Virtual Console Reviews - Page 14

This 2-D fighting game introduces a cast of different characters that met untimely deaths in their lives on Earth.

Released at a time when Street Fighter II and Mortal Kombat were both selling like hotcakes, Eternal Champions may have had players thinking it was an exploitative cash-in to make Sega a quick buck. This could not be further from the truth. Eternal Champions may share many of the same..

Take control of Dyna as he battles through action-filled stages.

Dynastic Hero is basically identical to the Megadrive Wonderboy in Monsterworld. Anyone who has played this MD classic will know that this is no bad thing - it's one of the strongest titles in the Wonderboy series. However, this version features different characters. I can only guess that after the PC Engine started to beat the..

Lace up your cleats and step onto the diamond with the pros of Baseball Stars 2.

Are you getting sick of all the sub-par sports games on VC (excluding Kirby's Dream Course, Punch-Out!! and, to some, Ice Hockey)? Yeah? Well, here's Baseball Stars 2 - a game breaks every rule in the book and delivers a completely crazy experience filled to the top with style. The gameplay's pretty much exactly like..

The aquatic adventures of Ecco come to life for a younger generation of gamers.

Ouch - what happened here? Ecco the Dolphin, suddenly transformed into a kid-friendly educational game? In this game, you play as Ecco Jr., a younger version of Ecco, or one of his two friends (Tara the baby orca or Kitnee the baby Atlantic dolphin). There is no real difference between them besides looks, however. When..

Match warriors from Fatal Fury against favorites from its sister series, Art of Fighting.

Although SNK’s Fatal Fury and Samurai Shodown franchises placed the company on the map as far as 2D fighting games were concerned, it wasn’t until the release of the first King of Fighters game SNK could go toe-to-toe with Capcom’s Street Fighter – and win. For the uninitiated, KOF involves picking a..

Bubble Bobble is a puzzle-action game featuring the two Bubble Dragons, Bub and Bob.

Bub and Bob are two rosy-cheeked dinosaurs who spit bubbles at their enemies and pop those bubbles for food rewards, all on the quest to save their girlfriends. If you don’t remember this classic arcade game from yesteryear you’ll probably know the two main...

Double Dribble is a 5-on-5 basketball game for the NES, based on the 1986 arcade game of the same name.

This is the first basketball game to come to VC, and unfortunately for us, it's not very good. While Double Dribble was fairly popular back in the day due to the graphics (There are some cutscenes with fairly detailed stuff, like a crowd marching into a stadium or a player making a slam dunk) it..

Mysterious aliens have invaded the Earth-like planet of Corliss, slowly draining the planet's resources.

Regardless of the fact that it was released fairly early on in the life of Nintendo’s 16-bit console, Axelay remains one of the best looking and most impressive shooters available for the format. Employing a similar format to Konami stable mate Lifeforce, Axelay switches between a vertical and..

The planet of Raguy has been invaded by the Daruma tribe, changing it from a beautiful and peaceful place into one filled with pollution.

The Neo Geo is known primarily for its fighting games and the occasional shoot-em-up, so it’s good to come across a cutesy platformer on the system. If you are familiar with Super Mario Bros 2 on the NES...

It's the Mario Brothers and plumbin's their game. Found the secret warp zone while working on the drain.

Back in 1990 when this was released in the USA, Mario fever was at an all time high. A few months earlier, there had even been a movie released called ‘The Wizard’ with that kid from the Wonder Years, which was essentially a commercial for...

Every system needs a golf game, right?

If Wii Sports’ gesture controlled club swinging has grown old for you, the more in-depth game offered in Hudson’s Power Golf might be of interest. There are three modes of play on offer here: stroke play is for a solo player, match play lets you take on a friend, and competition play allows for two to three players. When the game is in action you get a..

The evil Dr. Eggman stumbles upon an alternate dimension where some odd birds called Flickies have the ability to travel anywhere.

After producing three Sonic titles for the Genesis/Megadrive Sega decided to do something a little different – instead of creating another platformer they produced an isometric adventure with CGI rendered graphics, and...

As Epsilon-Eagle, you are an alien soldier who has been genetically-engineered to produce maximum intelligence and strength.

Treasure produced some of the finest games for the Sega Megadrive such as Gunstar Heroes and Dynamite Headdy, both of which are available on the Virtual Console. Alien Soldier follows in that great Treasure tradition by being a great game that shows off what Sega’s 16 bit..

This action platformer features a samurai ghost from the depths of the underworld.

The ghost of a samurai? Surely this must be awesome! Unfortunately, the truth is far from it. You play the ghost of a samurai who has returned to avenge himself. Thankfully the game information tells us this, as the main character looks nothing like a samurai. Your...

Zonk is back in Super Air Zonk, the sequel to the shooting game spin-off of the Bonk series.

Fans of excellent Turbografx-16 shoot-em-up Air Zonk will undoubtedly be intrigued by this sequel which was released in the latter years of the console for the CD-Rom attachment. Given the CD format, it would be fair to expect the sequel to be a vast improvement over the HuCard original, but sadly, this is..

Elta must battle through eight stages, collecting the eight tomes of power that are key to defeating Gul-Agieze and his evil plans.

One of the first games produced for SNK’s arcade system, Magician Lord is a lot like Capcom’s Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts. You play the titular wizard as he battles to defend his homeland from the evil advances of the...

Take on the role of Simon Belmont once again and duel to the death with Count Dracula.

Castlevania was a smash hit. Despite the difficulty of the game and its lack of quality in some areas it was loved worldwide and proved very popular. It was a no-brainer for Konami to create a sequel. Borrowing ideas from Nintendo (Super Mario Bros. 2, Zelda II,...

Ryu Hayabusa is back and this time he’s brought his dad! No not really, that was Indiana Jones, wasn’t it? The storyline is largely irrelevant; the point is this series features ninjas and therefore demanded a sequel. Of course what we really want to..

Ryu Hayabusa is back and this time he’s brought his dad! No not really, that was Indiana Jones, wasn’t it? The storyline is largely..

Set in the near future, most of Earth's land has been disintegrated in the chaos of the Anti-matter War.

The Japanese love big robots; you only have to look at series like Gundam, Macross and Patlabor to see this. However they seem to like strategy videogames a lot less, which is what makes Namco’s Metal Marines (Militia in Japan) all the more surprising. Released at a time where real time..