Alcahest is a scrolling, overhead action game – with RPG elements – that was developed by HAL Laboratory and published by Squaresoft in 1993. It was only ever released in Japan, but a fan-made, English translation patch is available to make it fully playable to Western audiences. Which is what I’m showing here.
Tag Archives: 2D graphics
Flat, two-dimensional graphics, usually constructed of pixels. Not three-dimensional.
Dig Dug, Arcade
Dig Dug is a cute arcade digging game from Namco that was a cult hit during the early to mid-1980s. It was first distributed into arcades in 1982 and was much cloned by other game developers, and was also officially ported to many home systems of the time, including for the Atari 2600 and Mattel Intellivision (among many others).
Warlocked, Game Boy Color
Warlocked is a neat handheld Real-Time Strategy (RTS) game, developed by British company Bits Studios and published by Nintendo for the Game Boy Color in 2000. Unfortunately, due to “poor sales”, it was only ever released in North America.
Championship Pool, Megadrive/Genesis
Created by Bitmasters and first published by Mindscape in 1993, Championship Pool is arguably one of the best pool games of all-time. It’s possible to make subtle or hard-hitting strokes, and the aiming system allows for quick, accurate enhancements that encourage ever more confident play.
Gremlins: The Adventure, ZX Spectrum
Gremlins: The Adventure is a text-based adventure, with graphics, based on the successful comedy horror film from 1984. It was first released in 1985 by Adventure International and was programmed by Brian Howarth with artwork by Teoman Irmak.
Snowball Sunday, Commodore 64
Snowball Sunday is a winter/Christmas-themed snowball fight game for the Commodore 64, written by Ashley Routledge and David Saunders. There isn’t much information available about it online, but from what I can tell it was given away free with various Commodore magazines in 1988. It was also freely available for download from Compunet (aka CNet) – an interactive service provider that was accessed via dial-up, that existed from 1984 to 1993.
Jazz Jackrabbit 2: The Christmas Chronicles, PC
Jazz Jackrabbit 2: The Christmas Chronicles is an enhanced version of Holiday Hare ’98 and was developed by Epic [Mega]Games and published by Project Two Interactive in 2000. It apparently only saw a limited release initially, due to the publisher going out of business, but it has since been re-released on GOG.com as part of the Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Collection.
Continue reading Jazz Jackrabbit 2: The Christmas Chronicles, PC
Snowdown, Commodore 64
Snowdown is a one or two-player Christmas-themed action game that was written by Badger Punch Games and first released for the Commodore 64 in 2020.
Merry Christmas From Horace, ZX Spectrum
This 2016 homebrew release for the ZX Spectrum is a tribute/sequel to the classic Hungry Horace, Horace Goes Skiing, and Horace and the Spiders games from Psion, originally developed in the early 1980s by Beam Software. It is a Christmas-themed Horace game written by Steve Broad.
Super Ghouls ‘N Ghosts, Game Boy Advance
The Game Boy Advance version of Super Ghouls ‘N Ghosts is a handheld adaptation of the classic Super Nintendo game from 1991, and it is a brilliant one too. It first came out in 2002 through Capcom.