Top Gear 2

Tonight, I take this Mega Drive game round our track, and a violent goose is the star in our reasonably priced car.

Look, it's the Clarkson-less Top Gear 2, the sequel to... well... guess. Among other systems it was brought to the Sega Mega Drive, and is a fine example of a pseudo 3D racing game from the early 1990s. I don't talk about these sorts of games much, so here's an opportunity for me to do so.

Sonic 2 LD

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on the Sega Master System is a nice game in its own right, but having been built by an entirely different team for a completely different console, it doesn't look much like its more famous Mega Drive counterpart.

But look, Doc Eggfan and co of Sonic Retro fame have changed all that. It's Sonic 2 as you remember it running on Master System hardware... sort of.

Frozen Bubble

I seem to spend a lot of time being screwed around with last minute cancellations and two hour breaks to kill. So fortunate then that I have an Android "smartphone" with enough freebie software to keep a Linux fan thrilled for life.

Frozen Bubble is one such piece of software. A completely free Puzzle Bobble/Bust-A-Move clone which has already absorbed several hours of my time.

Billy the Kid Returns

Well... this is bad.

Billy the Kid Returns, another remnant from my DOS-based childhood. It was developed by a company known as "Alive Software", but trust me, this one's better off dead. Billy the Kid is a prime example of a truly poor and flimsy title worth the time of no man.

So lets spend some time finding out why!

Arcade Classics

Classic game compilations are great. With the power of modern technology the expensive arcade machines of years long past can now be played in the comfort of your own home, for cheap, instantly. Of course in some cases such as when Sega hop on the re-release train, you don't get the best results. Sega's classic "cat in a blender" additions to many Mega Drive musical scores repeatedly give your childhood that extra level of cringe, but others seem to do a reasonable job.

But what were things like before the days of emulation? Like this, Arcade Classics on the Sega Mega Drive (and Sega Game Gear). Can they get it right? Is it even possible to get Pong wrong? Better find out.

Mega Man (Game Gear)

American culture is an odd thing. Arriving on the internet full-time in late 2003, I was told that a FIGHTING ROBOT known as "Mega Man" was the bees knees among "most gamers". This theory was based on supposedly two decades of success and many childhood NES-related memories. Shocking, then, that I had never played nor even heard of a Mega Man game up until this point. Was I missing something?.. aside from a NES?

Well, if I had I known about the series, it might have been through this. Mega Man on the Game Gear. Other contenders are Mega Man: The Wily Wars on the Mega Drive, or something like Mega Man X3 on the Saturn... though being honest it's unlikely I would have came across any of them, and I couldn't have played this one since it wasn't released in the UK. But it's an entry to the series that isn't discussed much, so that makes it ideal for Blog Squirrel treatment.

Jumpjet

A fan of Luigi alerted me of this game. A Defender clone for DOS, released in 1990. It may look simplistic, but simplicity is one hell of a lot easier to blog about than the stuff I've been trying to push out for the last week... and it's got a few tricks up its sleeve which makes it that extra bit special.