Populous (Amiga)

Developer:

Bullfrog

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

It's been on a few

---

This week on Super Adventures, I'm playing the legendary god game genre pioneer Populous, by equally legendary developers Bullfrog!

It's one of Bullfrog's earliest games, only the third one they made, which you can tell from that old school frog logo in the bottom left. I don't remember ever seeing that before, but I've played this game so I must have. Unless it was Powermonger that I played... they're pretty similar looking and it's been a while.

One thing I'm sure about is that whatever it is I played, I couldn't figure out how to play it and I turned it off after 10 minutes of frustration. I guess I was too busy not seeing the cute little frog logo that I didn't notice that big 'Tutorial' button over on the right either. This time though things are going to be very different! I'm going to stick with it for at least 20 minutes before giving up in frustration.

Populous started out as an Amiga game and I've always assumed it didn't stray much further, as it seems like the kind of game that would be considered too mouse driven and weird to make it onto consoles. But nope, Populous was ported to absolutely bloody everything. Well, the Acorn Archimedes, Apple Mac, Atari ST, FM Towns, PC-98, MS-DOS PC, IBM PCjr, Sharp X68000, Master System, Mega Drive, SNES, Turbografx-16, Nintendo DS and Game Boy anyway. Makes me wonder what the NES did to be left out.

Just listing all those systems took long enough so please don't expect screenshots of each of them. Or screenshots showing off any actual gameplay either. I can promise you only a title screen and shots of all my little dudes getting wiped out for reasons I can't even comprehend.

Psycho Fox (Master System)

Developer:

Vic Tokai

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

Master System

---

This week on Super Adventures I'm not even going to acknowledge the fact that I didn't post a new game last week. I'm just going to act as if I wasn't too busy/lazy to give you your weekly screenshots and move right on to talking about whatever this is.

Psycho Fox is basically what you get if you put Metal Gear Solid characters Psycho Mantis and Gray Fox into one of those teleporter pods from The Fly. But it's also a platformer released for the Master System during Sega's Alex Kidd era by Vic Tokai, creators of Clash at Demonhead and Magical Hat no Buttobi Tabo! Daibōken (aka. that DecapAttack game I played in 2011). In fact Wikipedia claims that DecapAttack is meant to be Psycho Fox's spiritual successor, which means I should have some idea what to expect. But I don't, because it's been six years since I played it.

I've only just turned this game on and already I have so many questions! Why is that monkey sticking a metal rod into Psycho Fox's ear? Is Psycho Fox related to Spy Fox? What's the 'F' supposed to be made out of? Why is the sun so bloody happy? Why magenta? Also this has to be the first time I've seen a fox that looks like he's about ready to fuck up a tiger. I'm getting a real Clockwork Orange vibe from these guys, like it's Psycho Fox and his Droogs.

Alright I'm going to give it an hour or so and see what it's like.

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (MS-DOS)

Developer:

Lucasfilm Games

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

Amiga, Atari ST, CDTV, DOS, FM Towns, Macintosh, Windows

---

This week on Super Adventures, I'm having a quick look at another one of those Lucasfilm/LucasArts adventures. It wasn't really part of my masterplan to play a pair of Sam & Max games in July then follow them up with a pair of Monkey Islands in September, but seeing as that happened I might as well finish the trilogy with a duology of Indiana Joneses. Uh, bit of a spoiler for the next game there, sorry.

The difference this time though is that I've never played this and I've got no idea what it's like. I don't even know if it's considered to be any good. But one thing I do know is that its full title is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure, as Lucasfilm also developed a multi-platform Last Crusade platformer in the same year called The Action Game and they didn't want gamers to get them confused. That's good responsible labelling, I applaud them.

Weirdly another developer called Software Creations went and made a third Last Crusade game a couple of years later, exclusive to the NES. Which means the console got two entirely different Last Crusade action games. Later Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures and LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures would revisit the movie as well. Not a whole lot of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull games out there though, you'll be shocked to learn.

Super Mario Land (GB)

Developer:

Nintendo

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

Game Boy

---

Today on Super Adventures, Mario Marathon Month drags on even longer with Super Mario Land, for the Game Boy! There's our heroic plumber up there on the top of the sign in fact, shaking his fist at the sky and yelling at strangers to get off his Marioland.

This was the fourth Super Mario game in Japan and Europe, but the third to come out in America. It doesn't count as part of the main Super Mario Bros. series though because Luigi hasn't bothered to turn up this time. Can't give it the Bros. label without Mario's bro around.

Though if it was a Bros. game it would've been the first Mario Bros. produced by Gunpei Yokoi since Mario Bros., and the first created without the involvement of Shigeru Miyamoto. It's also the first developed for a proper cartridge-based handheld system, and if you're wondering where you've heard the name Gunpei Yokoi before, it's possible that you remember him as being the designer of the Game Boy itself. Super Mario Land was a launch title for the system and was originally intended to be the first pack-in title until Nintendo was persuaded that Tetris would have more universal appeal... because it's Tetris.

Can't really disagree with that logic, especially as 25 years later I still haven't even really played Super Mario Land yet, but it says that it's "his best adventure yet" on the box, so I'm pretty hyped.

