I got 2 copies of Radiant Silvergun on the way and I am waiting patiently.
I got 2 copies of Radiant Silvergun on the way and I am waiting patiently.
I have spent way way too much this month and last, hopefully I get some nice christmas money to help make up for it.
Arrived today:
Shadow Dancer (Megadrive)
Ys Book 1-2 (PC Engine CD)
Popful Mail (Mega CD, brand new!)
Final Fight CD (Mega CD, brand new!)
Played the Mega CD stuff on Kega for a little bit, still waiting for my actual Mega CD system to arrive.
I think I'm gonna hold off buying anything new for a while and actually play through some of this stuff... I also have a HUGE Saturn bundle on the way, but it's mainly US stuff...
Amateur Sega Nut: SMS: 8 Megadrive: 13 Mega CD: 4 Saturn: 67 Dreamcast: 44
Got jpn sonic rush & oideyo doubutsu no mori (animal crossing) for DS.
Online is going to be a blast on doubutsu no mori.
here are things I picked up in Korea as well as few titles I bought from local EB.
Pokemon Edition of GB Micro. I was shopping for DS but when I saw this I had to have it since I also have Pokemon edition GBA-SP... Bit hard to get as many places were sold out whereas 20th Anniv. Famicom version was every where... ? also had hard time to find JPN release of MSAdv sealed as most of places were selling US bootleg...
Half-Life 2 is Asian version that I picked up for just over 100 HK$ at TRU and God of War, Sakura Taisen 3 LE, GT4 LE, Come On Baby are Korean version I picked up while I was in Seoul. The rest are brand new PAL releases that I bought from local EB on 50% off day with half the price of RRP knocked off except the Biohazard 4 LE that's from p-a with metal gun - I'm collecting the other three gun models btw...
Oh! Bakkyoun/Ghoul Panic is a light gun video game that has a total of 53 mini games all with a haunted house theme. After 4 mini games are completed the player must battle a area boss. This Playstation conversion of the arcade game offers 3 extra extra game modes plus difficulty levels. The ghouls and ghosts in the game are done with an emphasis on cuteness, making the game child friendly. Unfortunately this Japanese version has many menus and little English, but once you do get to where the shooting starts you'll see a very nice looking and fun playing game. A well done Namco port of the Eighting/Raizing arcade game. Released only in Japan and Europe, I choose the safer bet Japanese version when I saw it for $14.99 new on Ebay.
GAMEPLAY: 9
GRAPHICS: 9
SOUND: 9
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 1 (Everything but the scores are in Japanese)
OVERALL: 9
The Operation Deathwing can be completed with just 4 missions in this 1st person space combat game, but missions 2 and 3 are branching, giving you reason to play thru it a few times to see everything. All in-flight information, including the voice of your Bitchin' Betty are in English. Each mission starts with a Japanese narrated cutscene displaying your primary targets and it's defenses in wire frame mode. Aggressive enemy fighter's protecting the primary targets provides fast turn and burn dogfighting gameplay and is the highlight of the game. Fortunately for you, you have shields that will SLOWLY regenerate while your numerically superior opponents do not. Once you managed to clear out the covering fighters you can concentrate on destroying your primary objectives, typically a large space or ground platform. Besides your main gun, with its unlimited supply of ammunition, you're given 3 types of homing weapons of limited quantity. Active radar screens in the cockpit targets and identifies your primary targets so you'll never become disoriented as to which way to go. Which leads you to the games main drawback, it does not do a very good job with scaling large objects. Huge spacecraft will appear as a small target box until you are almost right on top of them. It's very confusing, completely unrealistic and effectively destroys whatever suspension of disbelief the game managed to muster. The game tries hard by giving you multiple missions types, then let's you down by uninspired planets that use a single tileset for the entire surface. The Operation Deathwing was made by a group of enthusiasts who came together to form CyberTech Designs. This is the only game they made before disbanding and if they had spent more time polishing it, they might still be around. As it is, Deathwing just barely manages to be average. Picked up this copy on Ebay for $22.
GAMEPLAY: 5
GRAPHICS: 5
SOUND: 5
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 9 ( Mostly English text and voices)
OVERALL: 5
Star Ixiom is the follow up to Namco's Star Luster arcade game, which was also released for the Famicom. As far as I know, this game is the final installment for Namco's Star series of games. At it's heart it's a space shooter, but it adds strategy elements by providing you with choices about where to attack and where to defend. The game is very well done with interesting enemies, planets, power stations and bases. There's plenty of NPC's to converse with at the bases, whom I'm sure are telling you vital information, unfortunately it's all in Japanese. Since you're going to be deprived of the epic story, you can at least console yourself with satisfying space combat gameplay with better than average graphics. All the large ships, planets and effects look quite good and I could sense that Namco wanted this game to be the jewel in the series. Found it on Ebay for $4.99
GAMEPLAY: 7
GRAPHICS: 9
SOUND: 7
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 5 (Playable - without understanding the story)
OVERALL: 7.5
The entire Namco Star saga as I understand it.
