Platformation Time Again #8: Yoshi’s Story N64

HISTORY

While nowadays the Yoshi Island subseries has mixed reception, the original sequel to Super Mario World was indeed (and still is) a classic, peculiar spin-off of the Mario formula, and Yoshi Story was the first follow up/sequel of sort to reiterate on the formula, developed by pretty much all the original team for the original Yoshi’s Island, minus Shigeru Miyamoto, here just supervisor instead of producer or director, that here being Hideki Konno, whose portfolio already included the original Yoshi’s Island and Super Mario Kart.

This one doesn’t have much in terms of production history or weird tidbits about its inception.

It was originally just called Yoshi Island 64 and meant for the ill-fated Japan only N64DD peripheral, the game – like many others – was moved from the floppy drive format to cartridge, and when revealed it was meant to also “flex” the 3D capabilities of the N64 alongside its 2D craft, which was peculiar of a stance to take when 3D was the new fangled tech and the industry was more than happy to join on the bandwagon of immediatly shaming the previous tech as obsolete junk in favour of “the future”, regardless the fact that in this case 3D turned out to be the future.

Also yes, you might remember this one in how Nintendo made the soundtrack available on a CD shaped like Yoshi’s face, similar to the one for Diddy Kong Racing.

While i possess a copy of its Virtual Console rerelease back on the Wii, i have used the version included in the N64 Nintendo Classics catalogue for Switch and Switch 2 (which requires to also have the Expansion Pak tier subscription), and yes, it was also available on the chinese N64-based IQue Player.

Continua a leggere

Super Mario Adventures [MANGA REVIEW] | Peach Power

Since i’ve run out of older Mario films to review, time to look at some of the manga about the plumbering bros and its magical mushroom world of pipes and princesses.

At least one of the mangas, as we’ll do Super Mario-Kun some other times.

Thankfully italian publisher JPOP did collect all of the more known Mario manga series, simply called Super Mario Adventures, all in one volume, at least for the italian release, the american one is handled by VIZ Media, so you’ll have to check availability for your region or whatever.

Story is by Kentaro Takekuma, mostly known for this and Even A Monkey Can Draw Manga/Saruman series that parodies instructional works about making manga and the industry as well, and received itself a sequel series, Saruman 2.0, back in 2007.

Art is by Charlie Nozawa, whom surprisingly isn’t credited to anything else… at least under that name, a pseudonym for Tamakichi Sakura, whom worked as a character designer for some old Enix games like Dungeon Land and other titles like Pikiinia!, the Sansara Naga series and Tower Dream, all that never left Japan, but he also has other works as a manga artist, as he’s behind Shiawase No Kaitachi (Figures Of Happiness) and Oyaji No Wakusei (Planet Of The Father).

Continua a leggere

Here Comes The (Virtual) Boy Again

So because i’m a major league doofus, i actually preorder not the 20 bucks cardboard VR thingie to play the Virtual Boy on Switch/Switch 2, but the entire fuckin replica that costed me 80 bucks, because ultimately i’m a kindred soul to the protagonist of Shangri-La Frontier, we go hunting high and low for the kusoge, for the odd, for the grime undesired depths of the videogame scene.

Of course i’ve heard of the Virtual Boy, i’ve seen the AVGN episode, i’ve seen Nintendo itself take potshots at its failure too eventually in stuff like Tomodachi Life, but i was still curious, and there were some games i wanted to play on it proper, especially since this oddity never came out in Europe, so

I’ve played modern VR games occasionally at some arcades, so i was super curious to see for myself how the Virtual Boy measured up today via a big ass replica of the console itself, even if can’t load any games by itself and it’s an accessory needed to play via Switch or Switch 2, but sure as hell that beats me bothering to collect the original console and its library, i have to draw the line somewhere.

Gotta say, i was kinda impressed.

Kinda.

Continua a leggere

Platformation Time Again #7: Wario World NGC/SWITCH2

For context: i played and completed the original release on Gamecube, previously reviewed it (more than once), but i recently played it from scratch and finished it again via the Gamecube Classics app on Switch 2, so this review is technically a rewrite, but it’s de facto new, almost completely done from scratch and rewritten/improved/revised to reflect my opinions on the game after re-revalution.

HISTORY

Wario needs no introduction, having been Mario’s Nemesis since its debut on Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins, and having not only its own peculiar platforming series, but in 2003 it also branched off into a new genre, with the peculiar mini-games compilation of the Wario Ware series, which had just debutted some months prior.

Wario World was also a peculiar case since it was not only the first 3D outing for a series that had been 2D platformers or puzzle games of sorts (including the Super Famicom exclusive Mario & Wario, and his reskin of Bomberman games, Wario Blast), but was also not developed by one of Nintendo’s internal development teams.

