Indholdsfortegnelse for No. 262 i Retro Gamer

There was sad news in the retrogaming community recently with the passing of Andy Dyer, a veteran of several beloved UK gaming magazines. Andy first rose to fame in the Nineties and started off as a writer for the popular Commodore Format. He soon teamed up with Steve Jarrett to create a brand-new magazine for Future Publishing called Total!, which was dedicated to Nintendo’s numerous consoles. His work at Future was prolific, including an eventual editor position on the aforementioned Total!, editor of the Sega magazine MEGA, roles on the likes of PlayStation Max and a later editorial role on Imagine Publishing’s N-Revolution, which closed in 2008. As you can imagine there was a great outpouring of appreciation for Andy online, with Andy Roberts, CEO of Thalamus Digital, sharing the…

Over a lengthy career in games, Richard C Hewison has been a project manager, a game tester, worked on the original PlayStation and often writes for Retro Gamer. That journey began at Telecomsoft in the late-Eighties, and now Richard has chronicled the company’s Firebird publishing label in a new book, Memories Of Firebird. We caught up with him to find out more about this latest venture. How did the Memories Of Firebird project first get started? Well, technically it started back in 1999 when I first decided that the history behind Firebird and Rainbird needed to be told by people who were there. By then my day job was in IT and I was getting involved with researching and setting up a web server, and so learning to write my…

Having an overwhelmingly successful console isn’t usually considered to be a problem, but by the end of 2006, the PS2 had Sony in a bit of a bind. Despite the ageing system being past its sales peak, new customers were still adding to the total of over 100 million PS2 consoles in homes worldwide. While some of them would naturally have moved on to other systems, it was obvious that Sony would be leaving money on the table if it failed to cater to the many players still enjoying the system. The only problem was that the PSP and the newly launched PS3 needed the software support more. Sony’s solution to the problem would be to maintain the presence of its major first-party series on the PS2 by porting them…

SABRE WULF SYSTEM: ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64, Commodore Plus/4 YEAR: 1984 ■ In his debut adventure, Sabreman is venturing deep within a convoluted jungle brimming with dangerous beasts and fauna. To escape, the hero must gather the four pieces of an ancient amulet hidden in the enormous maze. Only when he’s assembled the amulet can Sabreman pass the guardian and enter the Underwurlde. UNDERWURLDE SYSTEM: ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 YEAR: 1984 ■ Released simultaneously with the third game, Knight Lore, Underwurlde follows directly on from Sabre Wulf. Sabreman is stuck again, this time in the eponymous underground caverns. Three guardians, erm, guard the exits, each leading to a different ending. Defeat one of them, and Sabreman’s next adventure awaits. KNIGHT LORE SYSTEM: ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, BBC Micro,…

Nintendo deployed a strange US marketing campaign for EarthBound in 1995. A scratch-and-sniff magazine advert ran the headline, “This game stinks,” and an explanation that, “You’ve never seen or smelled a role-playing game like this!” Fart jokes abounded in an advert that didn’t quite match the subtle humour of the game. TV adverts were also commissioned, and the game was packaged in a huge box containing a 135-page strategy guide, which pushed the price up. “Right out of the gate the price point was above almost every other game,” Marcus reflects. “I was glad to have the strategy guide in there because I think it was a good tool for people and it was well done. But the expense was a lot for people. And when you have two games…

The first Alien 3 game was produced in the UK by Probe Software and released for the Mega Drive in October 1992, six months after the movie. It is a routine platform shooter, spread across 20 labyrinthine stages, where as Ripley, you’re tasked with rescuing the prisoners from the aliens – of which there are many. So many. Thankfully, there’s plenty of weaponry available to repel them. Overall it’s a decent game, spoiled only by the strict time limits that force you to speedrun each stage rather than explore at your own pace. This game forms the basis for the Master System, Game Gear, Commodore 64 and Amiga versions. The NES also received a conversion of the Mega Drive game, while the other Nintendo platforms earned their own adaptations. The…

