Back again for our regular Sunday roundup of quick-fire reviews and impressions of everything under the spotlight at Retro Arcadia this week, old and new and a bit of both…

I’m going to start with some reading material for a change, and N64: a visual compendium from Bitmap Books! This came out a few months back (but being a nightmare to buy for I was saving it for my recent birthday), and follows on from Atari 2600/7800: a visual compendium back in 2020, which is genuinely one of my favourite books of all-time, so not only did I have high hopes because of that, but it’s also helps fill a real gap in my own gaming history! As always with Bitmap Books, you’re getting a premium package, this time comprising over four-hundred pages of lithographic print, presented in a protective board slipcase with an animated lenticular cover. It’s got those coloured bookmark ribbons I always love too! Inside, as well as an in-depth look into Nintendo’s adventures in 3D and beyond, it’s full of beautifully presented screenshots and game art, together with profiles from developers or journalists involved with the 150 games covered, from Super Mario 64 and GoldenEye 007 to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Banjo-Kazooie, as well as spotlights on lesser-known titles like Beetle Adventure Racing, Mischief Makers, World Driver Championship and Body Harvest. There’s a stack of interviews with the likes of  Jim Wornell (Nintendo), Michael Mendheim (BattleTanx), Kevin Bayliss (Diddy Kong Racing), Remington Scott (Turok) and Julian Eggebrecht (Star Wars) too! I’ve come to expect very high standards from Bitmap Books and once again, you get what you pay for… And I’m getting a whole raft of games I need to get into as a result, so keep watching these Weekly Spotlight posts every Sunday for more on those!

I know I did a full review of Rainbow Cotton HD Remake when it came out the other week but I’m still playing so I thought I’d give it an update here too… While Cotton definitely sits in my top ten game series, if I were to do a top ten Cotton games countdown then unfortunately the Sega Dreamcast original of this from 2000 would struggle because as lovely as it all looks and sounds and moves, it’s always played like crap! We’re talking 3D cute ‘em up, where as usual, the witch Cotton and her bikini-clad fairy sidekick Silk have been called upon to rescue the magical Willow candy from the latest demon to have stolen it and thus plunged the world into darkness. It plays more or less on-rails, across five very spruced-up stages that do still vary from a bit sparse to spectacular but are mostly full of cartoon vibrancy, character-filled monsters, huge bosses with some brilliant special effects, and the top-notch job on the soundtrack you expect from any decent Cotton game… And it finally is decent, thanks to a rebuilt magic-aiming system that actually makes where you’re shooting and what’s shooting back visible from behind your big, witchy sprite on her super-animated broomstick! I still think the lack of instructions of any kind stinks when there’s all sorts of different magic at play, plus (some still inexplicable!) items, power-ups and bonuses to collect, and the checkpointing isn’t any better either, but whack the difficulty level down to suit and give it some time and the game itself is a good ‘un at last!

I’ve always been a huge fan of the ZX Spectrum conversion of the slapstick 1983 Bally Midway arcade game Tapper but I’d never played the Commodore 64 port until this week, and it really is a Commodore 64 port! You play a lone barman who has to slide cold ones from the taps at one side of screen down the rows of counters to the cowboys, punks, athletes and even aliens frequenting your joint, catching any empties coming back the other way and collecting tips, which triggers a can-can dance routine and buys you a few seconds respite as everyone turns to watch. Just make sure you only serve one drink to each customer though, as any surplus will smash and that’s a life lost, which is also the case for empties hitting the floor or customers reaching the end of the bar while they wait. Serve everyone and it’s on to the next level though, which will lead to a can-shuffling bonus round and a whole new bar to serve. This version arrived in 1984 and while it’s not bad and is certainly authentic, it did leave me feeling a bit cold… On the plus side, the chunky player sprite is full of character, with his little bow-tied uniform and moustache, and the customers are a colourfully varied bunch too. It takes some doing to get to a bar that’s even remotely interesting for them to drink in though – the first few environments are just so bland and lifeless, just like the music playing in them. And given how unsophisticated the controls were to begin with, there’s a floatiness to them that just kills the frantic spirit of the original…. Or the Spectrum version, which I think I’ll probably be sticking with!

Following on from the N64 book, something else it’s taken me a while to get to is Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story but good old birthdays… It’s a compilation from earlier this year and includes forty-two of his games on eight different platforms, spanning several generations and including the ZX81, VIC-20, ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Atari 800, Atari ST and the Jaguar, as well the new Gridrunner: Remastered. As tempted as I am to just list out all the games on the basis they deserve it, in the interests of brevity I’ll mention a few of my all-time favourites like Andes Attack, the original Gridrunner, Hover Bovver and Tempest 2000. Then, of course, there’s all the stuff he’s probably best known for, like Attack of the Mutant Camels, Metagalactic Llamas Battle at the Edge of Time and Llamatron: 2112. Were also getting his two early light synthesisers, Psychedelia and Colourspace, which have been updated to be played on controllers, and a demo of the unreleased Konix Multi-System version of Attack of the Mutant Camels.

And while you can jump straight into those games (sometimes on multiple systems) from a carousel, you’d then be missing out on the native interactive documentary presentation, where you’ve got history and media and all-sorts alongside the games they’re filling you in on; if you know Atari 50 which preceded this, you’ll know the format. And finally, if you fancy a more traditional documentary, you’ve got that too with The Heart of Neon, all about Jeff Minter and his career that’s pretty much spanned the entire history of video games to date! It’s a hell of a package and has some incredible historic insight, although my honest opinion is that you’re going to need a bit more nostalgia for the subject matter than you did with Atari 50 to get the most out of it. Let’s face it, most of us are here for the games, and while I’m thrilled to see the likes of the VIC-20, ZX81 and ST getting an unusual look in to these things, there’s not a huge amount there I’ll keep going back to that I didn’t play as a kid… Which fortunately was about two-thirds of them, so no real complaints on my side, and it was £25 on someone else’s money I have no regrets about spending!

That’s your lot for this week but if you’re still gagging for more and missed it last Wednesday, be sure to check out my deep-dive into F1 ROC: Race of Champions (aka Exhaust Heat) on the SNES, with its arcade-realism that’s totally at odds with itself but somehow pulls it off brilliantly! Then next Wednesday will be the first one of the month, meaning we’re heading back exactly forty years for the very latest in video gaming, including a type-in Jet Set Willy expansion, no less, as we get into Retro Rewind: June 1984 in Computer & Video Games, straight from the original magazine! Hopefully see you then!

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