Rick Dangerous (Atari ST)

Rick Dangerous has a reputation for being a total bastard of a game, but is it really so bad? Well I've played it before so I already know that it is, but let's pretend for 10 minutes that I don't know as I take a quick look at Core Design's very first tomb raiding game. Well actually their first game ever, released way back in 1989.

Fantasy World Dizzy (ZX Spectrum)

Once Dizzy used to be a video game star. He was the Sonic the Hedgehog of the ZX Spectrum, the Master Chief of the Commodore 64! But time hasn't been kind to the adventurous egg and at last count there are only 839 people left in the world who would be willing to spend cash on a new Dizzy game. If last year's Dizzy Returns kickstarter is anything to go by anyway. £25,620 raised with a £350,000 goal, ouch.

Still, there's over a dozen games starring the pugilistic ovoid in the world already and I feel like trying one out, so I decided to do some research into which of them is generally considered by fans to be the very finest of the Dizzy series. Then I learned that research is actually really boring, so in the end I just went with the third one: Dizzy III - Fantasy World Dizzy.

MechWarrior (MS-DOS) - Guest Post

BETWEEN THE FALL OF THE ANCIENT STAR LEAGUE AND THE RISE OF THE HEIRS OF STEINER-DAVION THERE LIVED AN AGE OF WAR UNLIKE ANY BEFORE OR SINCE. FIVE GREAT HOUSES STRUGGLED FIERCELY FOR SOLE POSSESSION OF THE INNER SPHERE OF MAN. ACROSS THIS TROUBLED STARSCAPE MARCHED MIGHTY MACHINES OF WAR LIKE TITANS THROUGH A GREAT STORM OF FIRE.

IT WAS A TIME OF HIGH ADVENTURE...

Check out that box! Oh yeah, it's stompin' robots time! (external link)

Dragon Warrior (NES)

Dragon Warrior may not be the first Japanese RPG ever made (not by a long shot), or even the first Japanese console RPG ever made, but it's the one that really set the template for the JRPG genre. Chunsoft grabbed the overhead view overworld adventuring from the Ultima games, the first person turn based battles from Wizardry, and fused them together with a Portopia Serial Murder Case style menu based interface to form a more accessible kind of RPG for a more mainstream audience.

Or so I've heard, I've never actually played the game. So I'm going to shut up, turn it on, and get myself educated about a piece of genuine videogame history.

007 Games Part 3: Licence to Kill, The Spy Who Loved Me

Super AiG's Guide to Every (old) James Bond Game Ever, Volume 3

Aka. "To Kill Who Licenced the Spy Love"

James Bond week, day three. I'm seven years into the first decade of Bond games, and it's starting to become clear that the series was one of the true pioneers of the 'terrible movie tie-in' genre. Maybe GoldenEye actually was the first good Bond game. I kind of hope not as I've still got four days worth of these things to go, starting with...

Millennium 2.2 (Amiga) - Guest Post

Well, here we are. I tried to prepare myself for this with colourful games but that didn't exactly work.

As unanimously requested by the mecha-neko fan club, here's Millennium 2.2. Hope you like words!

This is among the most depressing title screens ever created.

The Earth fades to a dull grey/brown while a truly miserable main theme (YouTube link) plays in the background.

Thanks, Ed.

Xenon 2 - Megablast (Amiga)

Super Adventures in Bitmap Brothers Games - Game 3

I'm just going to sit here and stare at this screen for a couple more minutes. The title screen music is so awesome they actually named the game after it. The Amiga's floppy disk version has a mod version of a song called Megablast, by Bomb the Bass, the CD version has a remix, (youtube links) and they're both great. In my humble opinion.

Electrocop (Lynx)

Half man, half battery, all cop.

Weird Dreams (Amiga) - Guest Post

Hello again!

How are we supposed to know how super weird these dreams are if you don't show us!

Holy Diver (NES)

Apparently this has no official connection with the Dio song, the developers were probably just metal fans. Though this guy does kind of look like the barbarian Dio plays in the music video...

Sadly despite the English title, this never actually got a release outside of Japan.

Shadow of the Beast (Amiga)

As requested/suggested, I'm finally playing Shadow of the Beast. Or just 'Beast' according to the title screen.

This seems to have been released for almost every game system at the time, (except for the SNES and PC surprisingly). But I'll be playing the original Amiga version, seeing as it was an important game for the machine.

Die Hard (MS-DOS)

Super Adventures at Christmas - Game 2:

Long before Die Hard: Nakatomi Plaza there was another attempt to bring the action of the original Die Hard movie to home computers. And it seems they couldn't get the right to use Bruce Willis's likeness for this one either.

Space Ace (MS-DOS)

Great, Space Ace again. I'm not going to make it past the first screen am I?

China Warrior (Turbografx-16)

Hey it's Liu Kang from Mortal Kombat! Uh, I mean Fei Long from Street Fighter! Or maybe that guy from Enter the Dragon...

Hudson Soft gave their PC Engine games volume numbers in Japan, and this is Vol 1 making it one of the very first games ever released for the console.

Airwolf (NES)

I've never seen the tv series so I've got no idea what to expect from this. Except a helicopter obviously.

X-Men (C64)

X-Men: Madness in Murderworld... sounds like a nice place. Oh crap, it's playing clown music. That's never a good sign.

This is the second ever X-Men game, coming after Uncanny X-Men on the NES. And I really hope it's an improvement because Uncanny was pretty bad.