Tag Archives: Let’s Play

Atari A to Z, Videos

Atari A to Z: A-Rogue

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Roguelikes are big business today, but they’ve been around for a long time.

Much like many early games, they originated as mainframe affairs that didn’t get home ports until much later, when ambitious programmers decided to see exactly what they could get their micros to do.

A-Rogue is what happened when Robert Jung decided to take the original Rogue and rewrite it in Atari BASIC for 48K Atari home computers. He did a pretty good job considering the limitations he had to work within!

Find a full archive of all the Atari A to Z videos on the official site.

Videos

Atari A to Z Flashback: Warlords

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Pong and Breakout were winning formulae for Atari, so it makes perfect sense they would want to try and do everything possible with this style of game over the years.

Warlords was one of the more interesting experiments, adding a healthy dose of theme, four-player competitive (or team-based) action and a couple of interesting additional mechanics.

It’s even reasonably fun by yourself… but get three friends together and you can expect the trash talk to flow freely within moments of starting!

Find a full archive of all the Atari A to Z videos on the official site.

Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy Marathon, Videos

Final Fantasy Marathon: Vampire Hunter F(F) – Final Fantasy I #7

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Last time, the Warriors of Light decided to take a well-earned holiday in the town of Melmond, only to discover it was a right shithole.

It (apparently) wasn’t the fault of the people of Melmond, however; the nasty vampire who had taken up residence in the Cavern of Earth was supposedly to blame, because he was blocking the flow of earth energy from the crystal and making everything rot. And this made all the buildings fall down, supposedly.

Motivated entirely by altruism (well, maybe a bit of greed… treasures are shiny!), the Warriors of Light descend into the Cavern of Earth to try and deal with this undead terror once and for all…

Videos

Atari ST A to Z: Tournament Golf

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Who’s up for the ruination of a perfectly good walk? Well, you’re in luck, because here comes Elite with their ST conversion of Sega’s Arnold Palmer Tournament Golf.

Tournament Golf, as it was rebranded for its home computer release thanks to the ditching of the license for cost-cutting reasons, is an interesting example of a relatively early golf game trying to incorporate some more complex simulation-style elements into the mix.

Unfortunately, said mix also includes incredibly twitchy arcade-style controls that you need the reflexes of a particularly hyperactive kitten to master, making the whole thing rather more challenging than it needs to be! Still, I had fun…

Find a full archive of all the Atari A to Z videos on the official site.

Videos, Warriors Wednesday

Warriors Wednesday: Stoking the Fires of Rebellion – Warriors Orochi #51

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Today’s scuffle in the lands of Warriors Orochi sees Xiahou Dun and Xiahou Yuan entering the picture, as Cao Pi does his best to gather the forces required for an effective rebellion.

The two proud warriors, ever loyal to Wei even after they felt its leader had abandoned it, are going to take a bit of convincing, though. And by “convincing”, I mean “poking repeatedly with sharp objects”.

New recruit Zhang He also gets a bit of time to shine. His claw work is beeeeautiful, don’t you know…

Custom Order Maid 3D 2

Custom Order Maid 3D 2: The Reluctant Idol and the Photoshoot

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It’s Tuesday! That doesn’t mean anything in and of itself, other than the fact that I’ve arbitrarily decided it’s time to pay the Empire Club of Custom Order Maid 3D 2 another visit. And that has nothing to do with it being Tuesday.

Today, we continue getting to know our “main three” maids a little better as Hi-chan tries her best to convince Majima-san to join her on her quest to become an idol maid. Aya, meanwhile, has numerous things to practice. And who knows what that mysterious little fox girl is up to?

Dust off your membership card and come on in, and be aware that there are NSFW images and themes ahead!

Continue reading Custom Order Maid 3D 2: The Reluctant Idol and the Photoshoot →

Videos

Atari A to Z: Zone Ranger

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We’ve made it to Z again, folks! And today’s a real stonker of a game that I used to really love playing back in the day. And still do today, in fact.

Zone Ranger was released in 1984 by Activision, back when they still made good games, and was the work of one Dan Thompson. Drawing loose inspiration from Asteroids and Sinistar, two favourite games of Thompson, Zone Ranger tasks you with shooting down a bunch of space junk because… why not?

It’s the quintessential mid-’80s arcade blaster in many ways: easy to learn, hard to master and very, very addictive.

Find a full archive of all the Atari A to Z videos on the official site.

Videos

Atari A to Z Flashback: Atari Soccer

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Yes, yes, yes, I know the “A to Z” angle in this series is already questionable and this one following Tempest makes it even more so, but we only just managed to find time to have a two-player match!

Indeed, today’s game is Atari Soccer, an arcade title which can only be played with two or four people simultaneously, so bad luck if you have either no friends or two friends. As a follow-up to Atari Football, it again had a cocktail cabinet form factor and exhausting trackball controls to blister your palms with.

Thankfully, the port in Atari Flashback Classics can be enjoyed with nothing more than a couple of analogue controllers, and even for those who aren’t big soccer fans, the game makes for an entertaining, competitive pastime for a few minutes every so often.

Find a full archive of all the Atari A to Z videos on the official site.

Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy Marathon, Videos

Final Fantasy Marathon: Lali-Ho! – Final Fantasy I #6

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In this sixth episode of the Final Fantasy Marathon, we take our legitimately gotten gains (courtesy of the Mystic Key) and take a trip to go and visit the dwarves.

Dwarves are another example of an aspect of Final Fantasy that was lifted from Dungeons & Dragons, though few can deny that the Japanese series puts its own unique twist on the dumpy delvers. Their catchphrase of “lali-ho!” (or variations thereof depending on who was on localisation duty at Squaresoft that week) became a recurring feature for a number of installments… and indeed at the time of writing the dwarves have most recently made a comeback in fanservice festival Final Fantasy XIV as part of the Shadowbringers expansion.

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. I’ve got some Nitro Powder burning a hole in my pocket (quite literally) and I can’t think of anyone better equipped to make good use of it than a dwarf.

Videos, Warriors Wednesday

Warriors Wednesday: Mystical Ninja – Warriors Orochi #50

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Cao Pi and friends have a tough battle ahead of them today: they’re up against Nene and her ninjutsu!

It seems our “hero” is still biding his time before unleashing his inevitable betrayal of Da Ji and Orochi, however, but we get closer and closer with every mission. It’s not a case of if, it’s a case of when.

Oh, and if you ever were wondering what I thought of Japanese denpa group PASSPO, you can find out, exclusively in this, the forty-ninth episode of Warriors Wednesday. Don’t say I never give you anything.