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Sonic CD (Switch): COMPLETED!

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And onto the next! Sonic CD was always the black sheep of the 16-bit Sonic games, what with changing the gameplay and returning to a graphics style more like Sonic 1 even though it came out after Sonic 2 (in the UK at least). Levels don’t feel as well organised as the other games, with scenery overlapping and areas messy with seemingly random item positioning – partly due to being able to travel into the past and future and so some item placements make sense in one time period but not in others, and partly due to The Power Of The Mega CD allowing much more in the way of graphic storage.

Sonic CD certainly has some… interesting colour schemes.

That’s not to say it’s bad, it just was a step sideways. Sonic Origins gets round this a bit by putting it chronologically between Sonics 1 and 2, which makes sense. Unfortunately, it introduces something that close to ruins it for me – the US version soundtrack.

For the most part, the music on the US release of Sonic CD was different to the UK (and Japanese) release. The most well known example being the terrible “Sonic Boom” theme tune in the opening video, which is infinitely superior “You Can Do Anything” (generally known as “Toot Toot Sonic Warrior”) in the UK, but I hadn’t realised that almost all of the music is different. And worse. Much, much worse. The end of game boss music – one of the best on the soundtrack – is especially missed.

Luckily, the gameplay has been left alone. It just feels weird having the wrong music!

This one isn’t too hard. Later special stages are near impossible.

As with the original Sonic the Hedgehog on Sonic Origins, you get coins instead of lives, and can “spend” these on retrying failed Special Stages. And thank $deity you can, because the Sonic CD special stages (where you run around a Mario Kart-like track chasing UFOs) are hard. Yes, I made use of those coins and I don’t even feel guilty. Time stones get! Good ending (which apparently isn’t the canonical ending?!) get! Sonic 2 next!

Sonic the Hedgehog (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Well, would you look at that. I bought yet another copy of Sonic the Hedgehog. I now have it three times on my Switch, in various guises. This time, it’s because I bought Sonic Origins, that remastered collection of Mega Drive (and Mega CD) Sonic games where they are reworked to fit into widescreen properly and a few things have been tweaked.

The original, unmodified, versions are on here too, but I’ve played them before so I went for the Anniversary Mode. For the first Sonic at least, that just added the widescreen aspect already mentioned, does away with lives (you have unlimited, with what would be lives now added to a coin pot to unlock things in a gallery), lets you do a drop-dash (although I only realised that by accident late in the game) and you can spend coins/lives to retry special stages should you fail them.

The only one that really makes a difference, is the special stage retries, although the special stages are pretty easy in the first game so it’s a bit unnecessary. The widescreen is nice, but it has the knock-on effect of changing some of the bosses a bit. For example, the one at the end of Spring Yard Zone relies on the left and right of the screen acting as walls. With the left and right now, er, more left and right, extra fake walls had to be implemented. Regardez:

The odd things bottom left and right? They’re the fake walls. Which have collapsed now I’ve beaten Eggman.

It seems a handful of bugs have been fixed (there’s a few places where it used to be possible to get squashed, even though you’re not in a get-squashed place), but I did bump into this new one:

Minor stuff aside, it’s still 16-bit Sonic, so it’s still great. And yes, I got all the chaos emeralds.

Kirby’s Dream Land (Switch): COMPLETED!

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I always forget that in this, the very first Kirby game, Kirby’s well known basic power of inhaling in baddies and copying their abilities doesn’t exist. Well, he can suck them in, but he can’t gain powers from doing so.

It’s also very easy. As in, I didn’t die. You can avoid a load of things by just flying over them or sucking them up, and there’s health pickups everywhere, so it’s only really the bosses that provide any sort of challenge. Except they don’t.

Not that any of that matters though, because despite the age, lack of difficulty, and limited nature of Kirby himself, it’s still a lot of fun to play through.

WarioWare, Inc.: Minigame Mania (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Nintendo added a load of Game Boy and Game Boy Advance games to their online subscription service this week, and although I’m hyped to get to play through The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap I’m leaving that until I’m done with Fire Emblem Warriors. In the meantime, however, I thought I’d play this.

It’s… very easy, isn’t it? Have I really remembered how to play every single minigame, accurately and with skill, from 20 years ago? To the point where I think I failed only about five times in total and only one of them was on a boss? And then went through Endless Mode (on Easy, to be fair) and got to 400 before I gave up? Yes, it’s easy.

But it’s fun. And there’s more to do now, like unlock the few remaining games and VS mode games.

Adventure (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Yes, the best Atari 2600 game. Well, one of the top three, anyway. I got “Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration” for Christmas and although I’ve played a fair few of the games, most aren’t actually “completable”, what with being mostly score-attack arcade titles. Adventure, though, has an end goal – take the Chalice to the Yellow Castle.

The game has three modes. The first is a shorter game with just one dragon, fewer objects and fewer rooms. The second is the “main” version, with the full quest, three dragons, mazes, etc. The third is the second game with objects in random locations.

The random mode is sometimes a bit stupid, because it can mean that (for example) the key to get into the Black Castle is actually… inside the Black Castle. There is a bat which wanders the map randomly picking up items, sometimes swapping them with other items (and hilariously it sometimes swaps whatever you’re holding for a dragon, who then eats you), which can allow you to get hold of these “trapped” items, but it’s hit and miss and may take aaaaages.

I ran through both of the first two modes, completing them (which only takes a few minutes) then completed the third mode six times. It’s a good game, brent.