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Castlevania: The New Generation (MD): COMPLETED!

Posted on 20/03/2016 Written by deKay

Or Castlevania: Bloodlines, if you prefer. Personally, I think both names are rubbish, and pretty much irrelevant.

Castlevania: The New Generation — Castle? Tick. Whip man? Tick. Moon? Tick. CASTLEVANIA.

My experience of this game previously has been that I own it, I’ve played it a few times, but because it wasn’t a Metroidvania style Castlevania (which I used to prefer over the older linear type) I never persisted with it. Of course, these days I enjoy most 2D Castlevanias, and since I just read about Castlevania: The New Generation this week in the excellent Hardcore Gaming Castlevania book and remembered that I’d never finished it, I thought I’d give it another go.

It’s excellent. Perhaps better even than Super Castlevania IV on the SNES. The graphical tricks the game pulls (sprite rotations and so on) were very unusual for the Mega Drive, not least because – as SNES fans would gleefully remind Mega Drive owners – there was no Mode 7 on the Sega console. The music, a vital ingredient in the series, is also incredible although perhaps not as iconic as in other Castlevania titles. It’s also a lot easier than Super Castlevania IV, which surprised me.

I played through as John Morris – the guy who isn’t a Belmont in name but is by blood, apparently, so can wield the Vampire Killer. He was in the original Dracula book too, apparently. The other character you play as is Eric, who has a pike or something. So yeah, I didn’t bother with him. Why would you? Tch.

There were some great bosses, marred slightly by Death’s Tarot Wheel of SuckySuck(TM), most of which I don’t think I’ve seen in other Castlevania games. Dracula also suffered from Irritating and Unnecessary Gaming Cliché #3, which was a shame but pretty much expected. I’m tempted to play more CV games now, but there aren’t any on the Mega Drive and that’s what I’m focussing on right now. There’s a sort of clone on the Master System though? Hmm.

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Batman (MD): COMPLETED!

Posted on 19/03/2016 Written by deKay

This used to be one of my favourite Mega Drive games, not least because of the tiny Sunsoft box it came in, but over the years time has not been so kind and it isn’t as good as I remember it being.

Batman — You’re going down, I’m yellin’ timber.

Part of the problem I’ll say upfront: I totally forgot, until the final level where I did it by accident, that it was possible to double-jump. This afforded Batman a bit more height, a bit more distance, and the ability to damage baddies on contact as he somersaults into them. The other problems were things that have worn me down in more recent years, like bosses that require you to repeat the same action, in exactly the same way, over and over again and leaps of faith. Or grapples of faith, on some of the levels – there’s no way of knowing if you’ll grapple up into a baddie or some spikes until it’s too late. And there’s a SuckySuck(TM) bit, only made worse by the repetitive boss fights. The batmobile and batwing levels should have broken up the mostly dull platforming sections, but the former was way too long and easy, and the latter way too hard and frustrating.

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I suppose not all games I loved when I can younger can still stand up these days, unfortunately.

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Legend of Illusion (MS): COMPLETED!

Posted on 19/03/2016 Written by deKay

And with that, the 8bit Mickey Mouse trilogy is complete! Well, I say it’s a trilogy, but apart from having Mickey and the name Illusion in it, Legend of Illusion isn’t really part of the series.

At first it seems like it is, but as well as how the story isn’t remotely linked, there are also a few things which set it apart. The main one of these is that Mickey can no longer bum-bump on baddies’ heads to defeat them. Instead, he throws soap (no, really) a feeble distance, a massive step back for the series and similar to one of the reasons I dislike the Mega Drive Castle of Illusion, where you throw apples. Further steps back include no more finding new routes through previous levels (like in Land of Illusion), no more power stars to find (you’re just handed the equivalent item instead), some rubbish bosses which require you to repeat the same attack some 10 times or so (in previous games it varied or was about 5-6 maximum, final boss Pete here was terrible), and the whole game is a complete walkover.

There’s also an additional issue where it isn’t a proper Master System game. It’s a back-port of the Game Gear version, and suffers from a much smaller viewport than the earlier titles (it’s bigger then the Game Gear one, but is badly implimented), and some odd glitching in the top “block” of the screen which I’m pretty sure isn’t related to the emulator I’m using.

It’s not quite all bad though. There are some nice new platforming gimmicks (like north and south magnets that repel or attract other as you’d expect), but they’re underused as the levels are pretty short. The rainbow level is very, very pretty and appears to squeeze more colours than is possible out of the Sega system, but again, is short and actually very dull to play.

What a shame a pair of excellent games had such a mediocre followup.

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Strider (MD): COMPLETED!

Posted on 17/03/2016 Written by deKay

Strider was always a nonsensical game. Set in 2046’s Russia but with giant robot gorillas, Amazonian warriors, wolves, an entire senate which transforms into some sort of caterpillar, and dinosaurs. There’s no cohesion, and levels flit from organic to techno and back with gay abandon. It’s utter nonsense.

The Mega Drive version, which was the first Mega Drive game I ever bought having received the console for Christmas a couple of months before, was fun at the time but still a bit janky. The collision detection is miles off, Strider himself has about four frames of animation, and the sound effects randomly vanish. Periodically, usually as a giant boss is about to appear, the screen just pauses. I’d like to say it’s crap, because all signs point to crap. But it’s not.

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There’s just something about Strider’s acrobatic prowess and the baffling list of baddies that makes it enjoyable. Even if there’s the SuckySuck Bit(TM) to end all SuckySuck Bits(TM) on the final level. Heavy boss after heavy boss. That was tricky.

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Midnight Resistance (C64): COMPLETED!

Posted on 17/03/2016 Written by deKay

Yes, I know. It’s the same damn game again. Or is it? This time it’s the C64 version which has a great soundtrack and less slowdown than the Speccy one, but the sprites are much less impressive. The level layouts are, again, much the same, and all the bosses are represented even if the final boss was a complete walkover.

I actually had to complete the game twice, because the first time I struggled to take screenshots (there’s no quick way in VICE on the Raspberry Pi) and so I used a cheat mode for the second run-through in order to get some – hence my bullet counter remaining at 500 the entire time. This had the bizarre side-effect of trying to skip a level every time I pressed down, so I actually had to play through it again as I missed stuff. The things I do for my single reader. Sigh.

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