Posted on October 7, 2019
Chase HQ 2 – Sega Mega Drive / Genesis – Let’s Play
Chase HQ 2 on the Sega Mega Drive – I didn’t really know what to expect. I thought that the sequel to Chase HQ was the one where you had a co driver with a gun, and you basically shot at everything that moved on the road – criminals and civilians! It seems not though – maybe that is Special Criminal Investigations, and this is a different game.
Anyway, it’s not a great game – the graphics look almost Master System like, and the speech is truly awful.
Equipment:
- Mega Everdrive X7 cartridge in a modded Euro Megadrive One
- OSSC
- 8BitDo M30 gamepad
Posted on October 7, 2019
Dragon’s Fury – Mega Drive / Genesis – Let’s Play
Dragon’s Fury by Tengen is a 1991/1992 pinball game for the Sega Mega Drive (or Genesis). It is a port of a PC Engine game called Devil’s Crush, and was called Devil Crash in Japan – all in all, the name is rather confusing!
A good fun pinball game with great graphics and a superb soundtrack just like any pinball game needs.
Equipment:
- Mega Everdrive X7 cartridge in a modded Euro Megadrive One
- OSSC
- 8BitDo M30 gamepad
Posted on October 7, 2019
Batman: The Video Game – Gameboy – Let’s Play
Batman: The Video Game was one of the games I got when I bought my Gameboy off my neighbour in around 1990/1991, therefore this game has a lot of nostalgia for me.
It’s a great little shooting platformer with a couple of side scrolling shoot ’em up stages when you get to control the Batwing.
There’s strategy involved in what pickups to collect, as you can upgrade your gun (I like the batarang gun best), but also downgrade it if you’re not too careful. I’ve never completed this game, but can pretty much always get to stage 4-2 which is annoyingly an autoscroller which I just cannot beat! It’s the final stage before the last boss, so I am agonisingly close to completing it, but I just cannot do it!
Equipment:
- Everdrive GB X7 cartridge in a Super Gameboy
- Played on an Analogue Super NT
- 8BitDo SN30 gamepad
Posted on October 7, 2019
Chase HQ | Arcade, 1988, Taito | Full Play-through | Let’s go Mr Driver!
This is a full play-through of the brilliant 1988 arcade game – Chase HQ. A full disclaimer here – I set the difficulty dip switch to “easiest” and also gave myself the full 5 turbos, otherwise you’d just be watching me fail time and time again to get past the 2nd stage!
I love this game, and I remember having it on the ZX Spectrum and the Amiga 500 back in the day, as well as playing it in the arcades whenever we went on holiday near an amusements (the only arcade machine near where I lived was at the local leisure centre, and they never had Chase HQ).
Posted on October 6, 2019
Sensible Golf (1994) | Amiga | Let’s Play | First ever go (it shows!)
Having played a lot of SWOS in the previous week, I thought that I’d give Sensible Golf a play, seeing as I’d never actually played it before in my life.
Sensible Golf was released in 1994 on the Commodore Amiga (it was also ported to Windows) by Sensible Software. Following on from their wildly successful games such as Sensible Soccer and Cannon Fodder, Sensible Golf did not do as well – not getting the critical acclaim or the sales that those aforementioned games did. Amiga Power gave it a paltry 66%.
This golf game isn’t as intuitive as Sensible Soccer (which as soon as you play, you basically know what to do), which is probably due to golf being a trickier game to simulate on a computer. When compared to other golf games around at the time of release like PGA Tour Golf, it just wasn’t as good. Shame, as it looked great in the magazines, and if the mechanics of the game worked better, then it could have been a real belter of a sports sim.
Posted on October 4, 2019
Super Mario Land DX | Colour ROM hack on Gameboy | Let’s Play
This is a ROM hack of Super Mario Land on the Gameboy. The hack adds colour, and other graphical improvements to give it a nice overhaul and make it look a lot better.
I had Super Mario Land back in the early 90s, and loved it. It’s got some really great music – even inspiring a single (Ambassadors of Funk – Super Mario Land) that reached number 8 in the UK charts!