SUPER FACEHUGGER ■ This oversized critter scuttles around the evacuation vehicle at the end of the first stage and tries to whip you with its tail. HOW TO BEAT THEM: As with regular Facehuggers, shoot it when it leaps towards you. The best time to damage it is immediately after it attacks. Don’t waste any bombs. ALIEN (ROUND 2) ■ It’s back and now it’s got two full health bars! First you battle it at the tunnel exit, then the fight moves to the blast furnace. HOW TO BEAT THEM: This is deceptively easy, as the boss stays on the screen, so it’s just a case of holding it in your crosshair and continually firing off quick bursts. IRON TORTOISE ■ Guarding the prison’s exterior is this annoying hulk of…

ZELDA: WAND OF GAMELON PHILIPS CD-I, 1993 ■ The first game developed by Animation Magic, notorious today for its quirky animated cutscenes. LINK: FACES OF EVIL PHILIPS CD-I, 1993 ■ Released the same day as Wand Of Gamelon, it featured the same engine and similar animated cutscenes. KING’S QUEST VII: THE PRINCELESS BRIDE PC, 1994 ■ While Sierra handled the puzzles and story, all the graphics in Chapter 1 were directed by Animation Magic. IM MEEN PC, 1995 ■ A sort of simplified first-person dungeon crawler made for kids, where you have to defeat an evil wizard and all of his strange creatures. CHILL MANOR PC, 1996 ■ Sequel to IM Meen, it featured pages with missing words or incorrect history facts for the children to find in order to…

» MANUFACTURER: Tapwave » YEAR: 2003 » COST: £299.99 (launch), £300+ (today, boxed), £100+ (today, unboxed) In the handheld market of the early Noughties, the Game Boy Advance was essentially competing in a one-horse race. Undeterred by Nintendo’s dominance, the ambitious California-based company Tapwave felt that it could differentiate itself by targeting an adult audience with a more expensive, more capable device. As well as offering full 3D games, the Zodiac featured full PalmOS PDA functionality as well as music and video playback capabilities. The system launched via online direct sales in October 2003, with games including Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4 and Duke Nukem Mobile, and the likes of Tomb Raider on the way. Reviews were generally positive about the Zodiac hardware, praising its gaming power, ease of use…

Seaside Driving began as a mobile game for Android systems in 2019, before being ported to PC (2022) and Switch (2023). The gameplay is very simple – your car accelerates automatically, and all you have to do is keep it on the endless track for as long as possible before it crashes into some kind of obstacle. The coins you collect along the way allow you to unlock new cars and more tracks. It’s not a particularly deep game, and its controls could surely be whacked with a precision stick once or twice. But it’s an interesting take on the endless runner genre, and it features a smooth Eighties-style synth soundtrack. Barebones though it may be, Seaside Driving laid the foundations for Old School Rally, as Sakis confirms. “I learned…

Picture the scene. Peter Molyneux is lying in bed, covers tucked up around his neck, dreaming soundly. Suddenly he awakes, startled, sitting bolt upright, eyes widened and a smile on his face. It is 5am and Peter is excited. He has just come up with an idea for a new game. Cut to the Lionhead Studios office that very same day. Peter has two sheets of paper in his hands and he’s waving them around, enthusiastically. It’s a very early design draft, noting things he believes should be in this awesome new game. Close up: his brain is whirring. Who shall he approach to help? Peter is something of an auteur but he can’t do this alone. Peter’s idea is to create a business simulation game in a similar vein…

» System: Switch (tested), PC, PS4 » Buy it for: £24.98 » Buy it from: Online First released on Nintendo’s 3DS, Monster Hunter Stories is undoubtedly aimed at the younger gamer. It’s far more story-focussed than traditional games in the series and also utilises a turn-based approach to its fighting. There’s a strong focus on stealing eggs and training the monsters found within them and it’s possible to team up with your mount to pull off some devastatingly strong attacks. Playing on a bigger screen highlights some of the game’s visual shortcomings, but the core gameplay has translated over well, even if some of the better DLC didn’t make the journey. Don’t be fooled by its cutesy exterior, this is a compelling strategy game and a fine introduction to the…