I am a huge fan of this series as well. Star Ixiom is pretty cool. I need to pick up a copy of Star Luster myself.Originally Posted by Spartacus
The entire Namco Star saga as I understand it.
There is also a System 246 Starblade 2 that never went beyond test: http://www.system16.com/hardware.php?id=543&page=1#1390 How great would that have been!?! I wish they would have at least released a PS2 version.
Back to topic, I recently picked up Real Bout Fatal Fury Best Collection, Fatal Fury 3 & Hyper Reverthion for Saturn. I never played the Real Bout games before getting them in the mail and I must say that Real Bout Special is especially excellent.
You'd be amazed at how much Star Luster and Star Ixiom have in common. Being only 8bit, Star Luster cuts right to the chase and just gives you the action part, though the map section is still included.
I didn't know about that one, thanks for the link! That does look good!
Candy Pink Japanese DS
Bubble Bobble DS
Animal Forest (N64)
Dobutso Bancho for the GC
and a PC Engine Duo-R (white)
Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne.
Got Star Luster from Joe's store
For Saturn:
Bulk Slash
Linkle Liver Story
Ronde
just got a SFC a boxed mother, mother 2, final fight and some other games but it is the first thing that i have imported
NeoGeo Battle Coliseum arrived in the mail today! So far, it's been rather underwhelming. I guess that's what happens when you hype up a game in your head for about two years...
Recently, I found a Japanese copy of Namco Museum (PSP) at a local game store. It wasn't cheap ($35), but it's in near-mint-plus condition. I think I'll hang onto it for a while...
World's greatest Internet game store: http://blastedmachines.com
Also on Facebook: http://facebook.com/BlastedMachinesTechShop
Wanted: Any and all Dragon Quest, Lufia/Estpolis, Tales of series, and NIS games, strategy guides, and miscellaneous items. Will pay $$$ or trade well for items I don't already have.
latest pick up with x-mas discount sales period...
two more 18+ rated title I found over here - for games MA15+ is the highest we have over here...Still Life is another 18+ titles though it's covered with MA15+ sticker)
and those two Bandai MG kits were for a small diorama project... :P
my second Saturn FDD, third Keyboard, 2nd new arcade stick turned up yesterday along with my old stock (never used brand new basically) Sanyo 3DO Try box set... Oh there were other few small items as well like official smoke black DC case top, Hori PS dual analog stick box set, Cotton omake ocha cup (to be add'd to missus collection)...
I will see whether I can take some pictures tonite... :P
I just got my Monkey Ball DS today. Overall, it's extremely good, but I'm hoping there are still some hidden Extra stages that I haven't discovered yet. Otherwise I've already cleared all the stages. Heh. I haven't tried the various mini games yet, but they look good.
For some reason they've been asking me to pull a lot of overtime at work. In fact I didn't get a single day off between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I'm exhausted and beat, but I do have a minor windfall that I should probably do something mature, something responsible, something adult with. Then again, I could just spend it on imports! And as long as my boss is buying them, I figured I should grab as many as I can of the kind that feels like I'm ripping off a band aid when I click the BUY button! Starting with this monstrosity!!!!
Hyper Duel - Technosoft's classic 2D horizontal shooter with both the original arcade game and a graphically enhanced Saturn version. Choose from three different fighter ships that remind you very much of the Thunderforce ships, which can transform on the fly into to mech-style robot called "Buster Gears". You can also pick up "mini" fighters and gears that will fight along side of you.
What I liked: The game moves along at a good clip with no slow down that I've seen so far. Transforming between a fighter and a mech is a nice game mechanic. Using a continue gives you the option to switch to another ship type. Each ship & gear has it's own unique weapons. 2 player option.
What I disliked: While playing as a mech your aim is pointed either up or down at a 45-degree angle. I know that's a part of the game mechanic to be able to attack all of the stuff that's attached to or traveling along the floor and ceiling, but it's difficult to aim.
Easy to find one on Ebay in the $90 range and that's what I coughed up for it. I'm clueless as to why this game fetches the price it does. Must be a lot of Technosoft fans out there.
GAMEPLAY: 9
GRAPHICS: 8
SOUND: 8
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 10
OVERALL: 7.5 (Takes a hit here because it really doesn't stand head over shoulders above Saturn shooters costing half as much!)
