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CHRISTMAS BONUS UPDATE: Karnov's Revenge: Fighter's History Dynamite

SPECIAL SUPER CHRISTMAS BONUS UPDATE TURBO:

KARNOV'S REVENGE: FIGHTER'S HISTORY DYNAMITE

Neo Geo, 1994

It's about time for the holidays, so who better to help us celebrate than the most beloved jolly fat man in videogames?  Everybody knows Santa Claus exists, and if we're not careful, he'll break into your house, take all his clothes off, and force you to turn on late-night Cinemax movies for him if you've been staying up like a bad little boy or girl, inhaling any and all food in the house and stealing your TV upon leaving.  At least, I think that was Santa Claus.  It could have just been some disgustingly fat crazy guy in a Santa hat.  That might explain the nudity.  But that's not important.  What IS important is that we're not talking about Santa Claus here.  No, this videogame icon may be fat and like to wear red, but he's usually just naked from the waist up.  That's right, I'm talking about everyone's favorite fire-breathing Russian, Karnov.

Karnov sort of disappeared for a while after his own game and his stint in Bad Dudes, where he decided out of the blue to help ninjas kidnap the president.  Some of you might have thought he disappeared entirely.  But did you know he was in another Data East game in 1994?  We can thank the arcades and the Neo Geo for bringing him back in Karnov's Revenge: Fighter's History Dynamite.

There's no Yoga in that flame.  All Karnov has in his gut is butter and vodka.

The mid-'90s were some of the most stagnant years I've ever witnessed in gaming history.  Virtually every other new game released in the arcades was a one-on-one fighting game, and rarely did the formula stray from the standard round system, control scheme, and strategy of the Street Fighter II games.  It didn't help matters much that Street Fighter II, the game that revolutionized and jumpstarted the genre, seemed to run out of ideas, and instead of giving us something new, it just kept getting incrementally updated over the course of about 5 years.  So, logically, that meant other developers would follow suit.  With some very minor exceptions, such as Mortal Kombat and Samurai Shodown, we not only got to see the same Street Fighter II games over and over, but also lots of imitators that didn't bother adjusting the gameplay, special moves, or even character designs.  The worst culprits of this crime were probably the developers at Data East, who decided to make a game so similar to Street Fighter II, they got sued by Capcom.  That game was Fighter's History.  Released in 1993, Fighter's History was a fighting game with mostly the same moves, controls, and even characters as Street Fighter II.  Every special move consisted of the same down to forward motions, direction charging, and rapid taps as Street Fighter II.  It had 9 selectable characters.  Even some of the names of moves were similar, like the Tiger Knee.  Still, it's not like Fighter's History was the only game that did this.  Capcom could have just had their president or whoever else was in charge close their eyes, make a pointing gesture, and pick the name of a developer written on a piece of paper and called a lawyer.  But guess what?  It's a good thing Data East was able to continue making games in the series, because the next installment gave us a character we haven't seen since his appearance in Bad Dudes vs. Dragonninja: the NES equivalent of Santa Claus himself, Karnov.

The 1994 installment, Karnov's Revenge: Fighter's History Dynamite, was clearly different.  You see that move Karnov's doing?  You think that's similar to Dhalsim's Yoga Flame?  Well fuck you.  It's totally different, because Karnov's doing it.  He was breathing fire before any starving Indian guy thought it would be cool to do in a game.  Besides, I never saw Dhalsim try blowing fire in a Tyrannosaurus Rex's face, either.  Let's see Capcom's lawyers argue through the T-Rex defense.  Don't even try to compare Mizoguchi to Ryu.  He's not wearing a shirt.  The defense rests.

Karnov's the only dude bad enough to wear gold chains to a street fight.

The gameplay consists of one on one fighting, best 2 of 3 rounds, and success depends on mastery of combinations and special moves, which is totally different from Street Fighter II, because Karnov's in it.  There are 13 characters to choose from, including a clown, a Muay Thai kickboxer, some karate guys and gals, a rocker named Matlock (which means it is crucial that they make this game into a movie relatively soon, before Andy Griffith dies), and Karnov.  The music is generic arcade fighting game fare, and not particularly memorable, but not too bad.  The controls are solid; every non-Street Fighter II-like down to forward motion, charge move, and combination can be pulled off with ease.  The graphics kick Street Fighter II's butt all over the place, because they feature Karnov, and he wears gold chains.  One new idea this game included is "weak spots" that can be exposed via flashing articles of clothing or accessories on a particular character, and these vary from high to middle to low points on each fighter.  I never saw Street Fighter II try that.  Maybe because it's a stupid idea.

