings but for one reason or another I didn't actually manage it until recently. Better late than never, I usually think in these cases, but I wasn't so sure here. Pilotwings was after all a flag-waving advert for the SNES's famed Mode 7, an early attempt at producing 3D graphics on home systems, and most early attempts at anything in games don't tend to age very well. Then again, F-Zero still kicks arse so hope remains while the company is good. It's also a game notable for it's almost total lack of violence. Okay, you can crash stuff but you can't shoot and certainly can't kill anything, with your objectives simply being to fly stuff well. I guess that makes Pilotwings a simulation game, albeit in a unashamedly arcadey way. It was a bit of a rare and precious gem all round for console gamers then.

F-Zero Series - Part 9

Well, it's been a few years now since I last took a look at the F-Zero series here at Red Parsley, mainly because I've already covered every instalment, but I still enjoy playing each of them to one degree or another. The Nintendo 64 game is without question my favourite but few gamers would argue that it was the SNES original that had the biggest impact, and for those of us that grew up with it, every corner of every course is consigned to memory. Despite that, I still fancied revisiting them and thought it might be worth taking a closer look at all of them. Therefore, whether it stands to cause pangs of nostalgia, or perhaps even give new insight into a game you (somehow) knew little about, here are the courses of F-Zero...

Knight League - Mute City I

This much-visited location, presumably the location of the F-Zero league head-quarters, is the 'biggest city on all the Space Federation Planets' and is where each of the three leagues start. Its first course is obviously the simplest, featuring nothing trickier than a right-angle turn, a ramp which might send an inexperienced racer over the edge of the course, and a hairpin to round off the lap, but overall Mute City shouldn't cause any problems on even the highest difficulty level...

SNES Shmups #5

Super Aleste a.k.a. Space Megaforce (1992)
By: Compile / Toho Genre: Shooting Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES First Day Score: 4,440,470
Also Available For: Nothing

I've liked shmups pretty much ever since I've liked video games. One of the first I really got into was a vertical-scroller called Power Strike and it was my favourite for a long time. So much so, in fact, that it wasn't until quite a few years later that I found a similar game I liked as much. That game was, believe it or not, Super Aleste which, as it turned out even more years later, was a sequel (of sorts) to my old friend Power Strike which I had discovered was better known to some as... Aleste! Indeed, like the first entry in the series, this SNES-exclusive came with an alternative name too, this time for American gamers who know it as Space Megaforce (why do they so often choose such generic names?) but for me it was the first Aleste game to (knowingly) grace my bedroom and it was... pretty good! I guess I'm getting a bit ahead of myself now though, this is supposed to be a review after all!

Bomberman Series - Part 12

Super Bomberman (1993)
By: Hudson Soft  Genre: Maze  Players: 1-4  Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES  First Day Score: 138,700
Also Available For: Nothing

Growing up as a gamer here in the UK came with a few benefits but it also had its drawbacks. The MSX and NES weren't popular here and we didn't even get the PC Engine at all, so the first time many of us were able to sample the delights offered by Bomberman and his fine games was with this release on the SNES. It was initially launched just a few months after Bomberman '93 which was quite comfortably the best game of the series up to that point, but could the introduction of a new format continue its gradual evolution? I guess we'll see about that later but one thing it did do was introduce a new bad guy in 'the evil Carat Diamond and his cohort, scientist Dr. Mook' who want to steal Bomberman's advanced combat capabilities for use in their special Robot Tournament. Black Bomberman has apparently reformed his character and attempts to stop the diabolical plan but is captured while doing so. Somehow he escapes and warns White Bomberman just as wave upon wave of enemy robots begin their advance toward Peace Town, the home of both antenna-wagglers.

SNES Platform Games #5

Magical Pop'n (1995)
By: Polestar / Pack-in-Video Genre: Platform Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES
Also Available For: Nothing

Cute platformers have always been among my favourite types of game so I'm always very pleased to find another one, and this is one I knew little of until recently. It was released towards the end of the Super Famicom's life, only in Japan, and stars a young girl known as 'Princess'. Surprisingly, she actually is a princess, and apparently a rather 'energetic' one too, and her quest is a seemingly simple-yet-arduous one - all she needs to do is retrieve 'The Magic Gem' from the ghastly Demon King who has snatched it, intending to harness its incredible power and bring an end to the era of peace enjoyed by the happy people of To'ahl. The trouble is, it and he lie six long stages away. After leaping out of a high castle window in pursuit of the (probably) self-proclaimed King (and apparently being none the worse from her fall), Princess sets out after him, but her progress is unsurprisingly slowed by the many monsters and idiotic creatures that stand in her way.

