cool way to make retro style games and work them intoa cohesive thingy
This should be on everyone's DS Hidden Gems lists. I'll save you the Game Center CX Shinya Arino introduction that the other reviews have done and hop right into the game.
It definitely has the show's sense of humor, which is excellent. From the Brain Age head Arino (which was the style at the time) to the contrast between Game Master Arino's world and young Arino' would, the commentary through out the games, and some of the magazine bits (which I wasn't a fan of the localization making it all Xseed staff rather than the original team, very odd and egotistical decision. It clashes with the setting and Arino himself, I just don't get the decision to change the magazine's side content at all.). The loop is simple, Arino gives you a famicom game, then 4 challenges, then you move on.
Some games attempt to simulate lag but there are no sprite flickers or sprite limits, and the later games like the final game, Ninja Haggleman 3 especially, feel way too advanced for the system. But the games are (mostly) decent enough despite this.
MINI REVIEW MONTAGE
Cosmic Gate - It's a galaga clone. The missile firing every third shot is interesting.
Ninja Haggleman - Interesting door and jump gameplay mechanics, gears feel useless once the enemies stop getting stunned by them but it's still solid
Rally King - Kinda clunky with how its boost mechanic and bumping into enemy cars is, but still would have been one of the better racers on the NES.
Star Prince - This is a fairly solid shmup, even if the boss variety is lacking (a problem all games here with bosses have but regardless)
Rally King SP - A parody of an actual trend in Japan where you just make same game but marketing that you can get for cheaper, but still feels like padding. Should have been counted alongside the original game.
Haggleman 2 - It's Haggleman but with verticality and a better graphics
Gaurdia Quest - Imagine Dragon Quest on the famicom but the gameplay is even simpler. You'll spend most of your time here thanks to one of the challenges and it sure is a Famicom RPG, but it's a nice experience. Besides, can you really recreate the Famicom experience without at least one RPG?
Ninja Haggleman 3 - Super high quality title with a good story for this "timeperiod" even if it's a Ninja Gaiden clone I'm not complaining about a copy of a good thing.
And this packaging just makes the whole thing worthwhile. These are all worth playing, and the recreation of the old days of playing games and hearing rumors, opening magazines, and so on is faithfully recreated here.
"When you are struggling out there, thinking back to the time we shared together in this game...will not help you at all. But we had fun together, and I hope you can remember that experience." ~Arino
It definitely has the show's sense of humor, which is excellent. From the Brain Age head Arino (which was the style at the time) to the contrast between Game Master Arino's world and young Arino' would, the commentary through out the games, and some of the magazine bits (which I wasn't a fan of the localization making it all Xseed staff rather than the original team, very odd and egotistical decision. It clashes with the setting and Arino himself, I just don't get the decision to change the magazine's side content at all.). The loop is simple, Arino gives you a famicom game, then 4 challenges, then you move on.
Some games attempt to simulate lag but there are no sprite flickers or sprite limits, and the later games like the final game, Ninja Haggleman 3 especially, feel way too advanced for the system. But the games are (mostly) decent enough despite this.
MINI REVIEW MONTAGE
Cosmic Gate - It's a galaga clone. The missile firing every third shot is interesting.
Ninja Haggleman - Interesting door and jump gameplay mechanics, gears feel useless once the enemies stop getting stunned by them but it's still solid
Rally King - Kinda clunky with how its boost mechanic and bumping into enemy cars is, but still would have been one of the better racers on the NES.
Star Prince - This is a fairly solid shmup, even if the boss variety is lacking (a problem all games here with bosses have but regardless)
Rally King SP - A parody of an actual trend in Japan where you just make same game but marketing that you can get for cheaper, but still feels like padding. Should have been counted alongside the original game.
Haggleman 2 - It's Haggleman but with verticality and a better graphics
Gaurdia Quest - Imagine Dragon Quest on the famicom but the gameplay is even simpler. You'll spend most of your time here thanks to one of the challenges and it sure is a Famicom RPG, but it's a nice experience. Besides, can you really recreate the Famicom experience without at least one RPG?