It was actually handled by Treasure, a beloved software house known for classics like Gunstar Heroes, Radiant Silvergun, Guardian Heroes, Ikaruga, after their collaboration with Nintendo on Sin & Punishment proved successful, that lead Nintendo R & D 1 wanting to do so again, but this time on a 3D iteration of the Wario series/franchise.

Who would turn down to opportunity to work on a 3D “Mario” game with Nintendo’s blessing, after all?

Definitely not 2000s’ Treasure, which was in a kind of identity crisis, coming off of both Sylpheed The Lost Planet and Stretch Panic/Freak Out/Hippa Linda not being well received (nor selling well either) and them basically having to take on more and more licensed tie-in work, for anything from Tiny Toons to anime series both well known (like the Bleach DS titles and the excellent Astro Boy: Omega Factor) or obscure, like a shonen series called Dragon Driver.

Continua a leggere

Iced (1989) [REVIEW] | Ski Slash

Last year’s review of the original Until Dawn on PS4 did left me with a peckish for icy, wintery slasher flicks, i did mention this in the review itself, so instead of The Chill Factor, we’re doing Iced, a forgotten slasher that i’m surprised doesn’t have an Arrow Video rerelease.

That’s because Vinegar Syndrome did release this one on Blu Ray (via their sub-label Degausser Video) last January, though i wouldn’t mind an import friendlier option later down the line.

Iced definitely doesn’t wanna reinvent the “slasher wheel”, as its premise it’s indeed pretty typical.

A group of friends are mysteriously invited to a ski resort, only to be systematically stalked and killed by a masked serial killer.

I’m sure this has nothing to do with how one of their friends, Jeff, died 4 years ago in a nightime skiing accident after being dumped by his fiancèe.

Continua a leggere

12 Days Of Dino Dicember # 60: Grunt! (1983)

Back in the mid 60 and 70s cavemen films had come back, going initially for an adventure feel, alongside other dinosaur or prehistoric themed films (most already covered here), but it became clear soon that what made One Million Years B. C. a success wasn’t the stopmotion dinosaur effects by Ray Harryhausen, but Rachel Welch in cavegirl garments, and hence these film began more focusing on the cave girls and the “historical” excuse for pseudo-nudity.

In Italy we had a tradition of sexy comedies budding in the late 60s, so in the 70s some filmakers hopped onto the bandwagon and made sexy cavemen comedies like When Women Had Tails, while others latched unto the more extreme trend of the cannibal films.

It was a fad, in the grand scheme of things, but the genre survived into the early ’80s with stuff like the alredy reviewed Caveman, the one with Ringo Starr, which i assume was the catalyst for director Andy Luotto to try his hand at a caveman slapstick comedy, with Grunt!, indeed one of the more apt titles ever for a caveman comedy, sporting the tagline “La Clava E’ Uguale Per Tutti” (lit. “The Club Is Equal For All”), also used as a subtitle for the kinda modern DVD rerelease it got and which i’m using for review.

You can find the entire movie on Youtube, but you might need to find some subs unless you understand italian, as yes, it’s a dialogue-less film…. BUT there’s also a voice over narration by the director, Andy Luotto (also in the film as the caveman that looks like a Squawkabilly) talking bollocks that intervenes here and there.

Then again, it’s not like it makes the thing have more sense (it’s mostly bollocks, including random homophobic shit and shit tier cabaret jokes), but maybe there are some german dubs around, or maybe french, as far as i know there are no official english dubs for the film.

Which makes sense since there’s just so little voiceover to dub, and no spoken dialogue per sé.

Continua a leggere

Platformation Time Again #6: New Joe & Mac: Caveman Ninja PS4

HISTORY

Fiction has more or less cemented the general vision of the prehistoric past as “caveman and dinosaurs” for entertaiment media as a whole, despite the fact our unshaven ancestors did not live at the same times as the dinosaurs, there’s no hunting down brachiosauruses when the things had gone extinct 65 millions years ago, or writing middling yet kinda charming newspaper comic strips (the fabled “western 4-koma”) that can change that.

But it was not reality; it was the 90s.

Indiana Jones discovered ancient shit every so often, and Jurassic Park ignited the dino craze… no, the dino mania, got the fever for these ancient creatures sky high, and Data East, a company mostly dealing in pinball machines but also occasionally videogames, was more than happy to oblige and carpe the dino diem quick and hot, by releasing Joe & Mac: Tatakae Genshijin (the original japanese subtitle translating roughly “Caveman Fight”), better known worldwive as Joe & Mac: Caveman Ninja or simply Caveman Ninja.