A LOST CLASSIC Hi Retro Gamer, Why does no one ever talk about Zoo Keeper anymore? It’s a genuinely fantastic game by Taito and has you running around the outside of an enclosure as you try and recapture the escaped animals. It’s never on any Taito compilations and I’d love to replay it. Jacob Brown Good news, Jacob. Zoo Keeper will be getting the Quarter Arcades treatment later this year. That will hopefully pave the way to it appearing elsewhere as well. GNOCCHI DAY Dear Retro Gamer, In Uruguay there is a tradition where on the 29th of each month, you get together with family and/or friends to eat gnocchi. I have lived in Scotland for a few years now, and I recently started to implement this tradition with friends…

» PSP » 2007 » CLAP HANZ I recently had the pleasure of being invited onto The Back Page podcast to draft my ten essential PSP games with co-host Samuel Roberts. As we went through our picks, I realised that I’d left no space for Clap Hanz’s entertaining sequel, so consider this my unofficial 11th pick. The original Everybody’s Golf was one of the Japanese launch games I picked up for my PSP, along with Darkstalkers Chronicle: The Chaos Tower and Lumines. I sunk a huge amount of time into it and enjoyed its numerous gameplay modes and many unlockables. When Clap Hanz announced it would be releasing a sequel, I was immediately interested as the new game offered online play for up to 16 players. This felt like a huge…

If you sign up to a service like Game Pass on the Xbox, then you’re getting hundreds of games for free. I know, I know. They’re not really free. It’s like saying the NHS is free. Yeah, it’s free at the point of contact but you pay for it through taxes. And it’s the same with Game Pass. You pay for it through taxes. Or something like that. But it does mean when I log in on Xbox, I can spend ages scrolling through all of the bloody awful things on there trying to find the half-decent one. Very reminiscent of standing in Blockbusters at 8.30pm on a Saturday desperately looking for something that wasn’t She’s Out Of Control or Cliffhanger. I didn’t have that option as a kid. If…

You know how things go in the music business – when the money starts rolling in, success can drive bands apart. That was certainly the case for Guitar Hero III: Legends Of Rock, the first game in the series to be developed by Neversoft. Official PlayStation 2 Magazine praised the new coop Career Mode and the use of original artist recordings over cover versions, but criticised the wireless controllers in a 9/10 review. This game marked the series’ debut on both the PC and Wii, and earned 81% from PC Gamer and 8.8/10 from nRevolution respectively. X360 gave a 9/10 score, proving the game’s appeal across various formats. Not to be outdone, Guitar Hero’s original developer Harmonix fired back with Rock Band on the Xbox 360, which expanded beyond guitars…

» INTELLIVISION » 1987 » REALTIME ASSOCIATES The North American videogame market crash of 1983 killed certain consoles dead, but the Intellivision wasn’t one of them – INTV Corporation bought the rights to the format from Mattel Electronics in 1984, and provided decent support for the console through the rest of the Eighties. Of course, by 1987 the console wasn’t exactly going to challenge the emerging dominance of the NES, and so new games would have passed most people by. Diner deserves your attention though, as it’s not only a console-exclusive sequel to BurgerTime, but a really good one. In many ways, Peter Pepper’s task is a familiar one – you direct him around the maze, dropping food to the bottom while avoiding marauding food. The biggest difference is the 3D…