Ninja Haggleman 3 - Super high quality title with a good story for this "timeperiod" even if it's a Ninja Gaiden clone I'm not complaining about a copy of a good thing.
And this packaging just makes the whole thing worthwhile. These are all worth playing, and the recreation of the old days of playing games and hearing rumors, opening magazines, and so on is faithfully recreated here.
"When you are struggling out there, thinking back to the time we shared together in this game...will not help you at all. But we had fun together, and I hope you can remember that experience." ~Arino
This review contains spoilers
I had to let this one go. There's something in here, but it really fizzles out with some very obnoxious design decisions. This review will be long, and I will be breaking it down into eight parts, for each game, and then one longer post about the game as an aggregate sum.
1) Cosmic Gate - basically the walkthrough game for the metagame you're playing. The four challenges you have to do are all super easy and the things it asks are explained via the magazines that you unlock during this part. It's basically a reskin of Galaxian, with not much more to it other than warps. It's the first game, and for what the game asks you to do at the point you unlock it, it's inoffensive.
2) Robot Ninja Haggle Man - There seems to be no clear indication of whether the title is Haggleman or Haggle Man. Anyway, I actually liked this game a lot which is what got me to start really getting into Retro Game Challenge. It has a bit of NES funk to it (which is nontrivially The Point) but for what it is Haggle Man is actually fun? If this was a full game I would play it. It's a simple yet effective platformer.
3) Rally King - If this game's goal was to achieve accurate simulation of early racing games, it achieved it, I guess. Rally King sucks. The drifting mechanic is super awkward and hard to get used to, the courses are confusing with no map so you can't plan too far ahead short of memorizing the courses, and it's easy to spin out and lose all of your momentum. One of Retro Game Challenge's concepts in the metagame is that you do have access to in-game "cheat codes", which I admittedly used here (they're part of the game), but they basically completely remove the difficulty and make you the ONLY character on the track and completely invincible. A slog. Challenge 3 is very difficult if you don't use cheats.
4) Star Prince - It's another space shooter, but far more complicated than Cosmic Gate/Galaxian this time. Not much to say about this one. It seems well designed, even it it's crazy difficult, I did have fun with it.
5) Rally King SP - this is the first time where the game gets outright offensive. Rally King SP is a complete clone of Rally King. The courses, the controls, the cheat codes, everything is identical other than the colors and a couple of graphics. I get it's supposed to be some sort of snide commentary on special editions being not different, but the fact that this game also has four challenges, with one of them being an insanely difficult time trial, is just offensive as hell. Rally King already sucked, we didn't have to do it again.
6) Robot Ninja Haggle Man 2 - I really liked Haggle Man 1, Haggle Man 2 is that but better. You can pull out the bosses early, the stages are wider, you can now use your special power (once you get it) on command rather than automatically when you pick up your third scroll. Much like the first one, I would unironically play this game in standalone.
7) Guadia Quest - I know that RPGs are a classic staple of the era that Retro Game Challenge is meant to embody. The problem is it doesn't really adapt to the meta-challenge format that the game asks you to play. So you get this RPG which is really short and content-devoid from an RPG perspective, but really long and drawn out from Retro Game Challenge's perspective, which just leads to it being a huge slog and not being fun. Which sucks! I like RPGs! The Guadia concept is barely used, it's basically a bonus party member you can pick up who sometimes attacks if you're in a pinch but largely just Vibes. The first dungeon is an enormous sprawling 4 level dungeon, with very dangerous enemies, no reliable healing items (there's a full heal tile bear the start), and worst: no in-game map at all. And sure, it's the 80's, they wouldn't have one, but part of Retro Game Challenge is that you can pause and look at game magazines/guides any time - and there's no map there either! And once you get to the end of the dungeon the boss there is super hard too - grinding is completely non-optional in this game and it drags Retro Game Challenge to a grinding halt with no payoff because the actual RPG content isn't good enough to warrant playing outside of this scope. This one is just offensively bad. The music is banger, at least, but I got very sick of the dungeon theme after spending hours in there.
