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Batsugun (Evercade): COMPLETED!

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Well isn’t this a slick little arcade shooter? I’ve heard of it before but never played it, and I don’t generally get excited over shoot ’em ups as they’re not really my favourite genre, but I couldn’t help be impressed with just how much is going on at any one time on this.

I suppose in some ways it’s an early bullet hell shooter, in that there are so many bullets coming at you the main focus of the game is avoiding them rather than shooting stuff (as that happens mostly coincidentally). Actually, having now stopped typing and looked it up, it seems that Batsugun is generally considered the first bullet hell shooter and not only that, but the development team later became Cave who are synonymous with bullet hell shooters. Well, it shows.

On the Evercade EXP you can play it in TATE mode, which I did, and it’s lovely. There are huge things to shoot, things to collect (which may improve my shooting skills but I couldn’t figure out how), massive bosses, and three different characters with different weapons to choose from. I chose Type B, the big laser cannon thing.

It’s a bit short with only five (I think) levels, but you can’t really complain as it’s an arcade game. It is, like most arcade shooters, impossible to complete without pumping it full of coins, so I was thankful for the unlimited virtual pennies.

Auf Wiedersehen, Monty (Switch)

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Nah mate. Look, I tried. And, it looks so much better and plays so much better than the previous two Monty games, but I just couldn’t make head nor tail of the map, where I’m supposed to go, or what I’m supposed to do. Collect plane tickets, go to other countries? Then what? Why? There’s money pick up, I think? And other items?

Just utterly flummoxed by it and wandering the map with a dwindling number of tickets which are needed to get around wasn’t fun. I looked up the original game cassette inlay and that didn’t help either. Abandoned!

Monty on the Run (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Another Monty game. It’s very similar to the first one, really, but with the added feature that you have to collect five specific items en-route to the exit or you can’t escape.

I think I was lucky in that I found them automatically or accidentally, because I certainly remember when I’ve played this previously a very long time ago I must have missed some. It wouldn’t surprise me if backtracking to find them again was impossible too.

The jumping physics and general collision detection seems a bit improved over the first game, and graphically it’s a bit nicer too. There is a teddy that looks like you should pick it up but it kills you, which seems a bit unfair as there’s no warning. Bloody teddy bears.

Wanted: Monty Mole (Switch): COMPLETED!

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The Monty Mole games were always Too Hard. You only have to look at the random nature of the instant-death Crushers to see that. I sort of liked them at the time, but not enough to struggle through with not-my-fault deaths threatening to cut my play short – it was just too frustrating. Plus on the Spectrum I had a million other games I could play instead.

So, why I bought The Monty Mole Collection, a set of three Monty and one Monty-adjacent games on the eShop, I don’t know. Madness.

But! Save states! Sure, emulators have had these for a Very Long Time but it’s just easier to play things on the Switch these days, isn’t it? And with these save states I can work around the stupid randomness and relieve some of the other frustrations that are always part of pixel-perfect platformers with slightly wonky collision detection.

And so it came to pass that I played and completed Wanted: Monty Mole. Obviously it’s a simplistic, if not exactly simple, game these days but it was fine enough. There was a bit where you have to collect items to get past a certain screen and the items I needed did nothing. Not sure if that’s a bug or I did something wrong, but I ended up starting the game again, did exactly the same thing, and it worked. Haunted.

This wall should “open”. It didn’t.

Densetsu no Stafi 3 (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Yes, it’s more of more of the same. Same baddies (mostly), same skills (that again need re-learning), same silly characters to interact with. But! Densetsu no Stafi 3 adds something new – a second, female, starfish. If my Japanese is correct, she’s Stafi’s sister Stapi.

At various times in the game you swap between the two starfish, sometimes at will, other times it is forced due to Events That Happen. Although similar, they have a couple of different skills. Notably, Stapi can wall-jump and crawl, so that’s one better than Metroid.

It adds quite a bit to the game, especially in a sections where you have to use each character’s skills to help the other character who in turn helps you. That said, this is really feels more of an extension of the series than a completely new game. If it ain’t broke, though. Oh! Except there is another thing which is new – WARIO. Yeah, for some reason Wario is in some of the levels and you have to guide him around. Weird.

There is a Densetsu no Stafi 4, which I own on the DS, but it’s a shame there’s no DS games on the Switch so I can carry on the series there.