SNES Driving / Racing Games #3

Uchuu Race: Astro Go! Go! (1994)
By: Meldac / Kaze Genre: Racing  Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES
Also Available For: Nothing

I think it's safe to say by now that even occasional visitors to Red Parsley will be well aware of my appreciation of Nintendo's stonking F-Zero series. I'm therefore quite flabbergasted that the existence of this catchily-named game only just reached me this very week. The reason for my surprise, in case you hadn't already guessed, is that it's a game that has more than a little in common with the classic series, and in particular its SNES debut. It actually appears to have been directly based on Nintendo's game as far as its visual style is concerned but it doesn't take long to realise that it's quite a bit weirder than its source of inspiration too. Lord only knows what the back-story could be - the game is a Japanese exclusive (although a US version was planned) so I don't have the luxury of reading the instructions - but the first thing I thought of while exploring it was... F-Zero meets Fantasy Zone! That automatically sounds like the greatest thing ever, so let's hope for the best.

Gaming Memories - Part 13

The early 90's were probably when we saw Sega at the height of their powers. Their splendid Master System was a big success here in the UK (and Brazil) but a failure everywhere else. The release of the mighty MegaDrive, however saw their success duplicated in all regions of the gaming world. It was a fantastic machine to be sure, but it didn't even have any serious competition either. That was, until Nintendo's long-awaited successor to the elderly NES arrived...

Being a Sega fanboy, basking in the dominance of the MegaDrive, I sneered at the first pics to appear of the Super Famicom and laughed most heartily at the hideous US SNES. Then, when reports began to emerge of its under-powered CPU which could only limp along at 3.5MHz, I openly mocked the pitiful grey slab. This poor performance often resulted in some major slow-down in games and was a joke compared to the MegaDrive. Even the secondary processor ran at 3.5MHz in Sega's machine with its main power plant running at almost 8MHz! It wasn't long before shots from games started appearing as well, and they did little to sway my allegiance. A new Mario game? Okay, but it doesn't look much better than the NES games. Sim City? Old PC game, blah, blah. Gradius 3? Not bad but the MD has plenty of decent horizontal shmups. Super Tennis? They'll need to do better than a tennis game to defeat Sega! But then, after the UK launch had been and gone, I saw some footage of F-Zero and Pilot Wings in shop windows. Convincing 3D graphics? What the devil? These games looked much more interesting and were of a type the MegaDrive, and indeed most previous systems, did not excel at.

Must Learn Japanese! #1

Hyper Battle Game: Zen-Nippon GT Senshuken (1995)
By: Banpresto / Kaneko Genre: Overhead Racing Players: 1 Difficulty: Hard
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES
Also Available For: Nothing

One of the things I like most about writing this blog is when I discover an uncommon, obscure game that I'd previously never heard of which turns out to be awesome. More often than not these 'surprise' titles tend to be one of the many that were released only in Japan. Of course, in these cases it can sometimes be difficult for me to find out if they're awesome or not owing to their understandable-but-inconvenient use of Japanese writing. Some genres such as RPG's are always a no-go but with most others it seems to be pot luck. It doesn't present a problem in some cases, and other times English text is even used for some reason, but every now and then I encounter a game like Zen-Nippon GT Senshuken (which means 'All-Japan GT Championship' if you're interested). I can't even remember how I first discovered it now but its screenshots revealed it to be a pretty sweet looking overhead racer - a genre I'm rather keen on - so I had to check it out. Upon doing so, however, I found it to be riddled with tonnes of menu screens in... you guessed it, Japanese!

SNES Shmups #4

Flying Hero (1992)
By: Sofel Genre: Shooting Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES First Day Score: 128,300
Also Available For: Nothing

The surprisingly extensive and very often crazy world of Japanese gaming continues to send surprises my way. The latest example is the ultra-peculiar Flying Hero which, whether good or bad, would surely have caught my eye had it ever passed before it. If it had done I expect my reaction would've been similar to the one I had this past week when I did start playing it - largely one of bemusement! I couldn't tell you what the story involves, although judging by a short intro sequence it seems that some female creature has been kidnapped by some evil creature or some such nonsense, but it does mean the 'hero' of the title springing into action. I'm not quite sure what he is - he looks like a cross between Kirby and Opa Opa to me - but he seems cheerful enough considering the tragedy that has apparently befallen him which leaves him with eight vertically-scrolling levels to battle through. Who is brave enough to guide him to what I can only assume is his loved one?

Pinball Games #1

Battle Pinball (1995)
By: Banpresto  Genre: Pinball  Players: 1  Difficulty: Easy-Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES  First Day Score: 601,910
Also Available For: Nothing

Have you ever found a particular genre of something ruined for you by its finest example being so superior to all other examples? This happened to me with sci-fi TV shows - I'm a big Babylon 5 fan but it's so good that most other sci-fi seems crap in comparison and my ability to further enjoy the genre diminished. The same sort of thing happened to me a little earlier than this with video games too, or more specifically, pinball video games. Having discovered the Crush series only a few years after getting into gaming to begin with, the supreme awesomeness of the games in question greatly reduced the appeal of pretty much all other examples. Therefore, to this day, almost the only pinball videogames I've played have been Crush-related ones. This kind of closed-mindedness won't do here at Red Parsley though, so I've decided to start looking at a selection of alternatives. The first one I've chosen, based purely on the splendid cover-art I accidentally found, is Battle Pinball which is apparently part of a sizeable series itself.

