Jaws NES Review

Jaws is one of those games that kinda grows on you.  Most people hate this game and say it sucks and only play a few minutes of it and get bored.  The game is actually quite challenging and fun if you give it a chance.  The game kinda plays like an RPG.  You travel back and forth between ports on the ocean with your boat collecting power ups which can be bought with conch shells.  It is totally random when you get thrown into "battles" with stingrays, sharks, and jellyfish.  Sometimes they drop shells or stars which are different point values and you can collect crabs which make your diver faster.  You can also get a submarine which has bombs that go down as well as straight shots.  The game is very basic and you will sometimes run into jaws and he has a lot of power.  You also get bonus rounds about every 3 "battles" in which you are flying an airplane dropping bombs into the sea hitting jellyfish.  You can get a lot of shells in the bonus rounds which you trade in at ports to raise your power level.  After you bring jaws' power level meter down to zero, you go into another scene where you have a chance to kill him to win the game.  You have 3 strobes that you activate to make jaws pop out of the water and then stab him with your boat when he is close.  If you don't bring jaws power down to zero you can keep playing to rack up your score.  I think I have gotten about 140,000 for a high score without making a calculated high score run.  Overall I give the game a 7 out of 10 with excellent game play and fun factor.   

Garage Sale Finds

One of the first sales of the day and Piper (my wife) spotted Burgertime for Intelivision CIB for $2.  I had to get that of course.  Later on I picked up Hey You Pikachu for N64 for $2 also.  Then the last garage sale we went to, I picked up Dragon Quest 8 for PS2 CIB and Xenosaga episode 1 CIB for $1.75 each!  Not too bad of a day for game hunting.

Adventures of Dino Riki NES Review

This game is not fun at all.  Number 1, I hate forced scrolling games which this is.  Number 2, the more speed power-ups you get, the harder the game is.  I don't really have anything else to say about this game.  I give it a 3 out of 10 mostly for graphics.  I just plain dislike this game, period.

Babseball NES Review

This game is pretty good considering it came out in 1984.  It is a basic and I mean basic baseball game.  There are no team names, just initials.  There are no player names or numbers.  You can pick from I think 8 teams total.  It doesn't matter what team you pick because they all are the same except the color.  The game play is very straightforward, except controlling the runners.  Controlling the runners is probably the most frustrating thing about the game.  Everything else is pretty much automatic.  One thing that sucks big time however is when you hit the ball towards the 3rd baseman, he always covers 3rd and 9 times out of 10 he lets the ball get by him.  Oh well, anyway, the game is alright and I give it a 5 out 10 overall.  It does get pretty boring after 2 innings though and I feel very hard pressed to complete an entire game when I do play this game.  It is so slow at times it makes you just want to turn it off and sleep.

Tetris NES Review

Dude, it's Tetris.  Does it really need a review?  If you have never played this game it is time to crawl out from underneath that rock and join the rest of the world.  Easily scores a 10 out of 10 just because of what it is.  You never get bored of it and only continue to get better with practice.  The only version that is better is the Tengen or the Arcade version with simultaneous multiplayer  mode.  A must have for any hardcore NES collection.

Win Lose or Draw NES Review

 Like 99% of all failed attempts to make TV game shows on the NES, this game sucks.  There is really nothing else to say.  I give it a 2 out of 10.  I guess it would be alright with 2 players.  Never mind, the game sucks, period. 

8 Eyes NES Review

This game is a weak Castlevania 2 Simons Quest clone.  It has a stage select when you start, you can select 8 different cities in the world.  I tried about 3 of them before I got bored.  The game is so repetitive that it puts you to sleep.  You have this bird thing on your shoulder that I guess someone using controller 2 can control, but other than that there is nothing special about this game.  Maybe I am missing something?  I give this game a 3 out of 10.  Game play and graphics are almost identical to Simon's Quest and although it seems challenging, it is very difficult not to get bored and just give up after about 10 minutes due to the repetitiveness.

WWF Wrestlemania Challenge NES Review

The title screen comes up with an awesome shot of The Ultimate Warrior!!  OK, anything cool about this game ends here.  Do yourself a favor and never play this turd of a game.  The graphics suck (other than the title screen), Hulk Hogan is so tan he looks African American, and the game play sucks so bad you can barely control it.  I will give this piece of shit a 1 out of 10 only because there are worse games out there that deserve a zero.