8) Robot Ninja Haggle Man 3 - To end things off after Guadia Quest, you get Robot Ninja Haggle Man 3, which has gotten a complete facelift and is nothing like 1 or 2. It's fine. Not as fun as the first 2, but I didn't hate it. It was a little annoying though that the game force turned off after completing challenge 1 and 2, and challenge 4 is just "kill 100 enemies in zone 2" which is more grinding (which is brutal after Gaudia Quest, frankly).
If the game ended here I'd be a bit happier, but then after completing the 4 challenges for each, you get a "final challenge", which is to complete all 8 games all the way through. I liked Haggle Man 1 & 2 (and 3 is fine I guess), Cosmic Gate has a "skip the game" shortcut, and I could use invincibility for Star Prince, but playing Rally King twice (even with invincibility), and finishing Gaudia Quest sounds like absolute torture and I cannot bring myself to finish this game.
It's frustrating, this game squanders its creativity because it seems to be so wrapped up in the challenges and the idea of "play all these retro-inspired hits" that it failed to make some of them good, because it both had to fit the challenges and the idea that they had to be retro. If this was just a collection of retro-inspired games I think it would've been way better (if they fine-tuned Guadia Quest and removed Rally King SP entirely), but what we have just burns its goodwill away and misses the mark by the end. Still Haggle Man 1 & 2 are a hell of a lot of fun by themselves at least.
1) Cosmic Gate - basically the walkthrough game for the metagame you're playing. The four challenges you have to do are all super easy and the things it asks are explained via the magazines that you unlock during this part. It's basically a reskin of Galaxian, with not much more to it other than warps. It's the first game, and for what the game asks you to do at the point you unlock it, it's inoffensive.
2) Robot Ninja Haggle Man - There seems to be no clear indication of whether the title is Haggleman or Haggle Man. Anyway, I actually liked this game a lot which is what got me to start really getting into Retro Game Challenge. It has a bit of NES funk to it (which is nontrivially The Point) but for what it is Haggle Man is actually fun? If this was a full game I would play it. It's a simple yet effective platformer.
3) Rally King - If this game's goal was to achieve accurate simulation of early racing games, it achieved it, I guess. Rally King sucks. The drifting mechanic is super awkward and hard to get used to, the courses are confusing with no map so you can't plan too far ahead short of memorizing the courses, and it's easy to spin out and lose all of your momentum. One of Retro Game Challenge's concepts in the metagame is that you do have access to in-game "cheat codes", which I admittedly used here (they're part of the game), but they basically completely remove the difficulty and make you the ONLY character on the track and completely invincible. A slog. Challenge 3 is very difficult if you don't use cheats.
4) Star Prince - It's another space shooter, but far more complicated than Cosmic Gate/Galaxian this time. Not much to say about this one. It seems well designed, even it it's crazy difficult, I did have fun with it.
5) Rally King SP - this is the first time where the game gets outright offensive. Rally King SP is a complete clone of Rally King. The courses, the controls, the cheat codes, everything is identical other than the colors and a couple of graphics. I get it's supposed to be some sort of snide commentary on special editions being not different, but the fact that this game also has four challenges, with one of them being an insanely difficult time trial, is just offensive as hell. Rally King already sucked, we didn't have to do it again.
6) Robot Ninja Haggle Man 2 - I really liked Haggle Man 1, Haggle Man 2 is that but better. You can pull out the bosses early, the stages are wider, you can now use your special power (once you get it) on command rather than automatically when you pick up your third scroll. Much like the first one, I would unironically play this game in standalone.
