I decided to try out this game that I had unlisted for low interest. My list price was 9$ (59 SEK).
As you may recognize, the game is based on The Wizard of Oz. It was only released in Japan for Saturn and PlayStation and is uncommon. Maybe it wasn't popular.
Most of the game is in adventure mode. It is a point-and-click game of the Myst type popular around '95-'96. I haven't played very far yet. It doesn't require Japanese but the dialogue is in Japanese so you'll be missing out on that.
I'm guessing the story is from the book, which is:
You are Dorothy from Kansas. You are in the land of Oz and want to get home. You meet the Tin Man, the Lion and the Scarecrow, who all have their own quest. Something with a witch and a wizard you have to meet. Then you get to go home.
In battle, the idea is to push the opponent's men out of
the field. You should focus on one of them first, and then the next. You
have a couple of different attacks and you select by clicking. No
Japanese text in there.
I enjoy the game so far. Nice scenes. Battles are action and are over quickly. Oz is a nice and colorful place too. Looks nicer with an RGB cable.
I would like to get my hands on a couple of Mother CDs from Japan.
It was released in 1989 and re-released in 2004. On Amazon Japan it costs 2388 yen which isn't economical to import.
All the songs from the game have been orchestrated and many are with real singers. It has glowing reviews. There is also a Mother 2 soundtrack (Mother 1+2), but it isn't considered quite as good. I think the Mother 1 part is just 8 bit-music from the game.
I don't quite think the female vocalist is quite right, and the music is over the top cheesy. It will be cool when we can remake other peoples' songs to improve them. There could be an app where you can insert your favourite singer. For this CD, I can envision the voices of Celine Dion and Whitney Houston. Awesome resurrection.
Anways, the CD is a must for an Earthbound lover, and the songs have powerful messages. They are in English.
Here is track number 1.
Speaking of MOTHER, I will soon send a genuine Mother famicom cart to my friend who will flash it with English text. It will be available for sell in two weeks. 60$ doesn't seem unreasonable for this unique Japan-exclusive game.
Speaking of video game CD:s , I do have a Japanese-exclusive Sega soundtrack from 1987 for sale. It's not anything special musically but nice for a collector.
Is it possible to collect for the virtual boy? With only 25 games released it isn't too hard to get a decent collection. A full collection costs a bit more. Racketboy just completed their list List of rarest and most valuable Virtual Boy games.
I consider the VB to be cool but not something I'd like to play for a longer period of time. I think the red/black colors make me depressed. But it looks cool and is fascinating for shorter periods of game play.
As you may have seen or read, they found an old storage room of Virtual Boys in Dubai a year ago or two. Funny thing is, someone who works in Dubai got hold of three and asked me to sell them (New In Box). Turns out that two of them had a dead eye. It's not too hard to fix though.
These games were only released in Japan. The puyo puyo concept is interesting because it was so popular in Japan but never quite made it over. Some Sega users may know it as Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine, and a fairly unknown SNES game was released too. In Japan, it was released on virtually every gaming console.
Anyways, it is an original approach to the Tetris concept that is quite simple but still challenging.
I probably should write a longer description of how to play this game, but I'll do it some other day.
The twist with Puyo Puyo is that you always play against a 2-player. Either human or computer. When you create certain chains of removed blocks, your opponent will get penalty blocks. When the blocks reach the top you are game over, as in Tetris.
In Puyo Puyo 2 some new ideas were introduced, such as being able to rotate the block when they are in between other blocks. This makes the game less annoying.
I think the Puyo Puyo games may be fun if you have a friend to play it with, which I don't, and that's why I play the Game Boy. Maybe my brain is too old. I am not able to get into the chain-thinking and the computer easily beats me on level 2. I want to clear blocks, not build them in strange patterns. :-/ How long should I keep trying to master this game?
Maybe someone will teach me to appreciate this game, or I'll give it a couple more chances, but I have many other GB games to try until then. I'll just give these ones (both of them) 3/5.
I don't know what games to review. Good game, bad games, common games, uncommon games?
