And Tony Hawk was paid to edit videos promoting the turbo grafx. This is probably just a coincidence but what a fucking weird one.
5 Likes
Mahjong On The Beach
That’s right I couldn’t stop trying one of them. It has nice city pop music. You take a Hawaiian Vacation with your girl. You immediately piss her off and then walk around Honollulu meet girls showing off their panties then challenge them to mahjong and lose because you’re an idiot at Mahjong, Rudie!
The art is charming. The legality of the girls is questionable, which puts a damper on everything. Each girl talks along the lines, “I am so horny, but we gotta play Mahjong.” “You couldn’t beat me at Mahjong? Oh well, bye!”
And while definitely present before, I noticed in this everyone had that Moe anime girl squeel voice. By and large every other game I’ve played on PC Engine had women talking in an approaching normal voice, or if they did have that voice they were a literal child character.
5 Likes
Aurora Quest: Otaku no Seiza in Another World
One mook informed this was a Super Famicom port. Another informed this is a remake of a Famicom game and the game makes a lot more sense as almost nothing happens. You play the only loser in another world. Now I gotta talk about the Japanese language for a minute.
You might be familar that Otaku meaning fan or nerd. It can also just mean “man”. Let me tell you this game was having fun with that.
NPC sprites are numerous, we even saw just Chun-Li (SF2 reference counter goes up again). The Gun Shop merchant really caught booji’s eye, and definitely would have been an avatar in SB1/IC days. One of your party members is JonJon and another is Nekettsu (of River City Fame). But the game was a linear Famicom RPG. I just went town to town played a simple dungeon, and was told to go to the next town. There is the promise of fan service at the beginning with the 5 Beautiful Women I was supposed to rescue or find, I wasn’t paying too much attention.
You can tell it is unimportant and unremarkable because it has a Super Famicom version and you’ve never heard of it.
Quiz de Gakuensai
It’s dangerous to go alone, take this small child
Our first Quiz game of 1993, during the High School Festival a little girl has gone missing. Now you a teacher must meet all the beautiful women/girls putting on school events and answer questions to find her. You will see some cleavage and implication of panties, but this is tame as far as these things go. There is no reward for answering questions correctly outside of Next Girl.
One of the most confusingly worded questions, “As of 1993 what was the last movie George Lucas Directed? Jurassic Park/Star Wars/Indiana Jones.” It’s like they wanted to future proof the questioning. There was a Trio The Punch questions in there. I don’t think that is the only quiz game where we’ve had a Data East question. There is of course a question about DeNiro’s haircut in Taxi Driver and what book Haruki Murakami wrote.
Quiz Caravan Cult Q
This Quiz game based off a real TV show was a hoot. In this you select from one category that all your questions will be about like, Video Games, Pop Art, Shibuya, Ramen, or David Lynch. Then you answer question after question about the topic.
So notes about the different categories. Shibuya is described as “Home to the Legendary Yakiniku place”. I found out Octopus Army used to be a big enough deal to be mentioned in a video game in 1993. What % discount does the Isetan Gold Card get you?
Ramen was hilarious. It was all hyper specific questions mostly about Tokyo Ramen shops. I felt proud I even began to know the answer to a few of them. I mostly didn’t know the answer to questions like, how much does Spring Onion topping at MaruIchi cost? If a normal ramen is 480 yen how much is the special? What prefecture does Hakata Ramen come from? I knew the last one, I’ve played Yakuza 6.
Of course my peanut gallery of friends lit up at the video game category. What games launched alongside the Famicom? Who do you control in the first battle of Langrisser for the Megadrive? What company made porn games for the famicom? What is the starting town in Dragon Quest V? Who did character designs for Dragon Quest? Who did the soundtrack for Mother? How many points do you get for finishing a level under 29 seconds in Sonic The Hedgehog? Which character is The 80s Mickey Mouse?
And the ultimate question: What was Super Mario USA adapated from?
There was also some extremely esoteric questions that @lonelyfrontier knew the answer to that shocked all of us. I don’t know maybe you know Xain’d Sleena. Or what game was developed by East Tokyo University.
some of the sound effects in this one were ear-piercing loud so glad it was coming out of my laptop speakers. When the questions would get more difficult you’d get this horror movie title card.
I have to try and get lady rude to try the Takarazuka category. I could easily easily steal from this game for Qing of Posters, and others were asking to before I verablized it. Especially the ramen questions.
It’s maybe the most fun we’ve had with one of these quiz games, though I still give the nod to Quiz no Hoshi for being the best of the system.
9 Likes
An actual review of Aurora Quest.
4 Likes
You’ll never guess the second google link for Aurora Quest.