ACTIVISION HITS REMIXED ■ The world’s first third-party videogame publisher was behind plenty of the best Atari 2600 games, and this compilation includes 44 games from that era, plus some Eighties hit singles. Highlights include Pitfall II: The Lost Caverns, River Raid, Enduro, Kaboom, Keystone Kapers, HERO and Imagic’s Demon Attack. CAPCOM CLASSICS COLLECTION RELOADED ■ Arcade aficionados will be right at home with this compilation, which is packed with 19 games including 1942, Commando, Ghosts ’N Goblins and three versions of Street Fighter II. Lesser-known games like Knights Of The Round and Eco Fighters are also worthwhile. EA REPLAY ■ It’s a shame that EA rarely pays much attention to the retro scene, as this compilation was a welcome surprise. There’s plenty of variety on offer, with 16 games…

PSP (PSP-1000) 2004 ■ The PSP’s first iteration is perfectly serviceable, but has a slightly mushy d-pad, and the square button feels rather odd as it has a cut-out that’s necessary to accommodate the LCD screen. Its low system RAM means it can’t use the UMD cache mode of other models, slowing game loading. PSP SLIM (PSP-2000) 2007 ■ This second model is one fifth thinner and one third lighter than its predecessor. The controls are improved, the LCD display is brighter, you can output to a TV and charging via USB cable is possible. For most people, this is the best model of the console to seek out. PSP SLIM & LITE (PSP-3000) 2008 ■ This one’s a bit of a mixed bag – the LCD display has a…

» COMMODORE 64 » 1987 » TIME WARP PRODUCTIONS The NES wasn’t very prolific at all where I lived and I only knew a couple of people who owned them growing up. As a result, most of my interaction with the console initially came from playing Super Mario Bros in the Boscombe branch of Boots. It felt like a monumental step above the platformers I was enjoying on my Amstrad and I always looked forward to a weekend stay at my nan’s house as she’d inevitably take me into town so I could play some more of the game. A year or two later I visited a friend who owned a C64 and a huge number of games and he introduced me to The Great Giana Sisters, which as you’ll probably…

» PLATFORM: Mega Drive » YEAR: 1993 » COST: £54.99 (launch, with game), £65+ (today, boxed with game), £15+ (today, unboxed) Lightgun peripherals can be a tough sell if the software isn’t there to support them, and Sega knows that all too well – backing for the official Menacer gun for the Mega Drive was non-existent, save for the worthwhile T2: The Arcade Game. Menacer owners must have been thrilled when they learned the arcade hit Lethal Enforcers was coming to the Mega Drive, but Konami was no saviour of the peripheral. The developer chose not to implement Menacer support in favour of its own Justifier, a wired peripheral that was bundled with the game and resembled a Colt Python handgun. The Justifier was a regrettable misfire, that was no…

CAN YOU START BY TELLING US A BIT ABOUT YOURSELF? Hello there, I’m 36 and live in Salford, England. I enjoy playing arcade games and anything difficult appeals the most. I do like a challenge. My favourite genre is lightgun games and I can 1CC [one-credit clear] most of them. I like to visit arcades and leave my name. SM on the highscore tables. You may see it in some arcades. WHAT IS YOUR HISTORY WITH ALIEN 3: THE GUN? DID YOU PLAY IT IN THE ARCADES, OR MORE RECENTLY VIA EMULATION? I played it in the arcades a long time ago, but I couldn’t get far at all. I didn’t know back then that Stage 2-1 is the most difficult part of the whole game. I started to play…

» PC ENGINE » 1991 » KONAMI In the spring of 2007, it felt like the writing was finally on the wall for the Dreamcast. The fact that my favoured console was still receiving new games at all after being discontinued in 2001 was miraculous, so I could hardly have asked for more, but it did leave me with a problem – supporting the console had made me quite fond of its shoot-’em-ups, which were decidedly unfashionable at the time. Fortunately, around this time I managed to pick up a new old stock PAL TurboGrafx. I’d heard that the system was supposed to be good for shooters, so I grabbed an import adapter and ordered a small stack of Japanese games, of which Salamander quickly became a personal favourite. Fans…