Anyways here is the Japanese version of Space Invaders. I feel sorry for anyone who buys it. This version was only released in Japan, and I think it is hard to find a simpler made game. I think I could have written this game myself in BASIC.
This game only seems to use two colors: black and white. No shades of grey.
If you are a hard core Space Invaders fan, you might enjoy this game. Even the first level is hard to beat.
I never liked Space Invaders, even when I first played it on my C64. It was a game that you got to play during the loading screen of F-15 Strike Eagle, I think, or some other game. Later I played it on an 286 but it just felt lame, difficult and pointless.
I give the game 1/5.
I think the box art is kind of cool though. Simple and stylish, as they were in Japan.
There's always time for a review. Crazy.
Lode Runner is a fine little series that was created in 1983 and was made known on the Apple IIe. I actually played it as a child. I like how it is not based on randomness, it is completely strategy and skill that matters, and I think that makes for a timeless classic.
Lode Runner was very popular in Japan as well. Interesting because it is an American game made by the very creative Brøderbund company who later made Prince of Persia, Myst and other original titles. You can see inspiration from the Japanese game Heiankyo Alien though, in my opinion, only that you see Heianyko Alien from a top-down perspektive and Lode Runner from a platformer perspective.
Lode Runner was so popular that they released two famicom Lode Runner and one Disk System lode runner for the fanatics. The Game Boy game was made by Bandai as early as 1989 and later ported to the west, as it happens.
I looked at the reviews on gamefaqs. One guy gave it 10/10 in every category, another reviewer at least admitted it was "For fans only, or nuts like me who like the obscure and old-school..."
(not my video)
As for gameplay, I think Hyper Lode Runner -- or any Lode Runner game -- is excellent. Graphics is excellent, the sounds are always so cheerful with the "du du du".
The early levels are a good mix of strategy and skill. However, the later levels become ridiculous. My theory is that they figured everyone were familiar with the concept and so they made it very hard to complete the game. One level requires you to drop down when the enemy is on the exact right pixel, then immediately drill a hole for him to fall into, and then keep that going. For me, this takes away the fun.
It's also quite painful to see your character die in that painful way when you fall into your own hole. There's a claustrophobic feeling to the game. Also, while there is a password for the later levels, the game kind of just wants you to play levels and make a mental note that you've beaten them. It's not very rewarding for that reason. I give it 3/5.
I was asked to review RPGs on the Game Boy. It's hard because I don't speak Japanese and I don't play RPGs. They take too long. But I did have one RPG as a kid: The Sword of Hope. Its Japanese name is Selection, if it matters, and it was released in Japan at early as 1989. The only RPG I've ever beaten. It took me a long time but it was alright.
I had the Swedish version with Swedish translation. It is renowned for it's very strange translation, similar to how Shadowgate on the NES famously wrote "gä" and "slä" instead of "gå" and "slå". For an adult this may just be fun, but it's hard for a kid to understand why you need to open someone's chest ("bröst") when you see a treasure chest. The Tree Ent is translated as a Tree Ant, etc. I think the badly translated spells and items also make the game harder.
The graphics are really nice for a GB game.
The best thing about the game may be the music. I still hum some
of the tunes from this game, such as the church music or the music by
the ferry spring. Also, it is a nice little adventure you're on. You visit the excentric magicians trying to figure out how to solve their problems. You get to fight several strange enemies, such as the Vampire Lord, the gold-stealing Troll, and The Shadow. All of them have their weakness against a particular item or spell.
The spells work quite nicely too, and you'll be happy to level up and get new and surprising spells. There is some level grinding involved but it didn't bother me too much. One reviewer on gamefaqs thought it was almost too easy to level up and beat bosses, but as far as RPGs are concerned less is better for me.
There are two flaws. Number one is that when you level up, you still have to fight those stupids moths as in the picture, even though they can't hurt you. Such a waste of time, in my opinion anyways. The second thing that bothers me is how illogical it is sometimes. I ended up just trying every item on everything in every pictures. I did manage to beat it without a FAQ and that's nice for a kid who never played RPGs.
