10/23/2008 - Batman & Robin Cursing

In the realm of comics, I prefer Marvel over DC, but back in the early-80's, I did enjoy watching the Super-Friends. After all, how could you go wrong with all the superheroes in one show? Marvel did have Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends, and although I really loved the show, I always felt that Firestar and Iceman were sort of thrown in just to form a superhero team. DC had all the heavyweights in the Super-Friends cartoons: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman were almost always present. They'd bring in the second tier as well: Flash, Green Lantern, Robin, and others.

Looking back at it now, the show really didn't have much depth... especially in the early years. Aside from their powers, you couldn't really tell the heroes apart. They all pretty much had the same personality. There was no conflict between the characters, and it was always clear that the bad guys were doing evil and the heroes had to stop them. Even though the comics at the time had more weight and appealed to an older audience, the Saturday morning cartoons were really geared toward kids. Contrast that to the recent Justice League commercials and you'll see a world of difference. Batman actually has a rock of Kryptonite to use against Superman in case he ever went rogue!

One can only enjoy the old Super-Friends cartoons with a nostalgic eye... or you could laugh at how simplistic and light it was. Especially if you dub in bleep sounds like in this video:

10/18/2008 - Mega Man 9 Death Gameplay

When I first heard that Capcom was making a Mega Man 9 game based in the old 8-bit style, I thought it was some kind of April Fool's joke. But when it turned out to be real, I couldn't contain my joy. My favorite 8-bit game happens to be Mega Man 2 for the NES... it was a simple platforming sidescroller whose greatest innovation was taken from the original Mega Man: your character would gain the weapon of the enemy boss you defeat. That weapon would help you in clearing other levels and defeating other bosses. As I've said before, Mega Man 2 perfected the design with its colorful and creative environments, refined control, and the best video game soundtrack of all time (in my opinion).

Mega Man would have 5 sequels on the NES that relied on the same basic design, and 2 sequels on other systems. There were a myriad of spin-offs, however, each straying away more and more from the original (I still don't know what Battle Network is all about). The original Mega Man would have a remake on the PSP with 3-D graphics, and while it was a nice nostalgic tribute, something didn't seem right about it. Capcom was definitely on the right track, however... and old school gamers like me really rejoiced when Mega Man 9 came out last month.

Mega Man really belongs in the 8-bit world. The graphics, the sound... nothing was enhanced in Mega Man 9 and it's just as well. Everything was made in the same way, even the difficulty. Now, a lot of current-generation gamers may say Mega Man 9 is a hard game, and some of them may get too frustrated with it and not finish the game. I say they are spoiled by the current games that have multiple difficulty settings and mid-level save points. Mega Man 9 is undoubtedly difficult and will require you to go through stages multiple times, dying a lot in the process. But that's what old-school gaming is all about. Because the control scheme is so simple (move, jump, shoot), the way to make it difficult is to test your reflexes, your memory, and your patience. Except for one part of the game which I think has the hardest jump in any Mega Man game (Jewel Man stage, you'll know it well), no death is ever cheap, and most of the time it's your fault. When you first start the game, however, you wll see this a lot:

9/14/2007 - Soundwave: The Touch

Rated R for using the F-Word (yeah, only three times, but that would have made Die Hard 4 a Rated R movie too)

Despite being a GREAT popcorn movie, Transformers lacked a little something that would have made it a classic. For me, I guess that it did not have enough nostalgia factor. Having Peter Cullen back as Optimus Prime was nice, but we only heard the classic transforming sound once (I thought that we should hear it every time Prime transforms). One thing they should have really done is bring back an old favorite of everybody's: Soundwave. So what if they don't make cassette player boomboxes anymore? They turned Frenzy in a CD player even though CD's are almost out of fashion these days.

Soundwave was great as Megatron's right-hand man... some would say their relationship went further than that. But the coolest thing about Soundwave was his voice. While every Transformer voice actor spoke through some kind of synthesizer to sound robotic, Soundwave sounded the most robotic. You'd recognize it instantly upon hearing it. Yeah, he couldn't do much in the action arena, but that's why he had his little henchmen cassettes.

His omission in the movie did not go unnoticed by fans, though. Here's a hilarious skit of what happened after Soundwave got rejected by Michael Bay, Inc.



Oh, and one more thing... WHY DIDN'T THEY INCLUDE THE SONG "THE TOUCH"??? Now that would have put the DVD into the "must buy" column for me. So it's a bit cheesy, but they could have at least made Bumblebee play it on the radio for like two seconds...