I admit the game is sort of generic, devoid of any real innovation, and is essentially the same thing you've played for years, but this one will grow on  you, kind of like fungus or some sort of deadly cancer.  You know, the fun kind of deadly cancer, where you're only mildly debilitated for the rest of your short life but you get to take time off of work for the surgery.  My instincts tell me to tell you to avoid this one, but my heart tells me to tell you to go find it.  Besides, I don't want to piss Karnov off, because skin grafts can be painful.  Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to prepare for Santa's visit in a few days, and I need to nail the VCR to the cabinet.  We have dirty movies to watch.

NOTE: Karnov wishes everyone a Merry Christmas (which happens to be his birthday), and for you to buy him some vodka on your way out.  He's been unemployed for years, and he's a little low on the money front.  If you have a lighter or torch, he'll show you a cool trick.

Let that be a lesson to all of you.

12-21-06: SENGOKU 3

Neo Geo, 2001

11 years after the Neo Geo was released in 1990, much of its content and gameplay has remained unapologetically unchanged.  The console and arcade cabinets have been featuring side-scrolling action, single-screen puzzles, and one-on-one fighting games since its inception.  What's truly amazing about it, however, is that its games have steadily improved over all these years.  Typically, creating games with the same concept and formula over and over makes for stagnating gameplay and a bleak future for a particular genre.  But somehow, games on the Neo Geo have managed to be somewhat exempt from this rule.  Such was the case with Sengoku 3, a sequel to an innovative series that has only gotten better with time.

This third installment in the series, released in 2001, was the first developed by Noise Factory instead of SNK, and made some changes from the gameplay of the previous 2 games.  The first 2 Sengoku games were side-scrolling beat-em up games where your character could collect certain power-ups and not only become stronger and collect weapons, but also have the ability to transform into more powerful, completely different fighters.  Sengoku 3 departed from this idea, instead giving you the option to play as 4 warriors: Kagetsura, a one-eyed ninja with a katana sword; Kongoh, your traditional big man; Falcon, a blond guy with a shortsword; and Kurenai, a female ninja.  Together, they do what you've been used to since the late '80s: walking to the side while beating up everybody on the screen for six or so stages.

Kongoh's got a zombie's throat in one hand and a giant club in the other.  That could only mean brutality.

Much like the previous installments, the story involves the resurrection of some evil force from  Japanese lore necessitating your endless assault of undead guys with weapons.  However, walking to the left or right while tapping the attack buttons has never been so deep in strategy as it is in this game.  Sengoku 3 utilizes all four buttons: you can swing your weapon, use your bare hands, jump, and throw projectiles you might find, such as throwing stars or bombs.  You can create some extremely long and devastating combinations by alternating your attacks if you can manage to keep from being hit from behind.  You can also perform several special attacks, such as superplexes, piledrivers, rushing attacks, and weapon throws, as well as a super special move that hits everything on the screen.  How well you balance your attacks and plan your strategy of destroying everything around you will dictate whether or not you'll need to take out a loan and convert the cash to quarters.

As the game progresses, you'll eventually enlist the help of 2 additional allies: Okuni, another female ninja armed with fans and huge tits; and Byakki, an extremely balanced and effective ninja master with a spiked boomerang-style weapon and the ability to summon a demon to deal loads of damage to the enemy.  You'll be fighting in three initial stages, of which you have the convenience of choosing the order for yourself: China, Italy, and Japan.  After tackling those, you'll have to conquer the enemy in Brazil, U.S.A., and finally Kyoto.  The difficulty curve will get quite steep after Japan, so practice makes perfect.

The guy's name is Evil.  It's not every day you can be totally clear about somebody's allegiance and motives.

