Sonic Spike

~ SONIC SPIKE ~

IGS

HuCard

1990

This beach-volleyball game seemed utterly awful to me at first. The players, with overboard "beefcake" physiques and caricaturish facial features, looked absolutely ridiculous. The animation fared no better, and the music was NES-type garbage. There was too much "downtime," as I regularly found myself waiting around while the crowd cheered or the players switched sides or prepared to serve. And the gameplay sucked.

Well, as I spent more time with the chip, I gradually discovered that the gameplay isn't completely terrible. Elements of offense are actually handled pretty well: bumping, spiking, and serving all feel good once you get the hang of the controls, and it can be pretty exciting to nail a super-fast winner or serve up a crucial ace.

Defense, on the other hand, never feels all that great, as the action is too random. You can try to anticipate where an opponent's spike will end up, but blocking/returning said spike will ultimately prove to be a matter of luck. Instead of being able to rely on skill, I was relegated to "hoping for the best."

So after elements of offense redeemed the game to a degree, aspects of defense killed it all over again. Shame, but in truth, Sonic Spike doesn't have enough appealing ingredients to come off as a strong title anyway. If you really must play an old volleyball video game, go with the much better Kings of the Beach for the NES.

Pick your players (I like to go with Cindy for her "SLNM Spike"), and then face off against other "global superstars." My evil counterpart is apparently a "boss blocker."

Everyone is all smiles before a match begins.

One or two of the backdrops actually look pretty nice, while others are just odd.

Serving and other aspects of offense feel fine. It's too bad that the defensive elements don't follow suit.

God Panic

~ GOD PANIC ~

Teichiku

Super CD-ROM

1992

God Panic resides with Star Parodier in the PC Engine's niche of wacky/cartoony verticals, and the one you prefer might just come down to the kind of humor you enjoy in your "lighthearted" shooters. SP cleverly caricatures Soldier-series enemies while GP features a huge, weird-looking red guy with explosive farts. SP has bright, gorgeous snowfield and underwater levels while GP has you soar over an enormous bikini-clad sun bather.

Seriously though, GP actually does succeed with its nutty character designs. The fourth stage alone features the aforementioned crimson fart giant; pudgy pouncing guys whom you can knock to the turf; a mohawk-sporting, chain-wielding punk-rocker dude and his two oddball sidekicks; clones of your own character; a lunatic tanuki; and a fire-breathing dragon.

That's a solid boss parade, and even the normal enemy sprites are often large and appropriately off the wall in design.

The soundtrack is pretty good and presents rips of some famous rock numbers (like "Danger Zone"). Still, SP whips this game superficially, as the background graphics here are far from impressive. But GP holds up well enough with its aesthetics.

Its gameplay is where most of my concerns lie. The action is heavy on projectiles even though your hitbox is a little large for a bullet-heavy style of play. In fact, even the bullets themselves are huge, relatively speaking. (The developers seemed to have an idea that this would be a sloppy affair, as they decided to grant players an extendable life bar and allow play to resume right from the spot of death even after the use of a continue.) GP is still easy, though, as it suffers from the Cyber Core syndrome: it keeps you busy with lots of things to blast, and it hurls lots of crap at you, but somehow it still ends up lacking challenge. The weapons are lame for a shooter of this ilk, and the adventure is too short, with only five proper stages to play through. (If you're wondering what I mean by "proper," well, let's just say that there's a GNG-ish twist that a lot of people will not be amused by.)

Once you do reach the end (which will probably happen sooner rather than later), there's little incentive to take another trip through the game. You can set it to Hard to try to draw a little more life out of it, but then you end up with sped-up bullets hurtling towards your huge hitbox, which just makes the whole thing feel messy. If you stick with the default difficulty level to maintain a playable feel, you'll find that it's simply too easy to stay one step ahead of the game, regardless of the constant fire coming at you; and you'll discover that GP is a classic case of a title featuring a lot of good concepts that aren't executed particularly well. Take the last boss, for instance.