STARTING WITH A BANG ■ Animation Magic first cut its teeth working with Philips, or rather the American publishing branch of the company, for two games starring Nintendo characters, Link and Zelda. For several reasons, these games were not up to the quality that players were used to. QUIRKY CUTSCENES ■ While they became a meme in the Noughties in the early YouTube era, it is fair to say that Animation Magic’s style of cutscenes did improve over time, with Warcraft Adventures looking quite beautiful compared to the limitations of the Philips CD-i. LIMITED BUDGETS ■ The two Nintendo Philips CD-i games were developed for little over 800,000 dollars, using the same engine, and in the space of a few months on a console that was not technically proficient enough…

» NINTENDO 64 » 1998 » PLAYER1 During lockdown, I found several ways to keep myself distracted from the threat of COVID-19. One was going for daily walks with my family in our local park, the other was building an N64 collection. The vast majority of games that were on my radar were mostly those that I had owned before selling my console in 1999, due to the incoming arrival of Emily, my first daughter. But as is often the case, I also made a list of games that had come out after I sold my console, as well as the ones that I had missed when I first owned the system. One of those games was Robotron 64 and it took absolutely ages for me to buy a copy…

DOLPHIN PARK ◼ Racing games live or die by their racetracks, and Wave Race 64’s warm-up course sets the perfect tone. At Dolphin Park, players learn to ride the 3D waves. It’s a happy place, a bright introduction to the Nintendo 64’s first racing game. DRAKE LAKE ◼ The game’s third course takes place on a stunning and dynamic lake. The race begins shrouded in fog, but by the third lap, the fog has burned away. Wave Racers must take care to avoid heavy piers, thick lake weed and a duck. TWILIGHT CITY ◼ Ever dream of riding a jet ski through the streets of Las Vegas? Then have we got a course for you! This is a tricky race accessible in the Hard and Expert Championship Modes. Dazzling spotlights…

THE BACKGROUND Few games understand their subject matter as much as 2019’s Lonely Mountains: Downhill. And yet the intently single-player mountain biking game started out as something rather different. Megagon Industries began work on the game in 2015, originally intending to create a multiplayer downhill truck racer. It would soon pivot to a focus on mountain biking, however, partly thanks to the vision of one of the developers, who was a devotee of the sport. Rather than squeeze itself into the trickfrenzy mould set by games like Tony Hawk’s Skateboarding, Lonely Mountains focusses on a much purer expression of what the sport can be. That is, making your way from summit to base in one piece, overcoming terrain and connecting with nature as you identify the best line to follow.…

» FLASH » 2005 » TAKAHIRO NARUMIYA In the days before internet culture was consolidated under a few massive social-media sites, I’d often find myself playing around with browser games made with Macromedia Flash. There were big sites that hosted plenty of them, like Newgrounds and Albino Blacksheep, but one of my absolute favourite games was an independently hosted game called Nanaca Crash. Many non-Japanese players at the time probably didn’t realise that it was a fan game based on the 2003 visual novel Cross Channel. I’ll admit that I’ve also never played it, although a friend tells me that the official English translation released in 2018 is somewhat incoherent. Anyway, Nanaca Crash puts you in charge of Nanaca, a girl who has an unfortunate habit of smashing into Taichi…

» System: Switch » Buy it for: £39.99 » Buy it from: Online, retail Sega’s spectacular simians are back, and mostly back on form. The Adventure Mode gives you a lightweight story and 200 new levels to tackle in solo or co-op fashion, and in traditional Super Monkey Ball style they eventually get mighty tricky. After the disappointingly odd physics of Banana Mania, this game feels far better and the new Sonic-style Spin Dash move makes for a natural addition. Sadly, the 16-player online multiplayer doesn’t live up to expectations – the framerate is halved to 30fps and the five minigames aren’t amazingly exciting, leaving you to pine for the likes of Monkey Target. Still, this is the best that core Super Monkey Ball has felt in years. >> Score…

