Nintendo Wii Fanboy

Taito's collection of mostly classic-Taito-themed minigames, Furu Furu Park, is out this month courtesy of Majesco. For $19.99, if the versions of arcade classics like Bubble Bobble, Cameltry, and Arkanoid are actually good remakes, the game would be an irresistible value. That was exactly what MTV Multiplayer's Jason Cipriano had in mind when he took the game for a test drive. Maybe this unassuming value minigame collection has improved on the arcade classics!

Basically, it hasn't. As you may expect, the minigame versions of the Taito classics are not better than the arcade games, mostly owing to the fact that you can only play them for a few minutes at a time. No matter how awesome the one level of remade Arkanoid is, it's just one level. On top of that, Bubble Bobble has been simplified severely.

Surprisingly, there were a few cases in which the potential was there for the remake to be an improvement, or at least a worthwhile addition. Both Arkanoid and Cameltry benefit from motion controls, which makes the lack of content hurt that much more. As it stands, just pick up one of the Taito Legends sets for the PS2.

We haven't heard anything from Majesco's Furu Furu Park in a while, leading us to wonder if it had been cancelled. Apparently it continues to live, since Games Radar has posted a quick preview of the game. The gist is that even if you think minigames are passé, you may find something to love in the pure weirdness of the game.

One of the weirdest parts of the game is the "Love Challenge" mode. We have been curious about this since we saw it in Japanese screenshots (as pictured above), and Games Radar was kind enough to detail it in their preview. Basically, it's a two-player mode in which the goal is to perform at a similar level. Your similarity-- and thus, your compatibility, is then judged by the game's love expert, Afro Love.

We look forward to the stories of true love being discovered after short Arkanoid games. If Afro Love tells you it's for real after Arkanoid, you know it's for real.

Say what you will about Majesco's Furu Furu Park, but it's got taste. Taito and 505 Games picked some fantastic games to adapt into minigame versions. If everyone made minigames based on stuff like Cameltry, we would never have a problem with minigames.

We thought it would be useful to post the full list of included games, because we hadn't seen it yet. If at least five of these are fun, we'll consider the game a winner. Arkanoid can't possibly be non-fun, so that's one in their favor!

In our bleak world of cancelled Pocky & Rocky sequels, we must take what we can get. And at the moment what we can get is a Pocky & Rocky-themed shooting minigame. We can smile a little, thinking that there's still some Pocky & Rocky in the world.

[Via press release]

Furu Furu Park, Taito's self-referential minigame collection, is coming to the US courtesy of Majesco. Normally, we're all GRR TOO MANY MINIGAMES. But this one's got Arkanoid bits in it, so it gets a pass.

In other words, Taito has figured out the winning formula for making us care about a minigame collection: well-designed gameplay making it look like old games. It may even be fun, with games like Super Karate (in which you waggle karate moves), Safe Cracker (The Wiimote becomes your, uh, combination lock dial!) and Bubble Bobble (which is Bubble Bobble!) Man, that version of Bubble Bobble looks sharp.