He's a gigantic vampire/monarch/pro-wrestling-champion bear dude, definitely neat in design, and he has five or six types of attacks at his disposal. Unfortunately, instead of utilizing his attack types randomly to keep you on your toes, he continues to use the same one over and over until you deal a certain amount of damage to him, provoking him to switch to the next. What should've been a great battle ends up a simple scrum, just like the fights that precede it.

GP certainly had the potential to be one of the PCE's true sleepers. It's still a decent shooter, boasting charismatic enemies, quality tunes, and consistent action. Honestly, though, based on screens I'd seen and reviews I'd read prior to purchasing it, along with the first few fun-filled moments I'd spent with it, I thought it'd be a bit better than it actually is. I ended up disappointed, but I have little doubt that there's an audience out there for it. Nonetheless, if it comes down to buying either this or Star Parodier for $5-10 more, SP is certainly the smart choice.

Human Sports Festival

~ HUMAN SPORTS FESTIVAL ~

Human

Super CD-ROM

1992

This disc contains three separate sports games, so I might as well break 'em down individually:

Final Match Tennis Ladies is the girlie counterpart to what is probably the most well-beloved PC Engine tennis game. Perspective-wise, the action is reminiscent of World Court Tennis', but the gameplay is much tighter and more enjoyable than WCT's. Still, the game is a little "dinky," and I prefer the more realistic feel and presentation of Davis Cup. But FMTL is certainly fun and fast paced, and it should be a treat for anyone who thinks WCT is even remotely playable. It easily could have stood on its own as a worthwhile HuCard.

Formation Soccer Human Cup '92 makes a poor first impression with horribly repetitive music and a cumbersome control scheme that has you press Run both to switch from one player to another and to select a teammate to pass to. Once you've got the controls down, the game isn't exactly terrible, but it can be quite boring, as you have to spend a lot of time simply fighting for the ball. Halftime is the highlight, as you can change the channel on a monitor that the contest is being "watched" on and check out other stuff like wrestling matches and Human's weather channel. It's pretty amusing (once).

Fine Shot Golf was a pleasant surprise. The gameplay is tight, and everything that needs to be done in setting up and taking a shot is made convenient for the player. The holes get pretty tricky but never stupidly so. I'm sure that some golf-game aficionados will find it too simple and easy, but it fits the bill fine for me as an enjoyable pick-up-and-play title. The graphics are definitely on the simplistic side (you never actually see a guy swing and hit the ball; it just sort of takes off on its own), but the jazzy music is surprisingly good and actually reminds me of Langrisser's soundtrack at times. This game manhandles Power Golf.

So the disc gives you two good games, and since it's extraordinarily cheap (often five bucks or less), it's easily recommendable to players who have even the slightest interest in tennis or golf sims.

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

~ WHERE IN THE WORLD IS CARMEN SANDIEGO? ~

Pack-in Video / Broderbund Software

CD-ROM

1990

While I like to praise the oft-disparaged geniuses who developed games for Pack-in Video every chance I get, I guess they don't deserve a whole lot of credit for this menu-driven mystery title being a quality product. After all, Broderbund is the company that crafted the original computer-based version and came up with the concept for the game in the first place. Then again, this is a fantastic port, one that'll appeal most to us old folks who chased after crime-lord Carmen and her crowd of crooks back in our junior-high days. New sleuths with no nostalgia for the game should still get a couple of hours of fun out of it, and it probably won't cost more than a fiver to acquire. It's too bad that Where in Time wasn't brought over to the PCE as well.

Stay hot on the trail of ever-on-the-move criminals by garnering information about their exploits in the cities you tour...

...and learn about the histories, geographies, and economies of said cities while you're at it.

It usually isn't difficult to figure out where to go next, but even though this is an easy game, it isn't a dull one...

...thanks in part to the funny animated bits that play out when you're on the right path.

The places you visit look pretty nice, and the appealing imagery is accompanied by appropriate location-exclusive tunes.

Lock up Carmen's cronies one by one, and then go after the ringleader herself.

