Comments 49

Re: Atari's Grand Hotel Plan Is Reduced To A Single "Glowing Monolith Of Light And Motion" In Downtown Phoenix

Johnny_Arthur

I think Atari is the only company with a record of bankruptcies throughout its history, but the curious thing is that some bright spark always appears to save them, only to repeat the same mistake... and the cycle repeats itself with each successor.

It still pains me to see a company like Infogrames, which was doing everything right and could have been a direct competitor to Ubisoft (which would have generated quality products in France), irrationally adopt the Atari name. At first, they were doing well (especially when they acquired the licenses for movies like The Matrix, Terminator, and Mission: Impossible), but out of nowhere, they fizzled out, and then bankruptcy again. Thankfully, Atari revived Infogrames independently, although they lost all their licenses and are starting from scratch.

And just now, when Atari is starting to do things—not exactly well, but at least with the purchase of NightDive Studios—they make the stupid mistake of investing in things outside the realm of video games.

Years ago, Sunsoft disappeared in America for the same reason: the president of the Japanese branch decided to invest in golf courses in the USA, and that caused bankruptcy.

Re: Argonaut Has An "Exciting Announcement" Coming "Very Soon"

Johnny_Arthur

I still remember when Nintendo announced FX Fighter and Star Fox 2 for the SNES and I was thrilled to see those graphics in the magazine, but they never mentioned those games again. Later, when a reader asked them about them, I finally found out they'd been canceled.

Years later, I was able to play Star Fox 2 emulated, but with FX Fighter... I've only just learned that they did release it, but for PC, and that it had much better graphics than the screenshots shown for the SNES.
I would love to see this game completely remade, especially with gameplay improvements and, if possible, the implementation of new mechanics.

Re: Community Challenge: Can You Beat Battletoads' Most Notorious Level?

Johnny_Arthur

Awww... 1993, what a great year! I finished difficult video games like Street Fighter 2010, Tom & Jerry, Castlevania III, Double Dragon 2, Contra Force, and of course, Battletoads.

In the case of the Rare game, it originally belonged to my cousins. They hated it because they never got past the Turbo Tunnel stage, and in fact, when we played with two people, we kept losing lives and continues.

One day they lent me the game, and I played it at home. I lost, lost, lost, lost, lost, UNTIL I started memorizing every single path. It was a difficult and arduous task, but I managed to finish the game in mid-1993, and although the ending was disappointing, at least I had the satisfaction of having completed it 100%.

And although I haven't played Battletoads for years, I know it like the back of my hand and in fact I finished it the last time without any problems. The same thing happens to me with Street Fighter 2010; it was like learning to ride a bicycle. Sometimes you might forget some things, but it doesn't take long to correct them.

Re: IO Interactive Says 007 First Light Is "Completely Different" To The "Fantastic" GoldenEye 007

Johnny_Arthur

It's incredible how a Bond game from the '90s still hasn't been surpassed, despite all the subsequent films that raised the bar and all the technological advancements that could have overtaken GoldenEye. The EA era is perfectly forgettable because none of their games convinced me in the slightest (I might mention Nightfire on the GBA, since seeing an FPS running so well on that hardware was revolutionary).
While during the Activision era, I'd highlight Quantum of Solace. From the beginning, its developers declared their intention to surpass GoldenEye. The idea of ​​mixing first-person with third-person when Bond was close to a wall always fascinated me, as did the melee attacks when you had an enemy nearby. That, to me, felt like a true evolution of GoldenEye. Unfortunately, the game was left unfinished due to pressure and haste from Activision, who didn't allow their programmers to continue exploring ideas and rushed the game out. I hoped the sequels could improve the formula, but no, Bloodstone was another fascinating game, but it ended up being too simplistic, and Activision didn't allow their programmers to implement more ideas either. To make matters worse, they overshadowed both games with the unnecessary GoldenEye remake, which I personally would have liked to see continue in the footsteps of QoS, but they only clumsily implemented melee combat, and the weapons they added were all identical, with minimal differences like a laser sight, a telescopic sight, or no sight at all.

And First Light will sadly be another game where we see beautiful graphics but no intelligent gameplay.

P.S.: I miss Pierce Brosnan so much, the last real Bond.

Re: SNES Port Of The Much-Maligned Contra Force Is Now Playable

Johnny_Arthur

This is by far my favorite Contra game, and one I have a special fondness for. My cousin got it back in '94, and we enjoyed it together. I was able to finish it when he lent it to me for a couple of weeks while I was sick.