7) Guadia Quest - I know that RPGs are a classic staple of the era that Retro Game Challenge is meant to embody. The problem is it doesn't really adapt to the meta-challenge format that the game asks you to play. So you get this RPG which is really short and content-devoid from an RPG perspective, but really long and drawn out from Retro Game Challenge's perspective, which just leads to it being a huge slog and not being fun. Which sucks! I like RPGs! The Guadia concept is barely used, it's basically a bonus party member you can pick up who sometimes attacks if you're in a pinch but largely just Vibes. The first dungeon is an enormous sprawling 4 level dungeon, with very dangerous enemies, no reliable healing items (there's a full heal tile bear the start), and worst: no in-game map at all. And sure, it's the 80's, they wouldn't have one, but part of Retro Game Challenge is that you can pause and look at game magazines/guides any time - and there's no map there either! And once you get to the end of the dungeon the boss there is super hard too - grinding is completely non-optional in this game and it drags Retro Game Challenge to a grinding halt with no payoff because the actual RPG content isn't good enough to warrant playing outside of this scope. This one is just offensively bad. The music is banger, at least, but I got very sick of the dungeon theme after spending hours in there.
8) Robot Ninja Haggle Man 3 - To end things off after Guadia Quest, you get Robot Ninja Haggle Man 3, which has gotten a complete facelift and is nothing like 1 or 2. It's fine. Not as fun as the first 2, but I didn't hate it. It was a little annoying though that the game force turned off after completing challenge 1 and 2, and challenge 4 is just "kill 100 enemies in zone 2" which is more grinding (which is brutal after Gaudia Quest, frankly).
If the game ended here I'd be a bit happier, but then after completing the 4 challenges for each, you get a "final challenge", which is to complete all 8 games all the way through. I liked Haggle Man 1 & 2 (and 3 is fine I guess), Cosmic Gate has a "skip the game" shortcut, and I could use invincibility for Star Prince, but playing Rally King twice (even with invincibility), and finishing Gaudia Quest sounds like absolute torture and I cannot bring myself to finish this game.
It's frustrating, this game squanders its creativity because it seems to be so wrapped up in the challenges and the idea of "play all these retro-inspired hits" that it failed to make some of them good, because it both had to fit the challenges and the idea that they had to be retro. If this was just a collection of retro-inspired games I think it would've been way better (if they fine-tuned Guadia Quest and removed Rally King SP entirely), but what we have just burns its goodwill away and misses the mark by the end. Still Haggle Man 1 & 2 are a hell of a lot of fun by themselves at least.
Arino may think that he's gained complete control of my DSi due to my foolish actions (starting the game), but little does he know that I already took control when I installed custom firmware just to play this game on official hardware. Seriously, have you seen these secondhand prices?
Retro Game Challenge sees the virtual spirit of Shinya Arino, host of the Japanese TV show GameCenter CX, sending you back in time and forcing you to enjoy gaming in the 80s. You won't have to go it alone, as you're accompanied by Young Arino, who's even voiced by the legend himself (if you remembered to undub your ROM, anyways). The only way back is to enjoy these games to the fullest, and complete all of Virtual Arino's challenges.
The challenges you're given range from trivial tasks to making major progress in a game. The game does this thing where it kicks you out of the game and turns off the console (the virtual one, not your actual DS) when you clear a challenge, something that doesn't exactly encourage me to try and get further in these games. A game like Nintendo's own NES Remix (also developed by indieszero, funnily enough) can get away with kicking you out because each individual task has its own dedicated stage. In RGC, the easy challenges are silly because you close the game mere moments after gaining control, and the harder challenges are occasionally a bit obnoxious due to having bad runback segments (needing to restart and run back to where you were just for another shot). That being said, while they're not applicable to some challenges, each game has honest-to-goodness cheat codes. Great for if you're having trouble with a certain game, or if you just want to get the whole experience with sooner. I won't judge. Arino might, but I won't.
At first, I wanted to lament the missed opportunity of licensing out familiar classics to play, but as the game went on, my opinion actually shifted towards the direct opposite feeling. If they included titles like Pac-Man or Super Mario Bros. in this, some Joe Schmoe who's familiar with these titles could pick up this game and just steamroll all the challenges. Even if a few of them are pretty strong homages, none of the "retro games" in Retro Game Challenge exist outside of this game's ROM, but the important factor here is that they still feel retro. Not in a "game is archaic and obfuscates information" way, that's the shitty definition of retro. They're "retro" because each game has simple concepts that are executed well; easy to pick up, hard to master. Each game looks and sounds like a Famicom title, and while they're probably not faithful to the hardware's limitations, that's not what's important. The challenges serve to get you invested in toying with each game's mechanics, learning them inside and out, something that a kid from the 80s would have to make do with.
