Five months at Gray-Haired Gamer

20140923_batman_originsDid I really start this in April? It’s funny looking back at some of my earlier stuff. My Batman: Arkham Origins review is so short, and my Persona 4 Golden review seems odd and doesn’t even read like a review.

I think this site is at its best when I’m writing about my past, or talking about the things that have influenced me. It gives me a chance to dive deep into things that mean a lot to me, or the people who have shaped who I have become, whether they are colleagues, friends, or family.

That’s not to say that I don’t like writing reviews or sharing my latest progress through what I’m currently playing. That’s also good, and it gives me an outlet for more structured pieces. For those progress reports specifically, I’ve found that YouTube has been a much better way to share them. It gives me the opportunity to not just show you exactly how I’m playing through these games, but it lets me share the thought process, mistakes, and other impressions of the series they’re based on or influenced by.

This has been highly rewarding and it only seems natural that the next step will be to set up a webcam to literally face the world when I speak. Soon, I promise!

Although my updates on the blog have not been daily as I originally set out to do, I have tried to post something daily across one or more of the other GHG outlets, so if there isn’t content being posted here, I’ll definitely be posting something elsewhere, whether it be YouTube, Twitter, or Google+.

If you follow me elsewhere, you might have seen the music video I put together last week:

I love doing things like this, and even though this video is mainly about the games I loved when I was in my early and late teens, it was also an exercise in synchronizing video to audio, which is a seriously time-consuming process.

I’m guessing there are better tools out there to make this easier, but I just did it all based on the song’s waveform. Anyway, I’m happy with the way it turned out, although I thought of at least a hundred other games I’d love to feature in future videos. I just need to figure out which songs to use.

As you saw last week, my Backlog Blitz progress for 2014 has been pretty solid. A few slips here and there, but I’ve managed to stay ahead up to this point, and I don’t intend on slipping before the new year!

So what’s next? Well, for one, I’m going to get back to my Industry Memoirs series. I’ve still only written up to the end of 1996, so there are many more years to write about. Lots of ups and downs to be certain, but mainly ups.

20140923_sh_sat_loadI’m also going to do some more in-depth videos on games or series that have influenced me. I’ve written about some of them, such as Space Harrier and Phantasy Star, but I’ve been wanting to do accompanying videos for them, which I think will be a lot of fun to produce.

I’ll likely start with Space Harrier, since it’s one of my all-time favorite arcade games, and I can’t wait to show and talk about the various versions I played, its sequels, and how it’s a series I hope Sega properly brings back in the way they did with Out Run 2.

Anyway, thanks for continuing to check out the blog. While I’ve expanded my horizons a bit and have definitely been focusing more on video content lately, I still very much love writing about games, so please look forward to many more updates.

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The NES & Master System: Inevitable Comparisons

Back in May, I talked a little bit about my first exposure to the NES. As someone who didn’t have one, and who was instead gaming on the rival Sega Master System, the NES was not only something I had limited access to, but it was a console I greatly desired. I would try to fool myself into thinking that I didn’t really want one, and that my Master System was better, but absurdity has its limits.

Don’t get me wrong: I loved the Master System. As evidenced by my post about the classic RPG Phantasy Star, it played host to a good number of excellent 8-bit titles. It just couldn’t hold a candle to Nintendo’s marketing, third-party policies, and resulting massive library of games. Even the console-specific print magazines were hilariously mismatched: Nintendo Power was this thick, robust magazine full of features, maps, letters, art, hints, reviews, and cool game advertisements. Meanwhile, Sega Challenge was a tiny, low-budget pamphlet that was maybe 16 pages long. I thought it was cool, but you wouldn’t want to bring it to school. You’d get laughed at, and get laughed at I did.

And so, for the three years that I had my Master System, I quietly enjoyed its games while playing a lot of NES games at my friends’ houses. However, even when I was there playing those games, I’d wind up comparing what I was playing to what I had on the Master System. Usually, what I was seeing on the NES was better.

One that really stands out in my mind is Sega’s Pro Wrestling vs. Nintendo’s Pro Wrestling.