5 Likes
Tenshi no Uta 2
Just as breezy as the first. Feels even more breezy after the recent slogs. This time you and your buddy go to a Sealing Tower to clear out some monsters and find a mysterious RPG girl with no memory and with no better plans, decide to travel the world and find her memories. Is she the source of the apocalypse?! On your first night back in tower it fades out implying you have sex.
There is an option to get an update and find out where you need to go next Oh My God. You’re also back to having an inexplicable save girl in each town. Maybe that’s explained somewhere in these games. There was a guitar player in town with his own special theme which reminded me strongly of Romancing SaGa.
But it’s so zippy I can see myself ducking in to play more in the future/later this year. Also the music like the first game is incredible. (The title screen is worse, and the story not as interesting, but felt like I got really lost in 1 and don’t know if I could recover my save.)
Ruin: Kami no Isan
MagiCoal wasn’t the only two character based Zelda-like this year (Secret of Mana must have made an impression). This is somehow worse than MagiCoal. The battle system is worse than Magic Knight RayEarth. I think I said that about a different game. The best thing I can say about playing MKR is that it is playable. Anything less than that and it would not be. Like Ruin. I spent 20 minutes trying to leave the starting town because it was too big (I complained about another game where the game was bigger than screen didn’t I?) Then actually playing it even more sucked.
YsIV can’t be this bad. Can it? Someone else gave a deeper impression.
7 Likes
i found a site last night selling bootleg pc engine games, including a version of cosmic fantasy 2 that undoes all of working design’s “rebalancing”, and ships with a translated version of the jp cover art, because as was the fashion at the time, the us art was shit.
5 Likes
Fighting games are back! The PC Engine was both early and late to the fighting game scene. It had the first Street Fighter in 1988 but didn’t really host any others until 1993, 2 years after Street Fighter II broke into arcades. Releasing with this new wave of fighting games was the 6 button Avenue Pad. Guess how they numbered the buttons.
Street Fighter II’: Champion Edition
Street Fighter II is still good even after all these years of innovation and iteration. It is legible, slow, and the choices are limited which makes it easy to pick up. This release came out on a special 20 Megabit HuCard, a beefy monster that’s as yoked as the characters. It plays far better than it has any right to, accomplishing fast, sturdy action that, outside of shooters, rarely happens on the console.
Martial Champion
This is a great illustration of just how high level Street Fighter II is. Here we have a fighting game made by Konami, possibly the most talented developer to touch the PC Engine. And it sucks. It’s really, really bad. It only supports a three button controller and everyone feels stiff and useless. Almost every character has their own weapon and it can get knocked out of their hands. If you like, you can pick up your opponent’s weapon, for fun. If you told me in 1992 that the PC Engine would start to get fighting games, this is what I would have expected.
Godzilla
AlfaSystem gets in on the action and I gotta say, despite being about as stiff and frustrating to play as Martial Champion, the game still managed to charm me. Every bonus point category is introduced with a Godzilla scream. The controls are very odd, yet verbose for a two button controller. I was having a miserable time in my first match, but when I started to get the hang of it, I could just pummel the other monster with punches, tail whips, and nuclear fire. It’s not bad!
10 Likes
don’t you have to unlock most of the characters in godzilla?
there’s a snes port where you don’t have to do that
it’s cool that jet jaguar and gigan are fighting in the background of the megalon stage
5 Likes
I’m not sure. I only tried one mode that made me play as Godzilla.
2 Likes
That Godzilla game was released in America six months before Japan. Wild. I was panicing checking my mook because I didn’t remember seeing it.
Mystic Formula
What does that title envoke? Is it Top-Down run n’ gun? Because that’s what this is. You can choose from 4 characters but 3 of them are useless and the robot is only somewhat useless. If you don’t fire the robot has a double charge attack, otherwise he has a two character long spread shot. Most of the other characters only fire straight. One button shoots the other locks position, RUN BUTTON is bomb.
I had played it on the Mister but it was so infuriating that I had to switch to retroarch. See on top of normal enemies is infinitely spawning bats that can come from any direction. One pixel tap kills you. Your attacks are not powerful to begin with, but neither are the enemy’s. The only fear is this constant barrage of bats. I complained about Psycho Chaser way back in 1990 (If I am thinking of a different run and gun forgive me). It is infuriating. If someone wants to make “Fuck! Bats!” Where you play a basic game but constant bats are trying to kill you otherwise I think it would be quite popular. Navigating the bats was the only fun bit. For a different boring game I had said play Granada for the Genesis. For this I say play Arcus Odyssey or Elemental Master for the Genesis.
Gensou Tairiki Auleria
First off this game doesn’t work in Retroarch! The cutscenes don’t display. Do I complain to Retroarch? Glad I watched this on a mister so I knew something was missing. Secondly, the game sucks. The Casiopia style free jazz is an inspired choice. Minty mentioned that Taito had stopped making games for the PC Engine, well there name is real big on this.
