Tag Archives: Japanese

Mr. Do!, Arcade

Universal‘s 1982 arcade game Mr. Do! is an iconic, early digging game, with chasing monsters and falling apples, and plenty of cute, Japanese surrealism.

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The Kung-Fu Master Jackie Chan, Arcade

This 1995 arcade beat ’em up from Kaneko is an obscure Mortal Kombat clone, with digitised pictures of Jackie Chan and his stunt team playing a set of fairly weird fighting characters.

“But is it any good?” you ask. “Not bad,” is my reply.

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Prince of Persia, Sega CD

Another Japanese conversion of Prince of Persia; this one done by Bits Laboratory for Brøderbund and released for the Sega CD in 1992.

Graphically and sonically it has been ‘enhanced’ to take advantage of the Sega’s CD‘s capabilities, but thankfully the developers resisted the temptation to fill the game with loads of Full Motion Video, which was prevalent on the format at the time.

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Prince of Persia, TurboGrafx-16

Another fantastic conversion of Prince of Persia – this one for the PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16. It was a CD-ROM only release, so took advantage of Red Book audio streamed directly from the disc, and as a result: the music in the game is quite amazing and really adds to the atmosphere of the game.

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Prince of Persia, X68000

Considering the graphical power of the Sharp X68000 this 1991 conversion of the classic Prince of Persia looks a little underwhelming.

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Spy Hunter, NES

The 1987 Nintendo Entertainment System conversion of Spy Hunter was handled by Sunsoft and is an excellent addition to the Spy Hunter family.

In some respects this is better than the arcade original, because it’s not quite so mind-bendingly difficult…

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Super Cobra, MSX

Konami themselves converted Super Cobra to the MSX, which is surprising because it’s missing the infamous ‘colour cycling’ of the arcade original (and all the other conversions). MSX Super Cobra stays distinctly green. And I have to wonder if that is an oversight, or a bug.

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Raiden, Arcade

A 1990 release into arcades by Tecmo of Japan, Raiden is an action-packed shoot ’em up with a vertical screen and impressive 2D graphics.

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The NewZealand Story, Arcade

Taito‘s 1988 arcade release, The NewZealand Story, is a super-cute platform game featuring a kiwi called Tiki, who is on a rescue mission to save his friends who have been kidnapped by a Leopard Seal. Tiki can jump and shoot arrows from his bow (as kiwis do), as well as commandeer various different floating or flying vehicles to get around in.

The NewZealand Story was an instant hit with gamers and is still much loved today.

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