Forgotten Old Games – Marvel Super Heroes in War of the Gems

Hello everyone. Welcome to another Forgotten Old Game!
I’m sorry for my absense. I’ve been pretty busy lately and couldn’t even find time to play anything! But I’m back now, and ready to hit you with another blast from the past.
Today I’m gonna tell you about a game from the Marvel universe. And no, it’s not a fighting game, but a 2d platformer with hints of beat-em-up for the SNES. I’m talking about Marvel Super Heroes – War of the gems!

Released in 1996 by Capcom, one year after it’s arcade fighting counterpart, this game is also based on the same comic books series as the Arcade one, “The Infinity Gauntlet”. By acquiring the six Infinity Gems which controls Time, Space, Mind, Soul, Reality and Power and becoming a God, Thanos proceeds to exterminate half of the sentient beings in the universe, which includes most of the heroes, just because of his love for Death (the being, not because he likes to kill err…maybe he does). The remaining heroes(Spiderman, Iron Man, Captain America, The Hulk and Wolverine) guided by Adam Warlock unites to battle against him, retrieve the Infinity Gems and undo all this crazyness.

Graphics 

 This game has good graphics, huge and well drawn backgrounds with lots of stuff and enemies on screen at the same time. The characters are also very detailed and the animation is good.

The Stage Select screen

Sound
The game music is just okay, nothing that really stands out. The same can be said about the sound effects.

Gameplay
Plataform + Beat-em-up = Fun! The controls are simple, responsive and fast!
Also for the game basics controls:

D Pad: Moves Characters
Y: Attacks
B: Jumps

Well drawn and animated scenarios!

On the start screen you can choose if you want to start a new game, adjust options or enter a password. Yes, this game does not have a save option, instead it uses passwords to keep track of your progress.
In the Options menu there isn’t really much to set. You can adjust the control setup and if you want Stereo or Monoaural sound.

Choose wisely, some stages requires skills from specific heroes!

This games works basically as any other 2d platformer, but as I said it’s kinda of a beat-em-up as well, allowing you to use special attacks of your heroes, and even combos! Don’t think it’ll be easy though, once you die, you lose that hero you’ve chosen and have to choose another one.  There are specific attacks for each hero, using simple sequences like  pressing Down, Forward and Y.

This item lets you perform a special attack once if you already have one of the Infinity Gems.

While looking for the gems on every stage, you’ll find lots of differents enemies and bosses. There are also items that recharge your health, allows you to use a special attack if you already have one of the Infinity Gems and even ressurrect a fallen hero.
Equipping one of the Infinity Gems will give your character a special ability. They are:

Time Gem: Hero moves 2 times faster.
Space Gem: Gives the hero the double jump ability.
Reality Gem: Shows hidden places/items.
Soul Gem: Doubles HP.
Power Gem: Doubles attack power.

You’ll be visiting lots of places in your quest for the gems, at first you can choose one of the following stages: The Avengers Base, Boston Aquarium, Amazon, Alaska and Dr. Doom’s castle, but more places will show up as you progress trough the game.

Conclusion
Marvel Super Heroes – War of the Gems is a real GEM for that time. It could be better if it had better songs, but otherwise it’s still a good game, and I truly recommend you to play this one! ‘Till next time!

Forgotten Old Games – Demon’s Crest

Hello again my friends, are you ready to take a final look at the twisted world of demons, gargoyles, zombies and weird creatures? well then let’s see what awaits us at Demon’s Crest, a dark fantasy game (really, really dark this time) for the Super Nes, released in 1994.

This is the third game starring Firebrand, the same protagonist from the Gargoyle’s Quest series, but this time, as you may have noticed, the series decided to take a more serious and gothic feel, I mean, just look at the Title Screen, it’s freaking awesome! The hellfire, the demon, the music everything is telling to you “We don´t fuck arround! This time we´re dead serious!”

Our story begins with Firebrand looking for six magical crests so that he can combine them into the Crest of Infinity, which will grant him infinite power and the ability to conquer any and all realms with it! You might be thinking “So, he’s looking to become stronger… again!?” That’s right folks, he’s one Power Hungry Demon son-of-a-bitch, but this time he’s not saving his world, he wants to conquer it!

Anyway, having all crests except the Heaven Stone, Firebrand engages in battle with its owner, a demoniac Dragon, coming out victorious but gravely wounded, Firebrand is attacked by a powerful demon called Phalanx, which throws him in at the Coliseum and steal all his Crests in the process. All except the Fire Crest, which was shattered in pieces, and Firebrand managed to keep hold of one shard. At the Coliseum, Firebrand has the unpleasant surprise of finding the Dragon still barely alive, but ready for vengeance!