Game Tenkgoku (Paradise) - Jaleco's parody shooter about an arcade being taken over by some evil handle bar mustached dude who infects all of the game machines. The arcade owner calls on different characters from Jaleco coin-op games to remove him. Pretty standard shoot-em-up with power-ups for increased firepower, mini side-ships and a mega bomb. Jaleco added two bonus levels (eight levels in all) for this Saturn port, including a Tate mode.
What I liked: This game is PACKED with anime, voice work and game options, including extra story and time attack modes using different backgrounds. Very cool game! You'll battle your way through through pinball machines, crane machines and even old school vector graphics games, the list just goes on and on! The game covers SO many different arcade games I couldn't even begin to list them all! One of my favorites had you fighting through some cars racing along a track and when you shot one it would jump up and flip over causing other cars to smash into a flaming pileup. Neato!
What I disliked: No fault of the game, but there's a bonus section that goes into great detail about the history of some of Jaleco's coin-ops. I really would have liked to be able to understand it. The LE edition included a VHS tape with about 15 minutes of anime based on the game and the remaining 45 minutes is a documentary about the voice actors. I would have much preferred it were all anime.
I found the LE edition on Ebay with a $55 BIN.
GAMEPLAY: 9
GRAPHICS: 9
SOUND: 10
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 0 (Not much help with the Japanese in this game)
OVERALL: 10 (I can't think of another import game I've bought and felt like I got more than my monies worth like I have with this. Every menu screen is done with talking anime. The longer I played it the more I was amazed at how much they were able to get on a single cd. The amount of effort and extra's that went into this is impressive!)
Hermie Hopperhead in Scrap Panic - by Sony is a 2D platformer about a boy who falls through a garbage pail into a scrap yard world of menacing garbage (I'm not kidding). There he will find lots of stars to collect and eggs with feet who will follow and help him along the way. He can give the stars he finds to his egg buddies and "breed" them into penguins, turtles, chickens and dragons, making them even more powerful allies. Nothing particularly outstanding graphics wise, but it is colorful with parallax scrolling.
What I liked: Pretty standard fare here, but it is a long game with multiple levels. This game never left Japan and nothing's in Japanese.
What I disliked: It's so easy to lose the egg's you've been feeding your stars to that you really can't justify doing it unless you need some temporary help to get past a difficult level.
Got it for $12.95 from JapanGameStock
GAMEPLAY: 7
GRAPHICS: 7
SOUND: 7
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 10
OVERALL: 7.5
Steam Hearts is shooter from TGL with a good deal of disturbing anime. As I understand it, TGL had a sub branch called Giga who was responsible for it's Hgames. The Saturn version has an Original mode with long anime scenes before each level and an Arcade mode that just plays the shooter levels without the anime.
What I liked: I love mecha games with an emphasis on "realism", so the worst thing for me to see is the Japanese turn powerful combat machines into dorks wearing samurai hats holding some gigantic laser sword. So when I picked up a power up playing Steam Hearts that stuck a sword on the front of my ship, I reached for the wastebasket with one hand in case I was going to hurl. Much to my delight and surprise I found I could wave yon laser sword completely around my ship with my D pad. It's not the end all be all weapon of the game, but it WAS fun swishing it around and frankly it sounds cool too! The game is just loaded with different kinds of power ups!
What I disliked: The game probably could have been done on the Genesis/SNES graphics wise, although there's a lot of weapon discharges that were probably too much for either system to handle. In fact, in a few places it noticeably slowed down the game on the Saturn. Being a T&A fan, I'm surprised how little I enjoyed the slide show anime between levels. I found listening to multiple sessions of rape victims crying rather depressing. And watching a brother and sister rape team in action, with the sister being the muscle no less, rather revolting. Finally, a "Mature" rated game that gives you maybe two or three seconds of nippleless breasts is something of a disappointment. One can only hope that there's a "Hot Coffee" mod for this floating around somewhere!
$69 on Ebay was the best deal I could find for it when I looked.
GAMEPLAY: 8
GRAPHICS: 7
SOUND: 7
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 0 (All Japanese)
OVERALL: 8 (I actually enjoyed the shooter portion.)
Gatchaman: the Shooting is by Bandai, which I know could spell trouble for a lot of people. As I understand it the Gatchaman anime went by the name of Battle of the Planets in the US and to be honest with you I've never heard of it. Perhaps someone who had would know all the characters and the game would have more significance. It's a vertical shooter with 5 two-stage levels featuring 5 mid bosses and 5 end bosses. You play the game using 4 young characters that don bird masks and capes to battle evil. They all have their own unique weapons, power ups, bombs and vehicles. They team up together for the last level.
What I liked: It's an anime based shooter, so everything is colorful and cartoony and the cheesyness kinda grew on me. I thought the game was too easy at first, but then began noticing that the game was being subtly ramped up in difficulty as I played on. I have yet to beat the 3rd level final endboss! Truthfully, it's an enjoyable game.