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In screenshots, you could argue that in some ways, the Master System version above looks a little better. It’s more colorful, its gameplay is tag-team style, players have energy meters, and the ring itself has some 3D perspective. However, that’s where its so-called advantages end.

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The NES version, on the other hand, was just a revelation when I first played it. It not only had a really catchy title screen tune, but it was followed by large, beautiful portraits of each of the game’s wrestlers, with stats and other bits of information that made them feel much more human than the generic cast of the Master System game. It was all the little touches that elevated it as well: The ringside commentators, the cameraman filming the action, the fact that you could go outside the ring, the more realistic wrestler animations and interactions, etc. The list goes on and on.

After playing the NES game, I was embarrassed to even show anyone the Master System title! It had its charms with its super-deformed and very Japanese graphics, but it would never appeal to western audiences the way Nintendo’s game would. It truly was a night and day difference, and it remains one of my all-time favorite wrestling games.

Another pair of titles that showed the stark difference between the consoles was Sega’s own arcade conversion of Out Run and little-known (at the time) Square’s Rad Racer.

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Again, upon first glance, the Sega game looks pretty good. The Ferrari Testarossa, the track layouts, and the visuals are a decent approximation of the arcade version, which is still a looker to this day. I remember being quite impressed with the screenshots, and when it finally came out as a 2 megabit (256 KB) cartridge in 1987, I couldn’t wait to play it.

And when I did? Man, was I let down. The graphics were so choppy, and even though I knew it wasn’t going to be as smooth as the arcade due to lack of hardware sprite scaling, it just felt way under-cooked. Most disappointingly, the music barely did the arcade soundtrack justice, which is one of its highlights.

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Released the same year on the NES, Rad Racer is basically an Out Run clone right down to the Ferrari and opening beach setting, but without the branching paths. I tried to write it off in my mind as just a cheap copy until I actually played it. Wow, I was blown away yet again! Rad Racer moves along at a brisk 60 frames-per-second compared to the choppy mess that is Out Run on the Master System.

Roadside obstacles and scenery scroll past your vehicle smoothly, and while the graphics themselves aren’t as detailed as they are in Out Run, the smooth framerate, convincingly undulating roadways, and responsive gameplay give it a polished, high-quality feel.

Rad Racer also one-ups its competition by letting the player change the music station from within the game instead of being stuck with one song the entire time. Additionally, it has on-the-fly anaglyph 3D mode, which lets you use the included blue & red 3D glasses for a gaming experience that was very cool and unique at the time.

Being such a popular game, Space Harrier wasn’t immune to this either, with Square once again “paying homage” to it that same year with their own run & gunner, The 3-D Battles of WorldRunner.

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Although vastly inferior to the arcade original, I loved the Master System version of Space Harrier. For the hardware it’s on, it looks great, has gigantic, screen-filling bosses, bonus content, and good versions of the game’s iconic music.

It’s somewhat choppy, though, and the techniques used to create such large visuals means there are flat, square-like edges around everything, and that detracts from the overall effect.

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By contrast, 3-D WorldRunner is cartoon-like and not very interesting to look at in screenshots, but much like Rad Racer, it’s something entirely different in motion, moving smoothly at a near-constant 60 FPS. It has fun backgrounds like Sega’s own Fantasy Zone, and a similarly lighthearted tone.

While I remember it being criticized for just being a Space Harrier clone, I thought it was unique enough. Sure, it’s set in a very similar world with creatures and obstacles that bear more than a passing resemblance to Sega’s creations, but the run & jump gameplay sets it apart, as does the 3D feature, similar to that found in Rad Racer.

It’s one of those examples where I would say they are as unique as they are alike. I enjoy both games for different reasons, even though one was obviously influenced by the other. As they said in 1996’s Swingers, “Everybody steals from everybody; that’s Hollywood.”

Similarly, we see this — and will continue to see this — all the time in the videogame industry. How many “match three” games are there on Google Play and the Apple App Store? By today’s standards, Space Harrier and 3-D World Runner are very different games.

As an aside, I wish Square would go back and make more games like this again, or at least work with the Japanese developer M2 to make good 3D conversions of them for systems like the Nintendo 3DS.