Robocop NES Review

This game is actually a pretty decent port of the arcade version.  The graphics and game play are pretty decent and it is a challenging game overall.  You start out with just your fists as weapons until someone fires a gun at you, then you have your gun as a weapon for the rest of the stage.  The format of the game is a platform side scroller.  Overall I give this game a 6 out of 10.  It is not a game I would necessarily play all the time, but it is fun to play every now and then.  

Rad Racer 2 NES Review

OK, number 1, why did Square make this game?  Anyway, this game is just a recycled version of the original Rad Racer.  The game play and graphics are identical to the original.  It doesn't even make any sense why they put this game out.  The only thing challenging about it is there are these red cars that actually try to block you.  I don't remember that in the original, but I could be wrong. The music is also different and the dashboard display.  I didn't see anywhere in the game where you could select a different car.  Maybe when you get to later stages, you win a different car?  The bottom line is that overall I give this game a 4 out of 10.  Same old recycled crap that Squaresoft should be embarrassed about even putting out.

Atari weekend

First stop was Toy Box and Treasures in Waterford on Saturday.  I picked up a ton of games for 30 bucks.  7800 games - Donkey Kong Jr, Dig Dug, Mrs. Pac-Man, Centipede, Choplifter, and Galaga.  Atari 2600 games - Phoenix, Galaxian, Venture (red label), Wizard of Wor, Popeye, Donkey, Kong (red label), Pitfall!, and Megamania.  Today, I went to Gibraltar Trade Center in Taylor and Taylor Town Flea Market.  I picked up Defender for the Atari 400/800.  I also got for the 7800 at 2 bucks each, Karateka, Xevious, and Food Fight.  I picked up for the 2600 - Defender, Demon Attack, Riddle of the Sphinx, Space Shuttle, Zaxxon, Surround, Stellar Track (Sears), Asteroids, Space Invaders (Rare Sears), Decathlon, Pac-Man (Rare Sears), and Adventures of Tron.  I only picked up 1 game at Gibraltar which was H.E.R.O.  the ever elusive full graphic label rare version for $5.25.  This game goes on Ebay for anywhere from $45 to $120.  Overall a nice Atari grab for the weekend!

River Raid and the Atari 400

So everyone has played River Raid on the Atari 2600 right?  Well, have you ever played it on the Atari 400 computer?  It is awesome.  The Atari 2600 version is awesome, don't get me wrong, but the Atari 400 version rocks!  The graphics are better and there is a lot more stuff going on.  There are tanks on the shore / bridges that shoot at you, there are hot air balloons, and the shoreline has definition.  The Atari 400 computer is far superior to the 2600 VCS.  I guess it was a lot more expensive back in 1978 when it came out so it's processor is better.  I plan on picking up more 400 games on ebay or wherever I can find them.  I see them out in the wild occasionally and I always try to pick them up when I see them.  I got River Raid, Super Breakout, and Basic Programing for 4 bucks each at a secret location in South Lyon a few days ago.  I picked up Frogger and Asteroids at a flea market a few weeks ago as well.  I also have Missile Command, Pac Man (Awesome port!), Star Raiders, Donkey Kong, and Centipede.  I also just bought Pitfall on Ebay yesterday for a mere $6 shipped.  I am looking forward to that one as the graphics and sound should also be far superior to the 2600.  Man I love the Atari computer!

Intelivision / Arcade cabinet

Well, the Intellivision works. I picked up "Sea Battle" with the overlays this weekend from Destiny Games an awesome place, check them out. I did also pick up an Odyssey 2 for 25 bucks with 4 games, however it doesn't power up. I plan to open it up in the near future and check to see if it maybe needs just a quick solder, I will keep everyone posted. On a plus note, I got a free Pentium 4 Dell tower from my neighbor to possibly resurrect the MAME cabinet. I have been going through Moon Patrol withdraws lately! He said it needs a hard drive but that is not an issue, I have about 4 40GB hard drives laying around here. Looks like a 4th of July project to me. I also picked up a few 2600 games over the weekend. I will be doing some reviews on here in the near future, so stay tuned!