Devil's Crush

If you don't like Pinball, I'm not sure what to say. Everyone loves pinball. But without going on a tirade about the dwindling number of pinball and arcade machines in the wild, I'll review Devil's Crush, a pinball video game. Most people, however, probably cringe at the thought of a pinball video game. With so many imaginative video games, who would want to play a regular, real-world game like that? Windows XP comes packaged with a damn fine pinball game, but nothing compares to Devil's Crush for the Turbo Grafx-16.

Devil's Crush is the 1990 sequel to 1989's Alien Crush, a space-themed pinball game. Typically I'd roll with the sci-fi game, but in this case Alien Crush has a few mechanical issues that make it slightly inferior: the board is smaller and the scrolling is not as smooth. Other than that, Alien Crush is still a damn fine game, and deserves it's own review. Devil's Crush fixes both of these problem, increases the size of the world, and remains the 8/16-Bit pinball game.



The coolest stage feature is a face that slowly transforms into a demonlady the more you hit the bumpers around her. Activating certain features, or going in certain passageways will launch the player into a bonus stage (1 of 6), in which the player fights a boss or a few mini-bosses.

Even though Devil's Crush may not be the real deal, that gives it certain advantages of which the designers fully take advantage. Little monsters run around the entire game, the skeleton's eyeball follows the player, and the physics are forgiving. Often, pinball games try to be too realistic, and this results in the player losing balls unfairly. Nothing of this nature appears in Devil's Crush, and more often you will make a shot that you expected to miss.



All your normal pinball crap is present, but the environment and music set a nice, creepy tone. This is clearly the most extreme pinball game for a home console, and a must-own for all TG-16ers. However, if considering purchasing this game for the VC, be aware of exactly what you are purchasing. If you suffer from a short attention span, Devil's Crush might not be the TG-16 title for you.

But for most gamers, Devil's Crush will provide many hours of fun and even features a 2-player alternating mode. Good luck convincing your friends to play this one. My best suggestion: simply turn the game on and hand someone the controller without saying anything. After spending a few minutes playing Devil's Crush, the attention to detail and balanced gameplay should keep everyone coming back for more.

First of E3 2011: Retro City Rampage

I often wonder about some homebrew NES games that simply vanish. One such game was Grand Theftendo: an attempt to create an GTA-style homebrew NES game. I stopped keeping up with the project year ago, when the developer went AWOL.

However, the game has resurfaced as a WiiWare, PSN, and XBLA title: Retro City Rampage. Suppodly the game cracks jokes, much like Fight Town, and gaming/GTA/beat-'em-up tropes (Final Fight took place in "Metro City" and "River City Ransom" is considered by many gamers to be the greatest beat-'em-up of all time, and the first to fuse RPG elements into a beat-'em-up.

Even though Retro City Ransom loses some novelty by not being an actual Famicom game, I'm glad to see the developer reach a wider audience with 8-Bit gaming.

More info on Retro City Rampage, and other interesting 2011 E3 News next week! I expect a general release date and pricing, as well as anecdotes revolving around the creation of the game to be revealed, but who knows? For now, check out these really sweet Retro City Rampage screenshots.




He's serious about that Code Book. I'd be pissed too, those things were important before the internet, damn it!

Phantasy Star II -- Part Two

I'd been assigned to gather some information on the Bio Lab. My commander suspected something was wrong with Mother Brain. A highwayman named Darum, however, was robbing everyone who crossed the bridge and killing most as well. He'd already tried to killed Nei a few months back. After gathering info in the small, dynamited town of Arima, I found a key and some dynamite in Shure dungeon.

I used this key in the next dungeon, Nido tower, and found Darum's daughter, Tiem. She asked to be taken to her father, after we showed her a letter we had found. The letter was ransoming Tiem, and she is horrifying to discover that her father became a murderer because of her. Tiem hides her face with a veil, and tries to tell Darum that killing is wrong, but, instead, he kills her. In a fit of grief, he blows himself up, ending the first story arc in a brutal murder-suicide.

But Rolf and co. press on to another town, Onita, and, finally, the BioLabs themselves. The experience and money is fantastic, and I'm able to buy several ceramic knives, good armor, and have decent gear for the dungeon. Unfortunately, Amy dies about halfway in, and I decide to press on. I almost make it to the recorder, but then Rudo dies as well and I have no choice but to warp back to town and try again -- this time I succeed and head back to Paseo!

