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Posts with tag irem

Virtually Overlooked: Street Combat

Welcome to our weekly feature, Virtually Overlooked, wherein we talk about games that aren't on the Virtual Console yet, but should be. Call it a retro-speculative.

Once again, we're turning to a crappy game for our weekly recommendation, due to its historical (or hysterical, amirite) notability. We've proven that we kind of enjoy bad Street Fighter II-era fighting games; now that time has passed and the awful clones didn't lead us into another crash, we can enjoy them as bizarre and hilarious curiosities. Well, "enjoy" is a strong word.

Street Combat on the SNES is one of those curiosities, mostly because of its origins. Don't be fooled by the "IREM" on the label -- this game dates back from when good old IREM had enough money to publish other people's games. Don't take it as the mark of quality it usually is.

Continue reading Virtually Overlooked: Street Combat

Virtually Overlooked: Deadly Towers

Welcome to our weekly feature, Virtually Overlooked, wherein we talk about games that aren't on the Virtual Console yet, but should be. Call it a retro-speculative.

Deadly Towers is the most frustrating game on the NES. It may be the most frustrating game of all time, although we're sure that there's some Koei number-crunching Chinese war game out there or realistic PC submarine simulator that's much, much harder. You go into those things expecting a convoluted mess; you go into an NES action-RPG expecting at least to understand where you are or what you're supposed to be doing before you die. Deadly Towers doesn't afford you the luxury. Why do we suggest that others should play it, then? Because we had to.

Continue reading Virtually Overlooked: Deadly Towers

Virtually Overlooked Special: A bunch of NES games I get mixed up with each other


Welcome to our weekly feature, Virtually Overlooked, wherein we talk about games that aren't on the Virtual Console yet, but should be. Call it a retro-speculative.

Last week, I asked for reader suggestions for this week's Virtually Overlooked. One reader suggested The Guardian Legend, and I thought that was a perfectly reasonable suggestion. The Guardian Legend was one of the biggest sleeper hits of the NES era, and something that is definitely worth checking out, especially for fans of Ys and Faxanadu.

It was only later that I realized that I was thinking of Legacy of the Wizard. I get those two mixed up a lot. They both fall into that "sleeper" category, they were both published by Brøderbund, and they both have "Leg" in the title. They're practically the same game, except that one's a hybrid vertical shooter/Zelda-style adventure developed by Compile, and the other is a side-scrolling action RPG from Nihon Falcom. But other than that, the same game.

Inspired by my inability to keep two similar things separate, I thought this week we could look at some more NES games I get confused about, either because they're so similar or because I'm so dumb.

Continue reading Virtually Overlooked Special: A bunch of NES games I get mixed up with each other

Ninja Spirit headed to VC, we take full credit


Have we mentioned recently how much we love Hudson? Not only did they make tons and tons of incredible games for the Turbografx-16 (and lots of other systems!), but they're better than anyone else about actually releasing their games on the Virtual Console. And now we have news that some of the best Turbografx-16 games are coming to the US in May! Also some stuff for Nintendo consoles in Japan, but we'll get to that.

It finally happened. A game we profiled in Virtually Overlooked has been officially announced for the Virtual Console. Even though IREM's Ninja Spirit was one of the best and most popular TG16 games, we're going to go ahead and declare this as a victory.

As if that weren't exciting enough, Hudson announced plans to release a personal favorite, Blazing Lazers, as well as Ordyne (excellent, adorable shmup) and World Sports Competition (we haven't played it, but we'll assume it's great because we're in a good mood).

Nintendo of Japan also has some fantastic stuff planned, including Super Mario Bros. 2 and F-Zero X, either of which would no doubt be the headline if anyone else were writing this. That's Super Mario Bros. 2, the Japanese version, released here as Lost Levels. The really, really hard one, as opposed to the silly one about throwing vegetables.

Virtually Overlooked: Ninja Spirit



Welcome to our weekly feature, Virtually Overlooked, wherein we talk about games that aren't on the Virtual Console yet, but should be. Call it a retro-speculative.

This is the second time we've ended up following a theme from week to week in these features-- in this case, we wanted to talk about Ninja Spirit for the Turbografx-16, and didn't remember until we started researching that, like last week's Photograph Boy, Ninja Spirit was developed by IREM.

The best way to describe Ninja Spirit for people familiar with Virtual Console games is "The Legend of Kage, but good." And we say that as fans of Kage.

Continue reading Virtually Overlooked: Ninja Spirit

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