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…

Last time out here, I was dabbling with everything on the new Toaplan Arcade 3 collection for Evercade, but I’ve not put down the mighty Batsugun Special Version on there ever since! It’s an old favourite I’ve never owned legitimately before now, as is plain old Batsugun, also included, which was unfortunately too little too late for Toaplan when it hit the arcades in 1993, despite evolving the genre and paving the way for bullet-hell, with new levels of bullet density and enemy patterns, progressive RPG-like weapon upgrades and the introduction of the all-important hitbox! They were just about bankrupt by the time Special Version appeared in 1994 but it outlived them and, as much as I still enjoy the original, is the reason why Batsugun is a favourite, with what I reckon is way better balancing on the first “loop” (where the first version just got too hard for me before it ended after five stages), as well as offering a smaller hitbox, a shield that absorbed one hit, bigger bombs and new scoring mechanics. It’s regular world domination sci-fi fare that’s (thankfully!) light on story but doesn’t scrimp on the polish, with tons of detail in its environments, tons of colour in everything, and so much stuff being thrown all over the place, staying just on the right side of being overwhelming. Love the vaguely cyber-goth music too, set off as it is by the total chaos of the sound effects! I’m a huge fan of Toaplan’s earlier shooters but this is the very best of everything they achieved before it, with everything else they had left at that point then thrown on top, which, given its legacy, turned out to be quite a lot! Whichever version you go for, it plays like a dream on Evercade on the TV, borders and all (see rubbish phone pic above!) but is even better spun vertically on the EXP handheld – and is way more than just a pioneer… It’s the best of all worlds to me! 

I’m going to jump to not a game at all next! If you’ve followed any of my Retro Rewind features (more on those to come…) you’ll know I’ve been working away at extending either end of my Computer & Video Games magazine collection, which started in 1985 and ended with the April 1992 issue, or at least it did until I got this May 1992 one the other day! I have picked up a few later ones too but it’s strangely way more difficult to pick up these ones at a reasonable price. Wider interest I guess! Anyway, this is a real treasure trove, and has the bonus Go! handheld(s) magazine that came with it still stapled in the middle. The big news inside this month is the arrival of the SNES in the UK, retailing at £149.99 and bundled with Super Mario World, with F-Zero, Super R-Type, Zelda III and “Castlevania 4” on the way soon. In the meantime, Smash TV on there is the headline act in the reviews, scoring 92% and looking wild, although I reckon Contra Spirit comes a very close second. Over on the Mega Drive, Two Crude Dudes isn’t far behind either, and you’ve got a big Sonic the Hedgehog pull-out game guide to help keep any new console envy at bay too! Elsewhere we have all kinds of cuteness with New Zealand Story finally making it to the NES, and the fantastic cute ‘em up Bells & Whistles making nineteen-year old me want a PC-Engine even more, although even that doesn’t come close to the mouth-watering Last Resort arriving on Neo Geo! Some great stuff in that Go! mag too, with World Class Leaderboard making the leap from the Master System to the Game Gear, meaning it’s the best golf game on both systems now, while Turrican leads the charge on Game Boy… If you can actually see the tiny sprite! There’s loads more besides but fingers-crossed I’ll still be here to eventually give this one a Retro Rewind of its own when it’s fortieth anniversary rolls around in May 2032, and I’ll be able to tell you all about it!

And having seen Last Resort in all its glory again just now in my new copy of C&VG, I couldn’t resist going back for another piece of that action, which I got on SNK Arcade Classics Vol.1 on PSP, where I’m also still plodding through Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (see last week), so this was a nice change of pace! It’s a horizontal shoot ‘em up from 1992 that has one of the most stunning parallax cityscapes you’ll ever see in a game, and on the very first level too if you’ve never seen it before and want to give it a proper look! Both the graphics and soundtrack are something else throughout though, as you protect the last remaining human colony from a computer virus and its minions across five stages that I think you need to beat twice, not that I’ll ever come close to doing it once! As well as the environments, enemy designs are superb, and in particular the bosses, that can be vast, multi-screen affairs, full of sci-fi detail and creative colour choices, while this dramatic orchestral synth-rock medley evolves in the background. There’s bullets and lasers and gunfire and environmental stuff everywhere too, with non-stop sirens and beefy sound effects giving its R-Type-inspired gameplay a whole new level of frantic. I guess a bit of its majesty is lost on both the small PSP screen and in its weedy speakers, but schmups generally play well on the system and this is no exception.

Although it took me almost forty years to actually get my hands on it, the original Commodore 64 version of Hardball from 1986 was the first baseball game that ever jumped out at me – one of those where a screenshot in something like Computer & Video Games magazine alone could sell you on a game, whether you were interested in the subject matter or not! Happened all over again a year later too, albeit in the cinema this time, when it appeared in The Princess Bride, but it would eventually take the arrival of The 400 Mini – exactly coinciding with my new-found love of baseball back in 2023 – for me to discover this 1987 Atari 8-bit release. Also plays great on the recent Atari 50: The First Console War DLC it came with on Nintendo Switch (pictured here) and elsewhere! It’s an early (but not the earliest) example of the TV-style presentation we’re familiar with today, with an over-the-shoulder view from the pitcher, neatly changing perspective depending on whether the batter is left- or right-handed, then switching the camera to a split fielding view as required. There’s intuitive but thorough pitching and batting control, while fielding and also coaching are enjoyably simple, and although there’s just two made-up teams to play with, and playing solo you’ll soon be winning games more often than not, it’s well-paced with a nice blend of arcade and simulation, and is a lot of fun all the same. And if the sound is ambitious but functional at best, the big, detailed, realistically animated graphics more than take the strain, and are way above and beyond expectations on any 8-bit system of the time. And if this was the only baseball game I’d owned since, I’d still be happy! 

Right, that’s more than enough for this week but in case you missed it last Wednesday, you don’t need to wait for this one because after a few months gap while my collection caught up with us, we’re heading back exactly forty years for the very latest in video gaming, as well as what was probably my very first glimpse at a future top ten all-time favourite called Elite… It’s Retro Rewind: December 1984 in Computer & Video Games, straight from the pages of the original magazine! Then next Wednesday, I suppose it’s time I thought about Christmas, and what better way than with my favourite Christmas game! Yes, it’s time for the traditional Retro Arcadia Christmas Special, and this year we’re going festive bullet-hell and rediscovering the original arcade version of Deathsmiles II: Makai No Merry Christmas on Nintendo Switch! Hope to see you then! 

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