It’s a Zelda-2 like side scroller with very short levels and leveling and extremely deadly enemies. It felt like a terrible waste of time to play. You could see it as a game a poor soul could be tricked into loving. They don’t have Zelda but they do have Auleria. I got into the first dungeon proper which was a cave-door-maze. Each cave looking exactly the same, can you find your way out asshole? Nah I’m good. Just scrolled through the one youtube longplay and didn’t see anything there outside of someone’s wasted 20 hours.
9 Likes
Championship Rally
It’s a racing game made by Intec. Remember them? The makers of simulations for war, baseball, and stocks? I like this more than I probably should. It plays like all of those F1 Circus games, but it’s rally so it’s cooler. I can choose a car and they’re all licensed off of real make and models. There’s a Dakar rally mode where the course is completely off road and incredibly difficult to predict. There are also Finland tracks which, blessedly, have marked paths. Oddly enough, I’m able to tune the car however I see fit. I can make it go really fast or slow, make steering and brakes tight or loose, and choose from three sets of tires. This is probably the most fun I’ve had with a racing game since Victory Run.
Zero4 Champ II
This has been one of my most anticipated games since I sampled the first one back in May. The game starts where the previous one left off. I play as Japan’s fastest drag racer. I hear that an American has been giving drivers trouble and he’s very fast. Unfortunately, my car is in the shop so I have to borrow one from a friend. I meet the American at the pier and he starts trash talking Japanese cars. I challenge him to a race, and in a cutscene, I lose. The trash talk gets more racist. Now, I have resolved that I will beat this man, no matter what it takes. What it takes is selling the car that helped me become the fastest racer in Japan. What it takes is getting on the first plane to America.
When I land, I realize I do not know English. Everyone I try to talk to sounds like they’re speaking gibberish. Luckily, my friend had given me the address to her aunt’s house and I find a place to stay. I can’t do anything because I don’t know English, so I start wandering around the street and approaching strangers. I meet two Japanese girls. They laugh at me. They tell me there’s an intense English school that can help me become fluent in two weeks. I approach the door…
14 Likes
Feeling things at that Yokohama screenshot
4 Likes
There’s so much care and detail put into this game. I’m amazed at how much the team believed in the concept of an adventure game where you drag race.
4 Likes
You gotta be kidding that it is called Championship Rally.
This is on my list to play because I keep looking at and seeing.
Which turns out was only similar in my brain.
5 Likes
I am on vacation for a week and won’t be playing any games. Anyone reading this, feel free to play Rondo of Blood, Bomberman 94, or the Ys 4 fan translation. I’ve been saving them for you 
7 Likes
Tengai Makyou Fuun Kabukiden
This is a Gaiden of Tengai Makyou 2 starring one of the Fire Family Heroes. This hero is the most obnoxious of the bunch being a sort of Lupin at a constant 10. They are constantly laughing at their own genius and how they are better than everyone else. I think it is supposed to be a joke, however every review I read mentions how annoying having this guy as a main character is.
Outside of that it plays like Tengai Makyou so lots of beautiful cutscenes, fantastic (and annoying) voice acting and dead simple gameplay. As this takes place one year after TM2 you start the game at level 13. Outside of the redbook audio, I liked the chiptune compositions that were Traditional Japanese stuff.
You see some of the things that Trails In The Hooter fans like to praise. There are a lot of NPCs to talk to. The menus are so dense with kanji and options. Your character only has 8 item slots and they fill up before you can leave the first town. “This is only going to get more annoying, despite this game’s good points.” Also despite moving fast in town, you move like molasses in the overworld. I think I would have to play this in an emulator with heavy fast forward. Which the Mister PC Engine core does not have. I could have done like Two Things in Tenshi no Uta 2 at this point. Seen more of Farosei no Jakotei.
I got to see a little bit of the party members from the two main games, and coming to the horrible realization of “I don’t think I like these characters.” The back half of the game tales place in London, so that would be different, but require more of my time than I would give it. I’ll just try to put a few more hours into 2 before the year is over.
I died 3 times trying to get to the 2nd plot point. So made the mistake of buying the most expensive armor that my one party member couldn’t use. at that point I said “Fuck This Game.” I think every Final Fantasy at this point at least said whether you could use an armor or not.
6 Likes
Trying to wrap my head around Martial Champions and Flash Hiders. Flash Hiders has a full story mode by Right Stuff Co. it looks better than MC. The story mode can be played automatically which was even more baffling. I couldn’t figure out to begin to fight in Martial Champions.