Of course they didn't have FAQs back then, you had to call Nintendo for answers. I would have been too shy to do that. I couldn't believe how people could call strangers on the phone like that.
The game has a password system which works well. There is actually one place in the game where if you don't get it right you are unable to try again, and have to restart from your latest saving point. This may be a bug. You probably want to know that this place is the ferry spring where you are asked such question as "do you prefer blue or green? * yes * no".
A problem for me is that I can't compare this game to other RPGs. Not even Pokemon or Final Fantasy I have played. I
looked over the reviews at gamefaqs and decided to give this game 4/5. RPGs feel more like work than play to me, but I suppose that's how it should be. Anyways, I did play it too the end and it seems that battles are a lot faster than if you play other RPGs.
Boulder Dash is a classic arcade game released for a lot of consoles. I have the European Game Boy cover here because I had this game as a kid. There's even a famicom version, but it's pretty rare.
I think it is one of the fine great Game Boy action/puzzle games. It never lags, the graphics always does the job, and you could't really improve much if it was on an iPhone. Well, you'd have better sound and graphics, but the basic gameplay would be the same.
I won't explain the concept, just watch the video. One thing not evident from the video is that if you get hit by one of those falling rocks, you die. Or a falling diamond may kill you. You could also end up trapped somewhere, trap necessary diamonds, or get hit by an enemy.
Some other concepts: Some enemies will give diamonds when they are hit by a rock, but you need to time at carefully. Other enemies just explode, but it may be necessary to blow holes in walls. Note that enemies have different movement patterns. Some always move right, other left, and so on. Watch out -- you don't want to blow up diamonds, or you may not be able to complete the level.
Those pulsating things turn into diamonds when they are trapped. That's a very difficult thing on the later levels because you need to move a lot of rocks to the right place, in a short amount of time.
The pulsating things are also sometimes used to blow up enemies and get diamonds, as in the video.
While Boulder Dash is a great concept, it bothers me that there is no continuation in the game boy version. If you die your lives and the continues (2?), you're game over. I tried to play this game many times, but it's really frustrating to play through the levels for an hour and then be game over. Some levels are long, and others are very tricky. The slightest mistake will kill you. I still cringe at those butterflies, the falling rocks, and what not.
It comes back to me now... I think I onced played really far, getting passed level 5. Then, a level 6 appeared, and I think after that a level 7. I'm not sure how long this game is. I don't think I've played it since.
I don't think I will play it again, too many bad memories. Oh, why did they make it so hard? It's so unrewarding. But I do have the Jap Game Boy version on its way, with box, and that feels pretty nice as a collector's item.
An important thing to know is that if you press A and the direction pad you will remove the stuff in that area without going there, which is necessary sometimes. Also cool is the Select button, which will change the screen from near to far.
I'll rate it 4/5. Apart from it's difficulty and stupid no continuation, it's great.
Today I put up for sale a Family Trainer with 7 games, out of the 10 released in Japan.
I actually tried it out the last time I had it. It is a decent workout equipment, would you believe it. Though I found it to be too hard to do the exercises properly, and too easy to cheat. For example, just wiggle your foot.
It fascinated me how lazy we are as humans. Whenever we find a way to make things easier, we do.
I actually go out jogging for real every now and then. At least once per week. Sometimes in the evening after a glass of wine.
I call it Mercenary Force, easier to remember. Love the Jap artwork though. And yes, I say "Jap".
It's a side-scrolling action/shooter game. You control your little group of men against the enemies. The interesting part is that you buy the group members before each round, and then you can put them in different formations as you play. The group members have different specialities. One is extra strong -- see the life bar down left -- one shoots long shots, another shoots short but powerful shots, and so on. During the round, you collect money that you can buy health with, and you could also save up to buy team members for the next round.
Somehow the game is unpolished. The levels are too long, the strategical element isn't that interesting in my opinion, and it's difficult because your team members are destined to get hit and die and you won't have enough money to buy new ones. Look at the screenshot above. You will take hits when your team covers almost all the screen. And, for some reason, you have less starting money in the Jap version making it even more difficult.
