So yeah, I took last week off. But now you get a double-batch of DLC goodness! And not-so-goodness, as judged by me! I have qualifications. No, you may not see them.
I don’t know what Nintendo’s New Year’s resolution was, but I can tell you what it wasn’t: Releasing good games on WiiWare! At least so far — this week’s Sandy Beach is, uh. Well, make with the clicky and I’ll tell you.
[[image:jh_090106_dlc01.jpg::left:0]]WiiWare: Sandy Beach
Konami | Wii | Sandcastle defense
Build sand castles and defend them from Giant Enemy Crabs! Well, Regular-Size Enemy Crabs. Crabs, anyway. But I’m not convinced I want to build sand castles without actual, you know, sand.
[[image:jh_090106_dlc02.jpg::left:0]]WiiWare: Maboshi’s Arcade
Nintendo | Wii | Puzzle
Play three mini-games on different areas of the screen in this game, with the goal being a million points in each. Up to three players can take on a game each, and what happens in one game can affect the others.
[[image:jh_090106_dlc03.jpg::left:0]]WiiWare: Cue Sports: Pool Revolution
Hudson Soft| Wii | Pool
Do we need another virtual billiards game on the Wii? I don’t. I’m betting you don’t either.
[[image:jh_090106_dlc04.jpg::left:0]]VC: Kirby’s Dream Land 3
nintendo | SNES via Wii | Platformer
Kirby’s generally good stuff — and this was the last first-party game released for the Super NES, so you might have missed it the first time around. In this one Kirby can give up hit points to summon a helper named Gooey, and can team up with several friends.
[[image:jh_090106_dlc05.jpg::left:0]]VC: Zoda’s Revenge: Star Tropics II
Nintendo | NES via Wii | Overhead adventure
Lots of end-of-the-road games this week, as Wikipedia tells me Zoda’s Revenge was the second-to-last licensed game released for the NES. Consensus seems to be that it’s not as good as the original, but doesn’t have the same tendency toward enragingly cheap deaths.
[[image:jh_090106_dlc06.jpg::left:0]]XBLA: Interpol: The Trail of Dr. Chaos
Publisher | Xbox 360 | Puzzle
Track down the mad doctor of the title in this object-finding puzzle game. I’m pretty sure you can find a similar game in your Sunday paper. If you get it. Which you don’t, because you have the Internet.
[[image:jh_090106_dlc07.jpg::left:0]]PSN: Lumines Supernova
Q? Entertainment | PlayStation 3 | Rhythm matching puzzle
On whatever platform, Lumines is Lumines — you stack two-toned blocks in such a manner as to link as many of the same color together as possible before a line sweeps across the screen and clears any highlighted blocks. The speed and temp changes with each new music track and background combination, or skin. It’s a solid, addictive puzzler, though if you have it on Xbox 360 or PSP you’ve pretty much played this already.
[[image:jh_090106_dlc08.jpg::left:0]]PSN: Suikoden
Konami | PSOne via PlayStation 3 | RPG
The inaugural chapter in an often-great RPG series, Suikoden is a lot shorter than you might think an RPG would be, but it makes up for it with an awesome soundtrack, memorable characters and plotting, and a snappy battle system. Worth getting just for the prospect of transferring your save data to the inevitable(?) release of Suikoden II down the line — and heck, buying this now can’t hurt the chances of that happening, can it?
Right about Startropics 2. It IS less cheap than the original, but it’s also much less distinctive. By maintaining the “tropical archipelago” theme throughout, the developers managed a game in ST1 that was thematically unified and felt creative within its self-imposed limitations. ST2 takes that away by sticking you in an unrelated setting for each level, with none of them feeling particularly well-realized.
Still, what Startropics 2 DOES have is: The Cactus Dance. That’s right, The Cactus Dance. Everybody in the desert do The Cactus Dance.
I’ve had Supernova for a few weeks now. I haven’t played it much but so far I’m not impressed by the skins that seem to be new.
However, I still really like Lumines, so I’m not complaining.
Face the cactus if you might then take two steps left and three steps right!