These are just a few of the many examples of genre and style crossover between the competing consoles. Sega would also bring out games that were déjà vu familiar to what was already on the NES, like Compile’s Golvellius: Valley of Doom. This is what Sega owners got instead of The Legend of Zelda.

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Golvellius had great music, and side and vertically scrolling action sequences replaced the dungeons found in Zelda, but the bulk of the game was spent in a very similar overworld, complete with hidden caves, vague hints, shopkeepers, and other near-homologous design elements.

It’s hard to deny that both of the opening landscapes had quite a lot in common, but as a Master System owner used to a slow trickle of quality games, Golvellius went down as one of my favorites back in 1988.

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The Legend of Zelda would, of course, go on to become one of the most memorable and timeless classics on any console.

Content is king, as they say, and the NES — despite the many stinkers that called it their home — had so many more great games that victory was a foregone conclusion.

Then there were those times where neither game was all that good. Rambo: First Blood Part II (SMS) and Ikari Warriors (NES) come to mind, which were both part of the popular vertically scrolling military shooters at the time.

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Rambo had decent visuals, and the gameplay was rather smooth, but it was slow. Painfully slow.

The thing about both of these games is that they are based on controls that were impossible at home at the time: a joystick that could simultaneously control the on-screen character and independently aim their gun in any of 8 different directions. This meant that at home, whichever way you were facing, that’s where you were firing, making strafing impossible. That was a huge part of Ikari Warriors‘ appeal, and would thankfully be addressed in its follow-up, Victory Road.

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And speaking of Ikari Warriors, what a mess. Choppy, simplistic graphics and a pace that felt even slower and more punishing than Rambo. I played this around the same time as Capcom’s 1942 on the NES and remember thinking, “Man, this console absolutely sucks for arcade ports!”, but as I discussed back in May, Rush’n Attack changed my opinion on that completely.

As the saying goes, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and there were a lot of games that seemed strikingly similar to one another.  It’s interesting to think back on the fact that it was pretty rare for the same game to be on competing consoles, even through the 16-bit era. A few come to mind, like Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat, and Earthworm Jim, but it seemed like the exception, rather than the norm.

Each individual system played host to a slew of exclusives you couldn’t play anywhere else, despite their similarities. It’s a very different landscape today, and while it is apples and oranges to this discussion, it’s not so much about having the exclusive title anymore, but more about who has the exclusive content or lead release window.

I wouldn’t mind a return to the basics. Speaking of which, I think I’ll play a little Rad Racer right now.

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My influences: Space Harrier

20140602_space_harrierI’ll never forget the first time I saw Space Harrier. It was at Disneyland’s Starcade in the mid-’80s. They were fortunate enough to have the deluxe sit-down version, too. The entire cabinet would tilt as you moved the flight stick around, a popular feature in a number of arcade games at the time, like Sega’s own Out Run and After Burner. I never would see that version in any other arcade after that, so looking back, I feel fortunate that I was able to play and experience it. More so than the cabinet, however, was the game itself.

The title screen alone was enough to capture my imagination with its huge spinning logo, one-eyed woolly mammoth, and beautiful-looking mecha. I was a huge Robotech nut as a kid, so how could I resist? I couldn’t. Even the sound the game made when you inserted a quarter or token was cool. That’s a small, but important detail that I really miss from modern gaming.

And then I pressed Start. Oh my goodness, those graphics! It absolutely blew my mind. Hardware sprite scaling wasn’t something we would see in home consoles until the Super Nintendo and Neo Geo in the early ’90s, and it was still a relatively new technology in arcade games. Using Sega’s Super Scaler technology, they took the concept of 3D gaming using 2D sprites to a whole new level. It represented a paradigm shift for me, establishing a very clear graphics capability line between arcade and home consoles, and altering my expectations from then on.

That was one of those moments where I figured playing an arcade-perfect port at home would never be possible. And I would be mostly correct for the better part of the next decade, until 32X and Saturn ports would finally make the impossible possible. It really shows just how advanced Sega’s arcade technology was back then.

