Is it a copout to say my current contender for GOTY is a collection of a bunch of arcade ROMs from the 90s / 00s? Not when it's arguably the ultimate love letter to an entire genre.

Ignoring the specific games included for a second, this package is od. First home release of many of the games here, ALL games have a training mode (even those that never did in their old console ports!) completely themed around them, online with rollback netcode for EVERY game instead of Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection, unique banner art for every game instead of just using stock art of characters (many of which were not from the specific game you were playing), first releases of artwork that has been thought to have been lost in time, and the cherry on top: all perfect arcade emulation where you can choose the USA OR JPN version of each game when available! This goes beyond characters changing names or some different sprites / animations, some games contain small balance changes between them. For example: the JPN version of Hyper SF II's Super X version of Zangief has the 90% guaranteed stun on Zangief's air 8HP, where the US version of Hyper SFII's Super Turbo version of Zangief doesn't have any special properties for that move.

For specific games: this is the first home release for Red Earth PERIOD, this is the first time Hyper SF II, arguably the best version of Street Fighter II, has gotten a home release since 2003, this is the first Western home release ever for Cyberbots, the first Western non-PSX release of any post-Night Warriors Darkstalkers game (the main appeal for many I am sure), but with that there is the one major missed opportunity. I know I just praised this for using Arcade ROMs instead of home ports, but there's this specific home port of Vampire Savior in Japan that has all characters from every version plus Dee, the non-canon character of Donovan succumbing to his vampire side and Demitri's dying body fusing his head on Donovan's body a la Dio to Jonathan Joestar (in what """""may""""" be a """""coincidence,"""""" Capcom produced a Jojo fighting game around this time [sorry for the run-on parentheses and brackets but I've seen a lot of complaints about Jojo's Venture and Heritage for the Future not being here. I get it, would be truly "complete" with them but they don't have the license, it's unfortunate but was unrealistic to expect it along with the Marvel licenses imo.)

Now that I've 100% completed this with every achievement, I would be completely OK with this replacing fightcade for these games. The convenience is too good to ignore, Capcom still gets financial support for something they absolutely deserve, but the only thing I have an issue with is that I have noticed sometimes after unpausing that it can take a second to get control over your character again or if you're holding back or down you'll have to go to a different direction before it reads going back or down again. Really makes playing Boxer or Dee Jay in Hyper a drag if you need to pause lol.

I didn't want to rate this until I finish every game here but not even halfway through completing them, this blows Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection out of the fucking water. It's a very good sign for Street Fighter 6 that its in the hands of the people who put this collection together, they clearly care for and love fgs a lot.

PopFul Mail was very nearly Doki Doki Panicked into a Sonic the Hedgehog game back in the day. Branded Sister Sonic, the intention was to bring PopFul Mail to the west with a new cast of Sonic characters, with the hedgehog's long lost sister in the lead role. I remember reading about this in magazines at the time, and my brain having already been rendered into a slurry thanks to a steady diet of Sonic related products and media, I was excited. Sister Sonic never came to be thanks to a campaign by fans who wanted to see a more faithful localization of PopFul Mail.

Anyway, Working Designs got ahold of this one so nobody wins!

To say Working Designs is a divisive studio is an understatement, though I generally like their localizations when they're not being patently misogynistic (see: Albert Odyssey.) I have no frame of reference for how PopFul Mail should be, but I think it's pretty damn charming for what it is. Mail is a greedy, snarky woman who isn't afraid to use the R-word and doesn't learn a damn thing from her adventure. This is somewhat refreshing, as I've grown pretty tired of greedy characters follow the same tired predictable arc of learning to value the greater good over coin. By the end of PopFul Mail our hero gets everything they wanted: ill-gotten gold, which she practically dives into like Scrooge McDuck. For what it's worth, based on the fact that this plays out in an FMV maybe that was Mail's character arc the whole time. A villain who is clearly meant to be taken seriously but is reduced to an Arnold Schwarzenegger caricature is 100% Working Designs chicanery though, and I like it.

But while I may have a better tolerance than most for the way Working Designs stuffs their scripts with 90s pop culture gags, I am less enthused by the way they tweak the difficulty of the games they work on. In PopFul Mail's case, the difficulty is ratcheted up and enemies are intentionally made more annoying. Or so I'm told. Again, no direct point of reference for the original unbastardized version here, but there's definitely parts of PopFul Mail that are more frustrating than they ought to be.

Gameplay is pretty straight-forward. You play as one of three characters, each rendered in a sort of chibi style with their own strengths and weaknesses. I found Tatt's magical abilities to be more valuable during boss fights and Gaw's stronger jump to be useful during the main levels with Mail losing much of her utility by the last third of the game. Levels are well designed but platforming and combat is nothing spectacular. In fact, if you've played one of the Monster World/Wonder Boy games you already have a good sense for what it's like.