<INTRO> INSPIRATION CAN COME FROM MANY PLACES. IT COULD BE THE THEME OF A COMPETITION OR GAME JAM. IT COULD BE A CLASSIC ARCADE GAME OR AN INDIE HIT FROM A MODERN FORMAT. IT COULD BE THE AVIAN STAR OF A CLASSIC CHILDREN’S PROGRAMME, OR YOU COULD DRAW IDEAS FROM WELL-KNOWN TITLES IN A FAMILIAR GENRE. THE RESULT MEANS THIS HOMEBREW COLUMN HAS A WIDE VARIETY OF ENJOYABLE GAMES TO DISCOVER. </INTRO> <MAIN HEADER> BIGGER BYTES <INTRO> THE 4TH ANNUAL BYTE-OFF COMPETITION FOR NESMAKER GAMES RECEIVED OVER 50 ENTRIES – AS ORGANISER JOE GRANATO IV EXPLAINS </INTRO> <BODY> “Not long after we’d released NESmaker, we thought it might be fun to have a competition,” says Joe Granato IV about the creation of Byte-Off. “Once we saw the calibre of games…

TWISTED METAL: WORLD TOUR » Surviving the vehicular violence of Twisted Metal isn’t easy, but it’s something that drivers are willing to risk in exchange for the prize – a single wish. Last year, good cop Carl Roberts wished for a world free of Twisted Metal, and earned a one-way trip to outer space. Now his sister’s out to find him, so let’s skip to the end and see how she does. 01 » Captain Jamie Roberts has won the contest and storms up to Calypso. As a cop, she should put an end to the barbaric Twisted Metal contest once and for all – but she doesn’t. 02 » Her brother hasn’t been seen since winning last year’s contest, so Jamie’s single wish is to see him again. Calypso, bearing…

The Switch may be over seven years old now, but the latest Nintendo Direct proves there’s still plenty of life left in the ageing console. The clear highlight of the show was saved for last, as Nintendo revealed the first proper look at Metroid Prime 4: Beyond as the show closed. Yes it looks a little rough around the edges and no firm release date suggests it’s most likely going to be doubling up as a launch game for the Switch’s successor, but we are still excited by how Samus’ latest adventure is shaping up. Equally exciting is the fact we’re getting a new Zelda game, but this time around, it’s Zelda who has the main starring role (she’s not led a Zelda game since the CD-i game Wand Of…

How do you enjoy yours? No, I’m not talking about Cadbury’s Crème Eggs. This is a videogames magazine, so that’d be a weird question to open with. Obviously, I’m talking about games. See, I’ve never been one for high scores. I never understand the appeal. When we moved away from an era where the arcades dominated, and every game celebrated scores, it was a good day for me. I mean, having grown up as one of the kids who was picked last when they were choosing the sides at school, high scores always felt a bit too merit and skills-focussed, and spoke to something more cerebral than the imagination that games stoked in me. Oh, there have been exceptions; Geometry Wars on the Xbox 360 somehow managed to sink its…

JANUARY 2008 – Are those shambling zombies from Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles, or just hungover revellers dancing to Rock Band and Guitar Hero III? Nick Thorpe’s beardy face is here, providing valuable familiarity in a strange new year The first episode of Breaking Bad aired in the USA on 20 January. The show stars Bryan Cranston as Walter White, a chemistry teacher who begins dealing in illicit drugs to provide for his family’s long-term future, following a late-stage cancer diagnosis. Though critically praised, the show drew a modest initial audience of 1.41 million viewers. Australian actor Heath Ledger passed away at the age of 28 on 22 January, due to an accidental overdose of prescription drugs. After a TV career including a stint on Home And Away, Ledger found…

HOW DID YOU COME TO WORK ON A PSP LAUNCH GAME? I joined Awesome Studios in April 2003 as head of research and development. This was the first time I had met Archer Maclean. Archer was a hugely charismatic person, very passionate about everything he did, particularly his new ideas. They had a demo of a new game idea working on PC which was described as a ‘ball in a maze’ style puzzle – essentially it used some of the ball physics from the snooker games, grouped them together into a shiny metallic looking blob like the metal mercury. My job was to convert this to the PS2. In May 2003, at that year’s E3, Sony announced their plans for a new portable machine, the PSP. Archer being Archer was…