“This dragon used to scare the crap out of my little brother when we were kids, between you and me, I think it still does.”

After Firebrand manages to finish de Dragon once and for all, the game starts at a foggy cemetery, there you will face the cool General Arma and so set forth for your original mission to collect all of the remaining crests again.

Let’s talk about the gameplay, during the side-scrolling part, everything seems very nice and fairly basic, you can fly, hover (as always), shoot fireballs and, as a new feature, destroy some stuff that are part of the background.

These can be statues mostly, and some stones, which will sometimes drop items or destroy gargoyle type enemies. When you exit stages you go to the world map, just like its predecessors, but this time Firebrand actually flies, providing a much faster way to travel between regions, when you want to go to a location, you simply press the action button and Firebrand will try to land at that location, if there’s something there, like a town or a dungeon, you will enter that area. All RPG elements from previews game are still there. You can buy items from a vendor, play a mini game, go back to stages that you have already completed to look for upgrades that you missed, talk to some characters to obtain valuable information, gain new armor and abilities by collecting the crests, and much more.

Now to the graphics, as always, this series provides very nice looking graphics, from the foggy cemetery of the beginning of the game, to the scary haunted tower of General Arma, in every level you’ll see something that will make you say “Now that’s freaking cool”, Not to mention the effects this game has, you can easily notice them at the world map, when you try to land at some location the game will suddenly zoom in giving you the sensation that Firebrand is actually landing there, It’s pretty awesome. I really think that this is between the best looking snes games. (I also think that is prettier than lots of 32 bit 2D games.)

I can’t say much about the music, you have to listen to it yourself, see how the soundtrack complements the gothic dark fantasy atmosphere.

In my opinion this game has the best soundtrack of all Super Nes games.

My personal favorite… Memorial of the Fallen Ones:

“Haunting and serene, good stuff”.

So, pick up your old Super Nes console and start playing this game right now, for you are in a last adventure with the remarkable Firebrand.

Forgotten Old Games – Undercover Cops

Hi there! Welcome to another FOG!
Today we’re going to take a look at another beat ’em up game. This one is called Undercover Cops for the Nintendo SNES.

Originally an arcade game, this game made it’s way to the SNES in 1995 by Varie in Japan, unfortunately the US release got cancelled!

We’re at the 21st century (LOL, we really are). With the inability of ordinary police to contain
the devastating increase in crime, the government sees no other option but to use unorthodox methods to combat crime. That’s where Zan, Rose and Matt, three citizens with knowledge in fighting and martial arts, are turned into undercover cops, and begins fight face-to-face with all kind of thugs.
Yeah I know. The plot is now awesome. Indeed is pretty generic, but it’s okay.

The graphics are good. It’s one of the best looking of it’s genre to the SNES in my opinion. The Arcade version have a crisper and more detailed look, but even so the SNES port delivers good and fluid movement.

The soundtrack is good enough, with each song fitting well into every moment of the game. The sound effects and voices are really good too, not to mention they’re funny!

If that's one of her attacks, I wanna be a bad guy...

The gameplay is sweet, you’ll have no problem punching the crap of your enemies. As any other beat ’em up, not only they can use special moves (that drains your energy as well), they can also use lots of items you find through the stages. By the way, there’s something quite disturbing about this game: The recovery items! Seriuosly, they vary from a living chick, to hogs and slugs! And when you grab them, depending on who you’re controlling, for example: Matt, he yells “DELICIOUS”… Gross!

The basic commands for the game are:
D-Pad – Moves character around the screen
B Button – Jumps
Y Button – Normal attack
X button – Nothing
A Button – Special Attack (Drains a little of your energy if it hits)

The enemies are dumb and slow, you manage to get rid of them in no time. The bosses are kinda easy as well, except for a few ones, and there is where a new flaw arrives. The game is too short, featuring only five stages! Undercover Cops is a good game nonetheless, it just had too many competition for that time.
If you’re tired of beating Final Fight and Streets of Rage,  this might be a good one for you to try! See ya!

 

 

Forgotten Old Games – Axelay

Hi everyone! Today I´m gonna review a great shoot ’em up for Super Nintendo, a classic that remains in past but today we´re going to resurrect Axelay!

Axelay was released in Japan during 1992 and produced by Konami. In 1993 it was released in USA and Europe. The awesome mode “7 graphics” and different styles of gameplay made Axelay a unique game.