Of course, a kid in the 80s didn't just slave away at a game by their lonesome. Young Arino brings in rumors he heard from his friends at school, and magazines with insider scoops. Being a clear spoof of Famitsu, the magazines provide really useful tips/cheats on each game, and previews of what's to come. This is also where you learn all of the aforementioned cheats. The magazines help highlight the passage of time, and tell a tale of a developing industry, even as you effectively time warp between release dates in-game. When all else fails, you could always check out the enclosed instruction book.
It's probably absurdly cheesy to say this, but this game gives me a lot more appreciation for the 80s. Everyone goes off on the 90s, probably because that's when 2D games got great, and 3D games took the world by storm. It shouldn't overshadow the era prior though, the 80s are the roots of console gaming as we know it. Anyways, all this talk of retro has got me thinking about what "retro" even means in a modern sense. It's probably safe to say that the Nintendo DS is retro, so that makes Retro Game Challenge extra retro. I'm off to go play some Castlevania: Lords of Shadow on my PS3, a retro game on a retro console.
...the passage of time has not been kind to the term "retro".
Retro Game Challenge sees the virtual spirit of Shinya Arino, host of the Japanese TV show GameCenter CX, sending you back in time and forcing you to enjoy gaming in the 80s. You won't have to go it alone, as you're accompanied by Young Arino, who's even voiced by the legend himself (if you remembered to undub your ROM, anyways). The only way back is to enjoy these games to the fullest, and complete all of Virtual Arino's challenges.
The challenges you're given range from trivial tasks to making major progress in a game. The game does this thing where it kicks you out of the game and turns off the console (the virtual one, not your actual DS) when you clear a challenge, something that doesn't exactly encourage me to try and get further in these games. A game like Nintendo's own NES Remix (also developed by indieszero, funnily enough) can get away with kicking you out because each individual task has its own dedicated stage. In RGC, the easy challenges are silly because you close the game mere moments after gaining control, and the harder challenges are occasionally a bit obnoxious due to having bad runback segments (needing to restart and run back to where you were just for another shot). That being said, while they're not applicable to some challenges, each game has honest-to-goodness cheat codes. Great for if you're having trouble with a certain game, or if you just want to get the whole experience with sooner. I won't judge. Arino might, but I won't.
At first, I wanted to lament the missed opportunity of licensing out familiar classics to play, but as the game went on, my opinion actually shifted towards the direct opposite feeling. If they included titles like Pac-Man or Super Mario Bros. in this, some Joe Schmoe who's familiar with these titles could pick up this game and just steamroll all the challenges. Even if a few of them are pretty strong homages, none of the "retro games" in Retro Game Challenge exist outside of this game's ROM, but the important factor here is that they still feel retro. Not in a "game is archaic and obfuscates information" way, that's the shitty definition of retro. They're "retro" because each game has simple concepts that are executed well; easy to pick up, hard to master. Each game looks and sounds like a Famicom title, and while they're probably not faithful to the hardware's limitations, that's not what's important. The challenges serve to get you invested in toying with each game's mechanics, learning them inside and out, something that a kid from the 80s would have to make do with.
Of course, a kid in the 80s didn't just slave away at a game by their lonesome. Young Arino brings in rumors he heard from his friends at school, and magazines with insider scoops. Being a clear spoof of Famitsu, the magazines provide really useful tips/cheats on each game, and previews of what's to come. This is also where you learn all of the aforementioned cheats. The magazines help highlight the passage of time, and tell a tale of a developing industry, even as you effectively time warp between release dates in-game. When all else fails, you could always check out the enclosed instruction book.