For once I will show the European game cover. This is what made me want this game! I must have been 12 or so.
Kung Fu Master is the sequel to Kung Fu on the NES. Hmm, I guess that refutes an earlier thing I said about Metroid II. Anyways, as with Metroid II, this sequel is more detailed than its preceding NES game.
Was I happy when I got this game? Well, at first I was bad at it, and also disappointed I couldn't play as that cool bare chested ninja roaming the desert. What a rip off! "Boss pattern" was something new to me, but once I had the first level, the rest wasn't too much trouble. I would continue to pick up the game from time to time, trying such things as beating it without getting hit, only using punch, beating each boss as fast as possible, or getting a high score.
(Not my video)
The music is nice, and the gameplay is kind of sweet. When you beat enemies they will go away with a scream. The level design is nice and varied. The complete lack of difficulty makes it hard to rate, even if I enjoy a short and sweet game rather then the time-wasting Ninja Gaiden or the brute Double Dragon.
Based on its merits and lack of competitors for the Game Boy, I'll rate it 4/5.
A trivia is that in the Japanese version you get to meet the end boss immediately on the last level.
Parodius is a great shooter that made me regain interest in shooters. After having played the lagging port of Gradius (Nemesis), it's nice to see a really good port. Having played the Famicom version of Parodius, I can't say there is any big difference. A Famicom player would prefer the Famicom version, a SNES player would prefer the SNES version. Me, I prefer the game boy version.
Like many Game Boy games it's pretty short and sweet. It can be a bit tricky at times, before you get the boss patterns and such, but you always restart at the beginning of the level when you're game over. I really appreciate that. Thank you Konami for making a fun game. The powerups are generous, so if you die you will still have a chance to build them up again. As with Gradius, you should start off with the speed powerup, one or two.
You'd think there be more slow-downs or flickering but there really isn't that much of it. I wish R-Type or Nemesis could be this smooth.
(Again, this is not my video)
As always, play on a Game Boy Color or Advance to get limited but useful colors.
With the great music that is the Parodius trademark, you'll enjoy the levels as you play them. What's there not to like about this game? I give it 5/5. It's technically inferior to the Famicom version, of course, but I rate
game boy games here based on how they are compared with other games
and how well they are made.
A reader told me he enjoyed reading about lesser known GB games. Well, I have many hundreds of games to write about so there will be many lesser knowns. Only I can't write about are text heavy games, since I only play Japanese versions.
Qix is an arcade game that was originally released in 1981 by
Taito. It is probably alright if all you want is to move something
around, but nine years later the Game Boy should have been capable of
more.
Qix was a game I received one Christmas. I'm glad I also got other games. Qix is about moving your little sparkle and make blocks, while avoiding the enemy called Qix. You press A to move the sparkle away from the border. Then you move it to create an enclosed block. The goal is to take at least 75% on each screen. When you move around the screen, you are vulnerable to the enemy Qix.
The game play isn't that bad. It is a decent idea. However, like many Pacman ports, the GB game doesn't deliver much. The main issue I always had with the gameplay is that the Qix moves
to randomly. He may stay in one part of the screen for a while, then
suddenly move at you with full speed. This ruins the strategy element.
I think you just keep on playing until you die to get a high score. As the GB game can't save high scores, that too will be lost when you reset.
I give it 3/5 (revised)
Some thing that would have improved the game: Better graphics, more varied game play, maybe boss levels, a continue feature of some kind, a way to keep track of level progression, less random Qix, music, and maybe powerups.
Many of these ideas were later implemented in Volfied on the Pc Engine which was actually released earlier, in 1990. That's a pretty nice game. Unfortunately they left out a continue feature, or that game could have been awesome.
There are so many Tetris clones so let's hope they get the Qix idea right sometime.
I received some Pc Engine games today with manuals but no box. I put them in some old CD Cases instead, mostly junk cases I got for free 10 years ago.
I think they actually look better like this, no?
All the games in the picture are good games. The junk games did not get a case.
Look up there to the left, it's Ninja Spirit! That's pretty sought after.
