Forums

Topic: Data East Arcade Classics

Posts 1 to 20 of 58

jkrguitar

Heck yeah I'm gonna get it! Neat selection of games there. Pretty happy about this too!

The truck have started to move!

outrun2sp

Im getting it. Shame midnight resistance isnt on it.

F Zero GX fan forever

Sean_Aaron

Definitely getting that (and reviewing it unless someone else arm-wrestles me for it); I just need Gamestop or some other exporter to list it and I'll pre-order straight away!

BLOG, mail: [email protected]
Nintendo ID: sean.aaron

JamieO

January 12th 2010 eh, nice one! I am patiently waiting for this one, but my good ole Canadian Wii importers are not listing it yet either, which is a bit of a bummer. It has lots of games that I am looking forward to, but I agree with @outrun2sp, Midnight Resistance would have been the blobby, three way firing, run and gun bullets on a tasty arcade cake.
There has been a couple of other topics set up on this in the past, one by outrun2sp Data East Arcade Classics, which has 2 user comments on it and the other by Tony Data East Classics for Wii, has 40 posts.
I was the last person to post on Tony's forum, I've actually quoted part of my comment below, possibly because it was the last post it did not get a response, so I was wondering if anyone knows much about Heavy Barrel, to answer my question:

  • "I will simply kick back with the Bad Dudes, Crude Busters and Mr Joe and Mac (Caveman Ninja has aged fairly well, as a jolly arcade platformer). I am most looking forward to Secret Agent (I remember it as like Rolling Thunder, with a classic level in which the background has the Washington DC Abraham Lincoln Memorial).
    Is Heavy Barrel similar to Ikari Warriors?"
    **** Edit i.e. Is it rock hard or is it a bit more approachable like Capcom's Mercs? Can you climb into tanks in it? Are there collectible power-ups? Is it multiplayer? etc ***

[Edited by JamieO]

I am passionate about retro gaming, from antiquated consoles to the continuation of classics. Obviously I love PSone, and PS2 retro games. I blast my ears to breakneck melodic punk, gruff vocals and nimble alternative guitar hooks.

X: | Bluesky: jamieoretro.bsky.social

jkrguitar

outrun2sp wrote:

Im getting it. Shame midnight resistance isnt on it.

Lets hope their thinking was saving it for a Data East Classics 2 if the first one sells good enough!

The truck have started to move!

y2josh

@JamieO: Those are the games I am most looking forward to as well. Never played Midnight Resistance, but it looks like a fun Contra-ish game and I love some Contra; too bad it's not on the set. Burgertime will also suck more hours out of my life. I had a original game boy copy of burgertime and I wasted so much time playing that game.

y2josh

JamieO

@y2josh I think that many of today's gamers would not be especially blown away by Midnight Resistance, it does not have quite as much razzmatazz as later 16-bit run and gun games like Contra III: The Alien Wars and Gunstar Heroes.
Arcade Midnight Resistance was released a little bit earlier than these others, in 1990, but it got loads of the fundamental of the genre right. Its weapons like the flamethrower, 3-way spread gun and powerful shotguns, may sound generic, but incorporated a strategy involving choosing which weapon was the best to tackle a subsequent level and determining how you spent your collected keys. Most importantly for a run and gunner, it was packed with set pieces: dodging huge cogs, being chased by tanks, dropping down conveyor belts, you even take down a sizable boat in its ship yard. The final boss was pretty epic too.
You may be able to tell that I love this game, I played the brilliant Amiga conversion non-stop and it received a decent conversion on the Mega Drive, which sadly lost the 2 player co-op option. The coin op has quite a unique control method too, which was hard to recreate on a Mega Drive controller. Perhaps a dual stick GCN pad would be a better fit to convert the arcade's controls. Final mention must go to the music, it is arcade brilliance, with a dash of the Space Harrier theme in its orchestration. Cheers, mate.
**** Edit. Here you go, I have included a link to the superb '90s UK retro magazine Mean Machines, Issue 8 The Mean Machines review of Mega Drive Midnight Resistance. This PDF is thanks to all of the work by The Mean Machines Archive in preserving this legendary gaming mag: http://www.meanmachinesmag.co.uk/ ****

[Edited by JamieO]

I am passionate about retro gaming, from antiquated consoles to the continuation of classics. Obviously I love PSone, and PS2 retro games. I blast my ears to breakneck melodic punk, gruff vocals and nimble alternative guitar hooks.

