Toronto Thumbs

BYTE-SIZE REVIEW
R-Type

Jamie has just written a great piece on Dead Space. Because I see that game as a great homage to the movie Alien, reading his take on it made me think of another game with scary aliens in it: R-Type.

As far as I know, R-Type was the first game that genuinely scared me. The first-level boss, Krell, graced the cover of the Sega Master System version of the game. It was this illustration that would ultimately haunt me more than the in-game menace would (though it would take me years to actually figure out how to defeat him – these were the days before easily-accessible video game information, after all). In fact, it’s quite possible that R-Type fostered my somewhat irrational fear of aliens.

What made R-Type a great experience for me was that it featured such a wide assortment of colourful aliens. Sprite flicker be damned! The slowness of the game may have been in part due to a lack of processing power, but its crawling pace genuinely amplified its creepy atmosphere.

Until I downloaded the Turbo-Grafix 16 on the Wii Virtual Console, the Sega Master System version was the only one I had played. Sadly, it now pales in comparison despite how impressive it still is for an 8-bit title. It certainly still has some of my favourite video game music in it. As a series, though, R-Type is my favourite shooter.

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BYTE-SIZE REVIEW
Zillion II: The Tri Formation

When I was younger, a game that let me jump and shoot while riding a bike that transformed into a flying exo-suit could be nothing but completely awesome to me.

In fact, I’m pretty sure I’d be inclined to like any such game even today. Zillion II: The Tri Formation was based on the anime Zillion, which I have never actually seen nor was I aware of as a kid. Turns out the Sega Master System’s Light Phaser was designed to look like the guns used in the anime, which is pretty damn cool.

As JJ, the commander of the White Knights, players are tasked with navigating through eight levels to both rescue comrades Apple and Champ while defeating the goons of the evil Norsa Empire. Stages alternated between auto-scrolling cycle/exo-suit stages and on-foot levels. The Tri Formation is the name of the three-wheeled (and tri-mode) cycle. The on-foot levels each had a boss at the end of them. The boss at the end of the eighth stage, Baron Ricks, was (and still is) a dick. I just played the game today, made it to the end, and he killed me quickly.

Posted in Byte-Size Reviews, Retro Reviews, Sega Master System | 2 Comments »

BYTE-SIZE REVIEW
Thunder Blade

Thunder Blade was one of the bigger “Arcade” titles on the Sega Master System. Essentially a top-down shooter with some pseudo-flight sim levels peppered in, it provided hours of entertainment to my nine-year-old self. Like with Shinobi, my cousin Mike and I would try to best each other at the game remotely. We’d call one another upon reaching milestones.

“I got to level five – the one with the caves,” was something he got to say before me. The game had its problems, even back then. For one the controls were completely different for the two types of stages. In top-down levels the helicopter moved too slowly. In behind-the-copter stages it moved too fast. There was also a dead zone in these stages where you could stay, not fire a shot, and still pass the stage.

This isn’t a game I’ve ever been able to finish, and even trying to today with my wealth of gaming expertise, I find myself unable to do it. Thunder Blade has ultimately defeated me!

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BYTE-SIZE REVIEW
Rampage

I somehow came into possession of three copies of Rampage for Sega Master System thanks to lot purchases. However, I’ve had Rampage since its release in 1988. At the time all Sega Master System games came in white boxes. Rampage, to my knowledge, is the only one that had a red box design. I’ve also seen it with the traditional white-with-grey grid box design, too. Oddly enough the box I received the game in was a cardboard one.

My dad and I would make a trek to Toys R Us when it came time to get a new game. Oftentimes I’d go with nothing in mind, only knowing that when we were done, I’d have a new game. The evening we came home with Rampage was different than others.

The way Toys R Us was set up back then, the game aisle actually had no games in it. There were only game box arts in plastic sleeves stuck to the displays. Flipping a box art over would reveal other details about the game, mostly just the back of the box art. Below each box art was a purchase ticket. To buy a game, you’d have to take a ticket up to a cash register, pay for the game, and then take the receipt to a game kiosk where an attendant would check it and slide your newly-purchased game through a tiny slot in the glass.

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Posted in Byte-Size Reviews, Retro Reviews, Sega Master System | 9 Comments »

BYTE-SIZE REVIEW
Vigilante

Since my last Byte-Size Review was for Shinobi, I figured I’d follow it up with the game that I most often associate with it: Vigilante. It’s another part of my Sega Master System game collection, and it’s one of the last Master System games I received when the system was still in its prime. It, like Shinobi before it, was a gift. If my memory is as good as I hope it is, it was the only game gift I had received for the 1989 holiday season.

What made me want Vigilante was not its bright, sharp graphics. It was the fact that the cover looked so cool. The game only has five stages and five bosses (two of which are exactly the same). But what I really liked about it was that it offered a lot of enemies and that each stage had nunchucku somewhere in it, which turned the character’s quick punch into a slow flick of the ‘chuck.

The premise of the game was that rogues had invaded my turf and kidnapped my girl. Naturally, I’d have to walk slowly after them wearing a white t-shirt and overalls. Some of the punks had chains while most were just fond of running up to me and trying to choke me to death. Pleasant! The bikers in the third stage presented most of the game’s challenge at the time. Sadly, it doesn’t hold up today despite it stirring older emotions of childhood.

Posted in Byte-Size Reviews, Retro Reviews, Sega Master System | 2 Comments »

BYTE-SIZE REVIEW
Shinobi + An Introduction

It’s true that with the bounty of great games gracing the offices of Toronto Thumbs we find ourselves with slightly less time to write and play as much as we’d like. So to combat this, we’re introducing Byte-Size Reviews. No, we will not be reviewing new games in this format. This will be reserved for games that have already been out for some time, perhaps even past their shelf lives.

The idea actually stemmed from the fact that I have hundreds of games in my personal collection and would like to, eventually, review every single one of them. So here without further ado is the review for one of them: Shinobi for Sega Master System.

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Posted in Byte-Size Reviews, Retro Reviews, Sega Master System | 7 Comments »

Fantasy Zone on Virtual Console

Shooters do not get much stranger than Fantasy Zone. You pilot a craft that has flapping wings and that can use its feet to run along the ground of stages, all the while blasting brightly-coloured enemies that explode into showers of coins. You then use these coins to purchase upgrades to your… um… ship.

The game also allows you to control the speed of your ship and the direction in which you fly, making it someone unique among other titles in the genre (as if the off-putting neon greens and pinks didn’t already set it apart).

In any case, Fantasy Zone is a Sega Master System classic title, and one that is now available on the Wii Virtual Console for 500 Wii Points. It was a must-purchase for me despite my having the original cartridge somewhere in this maze of boxes that is now my living room. That’s right! I’m moving, which somewhat explains the recent posting lull here.

Posted in Download Updates, Retro Reviews, Sega Master System, Virtual Console, Wii | No Comments »