My commander's suspicions are confirmed: Mother Brain fucked up, but currently HQ's best theory is that someone tampered with the programming, which sounds pretty reasonable. They've got some graphs to back this shit up too. My boss gives me a key, and I'm free to explore a lot of the world.

I traveled to two new towns, but not much happened. That means 2 new party members. However, I'm enjoying my current party, and think I'll stick with it. In part three I'll detail the next 2-3 dungeons and describe the two new towns, the garbage heap, and the developing story of Phantasy Star II.

READ ON TO PART 3

Click here to go back and read Part One.

VG Music: Dragon's Curse / Wonderboy III

It's been over 3 years since I first posted the first article here, Lifting the Dragon's Curse. Like many Turbo classics, this game has a rockin sountrack, and Imphnk's video nicely splices every track into one 7:25 video.

I'm almost certain the Sega Master System shares the same music as well.

Psychic World

Like Legacy of the Wizard, Psychic World was also originally an MSX game entitled Psycho World (but really they mean Psychic). The anime screenshots are actually taken from Psycho World, although Psychic World has some cutscenes in it as well--almost an industry standard by 1991 (upon it's North American release), but still a novelty in 1988 (in Japan). I suspect it was a bigger deal overseas because from 1988-1991 gaming technology developed rapidly; Psychic World might be fun, but it wasn't ever noteworthy. Sega ported it to their Master system and Game Gear, but the game has remained relatively obscure and the franchise was never picked up again. You play as Lucia, daughter of Dr. Konvak. You dad was into genetically mutating flowers and demons, and the divine will sets these monsters lose upon your family. If you can kick enough ass, the curse on your family's honor will be restored. Or something.

Your one super power: an ESP booster capable of telekinetic and elemental super powers. Not bad. As you progress through the game some cool abilities because available: flight and invincibility being the most enjoyable. The only problem with the controls is that the player is required to switch in real time (no pause-menu switching) and the command to switch powerups is down+jump+2 directions to select and activate, say, invincibility. Monsters drain your health quickly -- Lucia gets NO frames of invincibility for free upon being hit. These quirks make the game much harder than it needs to be.

If the player can overlook these shortcomings, the game truly is quite solid. Check out the box art, doesn't this look like the type of game you'd play?



The jumping physics are great, similar to Journey to Silius. However, unlike JtS and Mega Man, Lucia can run really fast if the player walks in one direction for about 2 seconds. It's a strange running system, and I've never played anything quite like it. You can not double tap a direction to start running, and you don't build momentum like Mario. All of a sudden your character just starts hauling ass. The levels are built around this concept at times, like the running parts of Super Metroid.



Now the game is noteworthy as an enjoyable and obscure underrated gem. I can't beat the third stage, but I'm getting close. Beating a stage truly feels like an accomplishment because every time you die it's back to the beginning of the very, very long stage. Almost every game out there features checkpoints, and not having this cushion admittedly makes the gameplay more exciting--but painfully difficult.

What's also exciting is mapping the console reset button to the normal "select" key so you accidentally reset 15 times while playing. This adds another layer of difficulty you simply cannot achieve on the home console.

If you have a Master System, I can't imagine not owning this game. Despite the flaws, the music is good enough to keep the player interested long enough to get hooked on the gameplay. The enemy and level design are both original, and from looking at some youtube videos of the later levels, the game gets even better in Stages 4 and 5.



The Game Gear version, while extremely similar, is a different game and not as good as the Master System version. I haven't played the MSX game, and typically games got better once ported to the Famicom or SMS, but this is not the case. Many features are missing in the Sega version, and the levels were modified from exploration-focused into a slightly more action-platforming focus. Psychic World definitely feels like an MSX adventure, which is a difficult thing to describe. Hit detection, gravity, music, colors, and enemy AI feel similar to other MSX games perhaps.



Psychic World is great, and it's a wonder people can even play Alex Kidd with gems like this sitting around on the SMS. Psychic World features great, action-packed gameplay, with zero downtime. You'll always be running or fighting or dying. Beating a stage in one life really isn't that bad; it's just good gameplay. This game will demand a moderate amount from the player, but once mastered stages become extremely fun to play through again. You won't feel bad about turning the game off/on for a 30 minute break/gameplay session.