The music in this game is as good as I've ever heard.  Every single track is catchy, with orchestral quality and a distinctly Japanese flavor.  It's upbeat enough to keep you going hard for the length of the game, but becomes eerie towards the very end.  The graphics are solid and some of the best I've seen on the Neo Geo, and that should say a lot.  Animation is smooth, and every slam, slice, and explosion is intricately detailed.

Sengoku 3 is, without question, one of the best games I have ever played.  It's got enough gameplay options, characters, and strategy to keep you thinking and fighting at the same time.  It's also extremely challenging.  If you want to see every scene of this nearly perfect game, make sure to skip some car or mortgage payments to keep the quarters flowing.  More likely, I'd suggest downloading it.  Even if you disagree with the idea of emulation, you're not going to find a better game than this on any of the newly-arrived consoles.  Go find it.

Evil and his minions stop in their tracks.  The old "I just happen to have dropped a quarter" trick works again.

12-11-06: RAIDEN

Arcade, 1990

At this point, there are all sorts of genres to choose from in gaming.  A lot of them have gotten extremely well-developed to the point of being overly complicated.  There are military strategy games that have you command remote armies in real time, role-playing games that feature orchestral music and voice-overs, and even life simulators where you can pretend to lay on the couch while in reality commanding a character from a computer, wondering why in the hell you're not doing this yourself.  But there are some genres that developers can do little with but to keep them as simple as they were when they were first conceived.  This is the inherent beauty in the space shooter.

It's a genre that has stayed true to its roots since the beginning, with games like Defender and Space Invaders.  Over time, we've gotten hundreds of these over the lifespan of every console from the Atari to the current generation.  You could probably find these all over the arcades if you look hard enough, and they usually don't deviate from the typical formula.  You might come to the conclusion that they're a dime a dozen, which is why I decided to pick a title out from the pile and take a closer look.  This week's induction is one of my favorites in the genre, Raiden.

It's made by Seibu Kaihatsu, which translates into "BLOW SHIT UP FOREVER."

Raiden is one of about a million vertical scrolling space shooters developed by Seibu Kaihatsu.  Released by Fabtek, Raiden has you controlling a small ship that flys slowly upwards for eight repeating stages.  A second player can join in the destruction, and the object of the game is to stay alive and kill the enemy, usually for several minutes until a big boss shows up that shoots just about everywhere, virtually guaranteeing your demise unless you figure out safe spots or use bombs.

This is where the story comes into play.  The wonderful thing about these games, especially in the arcade, is that they seldom attempt to provide any semblance of a plot or motivation to win.  This is definitely the case with Raiden.  Why are you shooting at everything?  I suppose the obvious answer is because everything is shooting at you.  Since much of the game takes place in outer space, you can only assume you're killing aliens.  But what's your motivation in killing?  Are you killing hostile aliens?  You can never be sure.  Perhaps aliens kidnapped your girlfriend.  Maybe the pilot of your ship IS a girl; that's no reach in witnessing every anime plot ever hatched.  Maybe aliens stole your collection of adult videos, and you want revenge and just happen to pilot a killing machine.  Stupid asshole aliens.  You don't even know these are bad aliens, but you sure as hell know they want YOU dead for one reason or another.  In fact, you can't even be sure these are aliens.  Maybe they're an army of freedom fighters, and they have to band together to stop you, the oppressive one-man wrecking crew.  Just make up something to suit your tastes.  It's kind of like reading a book!  You have to envision things yourself!

So what can you do to enhance the death dealing process?  Well, there are 2 primary color-coded power-ups: BLUE gives you a steady, straight laser beam, and the more you collect in this color, the wider and more powerful your beam will become.  RED gives you more bullets, and the more you collect, the more they spread out over the screen, covering more ground and reaching far-away enemies.  There are also missiles to add to your arsenal, with GREEN "M"s giving you homing missiles and YELLOW "M"s giving you more powerful straight missiles.  If you can manage to fully power-up GREEN and RED for your ship, very little will avoid your line of fire.  There are also bombs you can use to cover yourself in tight situations and deal heavy damage to bosses, although these are somewhat slow in launching.  Unfortunately, unlike many other games in this genre, there are no speed boosts, meaning you need to get somewhere quickly and predict your predicament if you want to avoid becoming chunks of flesh flying everywhere along with your wreckage.

