The 1988 NES version of Gauntlet was developed and published by Tengen, and – surprisingly – it doesn’t feature the levels from the arcade original, but does its own thing instead.
Tag Archives: Chris Downend
Marble Madness II, Arcade
***CANNED GAME***
Marble Madness II is the unreleased sequel to the classic Marble Madness. It was developed in 1991 by Atari Games and underwent market testing in a variety of locations, but these were deemed a failure so the game was cancelled and never released.
Marble Madness, FM Towns
The FM Towns version of Marble Madness is pretty damn special. Not only does it have a unique symphonic rendition of the game’s famous soundtrack, but it also has a Time Trial mode, and you can also choose the colour of your marble! It was only ever released in Japan, and – like the excellent X68000 version – it was ported by Tengen and published by Home Data Corporation in 1991.
Marble Madness, Megadrive
The Japanese Megadrive release of Marble Madness is completely different to the North American and European release of the game and was developed and published by Tengen in 1993. It is far superior to the Western Megadrive/Genesis release and is more authentic to the arcade original. In fact: it is very, very close to the arcade game, in terms of graphics, sound and gameplay. If you didn’t know that the Japanese version of the game was different, I’d recommend checking it out as it may shock you to find out how good it is…
Hydra, Arcade
Hydra is a relatively obscure arcade action game featuring an armed powerboat that is chasing wanted criminals along twisting waterways in order to intercept and recover various stolen artefacts from them.
Marble Madness, X68000
The Sharp X68000 version of Atari‘s classic Marble Madness is pretty much arcade perfect – barring, of course, the trackball controls of the original arcade game. In fact: if you compare the graphics to the arcade game you might notice that they’re crisper and slightly higher resolution.
Skull & Crossbones, Arcade
I hadn’t seen this 1989 arcade game from Atari Games before, until I played it recently, and even then I found it on the Commodore 64 first, then realised that it was an arcade conversion.
Skull & Crossbones has all the ingredients of a classic arcade action game, but – having played it extensively now – I can see why it failed…
Rampart, Arcade
Atari Games‘ 1990 arcade game Rampart is a strange but compelling single-screen castle-building action game, with artillery-based shooting sections.
Marble Madness, Arcade
Atari’s 1984 arcade hit was a very early proponent of isometric (meaning: “equal measure“) graphics, with a viewpoint that takes an overhead, three-quarter perspective of the gameplay area, and as a result was a huge influence on many games that followed it.
The King of Grabs 