What I disliked: You'll see a lot of the same enemies and that can seem a bit repetitive, but if they intended to keep the gameplay true to the anime, I guess you would have to expect that. The boss's were always unique. No repeat firing forces you to tap the fire button continuously.
$29.95 BIN on Ebay. I'm familiar with this particular seller on Ebay and know this is not a good deal!
GAMEPLAY: 8
GRAPHICS: 9
SOUND: 8
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 0 (It's a shooter, so it's very playable)
OVERALL: 8
Lattice: 200EC7 was released by Majorwave, a subsidiary of Konami for low priced games. It's a rail shooter with multiple paths across a large three dimensional object that gives a very strong maze element to the gameplay. Many objects, some mindlessly, some menacingly, swirl and hover about the rail and will damage you if you run into them. The rail is four sided and allows you to spiral out of the path of any objects that can't be destroyed, such as walls. It's a neat trick that also let's you navigate your way through the maze, but it can become disorienting. You can reverse your course at any time, but you can never stop, so the game requires you to constantly stay on your toes. Find special energy canisters and destroy them to open up new paths in the maze. You can also find power ups to increase your firepower, give you the ability to jump over obstacles and repair damage to your health.
What I liked: I don't like rail shooters much myself, but this one isn't like anything I've played before. The game places you into a very strange surrealistic world with an appropriate techno beat music to listen to. There are a tremendous variety of things swirling around you while you play. Some are solid, some are transparent, some glow, and all with nicely done graphics so the game puts on quite a show.
What I disliked: Everything you've cleared away with your guns will simply return eventually, so you'll never be able to create a safe stretch to relax a little.
I picked this copy up for $22 as the highest bidder on Ebay.
GAMEPLAY: 8
GRAPHICS: 9
SOUND: 8
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 10
OVERALL: 8
Namco Museum Vol. 6 (Encore) has seven coin-op games, many of which received ports to various other consoles. King and Balloon plays like Space Invaders with a crossbow. SkyKid is a bi-plane horizontal shooter. Rolling Thunder is a horizontal-scrolling secret agent shooter. Motos (F-GP) is an overhead bumper car game. Wonder Momo is a monster fighting girl platform game. Rompers is a key collecting maze game. And Dragon Saber is vertical dragon shooter.
What I liked: It's nice to be able to play games that weren't ported to consoles I own and there's a nice mix of games in here, but I bought the game primarily to play Dragon Saber, the sequel to NES Dragon Spirit. Dragon Saber has lots of cool looking enemies and if you push the select button while playing you can hear the dragon scream!
What I disliked: The ridiculously short-ranged ground attack weapon in Dragon Saber!
Picked up it on Ebay with a $29.95 BIN from the same seller I bought Gatchaman from so I'm sure this is not a good price!
GAMEPLAY: 8
GRAPHICS: 8
SOUND: 8
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 0
OVERALL: 8
Zunou Senkan Galg by DB Soft calls itself a Scroll RPG. It's a vertical shooter, hence the scroll part, and you're trying to collect 100 parts of the "enemy". That would be the RPG part. The game branches at the end of each level forcing you choose which path to take to find more parts and there's also teleporters to whisk you to different areas!
What I liked: It's got a good shooter game with plenty of variation's of enemy to fight.
What I disliked: Three lives to get 100 pieces? You've gotta be kidding!
Found it on Ebay with a $5 BIN.
GAMEPLAY: 6
GRAPHICS: 8
SOUND: 7
ENGLISH FRIENDLY: 10
OVERALL: 5 (It would be much higher if I could get more lives!)
Twin Hawk Megadrive import.
Some of my reasent JP games include Rhyme Rhider Kerorikan (WSC), Digimon Battle Spirits ver 1.5 (WSC), Buffers Evolution (WS), Mushihimesama (limited edition with figure) (PS2), Oretachi Geasen Zoku Sono: Time Pilot (PS2) and Dokodemo Mahjong (NGPC).
Been wanting Mushihimesama for quite a while. Great game, get it.
Oretachi Geasen Zoku Sono is a budget series from Hamster dedicated to direct ports of old arcade games. Each release only contains one game (and only the original, no remake) but at least it has lots of options, including TATE mode, screen zoom, etc. Each release also comes with the following:
* A mini CD with all the music and sound effects from the game (each sfx has it's own track) + a coupple of remixes.
* A mini DVD with a super play movie, one of the music remixes with a visualizer style video and a trailer for the series.
* A trading card.
* A miniature strategy guide.
Also the manual has several pictures of the original arcade board.
Other games in the series are Scramble, Crazy Climber, Karate Michi, Moon Cresta, Time Pilot, Sonic Wings, Burger Time, Super Volleyball, Terra Cresta, Yie Ar Kung Fu, Quarth and Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
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