1941 Counter Attack

~ 1941 COUNTER ATTACK ~

Hudson Soft / Capcom

HuCard (SuperGrafx)

1991

After the antiquated vertical blaster 1943 Kai had let me down big time, I wasn't about to get my hopes up for its thematically similar SuperGrafx descendant. But while 1941 is reminiscent of '43 in many fundamental aspects, it's actually a heck of a lot more fun to play.

It maintains a fast pace, unlike 1943's monotonous first set of strips, but forethought and logic are evident in its level designs: no sequence here reminds one of the stretches of seemingly random projectile spewing in Kai's "new" stages. Adding a little fun and variety are diagonally scrolling segments; the adventure isn't just an uninterrupted bottom-to-top trip. And using the devastating missile weapon to annihilate enemies spread across the screen provides the satisfying feeling of slaughter one always hopes to experience when playing a shooter.

The graphical upgrade from Kai, though expected, is stunning. Gone are the simplicity and redundancy of 1943's uninspiring seas and skies. Counter Attack's environments not only are detailed and gorgeous but also exert themselves as factors in the gameplay itself. You'll demolish city buildings and cliff crests; navigate narrow passageways; and, in some harrowing but inevitable instances, struggle to regain control as your plane careens off walls (due to your own carelessness, of course).

Amazingly, there are times when the music impresses even more than the visuals. Sure, these tunes might not strike one for "remarkable drum quality" or whatever other reasons people come up with for lauding Kai's mediocre numbers, but the compositions themselves are extremely pleasant. Nonetheless, we must return to the graphics to find 1941's most memorable superficial moments, which, of course, come during boss confrontations. The big machines featured this time around are far more interesting than 1943's occasional large-yet-remarkably-dull planes and boats.

Even with all it does right, Counter Attack certainly isn't impervious to criticism. In a game that focuses almost exclusively on twitch action rather than memorization (and indeed seems built for such an approach), there are places where enemies will suddenly ram you up the ass or dart onscreen from odd angles, making for some cheap-feeling hits. (Of course, with an extendable life meter in tow, most players won't consider these moments to be game wrecking.) Also, while it does just about everything it can with the World War II concept, '41 can seem a little dull thematically, being that its PCE peers include the fantastical likes of Sapphire and Spriggan. Nevertheless, Counter Attack is well worth buying when and if you locate it at a reasonable price, as its action, visuals, and soundtrack combine to provide an entertaining experience--even though it has you deal with planes, ships, and other contraptions that take their cues from real-world technology rather than crazy creatures and mecha.

Wonder Momo

~ WONDER MOMO ~

Namco

HuCard

1989

Wonder Momo was never exactly at the top of my to-get list, but I'd been interested in it for quite a while before I finally went ahead and purchased it. Its appealing cover art is really what evoked my fascination, but the game itself looked like it had the potential to be a kitsch classic, a goofy title that would follow the path paved by lords of the lowbrow like Night Creatures and Energy and endear itself to me despite obvious flaws. Of course, the risk involved with such hopes is that the botch-job in question might prove to be more irritating than amusing, as is the case with the rough, repetitive Bravoman. Wonder Momo, unfortunately, flounders in the Bravoman category.

A girl who seems somewhat brain damaged gets up on a stage graced with ugly, boring backdrops as an audience roots her on with World Court Tennis-style whistles and applause. You play as the addled goofball and kick around a number of dopey-looking foes, building up your "wonder" meter in the process. An ample accumulation of wonder enables you to don a helmet and a "power outfit" and toss a bouncing ring-type weapon. Beat up enough goons and a tougher goon or two will appear, and then it's on to the next act (of which there are twelve in all).

All of this probably sounds pretty stupid, and, well, it really is. It's also repetitive and more than a little annoying thanks to iffy controls and troublesome aerial bad guys. But hey, after every few stages you get to see a picture of the chick looking "pretty." And if that doesn't sound like strong incentive to keep going, well...

...it really isn't.