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MOVIE ■ Dusko Dimitrijevic’s cool isometric gumshoe adventure Movie was a hit in 1986, securing several accolades in the press. With its laconic star, hands plunged in pockets and noir plot, Movie was already a world away from Knight Lore. The ability to ‘speak’ using comic-esque speech bubbles was another great innovation. HEAD OVER HEELS ■ Jon Ritman had already cut his isometric teeth with 1986’s Batman before producing what many consider the finest Spectrum game in the genre. The twin dilemma – two switchable characters, each with its own abilities and weaknesses is the game’s USP, and it’s recently been brilliantly remade for the Spectrum Next. FAIRLIGHT ■ While it shares Knight Lore’s mediaeval theme, Fairlight introduces several RPG elements that raise it beyond the Ultimate trailblazer. Most notably,…

Shigeru Miyamoto is famous for making people happy, but the Nintendo legend caused tears when the concept for Mother landed on his desk. In a public discussion between the two men published on the Hobonichi website earlier this year, Mother creator Shigesato Itoi remembers welling up on a bullet train ride home after making an unsuccessful initial pitch to Miyamoto. Fortunately, Itoi was soon able to dry his eyes when Miyamoto changed his mind, giving the green light for the NES game and becoming its producer. Miyamoto would later fondly recall playing the game to completion, even despite the frustration of needing to restart his playthrough when his save file failed. Itoi had begun his career as an advertising copywriter, before having the idea to make a role-playing game that…

Appetite for an English translation of Mother 3 was strong enough after its Game Boy Advance launch that a petition of 31,000 signatures was delivered to Nintendo. When it became clear that no official localisation was forthcoming, fans took things into their own hands. The US EarthBound community rallied around the development of a fan translation, with professional translator Clyde Mandelin, known online as Tomato, leading the charge. In 2008, after two years of work, version 1.0 of the Mother 3 fan translation patch was launched. According to the official website of the project (Mother3.fobby.net) the patch was downloaded well over 100,000 times in the following months. On his Legends Of Localisation website, Mandelin sheds some light on the process. “I started by doing a first draft translation of the…

When there’s a divisive entry in a popular series, there’s often an effort to retrospectively change it, to fix it. This is quite apparent with Alien 3, where various ‘alternative takes’ have been released since the movie opened in 1992. These stories, often based on early rejected scripts, reveal what might have happened if Hicks and Newt, the two survivors of Aliens besides Ripley, had not perished three seconds into the film. And if the setting was not a prison planet populated by bald British thesps. A similar problem faced the software houses who licensed the game. Presumably they echoed Ripley’s query when she discovered one particular drawback of deep space correctional facilities, “You have no weapons of any kind?!” That’s right, zero guns – and just one alien. Quite a…

SHOT STRENGTH ■ Your gun’s power becomes crippled if you hold your finger on the fire button too long. In addition, its power subtly decreases as the bar depletes, so for maximum impact it’s best to continually hold and release the trigger, firing off quick bursts. FIRE HAZARD ■ You may remember that the flamethrower weapon in Konami’s Aliens arcade game was awesome. Here, not so much. It looks cool, but it’s quite poor when it comes to clearing a room. It is good for torching the scenery – that’s about it. FACE YOUR FEARS ■ As with any lightgun game, it helps to hit enemies before they get too close. This is particularly true of those annoying, scuttling Facehuggers that infest many areas. Take them out early so you…

The history of Animation Magic feels like that moment in Rocky IV when a tired and beat up Sylvester Stallone proudly announced the end of the frictions between the USA and USSR by screaming, “Everyone can change!” But, well, that was a few years before the actual end of the Cold War; the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the collapse of the USSR in 1992, but never mind. All those history-changing events seemed to immerse the world into a (long-lost) optimism for the future, and also probably influenced the creation of Animation Magic. Animation Magic was originally a multimedia company, founded in 1992 by the late Dale DeSharone, under his own name, who sadly passed away in 2008. He had been working at Spinnaker Software, designing, programming and…