It's probably absurdly cheesy to say this, but this game gives me a lot more appreciation for the 80s. Everyone goes off on the 90s, probably because that's when 2D games got great, and 3D games took the world by storm. It shouldn't overshadow the era prior though, the 80s are the roots of console gaming as we know it. Anyways, all this talk of retro has got me thinking about what "retro" even means in a modern sense. It's probably safe to say that the Nintendo DS is retro, so that makes Retro Game Challenge extra retro. I'm off to go play some Castlevania: Lords of Shadow on my PS3, a retro game on a retro console.
...the passage of time has not been kind to the term "retro".
a very fun little compliation of fake retro games presented in a lovely fashion. i liked the information gathering aspect of the game but the last challenge is kinda dumb. Play if you enjoy retro games in any capacity as this one simulates more than just playing the games, it rather simulates the experience of bein a kid when games were new and fresh. Looking at magazines for cheat codes, exploring the games for secrets, listening to your friends rumors, that kinda stuff. Stuff that nowadays has all been delegated to the internet. Deffo give it a try. Bonus points if you are already a viewer of Game Center CX, the japanese TV show this game is based off of.
El juego estaba yendo genial. La idea es maravillosa, y eso de hacerte sentir cómo se jugaba a los juegos en aquella época está muy guay. Me empieza a escamar en cierto juego que es como 20 veces más largo que los demás, y no apetece. Pero lo del final, el último reto, no tiene perdón
I absolutely adore this game. My words can't do it justice, just play it.
An extremely clever package of faux-retro games. Although the games themselves often dazzle, the work of unlocking them all is really the joy to be found here - being asked to engage with the game's mechanics in a very specific way. The developers guide your hands and teach you to enjoy these more traditional styles of play. They're not all winners, but Haggleman 3 is the shit
I love the concept of the game but I felt the execution was a bit off.
A perfect implementation of several NES games of it's time without completely replicating those experiences. This is a hidden gem on the DS.
This slaps! Really great game made with a ton of love, with a really smart localization, too.
very cute little experience! not all the games are good (rally king and guadia quest are notably weak) but i don't think the games themselves are really the point. RGC is really mostly about replicating the feel of the famicom era and showing off the history, and it does that stuff very well. it's super fun being able to check magazines for cheat codes, or hearing arino's mom ask if you want snacks when you're paused. the challenge format also mostly keeps these games pretty fresh, with the exception of guadia quest, which definitely goes too long and has most of the pitfalls common in a famicom rpg. there's a real sense that actual time is progressing and developers are getting better with the console here, which i appreciate. definitely worth a look if you find game history interesting at all, or just like charming cute little ds games
Pretty cool game! The challenges are piss easy for the most part, but the games here are really cool and fun! I love Haggleman and the development of that series as it goes along, it really feels like it’s own weird thing that would’ve come out back then rather than an imitation of something else. Most of these have their own personality that separates them from their NES inspirations, actually, apart from the Galaga clone that kicks the game off. The small-scale but still rather meaty RPG was a very pleasant surprise, even if it comes with all the QoL gripes that are typical of RPGs from the era it’s imitating.
While I like all the games here, and think the metagame surrounding them adds a lot of charm to the experience, I can’t help feeling like this format, the way it depicts playing a video game inside a video game had the potential to be something seriously amazing with a bit more narrative meat. I love the glimpses of world building you get, the peeks into the dev studios and culture surrounding this alternate history version of the 8 bit era, and I would’ve adored to see that fleshed out more, maybe through talks of studio rivalries or personal touches from the in universe developers to be found within the games themselves.
At that point, though, maybe I’m asking a bit much from a DS game based on a game show I’ve never watched! I think the fact that it got my imagination running like that is a sign that it’s a worthwhile time though, and one I had a lot of fun with.
While I like all the games here, and think the metagame surrounding them adds a lot of charm to the experience, I can’t help feeling like this format, the way it depicts playing a video game inside a video game had the potential to be something seriously amazing with a bit more narrative meat. I love the glimpses of world building you get, the peeks into the dev studios and culture surrounding this alternate history version of the 8 bit era, and I would’ve adored to see that fleshed out more, maybe through talks of studio rivalries or personal touches from the in universe developers to be found within the games themselves.
