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What the heck is on this $10 Retro Game handheld? Let’s find out!

Beowulf

Beowulf

Son of The Answer Man
(He/Him)
I'll admit, I'm starting to get a little tired, but I'm pretty sure I can make it to the finish. There are still plenty of games that probably aren't clones of ones we've seen already, or at least are ridiculous ones.

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402. MOUSE SNARE

A Nice Code clone of Minesweeper. Versions were also released as Mine and Bomb. (I have a strange enduring love for Minesweeper, but it always feels weird to me to play it without a two-button mouse.)

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403. MOWING

Another by Nice Code. A lawn mower must fully mow every inch of the lawn. This uses graphics from Wacky Races. It was also released as Agile Mice, Gem, and Lawn Mower.

RetroFC_23_game_(1).png
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404. MS PAC MAN

Exactly what you’d expect. I never really understood what was different between the original Pac-Man and this. The Wikipedia article, kindly, summarizes the differences, which are basically small, incremental improvements.

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405. LUIGI AND NEW QU

I think this is actually the same game as Luigi and the Christmas Quest (#282), just without the winter theme. It’s by the same hacker and at least the first chunk of level 1-1 is the same.

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406. CONTE ENEGY

Though you can’t immediately tell from the graphics, this is a Lode Runner hack. And a difficulty hack, at that!
 
Dracula

Dracula

Plastic Vampire
(He/His)
Yeah, you probably already saw this on the wiki, but Ms. Pac-Man was originally designed to be an upgrade board for Pac-Man. Programmers would make small changes to existing games to increase speed, difficulty, etc., and sell them to arcades. Once the regulars started mastering popular games like Asteroids, Missile Command, and so forth, they'd spend less money and play longer, which is bad for the arcade's revenue. So arcade owners had an incentive to buy upgrade kits like this.

Ms. Pac-Man was so popular that it attracted Namco's attention, and instead of suing the creators, they hired them (or at least purchased the rights to produce Ms. Pac-Man).

The biggest change I know of in Ms. is that the bonus fruit moves instead of sits still. I think there are quite a few other changes, too.
 
Kirin

Kirin

Summon for hire
(he/him)
I guess Lode Mario isn't quite as baffling as some of the other unexpected crossovers, but still. Great inexplicable name, though.


That Monster Truck Rally has a really neat distinctive look, with really busy/detailed backgrounds made by flipping and shuffling various tiles.
 
RT-55J

RT-55J

space hero for hire
(He/Him + RT/artee)
I don't know about Nice Code's mowing game, but the homebrew game Lawn Mower actually quite decent.

 
ShakeWell

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
Dracula said:
Yeah, you probably already saw this on the wiki, but Ms. Pac-Man was originally designed to be an upgrade board for Pac-Man. Programmers would make small changes to existing games to increase speed, difficulty, etc., and sell them to arcades. Once the regulars started mastering popular games like Asteroids, Missile Command, and so forth, they'd spend less money and play longer, which is bad for the arcade's revenue. So arcade owners had an incentive to buy upgrade kits like this.

Ms. Pac-Man was so popular that it attracted Namco's attention, and instead of suing the creators, they hired them (or at least purchased the rights to produce Ms. Pac-Man).

The biggest change I know of in Ms. is that the bonus fruit moves instead of sits still. I think there are quite a few other changes, too.
Click to expand...

That's not quite right. It was Midway, who had the US distro rights, and they kinda did it without Namco's say-so, which is part of why Namco treats Ms. Pac-Man as a 2nd class citizen. But it also has four mazes, instead of just one. It's a much better game, honestly.
 
Phantoon

Phantoon

I cuss you bad
Also there was a point where AtGames (of terrible small retro consoles fame) had the rights to Ms. Pacman, not Namco. They may still do...
 
ShakeWell

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
Phantoon said:
Also there was a point where AtGames (of terrible small retro consoles fame) had the rights to Ms. Pacman, not Namco. They may still do...
Click to expand...