Metroid II is the sequel to the NES game Metroid. It is the only sequel I know of that was only released on the Game Boy as a sequel to a NES game. It is also one of the more expensive Game Boy carts; it regularly sells for around 20$ loose.
Metroid II actually has better graphics than Metroid, and it also has a save feature that the NES version lacks (although the Japanese Famicom Disk System version has a save). Some people dislike that Metroid II is more linear that Metroid but I would
say it's an advantage for a grown up with limited time.
It is a simpler game than Metroid, because you can't get
lost that easily. It may still be tricky to find your way through the
caves, but there isn't many errors that can be made. Personally, I hate
having to go back and forth and being stuck for hours, so I don't have
patience for like Zelda-like games. This game is acceptable. I might get
stuck for 1-2 hours because I didn't understand how the upgrades
worked, in particular the jump in mid air. But I wouldn't say it was
unfair, as a game such as Zelda can be.
In the end, I did have to cheat and look up how to kill the end boss. Here's the spoiler: you either need a whole lot of missiles (200+ ?) or you roll into a ball and into his mouth, put a bomb there.
Play it on SGB or GBC to get limited but much need colors.
The film Alien served as the inspiration for Metroid, as it happens. You will need to appreciate Alien-like games to enjoy the game, such as running around in the dark with ambient music in the background. I suggest you give the game 20 minutes and if you're not hooked, turn it off.
I would say it's one of those games where you forget you're playing the game boy; you're just playing a great game. 5/5
I enjoyed making reviews so much I'll do another, lol.
Wedding Peach: Jamapii Panic is a puzzle game, to some surprise. Considering the name, you would expect an unplayable adventure game. But it is an acceptable little puzzle game.
The name comes from the anime / manga (difference?) called Wedding Peach.
In this picture (with Super Game Boy) you see the idea. You play as the little creature in the middle and the goal is to turn all the tiles by moving over them holding A. This creates a string. When you connect the string to itself somewhere, all the tiles under the string are turned.
You get a chain count for the number of tiles that are turned in a row. Points are added as bonus depending on what is under the tile, or if you kill an enemy with string. It doesn't seem to make any other difference how long the chain is or how high your score is. You progress through a couple of levels until the end, then you win. It takes around 15-20 minutes or so.
Not the most original idea. I know of a couple of tile-turning games before this one. But it's a decent game. I played it three times straight through, with different difficulty settings. You can set the speed of the enemies, among other things.
I'll just rate it 3/5. My original rating was 2/5 but this game is better than Aero Star, and Aero Star is better than a 1. Hmm.
Aero Star was one of my first GB games as a kid, together with Super Mario Land.
I'm glad I got Super Mario Land, that's for sure. Aero Star, and R-Type that I got later, made me think shooters were all repetitive, slow, restricted and unoriginal. Only recently have I come to appreciate Gradius, Parodius, Twinbee and the like. There's some real gameplay.
Aero Star is a typical scrolling shooter with the twist that you are a duck that can't really fly. You can only stay in the air for a limited amount of time (6-7 seconds), then you have to touch ground again. So while you are dodging the enemy planes and tanks, you have to make sure to find landing zones to jump between. If you miss, you die.
And miss you will. The game feels generally sluggish and I find it a bit boring. Also I consider the happy elevator music a turn off.
I didn't play Aero Star much and it didn't go with me on holidays. Except once, to Austria I think. I really tried, but it was difficult to enjoy it. You follow the paths for 3 levels or so, then you'll lose your lives and have to start from the beginning.
The positive side is that the game is of decent quality regarding graphics, music and gameplay. I'm sure there are people in the world that enjoy it.
2/5.
I'm not sure if it is useful to write about bad games, but I wanted to show that I don't rate all games a 4.
Picross was a popular game in Japan. Nintendo tried hard to market it in Europe and the US, but they failed. In Japan, several Picross games were published, but ROTW (Rest of the World) only got the first Picross for the Game Boy.
Some people consider it to be the most boring Mario game. Others are turned off by the name "Japanese crossword". Rest assured, it is only with numbers.