At that point, though, maybe I’m asking a bit much from a DS game based on a game show I’ve never watched! I think the fact that it got my imagination running like that is a sign that it’s a worthwhile time though, and one I had a lot of fun with.
A quite unique and memorable little mini-game collection. The star of the show here isn't necessarily the games themselves, which are for the most part quite fun and well designed, but the framing device behind it all is what's truly brilliant.
The idea is that you've been taken back in time and forced to complete challenges in fictional (but fairly authentic feeling) NES-styled games. It sounds basic, but it's a concept that's really fleshed out, with fictional backstories and development stories written about all the games, you can read gaming magazines with cheat codes and reviews, and the games get more advanced and sophisticated over time as the in-universe technology evolves.
Haggleman 2 and Rally King SP feel a bit like padding and Guadia Quest being a whole ass JRPG you have to go through a good chunk of feels like way too much, but overall it's a really shining example of what presentation and some clever attention to detail can do for a game.
The idea is that you've been taken back in time and forced to complete challenges in fictional (but fairly authentic feeling) NES-styled games. It sounds basic, but it's a concept that's really fleshed out, with fictional backstories and development stories written about all the games, you can read gaming magazines with cheat codes and reviews, and the games get more advanced and sophisticated over time as the in-universe technology evolves.
Haggleman 2 and Rally King SP feel a bit like padding and Guadia Quest being a whole ass JRPG you have to go through a good chunk of feels like way too much, but overall it's a really shining example of what presentation and some clever attention to detail can do for a game.
This game rules. The presentation is fantastic, and the games themselves are largely unique and fun to play. I loved to read the manuals and magazines to hype myself up for each new experience, and chatting with Kid Arino was a good time. I just wish there was more dialogue available (especially once Adult Arino gives you the final challenge and Kid Arino refuses to say anything to you).
I see other people upset with the final challenge (to beat all the games) but I really don’t see why. Apart from Haggleman 3 they’re all pretty straightforward, and if you’re having trouble finishing a certain game there’s a 100% chance that you can use some kind of cheat code or warp or trick to make things easier on you. They definitely could have included more challenges for each game, or made them feel more spread out. Maybe by making them harder, or unlocking new games after 3 challenges are complete and making you come back to each game later (before issuing the inevitable final “beat every game!” challenge).
Rally King rules so fucking hard. I’d love to see that one developed into a full-on multiplayer racing game.
I see other people upset with the final challenge (to beat all the games) but I really don’t see why. Apart from Haggleman 3 they’re all pretty straightforward, and if you’re having trouble finishing a certain game there’s a 100% chance that you can use some kind of cheat code or warp or trick to make things easier on you. They definitely could have included more challenges for each game, or made them feel more spread out. Maybe by making them harder, or unlocking new games after 3 challenges are complete and making you come back to each game later (before issuing the inevitable final “beat every game!” challenge).
Rally King rules so fucking hard. I’d love to see that one developed into a full-on multiplayer racing game.
A unique interesting homage to older games and the culture of the time. Aside from the fun NES-inspired games included here, you also get instruction manuals for each game, as well as a monthly magazine detailing secrets, cheat codes, and upcoming releases. It's an exciting playthrough that makes you yearn for simpler times.
love a game that throws out the most fun part of its design at the end. effortlessly charming regardless. obviously the undub patch to make arino arino and not fucking yuri lowenthal is essential
A great little hidden gem that very well emulates the style of retro games it's referencing, alongside its culture of video game easter eggs/cheats and magazine guides. I do think they could have improved the game somewhat by not having 2 racing games that are more or less the same and 2 arcade platformers that are very similar in design, but regardless, this is definitely worth your time if you like diving into games of the 8 bit generation.
This game's premise is pretty wild: Game Master Arino (apparently the host of a videogame-themed game show in Japan) appears to you as a floating head, turns you into a kid, and sends you back to the 80s where you play video games with his younger self. You need to complete challenges that he sets for you in order to unlock new games to play and more gaming magazines to read.