Sadly, my cousin passed away in 2016 at the age of 34, and I think of him every day—the moments we spent together, his voice still echoing in my head, when we played NES, rented games, and especially when we enjoyed Contra Force. While I was hoping for a sequel, this news still makes me happy because it will have all those qualities that could have made it even better.
T_T

Re: Retro Gamer's Nick Thorpe Has Passed Away

Johnny_Arthur

Sadly, I don't know all the writers at Retro Gamers, but a significant loss is always felt and affects you in some way. Nick Thorpe passed away knowing he fulfilled his purpose in this world, and if he had fans, then his work will always be remembered. I write articles for a Spanish-language magazine, and sadly, I'll never reach the level of brilliance of an English-language writer. At least Thorpe will be remembered. Long live him.

Re: An Early Arcade Title From The Creator of Ghosts 'n Goblins & Bionic Commando Is Heading To Consoles

Johnny_Arthur

I saw this game only once in the arcades and it captivated me for life, but for years I didn't know its name. I'd even forgotten about it for a couple of years, but once I learned it, I never forgot it again. Later, I found out that the creator was the same person who worked on several Capcom franchises.

I'm so glad that Hamster Games is finally bringing it to consoles. I think Rock 'N Rope deserved at least two more sequels; its concept had so much potential for evolution.
I'm still waiting for them to release Cabal, Blood Bros., the three Golden Axe games, Double Dragon 3, Joe & Mac, the two Robocop games, Iron Horse, Miki, The Legend of Cage, Sunset Riders, The Simpsons, King Of The Jungle, Lightning Sword, The Lost Castle in Darkmist and Vendetta.

Re: "It Would Have Been A Huge Success" - The Pitch Behind The Sega Handheld That Might Have Rivalled The Game Boy

Johnny_Arthur

This part of the story makes sense to me, because according to one of Nintendo's former engineers, when Yokoi was planning the Game Boy (which was the evolution of the Game & Watch), they were negotiating the monochrome screens with Company X but couldn't reach an agreement. Then they negotiated with Company Y, who sold them much cheaper, and they closed the deal. BUT, when the executives from Company Y left Nintendo's offices, representatives from Company X arrived and approached Yamauchi, offering him a monochrome screen at a much lower price. Yamauchi was in a bind and asked Yokoi to come up with an excuse to back out of the deal with Company Y. Yokoi asked one of his engineers to handle the matter, and this engineer created fake documentation for a portable console with a color screen. They presented it to Company Y, and they understood that this wasn't the screen Nintendo was looking for (wink, wink).

It's rumored that the people from Company Y approached Sega and presented them with the same falsified documentation, proposing to manufacture a handheld console with a color screen so they wouldn't lose the units they had already produced.

The same engineer who came up with the idea of ​​creating the falsified documentation bought a Game Gear, disassembled it, and was nearly shocked when he saw that it had been manufactured according to the specifications in the documentation he had created.

This part of the story makes sense when I combine it with what's reported in this news article: Sega didn't want to switch to a monochrome screen because they thought the idea that Nintendo "rejected" would work for them.

Re: "We Have Gone On So Many Adventures Together" - Video Game Icon Rebecca Heineman Has Passed Away, Aged 62

Johnny_Arthur

Did Sergeant Bertha Blast pass away?

Just kidding, any death is regrettable, and she earned her place in heaven for her immense contribution to the world of video games.

P.S.: I would like to ask the TS moderators not to delete the comments. I would like to know what kind of things they would say to someone who left us, so I have something to point them out to.

Re: Reviving Acclaim's Old IP Is "Not The Objective" As Some Of It Was "Not Great", Says New CEO

Johnny_Arthur

Alex Josef is absolutely right. The original Acclaim based its entire game library on licenses. I understand that nowadays it would be extremely expensive for them to re-release the WWF games, since before, Vince McMahon sold them the complete package at a reasonable price. But now they would have to pay not only for the WWE rights, but ALSO for the likeness of each and every wrestler individually, which is extremely unfair to the consumer.

The same would apply if they were to re-release movies like Alien 3, Judge Dredd, Stargate, Terminator 2, True Lies, Beetlejuice, etc. I imagine they would now have to pay for the movie rights AND ALSO for the actor's likeness rights.

And I suppose the same principle applies to games based on sports franchises like the NBA, NFL, and MLB.

But Josef is wrong about one thing, Acclaim did have its own sagas (Revolt, Xtreme-G, Tiger-Heli, NARC, Super Smash TV, Forsaken, Iggy's Reckin' Balls, Fur Fighters, 18 Wheeler: American Pro Trucker, ZooCube, Headhunter, Vexx, Gladiator: Sword of Vengeance).