I didn’t get as far as I wanted in this play through – only managing to get to world 3-1 (out of 4 worlds), but with a bit of practice, it should be pretty easy to complete. If I do it, I will upload it. Once you complete the game, it unlocks a ‘hard mode’ which has more monsters and obstacles. If you then complete the hard mode, then you get a level select.
The hack has released on 22nd April 2019, and can be found here:
https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/4477/
Posted on October 4, 2019
Contra III: The Alien Wars | SNES | Japanese 30 lives cheat!
Contra III is a hard game. I certainly never came close to completing it as a kid, and I certainly won’t come close to completing it (with 3 lives) as an adult. Luckily, the Japanese version of the game has infinite continues and a 30 lives cheat!
I suck at this game, I suck at most games, but I seem to suck especially at this one! I complete the game in this video, but I use well over 100 lives! If you’ve come here for a speed run, or a nice walkthrough, you’ve come to the wrong place!
The ROM hack that enables the 30 lives cheat and the unlimited continues that exist in the Japanese version is available here:
https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/3513/
Press DOWN, DOWN+RIGHT, RIGHT and START (so like a hadouken in SF2) on the title screen, you will hear a scream, and then you have 30 lives.
Posted on October 3, 2019
Granny’s Garden (1983) – BBC Micro – Let’s Play – Full Playthrough
This is Granny’s Garden – a edutainment game from 4mation that I remember playing on the BBC Micro in the late 1980s in the primary school. In this video I fully walk through the whole game, resorting to using save states towards the end, as some of it is a bit trial and error, and probably because as a fully grown adult, I am still too thick to be able to solve puzzles aimed at 6-8 year olds.
It has a scary-arse witch in it, that probably scarred and terrified many an 8 year old back in the day – I get captured by her several times in this walk through!
Comment below if you remember playing this game as well! I also remember playing Dinosaur Discovery on the school BBC Micro as well, and I’ve done a video on that as well, so make sure that you check that out!
Available to buy from 4mation:
http://www.4mation.co.uk/cat/granny.html
https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/retro-grannys-garden/id882315229?mt=8
This was played on a Windows 10 machine using the BeebEm emulator.
Posted on October 3, 2019
Dinosaur Discovery (1985) – BBC Micro – 4mation – Let’s Play
Dinosaur Discovery is an educational adventure game in which the player must navigate a map, collect clues and solve simple word puzzles on their journey to hatch a dinosaur egg.
This was played across the UK (at least I think it was – it certainly was in Surrey) in primary schools in the mid to late 1980s. I remember playing it when I would have been around 7 or 8 years old.
Sadly I was unable to complete it on this playthrough as you need to have the physical diary that comes with the game as it has the tide times in there which you have to look up and use for the sailing bit near the end (to get to the Stegosaurus Island). I may try a stream soon with save states to see if I can cheat my way to the end, just so we can see the game finished. If I do this (I can almost guarantee that I will!), I will post it on here.
Loved this as a kid – with this being the mid 80s in the UK, this would have been many children’s first interaction with a computer (I’m not sure if it was mine, as we had a ZX Spectrum 48k around this time). It has lots of puzzles to solve, and useful ways to get the children used to using a computer – something that kids these days certainly don’t need as they will be using computers all the time! Simpler times!
Make sure you let me know in the comments if you remember playing this game, or if you also played the more famous Granny’s Garden which was by the same developer.
This was emulated on a Windows 10 machine using the BeebEm emulator. I do now have the original disks and hope to complete the game soon now I have the tide charts!
Posted on October 3, 2019
Super Tennis | 1991 | SNES | Let’s Play
Super Tennis (スーパーテニス ワールドサーキット Super Tennis World Circuit) is a 1991 tennis video game for the Super NES. It released at early points in the Super Nintendo’s shelf lives and utilized mode 7.
This was one of the first SNES games I ever played – I think it was a launch title in the UK (at least it was a very early title, if not a launch one), and I have fond memories of playing it for hours on end with and against my friends. Easily the best tennis game around when it was released, it still holds up well today.