If you like Slayers or similar 90s fantasy/adventure anime, then you'll probably find a lot to like about PopFul Mail, both in its aesthetic style and in the 90s-as-hell localization job it was given. Personally, I got a lot of mileage out of that, and the sort of mysticism that's built up for me concerning Sister Sonic certainly helped keep me invested.

Capcom Classics Collection Revisits #12

Want to know how to tell when I'm getting burnt out on these? It's when I go down my list of titles to play and the arcade version of Bionic Commando is next, then I just sit on it for like two weeks, because "fuck I gotta play Bionic Commando next? goddammit".

I respect this for doing something new and giving us a unique way to move about the stage, but I just never really liked using the grappling hook and there's tons of times where shit just plows into you when you probably could've avoided it if Rad Spencer had any leg muscles to spare to leave the ground on his own volition. By stage three you're probably gonna be constantly dying, because this is unfortunately an arcade game that cares more about pinching the pennies from your pockets rather than giving you a good experience. This is probably the first game I'm playing for this where I legitimately just don't like the game, like Trojan and Street Fighter 1 are far worse objectively, but those games I can laugh at, Bionic Commando Arcade is just irritating.

It sucks that my review can basically be summed up as "play the NES version instead", but seriously just play the NES game instead. I can already tell you from the few minutes I spent trying it out quick that it feels a metric crapton better to play than this. Hell, this doesn't even have an exploding Hitler head. Seriously, why bother?

I found playing Frogun actively unbearable, sadly. I think this game destroys every possible burst of fun I could have with it as soon as it arises. I have to start the game multiple times a day just to complete one level - just complete, not even 100% - because my fight or flight instincts kick in as soon as the player character falls off a cliff because this game is really bad at communicating depth. Fascinatingly, this game has the opposite of what you would call a "game flow", to the point that I think this could've needed like an extra year just to get the controls and movement right. It has a nice artstyle at least.

cute! gay! kinda fun!

yeah, the floaty jumping and shooting do feel a little bit like cave story, but there's nowhere near that game's level of complexity to the (nearly total absence of) exploration: it's all running left to right, hopping in an elevator, blasting stuff with your space bike in shoot 'em up bonus stages, etc. levels are called asteroids, and they're all full of robots, sweets (cake and ice cream!), and floppy disks — and occasionally secrets. the weapon variety does lend it a touch of complexity (bosses are typically vulnerable to one weapon or another), though it should also be mentioned that layla takes a moment to turn around, somewhat hampering the fluidity of the action.

i almost want to rate this game more highly... it's '80s anime as all heck and despite the extreme simplicity and mild control awkwardness it's just so charming i kinda love it.

Ys Origin is (to date) my favorite Ys game and one of my favorite RPGs of all time. It's hard to explain and convey why I feel that way towards the game since it doesn't really offer anything earth-shattering in terms of gameplay and storyline but on a personal level I really enjoyed the setting, the character development in the game, the fast-paced action-based combat system, the soundtrack (best intro in Ys series) and how the game lays out the story for future Ys games.

Regarding character development, I really enjoyed how Yunica and Hugo turned out. Yunica starts as a sweet-loving and somewhat insecure scout group member due to her inability to use magic. However, as the journey of escalating Darm Tower's unfolds, she develops a strong will and determination that culminates with her confidence and overall character completely different to when she started this story. Hugo's character provides a good contrast to Yunica in the sense that he has a very "easy to hate" cocky and unpleasant personality that, someway-somehow, ends up growing on the player as his journey unfolds and you learn more about his past.

Despite the game only taking place at Darm Tower, I felt like the different levels offer as much variety as they can; and combined with different enemies, mild puzzles, and interesting (and challenging) boss battles, they make up for a fun journey full of surprises via the different plot changes that happen.

No, I did not just play a Hello Kitty game at random. After playing Balloon Kid again I later found out online that a port was released in Japan on the Famicom with all of the characters swapped out for Sanrio ones.

It's so utterly goddamn bizarre to find out that a game you grew up with back in the day underwent an identity change and was released on other hardware, I mean you really can't blame me for not knowing until recently. It's not like it was released as "This is a Famicom Version of Balloon Kid", and I'm not generally up to date on my Sanrio shit aside from random Aggretsuko clips, so the drive to play Hello Kitty games is almost non-existent.

As far as the game itself, it's mostly the same as Balloon Kid, but I wanna say the slowdown was a bit worse here and my control was probably better due to my 8bitdo NES controller being in better shape than my DS. They also really took away the intimidation factor of the Factory level at the end by brightening it up with Lego bricks and the first stage theme. Don't get me wrong I fucking adore that theme, but I kinda miss the "welcome to hell" feel of the original Game Boy version's aesthetic.

