Peter Molyneux's Top 10 GDC Proclamationsgamasutra.com
.
Penumbra: Black Plagueparadox.
The Hands of Timediygamer.
Spelunking Into the Pastdiygamer.
Crime of a Mâché Nation: The Condescension of Viva Piñatagamecareerguide.com.
Gobble Gobblegame set watch.
Craft Servicediygamer.
Nintendo Reveals Wii Pay-For-Online Play, WiiWare Compressiongamasutra.com.
Lost Empire: Immortalsparadox.
The Media Myth Of The Casual Gamergamasutra.com.
For less
recent
fare,
consult the
archives
at left.
You know how, at the start of Space Harrier, the announcer says “Welcome to the Fantasy Zone. Get ready!”?
In the Sega Ages remake, it’s a little different. He says, “GET BUSY, HARRIER! DRAGON LAND IS SCREAMING!!”
That tells you most of what you need to know.
That sounds so hot.
Ach du liebe. That’s… unfortunate.
It’s actually not that bad. Some good stuff in there. It just needed more work. The best game of the bunch, Alien Syndrome, is also the only one they used RenderWare on. I’m guessing it’s so much better because of the time and money they saved, that they were able to dump back in toward adjusting and polishing the thing. A couple of games would really have benefitted from that extra attention. Space Harrier in particular seems like a near miss.
The OutRun remake has an ugly car and interface; otherwise, it’s actually one of the best versions of OutRun I’ve played. Smooth. Sincere. It reminds me of the Master System one.
It’s on fire!
I had heard that Alien Syndrome came out quite well, which is probably reason enough for me to be excited about the collection. I loved that game, even though I was terrible at it way back when.
I’m just glad they lumped em all together for us.
But its telling that I’m more looking forward to getting Midway Arcade Treasures 3 than the Sega Ages pack.
YYeah. Actually, hell. I think I’m going to go back to it. Somehow I missed that it has a Robotron control scheme. Even playing it as straight aim-and-shoot, it was still kind of kickass.
Doesn’t that have, like… driving games on it, mostly?
So I just played Alien Syndrome the RIGHT way. Wow. It’s just… really good. This could easily sell on its own, for this price. Throw in a couple of VMU games, and it could have gone for full price on the Dreamcast. Would have made a high-profile NAOMI game, too. Still would make a good Atomiswave one.
See, you can also press “X” to shoot. That’s what I was doing before.
It even has two-player co-op.
…
I’ve spent another session with Space Harrier; if you turn off the “fractal” option, the ground reverts to the colored tiles from the arcade. That’s much better. It’s weird; that one detail does a lot, psychologically. The animation still sucks (especially Harrier’s running and that dragon from the bonus stages). Either I’m imagining things or turning off this option also makes the “many more stages will still be available” text appear when you start a new life. I don’t remember it, before.
They still didn’t do all they could have in revamping the game (like, why no bonus for destroying all of the ships in a “wave”?). Still, hey.
Can you beat the original Space Harrier? I remember playing for a couple of dozen stages. There’s now what seems like an end boss after about twenty levels, then you get a boss rush. I died halfway through the rush, so I don’t know what’s after that.
I seem to remember reading the game has a “random” or “arrange” mode to it; maybe that unlocks when you beat it?
Now I’m really eager to try Alien Syndrome. The videos I saw of it looked great, and it sounds like the game itself follows suit. Good to hear. I’d have liked to have seen Quartet in the collection, but A> Few people know of it and B> the PS2 doesn’t have built-in four-player support, so it would be a bit of a waste.
I think Space Harrier does have a special mode of some sort, though I don’t know anything about accessing it. As far as beating the original, I’m certain I never did it, though I played for quite a long time. Is the code to make yourself a spaceship still in place? The old sound-test thing? I hope so.
That space ship thing was unique to the Master System version, as far as I know. I always liked how the ship turned back into Harrier when it tripped over hedges.
… Hey. The new Harrier can’t trip, as far as I’ve noticed.
Hmm.
I’d say as few people know about Tant-R or Buster Bros. It’s not implausible; I’m sure at least five or six people own Multitaps.
Yes, which is surprising. You’re comments on Alien Syndrome and Space Harrier renew my interest, however.
I am comments on them!