9/9/2007 - Line Rider Super Mario Bros. 1-1

If you've never played with Line Rider, it's worth at least a try. It's a simple Flash "game" where you draw an slope for the "Line Rider" penguin to travel in its sled. You can draw the slope in any manner you wish... you can include loops, gaps to jump over, obstacles, etc. It all pretty much follows the physics of gravity and friction, so it looks fairly realistic in motion.

There are plenty of Line Rider videos on YouTube, as you can imagine, some with insane stunts and courses for the penguin to navigate. Today's video, however, puts the penguin in some familiar territory: the first level of Super Mario Bros! I don't know how the artist managed to achieve this, but for nostalgia purposes, this is the best Line Rider vid.

6/1/2007 - Double Dragon 2 - FLASH Parody

The first sequels in long running franchises all have some unique quality that make them supremely awesome, or make them the black sheep in the family. Examples of the latter are Zelda II: The Adventure of Link and Castlevania II: Simon's Quest. They may have their fans, but I'm sure very few would classify them as the best games in their respective series. More often or not, though, the second game of a series is the gem that people will continue playing and become a classic.

The best example on record would have to be Mega Man II. For me, that game just had the right amount of difficulty for someone to pick up and play over and over and have a satisfying experience each time. What made the first game unique was, of course, the ability to make each boss' weapon your own after you defeat them, and that certain bosses were weak against certain weapons. The problem was that you didn't have a save or password feature... you would have to play through an entire game to figure out what the best sequence was. With Mega Man II's password feature, you could carefully map out the stage order and backtrack if necessary to perfect your overall sequence. Also, the game just had this magical quality to it that no other Mega Man game has, and it had the best soundtrack of any 8-bit game out there.

"Part II"-fighting games also belong in the awesome list. Everybody knows what a quantum leap Street Fighter II is over the original, and the same goes for Mortal Kombat II. Like Mega Man II, I would have to say that Mortal Kombat II is the best Mortal Kombat of the series. I think even the creators of the series would agree since they made the entire Shaolin Monks game based on the storyline and universe of Mortal Kombat II. The characters in that game just seem so much more iconic, and it didn't have the overkill complexity the later games had.

That brings us to Double Dragon 2 for the NES. The original Double Dragon for the NES was a rather unique port of the very popular arcade game. It tacked on an experience-building system so that the more enemies you beat, the higher the experience you have, and fighting moves would be unlocked. To me it seemed unnecessary, but I guess the developers thought the game would be too easy if you had all the moves from the beginning. That didn't really make sense though, because the original arcade game didn't have this experience-building system and it was still a quarter muncher. What was really bad about the first NES game, though, was the lack of a two-player mode for the main game! I mean, it's called Double Dragon! One of the pioneering innovations of the arcade game was the ability to play cooperatively in a beat-em-up fashion. To take that away for the NES port was a letdown to say the least. Thank goodness they fixed that for Double Dragon 2.

I think the only true way to enjoy Double Dragon 2 for the NES is to play with a buddy. It's not that there are any fighting moves that you can cooperatively pull off in the game, or that there is some huge advantage to having an extra player (to the contrary, some parts are actually easier if there's only one player on the screen). No, it's just the experience that you have collectively in this game. Like Mega Man II, the controls are tighter, the music is better, the graphics are more vivid... and it had the same magical quality that I can't explain. Maybe this animated tribute can explain it better than I can:



Now that's some great sprite manipulation! It's also a great trip down memory lane for whoever played this classic with a buddy. Interestingly enough, some of the coop moves you see in this movie did make it to Double Dragon 3 for the NES, but that didn't save it from it's mediocrity. The Angry Video Game Nerd says all there is to say in his review.

5/1/2007 - 30 minutes of 80's cartoon Openings

Man, what happened to morning and afternoon cartoons? What does a kid watch nowadays? The Today Show? Dr. Phil? You have to have the Cartoon Network to be able to watch any cartoons at all. I really don't have an explanation for this. I mean, kids have spending power... just ask my parents. :)

When I grew up in the 80's there were all these cool cartoons that captured my imagination and sparked playground conversations (there weren't any watercoolers yet). They may have been shameless in their advertising purposes, but hey, that's capitalism and it worked! We bought the action figures and playsets to recreate scenes we saw in the cartoons. Now action figures are more for collectors, never to be opened from the box. It's really sad.

Well, it's nostalgia time, and here is half an hour's worth of 80's cartoon openings. All the great ones are here... Transformers, G.I. Joe, He-Man. I just wish they included Robotech. Hmmm... none of them have aged particularly well, with the possible exception of Beetlejuice. Must be that Tim Burton post-modern design thing...