*sigh* I remember being in an arcade once. For something called an ‘arcade’, XBLA sure has a crappy selection of actual arcade games. What’s up with Capcom and Konami not releasing a bunch of actual arcade games? I’d pay for Mercs (not that awful Commando 3) or any of the umpteen 4 player Konami games like Vendetta. (end xbox arcade rant)
@ Moran: Actually Capcom and Konami already have a fair amount of their arcade games on XBLA (their quality may differ tho):
Konami:
– Time Pilot
– TMNT
– Frogger
– Frogger 2
– Contra
– Gyruss
– Rush n’ Attack
– Super Contra
– Track and Field
– Yie Ar Kung Fu
Capcom:
– SF2: HF
– SSF2THD
– Commando 3 (which I may not think was as good as Mercs, but it did control a lot better)
– 1942
– Super Puzzle Fighter
– Bionic Commando
This doesn’t even include any of their original games or other arcade games by companies like Midway or Namco. I too would love an online version of some other Konami 4P titles like Vendetta, Sunset Riders, Xmen, or Mystic Warriors but they are either bogged by license issues or weren’t even that popular when they came out in the arcades to justify a rerelease. Plus most of those titles have already been rereleased on any of the Konami Acrcade Classics or Capcom Classics collections.
duh, I know the currently available selection but it just bothers me these companies (konami especially) have an entire library of super great arcade games but they’re not willing to do much outside the same 20+ year old games they’ve been dumping on compilations for the past couple of years. Classic no-license issue games that should be there. Like Gradius! Should I call it Nemesis? There’s no Nemesis on there! WTF Konami?
As for Capcom, with the exception of street fighter and puzzle fighter they have no arcade games up. Not even Final Fight (a crime!)
maybe I’m just angry there are zero Taito games on there like bubble bobble (another crime!). I blame square-enix so hard for that.
Stupid arcades. Why’d they have to go extinct so hard… *grumble* *grumble*
Macc-
amazing callout to Mystic Warriors. I never played it until I built my very own Multicade, but it is AMAZING. the voice acting, the levels, the black dude named Brad… so good. and so unappreciated, despite Sunset Warriors being only 90% as good.
@ Moran: Trust me I wish a lot of those titles were up on XBLA as well, but like I said before some of those titles are so abscure that I think Konami would not feel justified green lighting putting those titles up on XBLA. If all it was was just slapping the game as it is right up there I am sure they would have, but for MS to allow it they gotta make sure the emulations works on the 360 and then add a online component like all XBLA games (wether it be multiplayer or just leaderboards). This is a bunch of extra cost to release a beat um up game that like shumps has a very limited niche audience. Meanwhile they can just post up the exact emulations of their NES or SNES versions of these games at a very low cost on the Wii VC. Thats already what Capcom has done with Final Fight and Konami already did with Gradius. Although I will agree with you that Taito is missing out on some easy income by not release some of their old titles like Bubble Bobble on XBLA. Although if I recall correctly they should be releasing a version of Space Invaders Extreme on XBLA which is an awesome remake (which if it was not for Square-Enix probly would have never happened).
@Mercarfat: Mystic Warriors is one of those unsung awesome beat em ups that Konami released at the end of the American arcade era. I had almost forgotten about the game until I played in on MAME a while back. I approve of any game where you beat up guys while riding a board of some sort at any point in the game. I also forgot to give a shout out to GROWL another awesome beat um up.
That’s a load of bollocks. Konami put a primordial dinosaur like Scramble on XBLA. Once they ran their gamut of classics they put on their GBA compo, they stopped. What’s the point of making such a wonderful digital infrastructure like this and not utilize it? So much potential is limited to a patehtic trickle on a weekly basis for all these systems. The real issue looks more like a case of piss poor management run by miserly dopes who insist releases should be kept really really tight and limited for some bizarre reason.
And, sorry, I don’t exactly trust you when you say you wish those titles were up on XBLA too and then begin making pretty faulty excuses and assumptions why they’re not before letting me know how k-rad you are playing ROMs on MAME. I’m not as k-rad as you are. Most of these old arcade games I enjoyed and would like to play again are completely inaccessable.