I'm trying to think of a reverse of this situation. What if Balloon Kid was only released in Japan, then was changed for the western audience and ported to NES? What would the characters be? Garfield? The Ninja Turtles? Bart Simpson? Jerry Seinfeld? The possibilities are endless in this possible alternate timeline.

Play any combo-focused fighting game or beat ‘em up for an extended period of time and you’re bound to catch yourself thinking “Damn, I wish I had a second wall bounce!”. There’s nothing more frustrating than developing a theoretically strong combo in the lab and then discovering in practice that you already used up your OTG allowance 16 hits back. Sure, it might break the game if you could loop that EX move a third time, but it would look so cool, right? You deserve that shit, man! This combo is built different! If only you had unlimited ground-bounds, things would be different…

Urban Reign is the furled monkey paw’s fulfilment of this wish. Namco’s spirited attempt at a standalone Tekken Force game is wholly defined by its disrespect for the laws of the known fighting game universe, allowing you to wallsplat, sweep and breaker to your heart’s content - no idea is off-limits here if you have a demented mind that's capable of dreaming in the language of juggling. Lemme tell ya, it feels GOOD to football kick grounded opponents into the wall over and over again until their little polygonal souls leave their body!! Remember when your little brother threw down his PSX pad in a fit of rage because your King combos weren't "letting him play" in Tekken 3? This is a dark resurrection of that feeling writ large and legitimate.

The first dozen or so stages are borderline pornographic in their allowances to smokin’ sick style, making an aggressive argument for why doing damage with a super should allow you to build enough meter for another super than can be cancelled into from the first super. “Why can’t fighting games be like this all the time?” is something you’re bound to ask yourself when the second boss battle against the helpless sap Sick Rick ends with you infinitely hammer-tossing him into a pool table; you can practically imagine the little computer inside your PS2 throwing down its proverbial controller because you made it watch your mastubatory Brad Hawk combo video, packing up its shit and telling its mother you cheated at the game by "spamming too many moves".

But the law of equivalent exchange is alive and well here, and every player-positive design decision requires a reactionary advocate for the equality of CPU rights. Ever commented on EventHubs that “the best way to balance a game is to make all the low tiers as strong as the S-rank characters?” - well, here’s a look at what you could have won. Once the ten tutorials are done and the goons’ gloves come off, this becomes another game entirely. You thought you were safe from all these cheap hands you were throwing out? You’re built different, right? Pure skill? Shhhhhhhhhhhhhit. Sit down. PT-22 is gonna show you how truly broken this game is.

The mid-game of Urban Reign is a fascinating experiment in fighting game design, built almost entirely around how you think up a combo (both in sequence and circumstance) and how far ahead you can take it - given that some enemies can start chain-killing you with their first flick of their wrist, you’re forced to constantly plot random bullshit infinites out of sheer self-preservation instinct, the desire to "style on em" put aside in favour of hiding behind a shelf with dodgy collision-detection in the supermarket stage.

Strings that involve trash bins, jukeboxes, couches, lampposts and a whole lot of running up/suplexing into walls are only the tip of the iceberg here; you will have to go to the deepest, most depraved depths of your fighting gamer's mind in order to out-cheap the cheapest of the cheap shit. Let up for even a split second and it could all be over, and don’t forget that the CPU has the same rights as you do to do Guilty Gear-style bursts mid-combo - meaning no victory in this street war is ever guaranteed for even a second… Did I mention that while you’re being thrown by one enemy, other enemies can still kick you in the head? Damn! And there's no wakeup invincibility or reversal options? God DAMN!

Don't Stop until you reach the top and you'll be rewarded with the only language this game knows - more sadistic pain and suffering. After 99 stages of maverick midtown Marvel 2 madness, what could a final boss possibly look like? Well, the answer's hilariously simple - it's a dude with a gun who can kill you in one shot. Another one of gaming's greatest punchlines. Was it worth it? Hard to say, but this is a once-in-a-lifetime game that's worth checking out for a hot sec, even if you never make it past the karate guy in the 7-Eleven parking lot who can kara-cancel off a sneeze.

N.B. Really sad that this game's rough lil excuse-plot was written by the same guy who directed and scripted the Ace Combat Zero: The Belkan War story. I refused to skip all the cutscenes and intro text because I was expecting Something Clever would happen at some point but no, this is just the narrative equivalent of a Final Fight game where you munch turkeys and beat up guys called Golem and Mr. Motor who say stuff like "Ow! That hurt!" lol