This game, like all Seibu Kaihatsu developed games, features some of the most generic yet strangely upbeat and memorable music in gaming.  There are only four main tracks, and they each repeat once to cover eight stages, but most of them stay in your head if you can hear it over the explosions and shooting, which sound relatively authentic to what you might hear in the movies. 

Luckily, this game was converted to the SNES and Genesis as Raiden Trad, although the sounds on those versions took quite a hit and they use checkpoints after you die, unlike the arcade original.  If you have to choose between them, I'd highly recommend the Genesis version, as the action unfolds much faster and smoother, without too much slowdown.  However, there's no substitute for the original.  These games are unquestionably an acquired taste, so if you like to be in a perpetual panic for about a half hour, Raiden is a viable option.  Go find it.

Red ship and Blue ship have their orders.  Which are... something.  Kill, I guess.

12-4-06: REMOTE CONTROL

NES, 1990

Unfortunately, Kari Wuhrer is nowhere to be found in this game, nude or otherwise.

Think about just how many awesome games were released in 1990 for a second.  Think about the NES alone.  Ninja Gaiden II.  Super Mario Bros. 3.  Mega Man III.  The Neo-Geo was also released that year.  The point is that there were numerous classics released in 1990, especially for the NES.  Of course, we didn't expect anything less, since 1989 was arguably the best year ever for video games.  But in 1989, there was evil brewing.  In some dark tower, a sinister force was converting the raw evil energy gained from strangling puppies and kicking little girls into one concentrated form, ready for mass production.  But this force was kept locked in Pandora's Box until 1990, at least for NES owners.  The perpetrators of this heinous act were none other than MTV, and their first assault on everything good and pure came to be known as Remote Control for the NES.

Satan's first move in Armageddon.

You might remember Remote Control when it was a game show on MTV that ran from 1987 to 1990.  I could definitely argue that a TV trivia-based game show had nothing to do with music, and that this was around the time when MTV grabbed the music industry with both hands and started tearing it apart like it was Christmas.  But the real question is: how could one person, let alone a group of game developers, possibly conceive the notion to create a video game based on a low-brow game show and expect anyone, especially the MTV demographic, to buy it?  Well, apparently the folks at RSP thought they could pull it off.  Eventually, after this Frankenstein horror was finished, it was released to the public by Hi-Tech.  Great name, huh?  Check out how high-tech (another term for "shitty") it really is:

Don't bitch too much about the graphics; this is pretty representative of the actual set.

I shouldn't attack the show too much, though.  After all, it was pretty entertaining for the time, was low-brow enough for the teenage demographic and genius monkeys to follow, and had an extremely attractive hostess in Kari Wuhrer, who went on to do Sliders and some of those softcore adult movies you might see on Cinemax.  It was also somewhat of a launch pad for the careers of Colin Quinn and Adam Sandler.  But this is the god damned NES game.  None of those people appear in the game, and even the host is some guy who looks nothing like the main host.  I should probably point out that it does feature the theme music.  Over and over, throughout the game, using the most primitive of NES instruments.  Now, what was the name of the bald captain in Star Trek: The Next Generation?  That should give you an idea of the extent of the incredibly deep and complex game play.

That was a pretty clever line, buddy.  Now quit using it on me over and over, or I'll punch you.

Much like the show, it's a pretty laid back atmosphere.  Everybody's on those big, comfortable seats, including the guy with the sunglasses who I don't remember from the show at all.  The questions are pretty easy, since it's all basic stuff about really popular shows.  If you get one wrong, one of the other guys will end up getting points, since there are three options, and most of the time there's only one pick left by the time the second guy misses the other option.  The most annoying thing is actually getting a question right, because the host will probably come up with a clever line about your intelligence, like "OOOH, GOOD ANSWER!  DID YOU SKIP A LOT OF SCHOOL AS A KID?"  That's some quick wit there, except when he asks you the same thing the next time you get a question right.  Then again.  And again.  He seems to have only about 3 or 4 witty snaps, but uses one of them 98 percent of the time.  It's like they replaced the old host with a malfunctioning robot with a striped shirt and light-colored hair.  That's not the only difference from the show, however.  Unlike its TV counterpart that pulls the losers into the wall, the game punishes the losing contestants by disintegrating them with a bolt of lightning.

