Welcome to the final installment of Sega Astro City Mini! This will also be a bit longer as I'm going to include my overall impressions of the Mini at the end.
32. Tant-R - Tant-R can best be described as a party game of mini games. The only problem is, it's the Japanese version, so all the instructions before each game are in Japanese. It's pretty easy to understand what to do, though. You select from a scrolling wheel of four games and play games such as picking a flower underneath shuffling hats, solving a maze, picking a matching line up of slot machine symbols, and hitting hiding ninjas with shurikens. There's also cutscenes with what looks like characters from the Bonanza Bros. The game's fun, and I'd like to come back to see more mini games, but I just wish Sega would have translated most of these games in the Mini. It's getting irritating.
33. Virtua Fighter - I can't really fault this game for anything, aside from me thinking it ran smoother. It feels slower from what I remember. Anyway, Virtua Fighter is what started the entire 3D fighting genre. Of course, since I haven't played it in over like 25 years, I couldn't remember any of the moves. I played as my favorite Kage, so I kinda defaulted on his leg sweep to get me through a few rounds. When I had to fight myself, though, that's when I started losing. I got frustrated and turned it off for now, but I definitely plan on coming back to play more. It's so freaking cool to finally own the arcade version of such a classic!
34. Stack Columns - Wow... Sega really loves columns, the third columns game in this collection. Stack Columns is a bit more combative than the other two. Not only do you have trash dumped on you, you can also have your base level raised. Of course, you can do that to the other player as well. There's also an attack function, but I couldn't figure out how to use it because, guess what? It's another Japanese version. There was some kind of setting before I started the game, but because of the text, I didn't understand what I was doing. I beat the first two rounds out of sheer luck, but I actually did enjoy this entry of Columns the most. Maybe if I have a major hankering for Columns, I'll come back and play more.
35. Ichidant-R - Was Tant-R really that popular in Japan that Sega felt the need to put the sequel on this compilation? I didn't have nearly as much patience for this one as I did for the first. Again, it's in Japanese so I can't read any of the instructions. I was really stuck on a frog leap game and couldn't figure out what I was doing. Finally, I got it and was able to move to another mini game where a bunch of batters were hitting balls, and after the round, you had to pick which one hit the most. I could never do it. Imagine paying money for guessing wrong every time! The first mini game that I played was fun, though. You had to shoot down three UFOs before time was up. As the music played, I recognized what the melody was. It was Daytona! The fact that Daytona's not on here has now really pissed me off...
36. Puyo Puyo 2 - As far as I can tell, the sequel plays exactly like the first. There's supposed to be some new feature called Offset, but I can't tell where it is or what it does, thanks to this being yet another Japanese version. There are new characters to battle, but again, all the story text is in Japanese! Anyway, I only played one round and felt that was enough. It was a total waste to include this one in my opinion, so it's safe to say I won't be coming back to this.
37. Dottori Kun - This one is weird. It shows no genre or release date and all the synapsis says is, "The one that's already in there." It's a very simple game where you move a < shaped piece around a Pac-Man like maze clearing dots and avoiding a wandering X. The graphics are very basic and there's no sound or music. I'm really clueless as to why this is on here. So, I looked it up. It actually has an interesting history where you can read about here. Anyway, it's not really a game per se, and didn't hold my interest at all.
So, there we have it. After I finished playing with Dottori Kun, I went ahead and hooked it up to my TV and used my wireless adapter on it to play with my Switch Pro Controller. For starters, it's very cumbersome to hook up. Because the USB ports are on the back, they're also right next to the HDMI port and the adapter's bulk won't allow me to plug in my HDMI cable. I used the dongle included with the adapter to make space for the HDMI cable. When I finally got it up and running, the first game I played again was Virtua Fighter. Almost immediately, I felt the input lag, just like when I was revisiting my old mini consoles with the adapter. Even if I was really good at Virtua Fighter, I would not want to play it in this shape. I also played Sonic Boom, that fighter where I said it was really hard to see the projectiles. Well, it was still a bit hard to see them on the big screen too. I guess they just made them really hard to notice on purpose. The last game I played before I turned it for a while was Rad Mobile and got a couple more rounds finished. To my surprise, I got arrested by a cop who ended up smashing the hood of my car with his fist! How rude!
So, was the Sega Astro City Mini worth the 130 I paid? I'm hard-pressed to say yes. I mean, I love having the arcade version of Virtua Fighter, but thanks to the input lag from the wireless adapter, I'm pretty much stuck playing it on the Mini's screen until I can find an official controller for it. It's nice to have arcade versions of Shinobi, Altered Beast and Golden Axe, but how many times have I already played them? Plus, Sega just loves Columns and three titles is way too many. The sequel to Puyo Puyo adds nothing of value, and I really could have done without the Tant-R and Ichidant-R games. Without having to go back and read through all my blogs, it feels like at least half the games are Japanese versions, which is a shame, because I really like reading the text to know what's going on.
It would have been really nice if Sega would have localized them or better yet replaced them with other games. There's so many other awesome Sega arcade games that should have been in here like Afterburner. Since we have Virtua Fighter, why not Virtua Racing? Or Virtua Cop? And when I heard the melody for Daytona in Ichidant-R, where the hell is Daytona USA? Hell, Sega Rally or Sega GT would have been really awesome Sega arcade racers as well. It's a shame we only got one racer in the form of Rad Mobile, but at least we have that. Also, when I played it a second time, I just realized there was a Sonic ornament hanging from the rearview mirror. That was a nice touch.
I don't regret buying it, though. There are a handful of cool games that I've never played before. It was nice to be able to go through some of Sega's arcade legacy and see how certain franchises evolved. I never knew Wonder Boy had such an identity crisis. But yeah, unless you're a hardcore collector and just really have to own the arcade version of Virtua Fighter, I would recommend you pass on this. You're really not missing too much.
No comments:
Post a Comment