According to Sakis, the main inspiration for Old School Rally was the 1998 Colin McRae Rally. No big surprise, as it was a landmark title featuring real cars, real rallies and a very real rally champion namesake (who sadly passed away in 2007). Combining the accessibility of a typical arcade racer with life-like controls, physics and real-time car damage, Colin McRae Rally ushered in a new age of realistic racing simulations with a strong arcade flavour. It was a huge success and the beginning of one of the greatest racing series in the world of videogames. You can read about its creation in Retro Gamer 43. Another major inspiration came from the 1994 Sega Rally Championship, which made its way to European Saturn consoles a year later and was then…

Shoshinkai is a Japanese word which literally means ‘beginning party’. From 1989 until 1996, it was also the name of a three-daylong videogame tradeshow hosted by Nintendo, during which the company would showcase its new and upcoming products to a ravenous press and public. The seventh Shoshinkai, held in November of 1995, was a big one. Nintendo’s first ever 3D console, codenamed Ultra 64, was publicly revealed as the Nintendo 64, and two of the new console’s games, Super Mario 64 and Kirby Ball 64, were available as playable prototypes. In addition, eleven other of the new console’s early games were shown in a three-minute-long prerecorded sizzle reel. Squeezed in amongst such future-iconic games as Mario Kart 64 and GoldenEye 007, Star Fox 64 and Star Wars: Shadows Of The…

HYDRO THUNDER ◼ Any time we mention Wave Race 64, someone inevitably recalls Hydro Thunder. Released by Midway for arcades in 1999, Hydro Thunder made its biggest splash as a Sega Dreamcast launch title, where its fast action, impressive water physics and arcadeperfect graphics burned into our brains forever. SPLASHDOWN ◼ Splashdown, by Rainbow Studios, was released for the PS2 in 2001 and Xbox in 2002. It’s like Wave Race 64, except more realistic in presentation and aesthetic, with environments that lack the whimsy and imagination of Nintendo’s racer. A decent enough game that, for this correspondent, misses the podium. BLOOD WAKE ◼ This is a water-based, story-driven vehicular combat game that was released soon after the launch of the original Xbox in 2001. Taking place in an Asian-themed fictional…

INFORMATION » FORMAT REVIEWED: PS5 » ALSO ON: PC, PS4, SWITCH, XBOX ONE, XBOX SERIES S/X » RELEASED: OUT NOW » PRICE: £17.99 » PUBLISHER: UBISOFT » DEVELOPER: UBISOFT » PLAYERS: 1 While it wasn’t a huge commercial hit on release, Ubisoft’s Beyond Good & Evil has gone on to become a cult classic, adored by those who fell in love with the mining planet of Hillys and the creatures and characters that inhabited it. It’s rather fitting then that Ubisoft has polished the game up for its 20th anniversary and married it to a truly comprehensive behind-the-scenes gallery that offers a staggering amount of insight into the game’s creation (see the Magnifique Galerie panel). If you’ve never experienced Beyond Good & Evil before it tells the story of Jade, a…

» Buy it for: £34.99 » Buy it from: bitmapbooks.com After debuting with Go Straight, Dave Cook’s second Bitmap Books release is a far stronger offering that’s dedicated to the run-and-gun shooter. As with Go Straight, a number of other writers have contributed, including YouTube personality Sega Lord X, Chris Scullion, Kurt Kalata and our very own Graeme Mason. While we spotted a few niggling omissions and knowledge gaps in Go Straight, Run ‘N’ Gun feels far more polished and also has a better representation of the home-computer market. Dave clearly knows his stuff and while it’s light on interview content, it remains an entertaining read. It also looks beautiful, as you’d expect from Bitmap Books. If you’re a fan of the genre, this absolutely deserves a place on your…