Oh, and none of these games or magazines exist in real life - they're all exclusive to the Retro Game Challenge universe, designed to mimic the aesthetics and gameplay of 80s console games. The gaming magazines themselves are pretty neat; they're full of little references that range from the juvenile (guest writers being named things like "Hugh Jass") to the nudge-nudge-wink-wink (a prominent reviewer named Dan Sock after Dan Shu of EGM fame). They also come with hints and cheats for the games you have to play, which come in handy when you come up against a challenge you just can't clear or a game in a genre you don't particularly care for.
There are eight 'games' included here, and I don't think I should review each of them individually; instead, I should ask the million-dollar question. This game is obviously meant to invoke nostalgia, but in an age where old games are more available than ever thanks to emulation and ports/remasters, what is the point of it existing? In other words, why play Haggleman 3 when you can play Ninja Gaiden, or Guadia Quest when you can play Dragon Quest?
I have two answers to this. Firstly, the games here do come with an additional 3 decades of game design experience, and are generally smoother to play than their authentic 80s counterparts. Combined with features like unlimited continues, this offers older gamers a chance to revisit old-school-style games without the frustration as well as an unintimidating way for younger gamers to dip their toes in the waters of retro games.
But really, the bigger reason that this game works so well for me is that I'm not really nostalgic for specific games as I am for what gaming meant in the context of a particular season in my life. A season when I would spend my holidays lazing around in front of the TV with my friends seeing who could get farthest in That One Level, when video game manuals were essential reading, and when every video game magazine I read was full of wonder and possibilities. This game somehow managed to distill the essence of those days, and while I have no clue how effective this is for people who didn't grow up in that era, I do know that this game really succeeded in warming this old man's heart.
Oh, and none of these games or magazines exist in real life - they're all exclusive to the Retro Game Challenge universe, designed to mimic the aesthetics and gameplay of 80s console games. The gaming magazines themselves are pretty neat; they're full of little references that range from the juvenile (guest writers being named things like "Hugh Jass") to the nudge-nudge-wink-wink (a prominent reviewer named Dan Sock after Dan Shu of EGM fame). They also come with hints and cheats for the games you have to play, which come in handy when you come up against a challenge you just can't clear or a game in a genre you don't particularly care for.
There are eight 'games' included here, and I don't think I should review each of them individually; instead, I should ask the million-dollar question. This game is obviously meant to invoke nostalgia, but in an age where old games are more available than ever thanks to emulation and ports/remasters, what is the point of it existing? In other words, why play Haggleman 3 when you can play Ninja Gaiden, or Guadia Quest when you can play Dragon Quest?
I have two answers to this. Firstly, the games here do come with an additional 3 decades of game design experience, and are generally smoother to play than their authentic 80s counterparts. Combined with features like unlimited continues, this offers older gamers a chance to revisit old-school-style games without the frustration as well as an unintimidating way for younger gamers to dip their toes in the waters of retro games.
But really, the bigger reason that this game works so well for me is that I'm not really nostalgic for specific games as I am for what gaming meant in the context of a particular season in my life. A season when I would spend my holidays lazing around in front of the TV with my friends seeing who could get farthest in That One Level, when video game manuals were essential reading, and when every video game magazine I read was full of wonder and possibilities. This game somehow managed to distill the essence of those days, and while I have no clue how effective this is for people who didn't grow up in that era, I do know that this game really succeeded in warming this old man's heart.
A fun concept that's unfortunately full of not-so-fun games. I would probably have received this better had indies not devoured the 8-bit style. Still, it's a unique game, and that deserves some praise.
Retro Game Challenge is a trip to the past in the most literal sense to gaming. Even if you’re not a fan of nostalgia, these games stand on their own, and deliver fun gameplay, and mimic retro gaming to an eerie level. And if you’re a fan of Retro Gaming this game is certainly a must.
A neat idea for a game. You play as a kid who is at his friends house, and you have to beat a bunch of challenges within a series of made-up NES games. When you're not playing one of them, you can read the games' manuals and also magazines that give you hints and cheats. The dialogue between you & your friend is designed to resemble the gaming culture of the '80s. The games themselves aren't anything special though.