God exercises His wrath on the losing contestants.

To make a long story short, you really have to be one of 3 things to want to play this game: a huge fan of the '80s, an intense collector of NES games, or the Devil.  It's entirely possibly that by just playing this game, you will be coming mostest stupider off all n yous werds lyk PWN3D wen Thai Peng.

Kari: "WHAT WAS THAT?"

Officer: "FBI!!  YOU'RE UNDER ARREST FOR BEING LINKED TO THE REMOTE CONTROL NES GAME!!"

11-26-06: NINJA GAIDEN

Megadrive, 1992

Ninja Gaiden was wildly popular among NES owners who loved the process of learning through being killed hundreds of times.  From 1989 to 1991, Tecmo's Team Ninja development team created a trilogy of some of the best 8-bit action games ever made.  The NES Ninja Gaiden trilogy featured nonstop ninja action, magic attacks, awesome graphics at the time, and music that sticks in your head forever.  But before any of that, Ninja Gaiden was an arcade beat-'em-up game developed by Strong Team in 1988 in the vein of Double Dragon.  It was kind of fun, but nowhere near as addictive and awesome as the NES games.  After the series ended in 1991, mainstream gamers would never hear of Ryu Hayabusa again for years except for a collection of the NES games released on the SNES and a release on the Atari Lynx.  But if you consider yourself truly hardcore, you might know of a VERY well-kept secret.  This secret could only be revealed in Japan, as there was actually a Ninja Gaiden release in 1992 on the Japanese counterpart of the Sega Genesis, the Megadrive.

Can it be?  A 16-bit release of one of my favorite series?  What new direction could they have for Ryu?

The Megadrive version of Ninja Gaiden did not continue the storyline and gameplay of the NES games.  Instead, it focused its gameplay on the arcade original.  You won't be seeing any boomerang shuriken-tossing, wall-clinging, phantom double ninja tricks in this one.  This Ninja Gaiden game wasn't even developed by Tecmo; it was "reprogramed" by Sega itself.  It remained somewhat faithful to Strong Team's vision: a ninja running down the street, punching and kicking Jason Voorhies fans into the pavement.  What prompted this ninja brutality?  Here's how the story goes: Ryu, a faithful ninja of the Huma clan, must travel to America to track down two rogue Huma ninjas, Jin and Rika, who stole an ancient scroll.  This results in several beatdowns across the country, and Ryu winds up picking fights with a sumo wrestler, a rock n' roll maniac who flips the bird to any and all ninjas, and yes, even a demon.

"You don't like my music?  Go fuck yourself!" (I'm glad his back is turned and that wasn't out loud.)

This game brings back several of the old characters from the arcade game: Jason Voorhies, other ninjas wearing different colors (including aqua), the loggers, the guys with huge claws, and the tag-team wrestlers, although they no longer look anything like Road Warrior Hawk or come out to Black Sabbath.  Even the huge two-sworded bondage guy makes a return, although no longer dressed so... enthusiastically.  Gameplay is flawed, to say the least.  It works sort of like the 1988 arcade version, only with lots of bugs.  You can run, although never in a straight line.  You can punch-kick combo the enemy to death, execute a desperation somersault special move that takes life from you with the C button, and you can also do the most useless flying elbow attack in gaming history.  Good luck ever connecting, and if you do, it does little to no damage.  In the original game, you could execute a jumping flip attack similar to Double Dragon III, and throw enemies across the street or into pits.  Positioning was critical, as you had to be just above the enemy while jumping.  In this game, you get leeway.  A whole lot of it.  You can stand anywhere above or below the enemy, jump over them, and press the jump button again.  No matter where the enemy was, you now have them in the air, and can do with them as you please. 

This is another gameplay-exposing tip: do this nonstop to everyone but the final boss.  Even the heavier characters, while not thrown in animation, will simply disappear after 2 attempts.  Bosses will take a little longer, but it still works, and many boss fights occur near pits. 

The music in this game isn't even close to the NES quality tracks in the trilogy, but it's still catchy, generic Sega stuff.  Just don't expect much of it to stick in your head after a decade.  The graphics are definitely a step down from the arcade game, but they still do the trick.  If you're a hardcore, and I mean HARDCORE fan of anything Ninja Gaiden related, whether the NES games or the arcade version, hunt this down somewhere or consider a download.  Otherwise, the flaws might be too much to bear.