Axelay take place in a solar system known as Illis. Illis was invaded by alien warriors named as the Armada of Annihilation. These guys took over the entire system included a earth-like planet named Corliss. In response, the humans from Corliss launch the powerful D117B Axelay fighter to put an end in this invasion.

This game, as I said before, feature a very unique gameplay style, it´s like you have two games in one. When you start playing Axelay the first thing that you´ll notice is its different perspective thanks to the MODE-7 and parallax scrolling effects. Thanks to these features, players will experience an awesome Star Fox a like gameplay even though at first it´s pretty hard to get used to it. Most part it´s because visually you´ll think that you´re playing something like Star Fox but to be honest I think that´s something more like a vertical scroll shooter. There are also some side scrolling stages, this stages play more like R-type and they´re freakin awesome!

Another very distinct mechanics is the way that the player acquire new weapons. Instead of gain more advanced weapons via power-ups during stages, players earns weapons as they advance through game. Axelay also feature three weapon types that are selected before the level starts. Players can switch freely between this three weapons during stages.

You may have a powerful firepower however Axelay is a one hit kill space shooter so you´ll need it in order to survive to this hard to beat game. Axelay feature 6 stages with lots of enemies and bosses.

Graphics are awesome, with heavily detailed enemies and environments, the Axelay fighter looks great and has cool design.  Soundtrack is awesome, and was composed by Taro Kudou, I always get myself hearing Axelay tunes.

This one is my favorite:

That´s all about Axelay an awesome shoot ’em up that sadly was forgotten…

Forgotten Old Games – Clock Tower

Hello and welcome to another FORGOTTEN OLD GAME.
When I ask you about an old survival horror game, which one comes in mind? Resident Evil? Silent Hill?
Well the one I’m bringing you today can be considered the predecessor to both series! We’re talking about Clock Tower for the Nintendo Snes.

Developed by Human Entertainment, Clock Tower made was released in 1995 only in Japan, as an action/adventure game with an horror storyline. As most Nintendo games from the time, you won’t see any blood spilling, but even without blood this little bastard was pretty successful in leaving you frightened.

Clock Tower tells the tale of a girl named Jennifer, an orphan that along some others has been adopted and now is heading to their new home, a huge weird looking house with a Clock Tower in the middle of the woods. After a small cutscene, you find that the other orphans have gone missing, and you are completely alone. Maybe they’re playing hide-and-seek you think… but when you decide to explore the house you start to uncover it’s hideous secrets…

Yeah..sure...

The graphics are good, lots of dark places. There’s not a great variety of scenarios, but since most of the game events happens inside the mansion it’s ok.

Even though most of the game is played in silence, the soundtrack (when present) blends perfectly to the game helping to create the dark and eerie atmosphere, specially when you’re being chased by something. The same could be said about the sound effects, they’re great! As for the gameplay… well…it’s really, really slow. It resembles those old point-and-click adventures for PC, where you had to click where you wanted to move your character or at the objects you wanted to interact, but Jennifer doesn’t seem to move like her life is at a stake, even when she’s running. But I don’t think it’s that bad, because it adds to the experience, since you have no weapons. When being pursued, if you try to walk Jennifer will run, and she can even trip while doing so, making things more tense. When in danger, Jennifer’s portrait flashes red and blue, you must tap B button in order to avoid dying.

The basic controls are:
D-Pad – Moves cursor around the screen.
Y Button – Makes Jennifer walk in the direction of the cursor/area. Double-tap to run.
X Button – Stops Jennifer.
A Button – Opens Inventory.
B Button – When in danger, tap furiously to escape.
L button – Runs left.
R Button – Runs right.

For the sake of GOD! RUN!!!

The game features 9 different endings, depending on what you accomplish. Unfortunately as I said, the game is only available in Japanese, but you probably can find a translated version or IPS if you really want to have a look at it. And if you really like the survival horror genre, I strongly recommend you to do so!

$80 bucks Super Nintendo Portable

Not a big fan of Nintendo new gadgets and portables neither willing to wait for Sony Vita? Hungry for something that you used to feel while playing that nowadays games fail to deliver but don’t have so much time to spent in front of a TV or emulator? None of the above, but still thinks Zelda: A Link to the Past is the best Zelda game ever?

Worry not, my friend, because Hyperkin has just solved your problems. Which, by the way, you didn’t even knew you had before reading this. Remember the guy who transformed a full N64 into a portable system? Well, Hyperkin just did this for you. With the Super Nintendo. Yeap, I’m not joking. Yes, you can order it now. And no, I don’t know if its compatible with those tricky-dicky cartridges.

But who cares? Shut up and take my money, Christmas style!

[Spoted by Jordan Devore @ Destructoid]