Iga Ninden Gaiou
Nichibutsu you can make a better game than this. You deliberately made a bad game. I think this is the only PC Engine CD game with zero voice. As far as I can tell they used the space for Neo Geo style cutscenes and a soundtrack ripped from a Super Famicom soundchip, which is the second time this year I’ve said that!
Like this game is giving me a crisis, maybe I am in too deep to mediocrity and need to take a break, but there is no reason this game is as stiff, enemy spawning, unfair and yet lax as it is. Rondo is a miracle compared to the competition for PC Engine Action games. This maybe the most stiff I’ve ever seen a Ninja game, and I’ve played Revenge of Shinobi. There are at least 4 other ninja games on this console that look like masterpieces by comparison.
It’s not the worst game on the console, but it feels like it’s poorness is a choice, and they could have done a thousand things better. It feels like I got this game for my birthday, it’s the only game I have, and I’d rather read Tom Sawyer or drag a stick through the dirt or see if I can make a mosquito explode by flexing my arm.
5 Likes
Yami no Ketsuzoku
The mook referrs to this as a “Novelware”. It’s an adventure game but I think I pressed a button 5 times in the first hour. In a stunning bit of indulgence you sit and watch 3 adult women plan a Girl’s Vacation at a cafe for about 20 minutes. This is so when one of them is mysteriously murdered immediately afterwards you are caught up in the narrative. They were going to to to Mexico! They just had a fashion show! God dammit they had so much to live for.
I was shocked how talky this was, and how it was just mundane adult conversations. The narrator/protagonist spends at least 10 minutes just describing her job to the player.
Turns out the girl was killed and found naked and drained of blood. Spoilers it was an evil Mayan Vampire.
What issue of Mu did they get that from?
I quit right when it seemed like the game began and I could actually choose to go to one place. Seeing a series of animes get sexy murdered by a pile of unknown cliches seems like a bad time. The most fun I had was when they were in Kichijoji and even 20 years later I could immediately identify where the reference photo was from.
7 Likes
Sword Master
What a rippoff of Shining Force, what a Megadrive game. I think all the songs despite this being a CD game were composed for the Yamaha soundchip. It’s wild. The color pallette is Megadrive. It even looks like a Japanese company trying to make something ugly that appeals to Americans. I guess it is slightly different that you play an anti-hero loner that loves murdering. He really delights in killing a goblin that begs for mercy.
I showed off what it looked like, the only video of extended game-play is a English speaker laboring over every line. You wonder if this is what my streams look like. Anyways he turned off animations confirming this to be a Fire Emblem/Shining Force. But if you turned off the animations, why even bother? Then you are just playing the game (which seems dull). I could go i to the kitchen, grab the spice rack, and invent a campaign of Spice V Herb:Ballistic.
In my first battle with a full party (of 4) two of my guys got one shotted by goblins and I just had to consider if it was worth any more. It wasn’t. Neat that this game has so much Megadrive in it. It is by Right Stuff, which we are going to talk a lot about next year, but already this year made Fiend Hunters, Flash Riders, Terraforming and a Sega CD RPG they port to PC Engine next year. They are kind of like Human, but nothing they make is particularly good or interesting (unless…).
Patalabor
Another year, Another digital comic by River Hill Soft. I had to look up, oh yeah these are the guys that did Overblood which is definitely a good time to scroll through the devilish youtube playthrough of. They also made the Burai games I hated, and JB Harold games which Bachelor hated.
This one sounds better than the Gunbuster adaption, which shocked me with it’s shit sound quality (I mean to recheck that tonight.) They got the whole voice cast of the TV Show and got them to do their thing. Hearing the Patlabor cast do Patlabor stuff is fun. I think this is an original story, but haven’t watched all 48 episode of the TV show so could be wrong. They definitely reference stuff from the show. The cops are chasing down a mysterious Black Labor that Noa has fought twice before.
It’s well presented between the linear adventure game elements and when it launches between background, character portraits, and different panels to tell the story. It is very well put together and I imagine pretty short.
It has a rock/paper/scissors Labor fighting game I did not understand at all, that a trick of looking at a screen would make you think it is a full fighting game. They recorded individual “next episode” interstials. If you do speak Japanese this, Ranma, and Urusai Yatsura digital comics have all been fantastic introductions to these series.
Repeating what Minty says that we are leaving The Good Games to other people, though I will get to YsIV before the year is up. I am probably going to start in the RPGs for 1994 soonish because there are 21 of them (Fuck!) and giving them each 90ish minutes is going to be my whole August, now it can by whole August and July.
What’s fascinating is how as the PC Engine has winded down, the shooters have dried up, the mahjong horny has remained constant, and the rpgs have only gotten more numerous and yet seemingly, of worse quality. That’s on a sliding scale. I don’t know I keep avoiding the 3 good games of this year in favor of this avalanche of stuff no one cares about.
11 Likes