The “Ninja” in the title is there because the 80s craze with the japanese born assassins still made for attractive videogame marketing, as fun and crazy as it would have been to have a game subtitled “Caveman Ninja” to actually have caveman ninjas…it’s just marketing.

But boy it worked, as Joe & Mac proved to be a smash hit for Data East, a very big hit (so big you couldn’t avoid it going into arcades even in my country as well), so much that many ports followed for basically every system of the era, including the NES (which was quite old back then) and many home computers, not the usual for a Data East game, so much it cameoed in Tumblepop, had a spin-off in the vein of Tumblepop itself, Joe & Mac Returns and eventually spawned sequels.

For reasons i will explain later, this also – if indirectly – counts as a review of the original Joe & Mac: Caveman Ninja game that released in arcades and today can be found as a Switch download, part of the Johnny Turbo branded series of releases…. Well, could.

Continua a leggere

Platformation Time Again: The “WAH” Heard All Around The World & Ubisoft Oldies

the Nintendo back catalogue offerings have been very little and mostly minor, so i was surprised to see all of sudden some old Ubisoft titles surface as part of the N64 Classics app, Rayman 2 not so much, but i did not expect at all to see a rerelease of Tonic Trouble, a mostly forgotten Ubisoft platformer-puzzler of that era that can be seen as a sister game to Rayman 2, which in return has been re-released to hell and back, and one whose N64 version isn’t exactly the most praised or definitive, but it’s good to have that too, since the two games kinda go together, in a way, and will be available on the service (which does require having the Expansion Pak tier of NSO subscription) on Dicember 17th, so very soon indeed.

Also, this happening a mere month after i bought an used copy of Tonic Trouble on the N64 is definitely a timing of all time, but what can you do?

I could take this as a sign of sorts, but the full lenght review for that on the rubric will have to wait at least until May.

Even more surprising, is the Gamecube Classics for Switch 2 adding off Wario World, the only 3D platformer outing for the “evil Mario” himself still, one i had mixed feelings about but personally felt it needed a follow up of sorts, a second chance since it’s not exactly a great game, even when it came out the Gamecube had way better platformers to offer, but i do have a fondness for it.

I did actually review that at detail before, but i’m gonna play it from scratch on the Switch 2 Gamecube app to see if i changed my mind about it or not, so expect that kinda extended rewrite somewhere early 2026.

Ghost Pilots (Arcade Classics Archives Neo Geo) NSWITCHDDL [REVIEW] | My Very Own 194X

I love the Neo Geo, as in, i was a wee child that did always light up when the arcade cabinets started up with that logo and name, letting me know i was in for a good time.

I never owned a Neo Geo cabinet or one of their home consoles, so aside from the odd port on PS1 or PS2 collections, for me Neo Geo was something you went to the arcades, which already tells you how ancient (in prospective) i am, given how that market/scene ended up in the following decades.

That said, i’m glad i never encounted a Ghost Pilots machine, and to be honest i never even heard of this one until i found it and bought its Arcade Classics Archives release on the Nintendo eshop.

As to why, it’s because its one of those early releases for the Neo Geo based hardware that are better forgotten, left in their own little burrow in the ground, their own little cubicle in videogame history.

Continua a leggere

Platformation Time Again #5: Yooka Laylee PS4

HISTORY

I’ve played Banjo Kazooie to completition. Twice.

Both on the N64 and the XBLA release pre-Rare Replay.

I’m prefacing this because i definitely fit the profile, i am the target demographic for retro plaftormers like Yooka Laylee, as i love the original Banjo Kazooie, like its sequel and even enjoyed that oversprawling excess that is Donkey Kong 64, and i love 3D collecthathon platformers from the early days of PS and Nintendo 64, especially if made by Rareware/Rare.

Heck, i love them so much i made this rubric. Twice.

When it was announced on Kickstarter, i was excited at the idea of a spiritual sequel to Banjo Kazooie, made by a team of ex-Rare employees, and they also got Grant Kirkhope back for the soundtrack. But i didn’t back it because the idea of Kickstarter and crowdfunding was still new to me, so i just waited for the game to come out.

Which eventually did, to mixed reception.

In hindsight, Yooka Laylee does deserve a spotlight and a place in the history of platforming games, but not for the reasons Playtonic might have liked.

To give some of the younger readers context, back then we were excited because Kickstarter projects would swoop in and serve a specific “niche” of games the big companies simply didn’t made anymore, as in they were chasing the more modern gaming trends of their time.

One of these “underserved niches” was definitely collecthaton platformer in the style of the late 90s and of the 3D kind, as 2D style retro platformer were already starting to get made for the audience that craved them, and aside from Nintendo franchises, 3D platformers as a whole were old hat, left behind by most of the industry as it hurled ever more into F2P monetization and “services”.

Continua a leggere