The Legend of Kage

As the beautiful princess stood walking in her native woods... terror struck! An evil ninja flew down and captured the innocent princess, imprisoning her at the top of a great palace, but do not worry princess, for Kage is on his way!

And that's the idea of The Legend of Kage. You are Kage, ninja warrior on a quest to save the princess, several times I might add, and restore peace to the galaxy etc. etc.


Now I agree the story isn't original, or fantastic, or even that cool, but at least it's got ninjas. More importantly it's just funny, and I like the idea of the story being so completely random that its not even a part of the game. Sure you have to rescue the princess, sure that's the ''goal'' but not once was I ever concerned with that. I wanted to kill ninjas! And that's why the story is fun, and that’s why it gets a ten.

The graphics in the first level are excellent, but the quality low in the second and third, but good again in the fourth. Everything is rendered in bright, solid colors; it's pixelated and small, allowing the player to see a lot of the action.

Unfortuneatly, the sound is horrible, and I really mean that. Its the same song throughout the entire game, and its a really annoying one at that. To make things worse, every time the princess is captured, a little song plays that makes you want to have a seizure. I'm so serious, it's about the most annoying thing on the planet.

Hundreds of ninjas are flying at you from everywhere throwing shuriken, and then other times they aren't. A lot of the game is luck, and luckily I have a lot of that. I beat the game 4 times through all the seasons one night to do research for the Walkthrough/FAQ, nearly went crazy in the process... No continues, 3 lives, not very many extra lives...tough. The real fun is all in the jumping: Kage jumps so high it's incredible; he bounces off of trees nicely, and all in all it's a really fluid Crouching-Tiger-Hidden-Dragon-Feel.

There is plenty of fun waiting inside the forests of Legend of Kage. Finding a copy shouldn't be hard: I see one in every video game store. Don't expect too much out of it and take it for what it's worth, you'll easily see that it deserves the ten. This is one of my favorite games of all time; wonderfully simple and addictive.

Phantasy Star II -- Part One

I killed Lassic. Peace could now return to the Algol system, but the game instructed me to go to the Governor's mansion on Mota. There I fought a demon, the real boss of Phantasy Star. Rolf, the protagonist of Phantasy Star II, dreams about Alis fighting this demon in the into to his game. He wakes up on Mota. The star system is a very different place than the one Alis inhabited.

The Mother Brain handles all of humanity's problems: from money to the weather. One suspects early on that this power extends towards the government as well. Rolf works for the Mother Brain, in fact, he's its top agent. Right from the start, a tension exists between what the player knows must happen: information about Mother Brain's supposed evil plans needs to be gathered, and what Rolf wants: to do his job as a field agent, go home, and watch TV.

In Phantasy Star, the people of Algol were beaten down, but some of them have hope. In Phantasy Star II, this virtue has degenerated into apathy and amorality. A band of rebels dynamites an entire town and steal everything in sight, and still it remains unclear to me as a player who, if anyone, I should be rebelling against. Probably not the misguided rebels, but probably not Mother Brain either. If there is one thing Star Trek has made perfect clear: computers lack the human emotion to rule people. Still, the question is chillingly relevant, and, surprisingly, Phantasy Star comments on real life more effectively than fantasy-RPGs.

The battle system is greatly improved, and I'm glad to say goodbye to first-person dungeons as well. Phantasy Star II compensates by providing the player with amazing music, easily on par with Final Fantasy 7, Sonic, Mega Man, Lufia, Ninja Gaiden, and other acclaimed video game soundtracks. Usually the battle theme in an RPG is "okay" and sounds vaguely "tense" which sometimes just translates to "unbearably annoying" or "seizure inducing." Phantasy Star II's battle music could roughly be categorized as "fucking awesome."



Sega brings this level of quality to every single track in the game.

I really enjoy the new battle layout, it's nice watching Nei and Rolf slash at the enemies. Battle formations are now varied, and Phantasy Star feels futuristic and exciting. Many genre perks missing from Phantasy Star (moving NPCs, huge cast of characters, dual wielding, etc.) are now, thankfully, present. Sega takes full advantage of the Genesis hardware and create a technical rival to Final Fantasy. But Final Fantasy 4 was really easy, even the Japanese version. You could basically beat it and sleep at the same time. I'm hesitant to call Phantasy Star II "underrated," because it's actually quite popular and I know many gamers out there already consider PSII to be the best 16-bit RPG ever created. I look forward to testing that claim.

Continue reading in Part Two!