X: | Bluesky: jamieoretro.bsky.social

outrun2sp

@Jamie

The megadrive version of midnight resistance was really good. Superior soundtrack. Shame about only being one player but in the end didnt hurt it too much. Also the speech was gone but seriously the music made up for it. Feels good to play a game like that on Megadrive.

Another good conversion that ended up being one player was Growl by Taito. Had a couple of extra stages and once again megadrive demonstrating better sound in the music department. Excellent conversion. I imported it back in the day and preferred it to final fight. It was like cadilacs and dinosaurs on megadrive.

Heres one thats one of the best Megadrive games ever and better then most shooters on pc engine. Slap Fight. Better then the arcade with an original mode and a soundtrack by Yuzo Koshiro. I regard it as one of the best shooters on any format beating the gradius games and r type. Look at the beauty http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Z4wzXhbl50&feature=related

One more while im at it Snow Brothers came out as well with 2 player mode retained.

These are the kind of games that should come out on VC. Nice quirky games. Sorry If I went a bit off topic.

F Zero GX fan forever

Sean_Aaron

@JamieO: Heavy Barrel does have controls similar to Ikari Warriors, i.e. you rotate the stick to change firing direction which allows for dual-stick style play without using a second stick. There are no hopping in tank sections however. The main draw is getting the bits for the "Heavy Barrel" gun which can lay waste to everything. It's kind of like Ikari Warriors meets Contra and was always a lot of fun, but is a little rough in emulation due to the specialised joystick. I'm curious as to how they'll handle it on the Wii. I suspect dual-stick option with the CC, but who knows?

@outrunsp2: Snow Bros. for Mega Drive was announced as a VC release in Japan in 2007, but sadly got changed. Imagine my disappointment at seeing one of my very favourite arcade games listed online only to get an import Wii and find it never actually happened. No doubt some kind of rights hang-up with Toaplan's old IP sigh.

BLOG, mail: [email protected]
Nintendo ID: sean.aaron

JamieO

@Sean_Aaron Cheers for that mate, I will add Heavy Barrel to my list of games on the compilation that I am really looking forward to playing. I know that some gamers are tired of an overload of 'dual-stick' shooters, especially on PSN and XBLA, but that control method works a treat for top down 'run and gun' games. I even play loads of PSN Mercs · Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3 even though it was not very well received.
@outrun2sp Thanks for the Slap Fight link, I did not know much about that shooter before. Taito Legends 2 enabled me to play lots of arcade Growl, I liked the way it had an Indiana Jones feel to the characters and brawling with poachers was a unique slant on the genre. Cadilacs and Dinosaurs sits amongst a heap of wonderful side-scrolling beat 'em ups by Capcom, they just kept chipping away at that genre until they made it their own throughout the '90s.

I am passionate about retro gaming, from antiquated consoles to the continuation of classics. Obviously I love PSone, and PS2 retro games. I blast my ears to breakneck melodic punk, gruff vocals and nimble alternative guitar hooks.

X: | Bluesky: jamieoretro.bsky.social

Sean_Aaron

Robotron 2084 is still the king of dual stick as far as I'm concerned. Eugene Jarvis really had it down when it came to giving players a clear set of parameters and then controls to enable them to master a game -- if they could. No surprise Defender and Robotron 2084 are my favourite games!

BLOG, mail: [email protected]
Nintendo ID: sean.aaron

cheetahman91

Only 20 bucks? Might just get this soon then.

Jesus is the only way.
It's OK to have an opinion. This ain't the Soviet Union you know.
Letterboxd
Youtube Channel

Switch Friend Code: SW-2350-3570-9923

JamieO

@Sean_Aaron Yep, Eugene Jarvis is a genius, it was like his head was built to create games and fate took its course in placing him as a games designer for Williams. Imagine gaming today without his input, it would be like a video gaming world without Pac-Man, Family Computers, or Miyamoto. Shudder.
However, I must confess that the late '80s and early '90s were when gaming really went into overdrive for me, so Smash TV was Jarvis's dual stick shooter that truly occupied my time, I was a bit late to the party to really play arcade Robotron 2084, although I obviously have it on Midway Arcade Treasures. I played the SNES Smash TV conversion loads, but I was buzzing most of all when it was first converted to proper dual sticks control on the PSone, on the Midway Arcade Party Pak.

I am passionate about retro gaming, from antiquated consoles to the continuation of classics. Obviously I love PSone, and PS2 retro games. I blast my ears to breakneck melodic punk, gruff vocals and nimble alternative guitar hooks.