A true ninja runs from spear-wielding samurai.

11-13-06: SHATTERHAND

NES, 1991

By the early 1990s, videogames were starting to move on to the 16-bit era.  The Sega Genesis had established itself as a legitimate contender, and by 1991, the Super NES finally hit U.S. shores, debuting with Super Mario World.  But that same year, the 8-bit Nintendo console could still prove to carry some awesome gaming action of its own.

It was at this time when Jaleco released Shatterhand for the NES, developed by Natsume.  A slightly reworked version of its Japanese counterpart, Solbrain, this sidescroller proved that the NES wasn't done pumping out awesome games by a longshot.  While it was only a matter of time before games featured fancy stereo sound, orchestral music, and far more detail than they ever could with the NES and would eventually abandon it completely, Shatterhand served as a prime example of how a console can produce its best games towards the end of its lifespan.

Nice matching pink jumpsuit and gun, sissy.  I'm going to punch you so hard, you'll explode.

The story behind Shatterhand revolves around a futuristic cop taking revenge on criminal cyborgs with a new cybernetic arm.  Much like the Mega Man games, you can choose your path among several stages after completing the first level.  After completing these 5 stages in any order, you'll be sent to the 7th and final stage.  Shatterhand's gameplay consists of nonstop action, with all sorts of options for powering up yourself and your cybernetic arm, which you'll be using to beat the daylights out of enemies.  You can also enlist the help of floating robots after collecting three power-up boxes.  These cybernetic assistants are sort of like the R.O.B. except that they're not totally fucking worthless.  The boxes are labeled as Alpha or Beta, and each different combination of letters will give you a different robot assistant, some throwing grenades, others shooting flamethrowers, lasers, or mines, to name a few examples. Collecting the same combination of letters twice will grant you a superpowered cybersuit for 15 seconds, making you invincible and giving you the ability to throw powerful fire shots.  

Shatterhand's graphics were awesome, especially for the NES.  They really utilized the 8-bit technology to its fullest, with smooth-flowing movement for your character, even down to his jacket.  It also featured highly detailed backgrounds and interactive environments.  This affected gameplay, making it nice and intense for those hungry for action with the prospect of death.  Each of the 7 stages had some challenging obstacles in them, from reverse gravity pulling you upside down to flaming debris falling from the ceiling, and there were plenty of bombs, flamethrowers, and sawblades to avoid.  Enemies attack with guns, grenades, missiles, and vehicles you'll wish you could utilize yourself.  In addition to all of that, I can't say enough about the music in this game.  It's typical upbeat 8-bit action game music: in other words, it's got that catchy effect you don't get much anymore.  Every track tends to stay in my head, even today.  If you never got to experience game music from the NES era, you missed out on their ability to embed themselves in your head for well over a decade.  This game's music will likely do the same.

The guy on the left has the right idea.  "If I jump headfirst into this beam and get knocked out, he might spare me."

Overall, Shatterhand is an action-packed title with enough difficulty to satisfy fans of action games of the NES era for some time.  Even though it was released towards the end of Nintendo's 8-bit run, it's one of the best games on one of the best classic consoles.  Go find it.

YOU: "Knock knock."  HIM: "Who's there?" 

YOU: "Fist to the face."  HIM: "Fist to thKRAKK!"

11-6-06: CROSSED SWORDS

Neo Geo, 1991

At some point, maybe you've said to yourself, "Man, I wish there were more games like Punch-Out!!, that game rocked."  If you're like me, you might even have yelled that out loud in public, drawing the attention of strangers and classmates.  But is there a chance somebody relevant to the videogame industry was listening?

It's Punch-Out!! with swords and armor.  Novel concept.

That must have been the case in 1991, when Alpha Denshi released Crossed Swords for the SNK Neo-Geo consoles and arcade cabinets.  Gameplay was nearly identical to the arcade Punch-Out!! games, as you controlled a transparent knight facing the action in front of you.  Only this time, instead of boxing gloves, you got to carry a sword and shield.  A 2nd player could join in for co-op action, and believe me, you'll appreciate all the help you can get in this game. 