I think it is pretty nice game. Relaxing, logical. I would compare it to sudoku. Or, if you have played minesweeper, wasn't it annoying how you would lose by random chance? That won't happen in Picross.
Picture from gamefaqs, as usual.
You see for example how it says "8" on the column where the marker is. That means there are 8 joined blocks to carve out on that column. The "X" indicates there is no block at that place. Based on that, we know there must be several joined blocks in the middle of that column, and no blocks below the X.
If it says "3 3" it means there are 3 joined blocks on the row, then one or more spaces, and another 3 joined blocks. And so on.
You carve with A, and place an X with B. Simple.
There are several tricks you have to use to solve a puzzle and you never have to take a guess, unless you want to.
I have played a lot of Mario Picross 1, but not so much of Picross 2. Picross 2 has a story mode, unlike 1. But it seems the basic idea is the same.
The negative: It is *long*. Expect to spend weeks to solve all puzzles. If you just want to beat games and leave them, this is not for you. Also, while it is a pretty nice puzzle game, I don't think it is the most exciting idea. But if you are on a vacation and only can bring one game, this game would not be a bad choice. I give it another 4/5.
I think I wrote about my playing of Cyraid (Jap: Bakuretsu Senshi Warrior) on some forum, but I can't find where...? Anyway, I sold a copy of Bakuretsu Senshi Warrior in an auction recently for amazing 10 SEK, or 1.50$. I get to keep half of this, so I sold it cheaper than I bought it. You'd assume it was a junk game? Well I've had at least 20 hours of good fun with this game.
I think it is an original game boy game not on any other system. That's one reason to own it.
(video updated 2015-03-17)
The goal is to smash the E-blocks on each level and take those mushroom things. Or you can smash the mushrooms instead of taking them.
You can kick ladders to combine them, but watch out because you can't disconnect the ladders. You can kick around blocks to smash monsters or get passed walls and floors. When the monster appears, blocks you have smashed will respawn. This may kill you, should you stand in a respawning block, which happens surprisingly often.
It's kind of tricky. Some youtube comments are on to how difficult it is, but I think a modern GBC or GBA screen makes it easier. It took me around 20-30 hours or so, a lot more patience than the youtube reviewers seem to have. Some levels will take a lot of tries, and I'm still not sure if the last boss can be beaten by skill or if it requires luck. If you lose all of your lives on a level, you go back to the first level of the world, usually 3-4 levels. I think it is acceptable, as long as you enjoy the gameplay (as I did).
It's not always obvious how to beat a level. I think being a bit older helps when playing this game, to be able to think of different strategies. In these aspects, the game is similar to Donkey Kong '94 on the Game Boy, a great Nintendo developed game.
The graphics do what they should. DK '94 has better graphics but it also suffers from lagging sometimes, which this game doesn't. So I actually prefer this game's graphics.
On the negative: The controllers will give you problems sometimes. You need to be very precise on some levels where you stand on one ladder to kick another next to it. And while the music is nice, it is a bit repetitive. Lastly, I think it is a bit too difficult; I won't try to beat it again in the near future.
If you enjoyed Donkey Kong '94 (GB) you'll enjoy this one.
I give it 4/5.
I am currently playing "Tokyo
Disneyland: Mickey no Cinderella Shiro Mystery Tour" on the Game Boy.
The downsides are there's no challenge at all, the game is a bit short, and I don't like the music.
But it has really excellent graphics and it's nice with a map quest,
and shows completion in percentage. For a game that is called Tokyo Disneyland,
I think it nails it. It has re-spawning bats, talking mirrors, crumbling skeletons,
jumping skulls, balloons, spikes that don't kill you instantly,
and the music doesn't stop each time you die. Oh, and it has a password system.
I give it 4/5.
After I beat the game, I found you could get 100% if you find everything.
So that's what I am doing at the moment.
It looks nice on a super game boy, but I play on Game Boy Color. Here is a screenshot from gamefaqs. The two first courses are called 1-2 and 1-2. Then it's 2-1 and 2-2, and so on.
Here is another screenshot I took from vizzed.com.
In color, Mickey has red pants.