X: | Bluesky: jamieoretro.bsky.social

Sean_Aaron

Yeah the dual stick layout on the Playstation pad was really a godsend. The CC Pro feels even better in my hands.

BLOG, mail: [email protected]
Nintendo ID: sean.aaron

y2josh

@JamieO: You sure are full of information Thanks for the linkage. That game looks real fun That mag looks like it was a good one.

y2josh

Sean_Aaron

From doing a little research it looks like Data East's IP is split between a couple of companies. G-Mode owns the rights to the games in this collection and do mobile phone games, so they're just interested in licensing it out to companies like Majesco. Paon owns the rights to a few games: the Hercules console RPG series and then Karnov and Chelnov (Atomic Runner) which is why the latter two won't be found on this collection. Paon are interested in directly publishing these games and the superior Mega Drive port of Chelnov is already on the Japanese VC (and is one of the few examples of the console version exceeding the arcade original in pretty much every way). There's other properties like the detective Saburoo series that were acquired by the developers and continued.

Not idea, but it's better than conflicting rights or no one caring about it at all. Sounds like there's possibly enough games left to have a Volume 2 -- depending on how this one does!

BLOG, mail: [email protected]
Nintendo ID: sean.aaron

outrun2sp

I think they need to get something like this right the first time round because how many people really know about data east and the impact they had in the late 80s, 90s. If sales are not good a part 2 will not come out imo.

Must be licensing issues as its crazy to not have Karnov on there which is almost like a flag ship character. Fighters History I can only imagine ties in the SNK factor. Karnovs revenge would have been great though.

I can think of no real reason to not put Midnight Resistance on but hey ho. Ill get the collection anyway.

F Zero GX fan forever

Sean_Aaron

The good thing about Karnov, is that Paon has demonstrated a desire to exploit their Data East IP by releasing the superior Mega Drive version of Chelnov in Japan (hopefully Atomic Runner will eventually follow-suit elsewhere) and the Hercules RPG are actually going to be seen on DS under the name Glory of Hercules. We can only hope a VCA release of Karnov will be next!

Someone on the digitpress forums posted a list of Data East games owned by G-MODE; there's certainly enough there for a Volume 2 (or even a 3) and Midnight Resistance is one of the titles they own, so don't give up hope!

List of G-Mode's Data East properties
Act-Fancer Cybernetick Hyper Weapon
Bad Dudes vs. Dragonninja
Battle Wings (B-Wings)
Bloody Wolf / Battle Rangers
Boogie Wings/The Great Ragtime Show
Break Thru
Burger Time
Burger Time Deluxe
Burnin' Rubber / Bump N' Jump
Caveman Games
China Town
Cobra Command
Darwin 4078
Desert Assault (aka Desert Storm Gulf War / Thunder Zone)
Dunk Dream / Street Hoop / Street Slam
Dunk Dream 95
Express Raider / Western Express
Fighter's History
Fighter's History Dynamite
Fire Trap
Gate of Doom ( Dark Seal )
Gondomania
Ghostlop
Heavy Barrel
Joe & Mac Caveman Ninja
Joe & Mac Returns
Kamikaze Cabbie
Karate Champ
Last Mission
Liberation
Lock N Chase
Locked 'n Loaded
Mad Alien (aka Mad Rider, Highway Chase)
Magical Drop / Chain Reaction
Magical Drop F
Magical Drop II
Magical Drop III
Magical Drop Pocket
Metal Clash
Midnight Resistence
Mutant Fighterseath Brade
Mysterious Stones
Nitro Ball
Peter Peppers Ice Cream Factory
Psychonics Oscar
Shackled
Shoot Out
Side Pocket
Side Pocket 2
Side Pocket 3
Sly Spy
Spinmaster / Miracle Adventure
Super Birdie Rush
Super Burger Time
Super Real Darwin
Tattoo Assassin
Trio The Punch - Never Forget Me…
Tumble Pop
Two Crude Dudes / Crude Busters
Wizard Fire ( Dark Seal II )
Wonder Planet

[Edited by Sean_Aaron]

BLOG, mail: [email protected]
Nintendo ID: sean.aaron

y2josh

Quite a few games on that list I would like to see in a vol. 2. I would say with the 20 dollar budget price tag that it will sell well enough for a vol. 2. At least it doesn't seem so Farfetch'd. 15 games for the kiddies to play to keep em quiet

[Edited by y2josh]

y2josh

This topic has been archived, no further posts can be added.