A port of The Fairyland Story
The Fairyland Story is an action game released by Taito in 1985. Take control of a young witch and battle against monsters deep within the castle. Master various magics and techniques to overcome your enemies.
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Rating is for the port rather than the game itself. Game itself is fantastic despite a few issues (see the main game itself for a more detailed review on my end), if unfairly maligned compared to Taito's later platformer games. Also one of my favorite arcade games.
However, I do have a few issues with this port, namely with emulation. The sound emulation is WAY off. The music sounds reverb-y as hell and some of the sound effects are off. In its defense, Fairyland Story is a hard game to emulate right, and even MAME doesn't get it right. But it's still a tad disappointing given Hamster's usual perchant for accurate emulation. Even more confusing is the fact that it sounded more like the original hardware before the day one patch it got, which makes me wonder why they meddled with the sound in the first place. I've attached videos below of real hardware footage, what it sounded like pre-day one patch, and after. Regardless though, it's still an improvement over MAME in some ways.
I also wish it was a tad less barebones, like I wouldn't have minded a scan of instruction card/promotional material/etc like some later ACA releases at least, since scans of said stuff made for this game are slim to nil, and what's there isn't a good quality scan.
Despite that, if you're not willing to set up a Sharp X68000 emulator (or get a real one and a copy of the game on the system, good luck) to play the best version of the game, or even just use MAME, this is still a great way to play the game that isn't affected by the issues of the other emulated versions before it (unless the upcoming Egret II Mini somehow emulates this game better, will update with my thoughts on that). Has pretty much everything you'd expect from these ACA releases, like leaderboards, save states, a one-credit hi-score mode, and a 5-minute score run mode too.
Real PCB playthrough: https://youtu.be/S2AlKBsVWvc
Pre-day one patch: https://twitter.com/otemoto_stinger/status/1334472610025938945?s=09
Day one patch:
https://twitter.com/TremiRodomi/status/1334555550609068033?s=09
However, I do have a few issues with this port, namely with emulation. The sound emulation is WAY off. The music sounds reverb-y as hell and some of the sound effects are off. In its defense, Fairyland Story is a hard game to emulate right, and even MAME doesn't get it right. But it's still a tad disappointing given Hamster's usual perchant for accurate emulation. Even more confusing is the fact that it sounded more like the original hardware before the day one patch it got, which makes me wonder why they meddled with the sound in the first place. I've attached videos below of real hardware footage, what it sounded like pre-day one patch, and after. Regardless though, it's still an improvement over MAME in some ways.
I also wish it was a tad less barebones, like I wouldn't have minded a scan of instruction card/promotional material/etc like some later ACA releases at least, since scans of said stuff made for this game are slim to nil, and what's there isn't a good quality scan.
Despite that, if you're not willing to set up a Sharp X68000 emulator (or get a real one and a copy of the game on the system, good luck) to play the best version of the game, or even just use MAME, this is still a great way to play the game that isn't affected by the issues of the other emulated versions before it (unless the upcoming Egret II Mini somehow emulates this game better, will update with my thoughts on that). Has pretty much everything you'd expect from these ACA releases, like leaderboards, save states, a one-credit hi-score mode, and a 5-minute score run mode too.
Real PCB playthrough: https://youtu.be/S2AlKBsVWvc
Pre-day one patch: https://twitter.com/otemoto_stinger/status/1334472610025938945?s=09
Day one patch:
https://twitter.com/TremiRodomi/status/1334555550609068033?s=09