SNES Platform Games #4

Mr. Nutz (1993)
By: Ocean Genre: Platform Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES First Day Score: 75,630
Also Available For: MegaDrive, Game Boy, Game Boy Color

As far back as their very earliest days, most platform games have been based around a hopefully-appealing character, and after the success of Sonic many of these characters were cutesy anthropomorphic animals as you might expect. This particular game, which was first released on the SNES before receiving ports to the MD and GB, was one of many that featured such a character. He's called Mr. Nutz, he's a squirrel, and there's not really anything exceptional about him. Indeed, immediate impressions of the game are that it's nothing more than a generic bandwagon-jumper-onner. Even the story is rather yawnsome - apparently an evil yeti called Mr. Blizzard is trying to take over the world by freezing it. Mr. Nutz's mission is to stop him. Via some unspecified means. That's it! So, with an unspectacular (albeit cute, as was necessary at the time) main character and a story so uninspiring that I feel embarrassed using that word to describe it, the game has got its work cut out if it's going to impress anyone.

SNES Driving / Racing Games #2

Top Gear a.k.a. Top Racer (1992)
By: Gremlin Graphics / Kemco Genre: Racing  Players: 1-2 Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES
Also Available For: Nothing

There were many reasons that gamers of the world were excited about the arrival of the SNES but one of the main ones was the ultra-hyped Mode 7 graphics trickery. We were told it would revolutionise 3D gaming, or at least games that appeared to be 3D thanks to the wizardry it would offer. The greatest benefactor of this was the driving/racing genre - titles such as F-Zero immediately showed what was possible, so it was very strange that it wasn't used by more developers. A great example of this is Top Gear, a seemingly new game exclusive to Nintendo's new machine, but one which had its roots firmly planted in the dark and gloomy world of systems bereft of Mode 7 splendour. Indeed, as the keen-eyed among you may have already spotted, Top Gear is a direct descendent of celebrated Amiga series, Lotus Turbo Challenge. This was probably not what expectant Nintendo fans had in mind prior to the system's launch.

SNES Platform Games #3

Hagane: The Final Conflict (1994)
By: Red Entertainment / Hudson Soft Genre: Platform/Fighting Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES First Day Score: 23,970
Also Available For: Nothing

Like many systems, the poor old SNES saw a lot of decent games released near the end of its lifespan which were missed by many gamers with the eyes on the next generation of consoles. I took a look at one of these in the last post for this feature and, like that game, Hagane is another one I knew almost nothing of until many years later. If I told you it's a game featuring lots of ninjas and rival warrior clans you'd be forgiven for thinking it was set many hundreds of years ago, but this ninja game is a little different. There are two main clans - the Fuma and the Koma, both of whom have mastered various mysterious and magical arts, but one of whom is of course evil. The object of their desire is the Holy Grail which has "a power that can destroy the world". I'm not sure how it made it to Japan, nor why the Koma clan should seek to use it to destroy the world - surely if they did that, it would take them with it? Oh well, nit-picking aside, it's time to cower in fear as they've managed to half-inch it from its guardians, the Fuma clan!

SNES Platform Games #2

Skyblazer (1994)
By: Ukiyotei / Sony Imagesoft Genre: Platform Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES
Also Available For: Nothing

The arrival of the monstrous 32-bit consoles in the mid 90's may have brought lots of flashy polygons and lighting effects with them but something else their arrival did was to overshadow a good few of the later releases for the trusty 16-bit machines, and among them was this offering from Sony which must surely have been one of the last games they made for someone else's console. It takes the form of a platform/adventure game and is actually pretty flashy itself which is just as well since its story is not. It's an adventure that sees you take the role of a young scamp named Sky, believe or not, which presumably means his adventure will take the form of a 'blaze' across the magical kingdom in which he lives; a magical kingdom, incidentally, which is now bereft of its princess, Ariana, who has been kidnapped by the nefarious 'Lord of War', Ashura, who intends to use her magical properties to summon Raglan, an ancient creature of unspeakable terror. The story gets a little more detailed with the odd piece of dialogue here and there but the basic objective is - rescue Ariana and smack Ashura upside the head!

SNES Shmups #3

Strike Gunner S.T.G. (1992)
By: Athena / Tecmo Genre: Shooting Players: 1-2 Difficulty: Mediumd
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES First Day Score: I don't know, it doesn't give you a chance to record it!
Also Available For: Arcade

Since I started writing this blog it has served two main purposes. The first has been to stir some of my many fond memories of the games and systems I played while I was growing up. The other is to introduce me to titles I missed for whatever reason the first time around. The time I've spent playing Strike Gunner over the last couple of weeks has done a little of both. I have a vague recollection of it receiving very little attention in magazines of the day, maybe the odd unenthusiastic review in the corner of a page, so it went under the radar of most SNES gamers, including me. I can't even remember what brought it back to my attention just recently but I went in expecting little. Shoot 'em ups were ten a penny on the 16-bit consoles after all, so if this one was much good, we'd have all heard about it long ago, surely?