However, that didn’t stop me from wanting the home Space Harrier experience ASAP. Back in junior high, several of my friends all generously chipped in and bought me the Sega Master System version for my birthday. I knew there was no way it would be as good as the arcade, but then again, I’m the one who thought Cobra Command was possible on it, so my hopes were still unrealistically high. After containing my excitement, I opened it up and turned it on…

20140602_shI was actually quite impressed with the title screen! It approximated the look of the arcade version, right down to the light glinting off the mecha’s gun, which was always one of my favorite details. It also had a new, majestic-sounding title screen song, which the arcade game lacked. So far, so good.

Then I started playing it, and that’s when disappointment set in. I mean, it wasn’t bad and I still played it endlessly for weeks on end, but when so much of Space Harrier‘s appeal is in its visuals, it’s easy to be let down. When you stop and think about what they achieved, however, on hardware that was never designed to do this, Sega pulled off a small miracle. It might not be as fast or pretty as the arcade original, but it still plays, looks, and sounds good in its own right.

One of the things that made the Master System version stand out was the exclusive final boss, Haya Oh. The first time I got to it, I was so surprised, because I was expecting the lackluster “The End” from the arcade game. In addition to it having an intense and memorable music track, it provided a good challenge and was a nice example of developers adding extras to the home versions. It also had a surprisingly lengthy epilogue hinting at a sequel, so that obviously got my attention. That sequel came in the form of 1988’s Space Harrier 3-D, but I never did play it because I didn’t have the SegaScope 3-D Glasses. I remember wanting them bad — real bad — but I think it was the limited game library for it that never made me ask for them.

As the Sega Genesis’ release date drew near in late-’89, so did that of Space Harrier II. With the Genesis being a 16-bit videogame console, and early signs looking terrific with strong entries like Ghouls’n Ghosts and Thunder Force II, I wondered if this would be the era for my beloved Space Harrier to come home in all its glory. Even though the review of it in EGM was very average, I still wanted to give it the benefit of the doubt.

20140602_sh2_titleOh, how wrong I was. Not only did it have an absolutely awful and generic title screen — seriously, what is that? — but the music was a complete downgrade except for the main theme, which was OK, but hardly came close to the classic original. Most disappointingly, the visuals seemed even choppier than the Master System version. The sprites were nice and big, and the scrolling playfield now shifted perspective, but the objects scaled poorly, and the artwork overall was very generic.

This was not what I was expecting out of Sega’s brand-new console, and it goes down as one of the most disappointing games on the Genesis for me. It would be another 6 years before I would reunite with the series, this time on the infamous Genesis 32X add-on.

20140602_sh_32xDespite its lackluster software lineup and hideous design, I bought a used 32X in late-’95, and it came with the only two games I would ever play on it: Space Harrier and After Burner.

Although the 32X version of Space Harrier suffers from some frame drops when there’s a lot going on, it’s one of the better ports. It controls well, and for all intents and purposes, looks and sounds exactly like the arcade version. I just couldn’t stand the 32X itself, and after only a few weeks with it, I sold it.

As I mentioned earlier, an even better version of Space Harrier would be released shortly thereafter in ’96 for the Sega Saturn under their Sega Ages label, and that’s the one I still have. At long last, what I consider to be an arcade-perfect version of one of my favorite arcade games now exists, looking and playing beautifully at home. I would spend additional money to buy the Saturn Mission Stick for an even closer approximation of the arcade experience. It was glorious, taking me back to that fateful day at Disneyland.

When I think about it, the reasons why Space Harrier was such a big influence on me seem superficial. It first and foremost came down to the graphics. For a game that’s pushing nearly 30 years in age, it still looks fantastic to me. It was really unique at the time to be playing a shooting game where you were flying forward, with enemies and obstacles coming at you at breakneck speeds. It has a terrific sense of style, with bright colors, individual stage names, amazing sound, a wide variety of enemies and bosses, and rewarding twitch gameplay. Successfully navigating one of its accelerated stages is still a tremendous rush.

It might be a one-trick pony, but it does that one trick exceptionally well. Perhaps one day I will own that elusive sit-down cabinet, too.

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