Oh, you missed!  Hope you're ready to get cut open, bastard.

The plot was typical videogame stuff: kill enemies to save somebody in a kingdom somewhere.  Maybe save a princess or two.  Simple enough.  But the enemies weren't pushovers at all; there were fire-breathing centipedes, orcs, evil knights, jesters, and even sword-wielding mice.  Unlike any of the Punch-Out!! games, however, these guys won't be sending you any cues with yellow eyes, a little tapdance, or a wiggling of the eyebrows.  Even the worst enemies will attack you either high or low, and you'll have only a split second to determine where they'll aim based on how they pull back their weapon.  Even though there was a 50 percent chance you would successfully block, it seemed to always pick the direction you weren't thinking of.  Later on, things get extremely frustrating, as they start attacking faster, harder, and gain the ability to counter your attacks.  Fortunately, this game rewards you in a fashion similar to RPGs, with weapon and life upgrades, as well as new magic attacks as you progress later in the game.

Psh.  No sword?  Good luck getting past m- SHIT!

The graphics and music were great for the time, as they were for virtually every game for the Neo-Geo, which had far more capability than any of the other 16-bit consoles.  Every clang, slash, and grunt was accompanied by dramatic medieval themed tracks, although they only featured a few in the whole game.  Overall, it was a unique gaming experience with lots of potential for screaming, cursing, and attacking the machine in a blind rage.  To see the end required patience, skill, or a boatload of quarters.  Go find it.

You're welcome, princess of castle.

10-30-06: HAUNTED CASTLE

Arcade, 1988

It's that time of year again, which means it's time to take a look at everyone's favorite vampire killing series, Castlevania.  Every Halloween, I look forward to playing just about every game in the series, which at this point are many.  One thing about Castlevania games, though: they're either hit or miss.  While most of the series' standard entries can be considered classics, there are a few which stand out as bastard children in a family full of aristocrats.  There are some who might argue whether or not Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest fits well enough within the NES trilogy, and several harsh critics rail against Castlevania: Bloodlines on the Genesis and the much hated Castlevania on the Nintendo 64.  When you keep creating enough games to add to a popular series, there are bound to be some setbacks.  Between the NES, SNES, Genesis, Gameboy and Gameboy Advance, the N64, Playstation, and even the PS2, there have been well over 20 Castlevania games.  But did you know that it once haunted the arcades?

Make no mistake: you will be haunted by this game.

That's right.  Only a year after Castlevania first made its way to the NES in 1987 and changed the way gamers thought about the proper way to kill vampires and eat meat found sealed behind an old staircase, the arcades were possessed by the evil spirit of Haunted Castle.  It was a tad different from how you might typically think of Castlevania games, though.  Not only did they decide that the Castlevania storyline would be better suited as a virtual clone of Ghosts n' Goblins, they also decided that nobody should ever, ever come close to seeing the end of this game.  So after Dracula comes out in broad daylight and captures Simon's wife, proving that vampires can in fact overcome the sun, Simon goes after Dracula in the most hopeless fight of his life.

He's jumping away!  After hi-- wait.  Let me go change first.

The graphics in Haunted Castle aren't too bad.  They kind of look like Rastan with a Belmont touch.  The music is awful, but at least they throw in some classic NES tracks every now and then.  One thing you'll immediately notice about Haunted Castle is that it keeps with the NES late '80s tradition of being one of the more challenging games in the series.  Another thing you'll notice is that it puts all other Castlevania games to shame in this department.  Typically, Castlevania games, especially for the NES, get exponentially harder as you progress through the stages.  Not so with Haunted Castle.  From the very beginning, you're bombarded with bone-throwing skeletons, swooping bats, tumbling tombstones, and even a wall that shoots bricks at you.  It's entirely possible you won't ever see the second half of the first stage.  Everything that hits you does a ton of damage, and unlike the NES games, where you can find a certain rhythm once you pick up the enemies' patterns, it's pretty much impossible to get a clean shot on anything.  The bats are an absolute nightmare: they swoop in such a way that your ultra-slow whipping motion won't ever hit them, forcing you to block with your face.  It's like Simon got arthritis since 1987.  His... whipping... is... so... horribly... sloooooooowwww...