It's a legal quagmire, honestly. Namco always has part of the rights. GCC (the group of MIT students who made the original Ms. Pac-Man) had part of them. They apparently sold their part to AtGames, which means Namco can now just freeze out AtGames if they want, but it also limits the kind of Ms. Pac-Man stuff we'll see for the foreseeable future. I also know they sued to stop that sale from happening, but I haven't heard any updates on that suit lately.
 
Violentvixen

Violentvixen

(She/Her)
Beowulf said:
I'll admit, I'm starting to get a little tired, but I'm pretty sure I can make it to the finish. There are still plenty of games that probably aren't clones of ones we've seen already, or at least are ridiculous ones.
Click to expand...
I gotta say I am incredibly impressed with how well you've kept up the schedule. This is such a fun thread.
 
Kzinssie

Kzinssie

(she/her)
Look up footage of Ms. Pac-Man's original unlicensed form, Crazy Otto, sometime. It replaces Pac-Man with a little guy that, uh, has human legs. The tone of the game becomes much different when Pac-Man is a guy running for his life in terror
 
Beowulf

Beowulf

Son of The Answer Man
(He/Him)
Violentvixen said:
I gotta say I am incredibly impressed with how well you've kept up the schedule. This is such a fun thread.
Click to expand...
Thanks! I can't really take credit, given how much everyone else has been contributing, but I'm happy I've been able to have my "project" be a hit.
 
Beowulf

Beowulf

Son of The Answer Man
(He/Him)
RetroFC_23_game_(7).png


407. MUSIC MOMENT

You need to maneuver the dinosaur to catch drops in the umbrella, which plays musical notes if you do it right. The prize is the song, apparently. It’s by Nice Code, and the Bootleg wiki notes that collecting all of the notes is, in fact, impossible.

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408. MYSTERY QUEST

This side-scrolling platformer game was apparently released in the US in 1989, but I have absolutely no memory of it. I did, however, find an entertaining review by somebody who regretted their decision of picking it over Zelda when they bought a new game as a kid.

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409. NINJA3

I think we’ve finally solved the mystery of what was hacked to make Tiny Toon (#113). This appears to be Ninja Hattori-Kun, and it plays just like the hack did, complete with the P meter for your life but also enemies that can instantly kill you.

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410. NUT CRACKY

You’re a Nutcracker soldier. You have limited shots to knock out enemies (who emerge from the holes), but there’s no meter for them. You need to cross the screen to rescue the princess in each level, but your abnormally huge hitbox is a problem when enemies close in. This is a Nice Code port of the Atari game Food Fight (which they also released as Food Fight).

RetroFC_23_game_(14).png
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411. OBAKE NO Q TAROU

We saw this before as Chubby Cherub (#190). In this version, you’re a ghost rather than a naked angel boy. You’re still collecting candy and avoiding dogs, though.
 
Dracula

Dracula

Plastic Vampire
(He/His)
It's funny to think of it that way, but I guess in a certain sense a localization with graphical changes could be considered a rom hack.
 
Beowulf

Beowulf

Son of The Answer Man
(He/Him)
RetroFC_23_game_(16).png


412. OCTOPUS

It’s hard to tell, but you’re a swimming woman who needs to collect the gold coins while avoiding the giant octopus and also the fast-moving shark. (The octopus can go on land and moves slowly towards you; the shark moves in a pattern in the water, but faster.) Getting the coins uncovers a trident; getting that wins the level.

This is a clone of the "Too Cool!" minigame from the PC game The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea; the graphics from the original are mostly retained—the octopus is Ursula and the trident belongs to the king. Also published as Brave Boy and Skateboard.

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413. ONYANKO TOWN

You’re running like crazy through the town, and your only defense against crazy dogs killing you is jumping over them and opening manholes (the yellow circles) for them to fall into. This is an arcade-style maze game, but Hardcore Gaming 101 has a great article on why it’s a standout example of the genre.