Re: Konami's Car Combat Game 'City Bomber' Is This Week's Arcade Archives Release

Johnny_Arthur

There was nothing more glorious for a next-gen console than releasing all those arcade classics from 40 years ago. It drives me crazy to think that I can only now enjoy all those games I so longed to have in my house in their original versions.
I have to admit that the console ports were never faithful and that the experience wasn't the same; both graphical and gameplay details were lost.
I know what you'll also say: that this could already be enjoyed in the mid-90s with the MAME emulator, but getting those games to run was always complicated for me, and I could never figure out how to get several of them to run. The BIOS might be missing a file, the ROM might be outdated, the game might have no sound or sounded very different. They never managed to simplify things.
But now I can play in handheld mode and on my own TV.

Re: It Was "Helpful" That Nintendo Killed The SNES PlayStation - Otherwise Sony Would Have Been "Stuck", Says Shuhei Yoshida

Johnny_Arthur

Personally, I still consider this to be one of the biggest mistakes Nintendo ever made, as the SNES was one of the most beloved consoles, and the world yearned for its lifespan to extend for a good handful more years. Everyone was even willing to buy that peripheral, but Nintendo never explained why it was canceled. For years, I heard the excuse was that CD-ROM technology was too slow to transfer data, and that wasn't what Nintendo was looking for. Now I find out it was because Sony was going to collect royalties from the software. What was the problem with that?
But what I still don't understand is why, if the hardware was Nintendo's, Sony was able to use it without any problems on the PSX.
The irony is that after the cancellation and the promise of the N64, the PSX often reminded me of the canceled CD-ROM, and I didn't even know the real story.

Re: Ubisoft's 1994 Mario Kart Clone 'Street Racer' Is Getting A New Retro Collection On Steam

Johnny_Arthur

Let's just say this was the game that introduced me to UBI Soft on the SNES, and I think it was the only one released for that console. The thing is, I fell in love with this game because it was a 4-player Mario Kart (I was lucky enough to have the Hudson Soft multitap and played it with my cousins). That day, I made the mistake of elevating UBI Soft to the status of gods, and I hoped they would do well as a company so they'd release a sequel in the future, which never came. I found it strange because I was sure Street Racer had been a hit.
Of course, the game was far from perfect; it needed more work, the weapons needed improvement, the melee attacks were very bland, and when you ran out of energy, you didn't die; you just kept driving your vehicle as if nothing had happened.
Some time later I found out about the Gameboy version (quite mediocre by the way), the PSX version which was nothing more than a slight improvement of the SNES version, and later I found out that the programmer was a Turk who lived in England and that when the sequel to Street Racer had already been announced he decided to return to his native country as soon as it was cancelled.
Now, to be honest, this game has aged terribly (not even comparable to the Top Gear trilogy, which did stand the test of time and you can enjoy its trilogy today). The other day I played Street Racer on my SNES and it already feels obsolete. I think they should fix all the bugs and make it so you can lose like in F-zero.

Re: We Could Be Getting A New Version Of NES Cult Classic Shatterhand

Johnny_Arthur

And finally, we had to wait 34 long years to finally enjoy a remake of this wonderful game, in my opinion the best ever made for the NES (forgive me for Shadow of the Ninja and Batman Return of the Joker).
For those who don't know, Natsume had programmed Shatterhand and was going to release it in Japan and America, BUT Angel, which held the license for the Solbrain series, commissioned Natsume to make a game based on the series. Natsume modified the Shatterhand game, and as a result, a "different" version was released in Japan, while in America, we had the game in its purest form.
I knew the rights were held by Jaleco, but with its demise or due to expiration dates, they returned to Natsume around 2009, although they never made it public. With luck, they only released a compilation album with all the songs from Natsume's most well-known franchises (including Shatterhand).
Even so, it's sad that those of us who loved this game had to wait a lifetime to finally enjoy a remake.

Re: Mega Man's 1994 Animated Series Is Getting The Definitive Home Release Fans Have Been Waiting For

Johnny_Arthur

This series is truly awful. Mega Man's design reminded me a lot of Popeye, and the animation style was very Hanna-Barbera (meaning the artists were working without motivation just to keep up and save money).
I'm far ahead of the OVAs that came out in Japan several years ago, needless to say it surpasses the series in every way and in fact it deserved to be released on Blu-ray.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yv8XJJwYjjk