Good ducking.  But don't get cocky, because that raven's GOING to hit you.

The control scheme is definitely a horror in itself.  Simon can only swing right in front of him while standing, jumping, or ducking.  That's great, but any flying objects (everything) come at angles where you won't be able to hit or avoid them.  It's like you're fighting an army, only you're crippled and they've all got state-of-the-art sniper rifles.  So don't worry about avoiding the inevitable.  Just avoid this game.

Get used to seeing yourself in this position if you insist on playing this game.

10-24-06: VENDETTA

Arcade, 1991

In the late '80s and early '90s, there were tons of games of the side-scrolling beat 'em up genre to be found in the arcades.  Most of us know Double Dragon well enough, as well as Final Fight.  Lots of games ran on the same engine as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, including The Simpsons and X-Men.  Just about every one of these games featured 2 to 4-player cooperative fighting action, jump kicks, weapons, kidnapped women, and six stages of mayhem.  But since games of this genre quickly became a dime a dozen, some got overlooked.  That's why this week's induction is the little known Konami gem, Vendetta.

The lower right part of the screen sort of hints at what you'll be fighting in this game.

Known as Crime Fighters 2 in Japan, Vendetta features four crime fighters out to save a kidnapped girl from a local gang.  Original, huh?  The game features Hawk, a Hulk Hogan ripoff wearing a blue shirt; Blood, a black man wearing glasses and a red shirt; Boomer, a flat-topped guy in a yellow shirt; and Sledge, who looks like a white Mr. T in a green shirt.  Together, they seek to rid Dead End City of the Dead End Gang and deal color-coded justice to the punks.  The Dead End Gang sure was original, naming their gang after the city.  That's like a gang from Atlanta calling themselves the Atlantas.  Your job is to punish their lack of originality with punches, kicks, spiked bats, boxes, and anything else you can grab.  What's so unique about Vendetta is its total lack of a jump button.  They figured you never actually do too many jumping attacks in a real street fight, I guess.  This tends to make mobility a little tricky, and the punks will often take advantage of this to end your life quick.  Even so, there are all sorts of throws, special attacks, and tag-team moves at your disposal.  You might not get more generic than Vendetta, but if you like these types of games, it's right up your crime-infested alley.  Go find it.

After the bar ignites, you'll wish this guy was simply a pervert wearing a mask and trenchcoat.

10-17-06: BLOODSTORM

Arcade, 1994

Whether you like or dislike a particular title, you can always tell if it's successful based on the number of imitations it happens to spawn.  Such was the case with Mortal Kombat.  As a result of its fan base and quarter-eating capabilities, other game companies attempted to piggyback on the violent fighting trend.  The end product typically wasn't pretty: lots of fighting games simply added violence in gameplay for the sake of violence.  MK ripoffs were created, such as Way of the Warrior, a digitized imitation with awful gameplay mechanics.  A company known as Strata developed Time Killers, a game seemingly without any strategy except to mash buttons and hope to decapitate the opponent.  Yet Strata clearly didn't want to give up on the concept; in 1994, they released another fighting game similar to Time Killers, known as Bloodstorm.

How generic can you get?

Bloodstorm is the kind of generic name that a TV show might throw out if two characters are talking about video games and don't want to mention actual titles for fear of lawsuits.  You would think Strata learned a lesson or two about success being about more than violence and a sinister-sounding name.  Indeed they did.  They also thought it was about gimmick codes and hidden characters, another prominent feature of the MK world.  There were all sorts of button taps and finishes that led to messages or other secrets, such as a character named Blood.  Original, huh?  The best thing about Bloodstorm is the music.  There are all sorts of foreboding and dark tracks supported by cool orchestral effects.  And to be honest, they really tried to make just about everything interactive with each other.  Just about every stage has a fatality, opponents' weapons can be collected for later use, and said weapons each have different ways to kill the enemy, although the end result tends to be the same (decapitation, lost limbs).  I see no reason for this not to be marketed to high school kids who dress in black, cut themselves, and like shitty music.  Maybe they'll write poems about it or something.  The rest of the gaming world, however, should consider it only for sadistic comic relief.

Wow, I knocked his head off.  Never seen that in a game before.

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