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414. TWIN CARDS

A relatively simple card-matching memory game by Nice Code. Also released as Ilk Cards and Two Cards.

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415. PACHI COM

An early Famicom Pachinko game. I had no idea what I was doing, but to be fair, I don’t actually know how pachinko works.

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416. PAC LAND

The original arcade runner game, ported to the NES. I’m far more familiar with the Smash Brothers stage based on this (my son loves it for some reason) than the original game. I think I saw it in an arcade once when I was ten.
 
Dracula

Dracula

Plastic Vampire
(He/His)
I have a boxed copy of Onyanko Town. The HCG article probably goes over this, but AFAIK it's the only original title developed by the infamous Micronics, who were responsible for shoddy FC ports of games like Ghosts 'n Goblins, Athena, and 1942. It carries all of the familiar Micronics jank - glitchy hit detection, tinny sound effects, and lots of sprite flicker. But like beowulf says, it's a solid maze game and it has some fun nuance. And it's so cute! I just have to turn the volume way down. The music is unbearable.

I've often wondered what Micronics was like. Some have theorized it was just one person, a mercenary programmer on the Famicom frontier. Who knows.

Pac-Land on FC has an interesting quirk. The controls, by default, really don't work the way you'd expect. The A and B buttons make Pac-Man move left and right, and you can double-tap one of the buttons to get him to move faster. Then you jump with the D-Pad. Yes! It's very weird.

But, apparently the developers realized this was a strange choice, because you can play the game with the second-player controller, and the controls work in a more conventional way, with the D-Pad moving Pac-Man and the A button making him jump.
 
Kzinssie

Kzinssie

(she/her)
That Little Mermaid minigame is kind of a mainstay of these bootleg consoles/multicarts, often hacked to have different characters and environments (many of which obscure the "water and land" concept) - I had no idea that was its origin!
 
WildcatJF

WildcatJF

Let's Pock (Art @szk_tencho)
(he / his / him)
Beowulf said:
RetroFC_23_game_(17).png
RetroFC_23_game_(18).png


413. ONYANKO TOWN

You’re running like crazy through the town, and your only defense against crazy dogs killing you is jumping over them and opening manholes (the yellow circles) for them to fall into. This is an arcade-style maze game, but Hardcore Gaming 101 has a great article on why it’s a standout example of the genre.
Click to expand...

Dracula said:
I have a boxed copy of Onyanko Town. The HCG article probably goes over this, but AFAIK it's the only original title developed by the infamous Micronics, who were responsible for shoddy FC ports of games like Ghosts 'n Goblins, Athena, and 1942. It carries all of the familiar Micronics jank - glitchy hit detection, tinny sound effects, and lots of sprite flicker. But like beowulf says, it's a solid maze game and it has some fun nuance. And it's so cute! I just have to turn the volume way down. The music is unbearable.

I've often wondered what Micronics was like. Some have theorized it was just one person, a mercenary programmer on the Famicom frontier. Who knows.
Click to expand...
Milky, the protagonist of Onyanko Town, is the first female character from a third party to debut on the Famicom as the heroine of the game (Bubbles from Clu Clu Land is the first overall, and Clarice from the port of City Connection is the first third party woman to star in a game, for reference). I talk about this aspect of the game more here:

lvls.wordpress.com

Femtendo – Milky (Onyanko Town) and Zelda (Legend of Zelda)

Milky (Onyanko Town) Release Date: November 21, 1985 Developer: Micronics Publisher: Pony Canyon Format: Cartridge Role: Main Playable Character Any Subsequent Appearances: No Introduction: Pony Ca…
lvls.wordpress.com lvls.wordpress.com
 
muteKi

muteKi

Geno Cidecity
Sounds interesting on a number of levels but we all know it's no heiankyo alien *resets the heiankyo alien event clock*
 
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