What's On This $10 Handheld 3: There Are More. Blame Ixo.

[ThornGhost]

52 Smart Frog
This is a “step on all the squares once” puzzle game starring a frog and lilypads. There are only 11 stages, but these are some real brainteasers (mostly because it’s not clear what the frog can do—you can’t turn around, but you can jump over gaps). The wiki tells me that the graphics are used from an unidentified Frogger game. (VT3xx original)

I think we need to let the Frog Fractions 2 ARG fans know about this immediately.

 

[Beowulf]

56 Morra
A Rock, Paper, Scissors game, made in the style of a fighting game, and starring Pucca. If you win RPS you get to hit the opponent with a hammer. If you knock out his health bar, you get to swat him away. That’s all there is here. (VT3xx original)

57 Pinball Track
A labyrinth maze game where you need to collect a key and get through the gate. The gimmick here is that this is one of several games made for the Tiltboy (by JugleTac!), and we actually saw this title on the My Arcade Go Gamer (#293), at the very end of my last thread. I’m going to re-link the video of Tiltboy gameplay here.

58 Down to 100
You need to carefully maneuver down 100 rising floors without touching the ceiling (it’s spiked and costs health) or falling off the bottom (game over). Some floors collapse, some have spikes, some have conveyor belts. I think we saw variations of this on the Family Sport; but it’s not on the bootleg wiki.

59 Yakyuuken
A different Rock, Paper, Scissors fighting game; this one is in first person. You get kicked in the face if you lose, and get the opponent’s disturbing, terrible laughter if you draw, which is honestly worse. (VT3xx original)

60 Bingo Zap
Maneuver the marble into the hole while avoiding other holes. Another Tiltboy game that was #291 on the My Arcade Go Gamer.

 

[Beowulf]

61 Dragon Fire
A snakes game where your snake/worm has to collect tomatoes. If you’re like me and can’t figure out where the title came from: It’s because this is a clone of Gamtec's snakes game Fire Dragon, which does actually feature a dragon.

62 Little Plane
Angle your plane to fly as far as you can, avoiding obstacles and the walls. This is another WarioWare minigame clone, of the game Paper Plane. (VT3xx original)

63 Magic Bubble
A Puzzle Bobble/Bust-a-Move clone without much going for it. (VT3xx original)

64 Mister Easter
Catch the eggs that fall from above (in three places). If they hit the ground they leave goop you can slip on. You can also jump and catch them in mid-air. If you get enough at the end of each level (the first level drops 40 eggs but you only need to catch 20, for instance) you go to the next level. The limited number of locations and the gameplay made me wonder if this was a Game & Watch clone, but I can’t find one it actually matches. (VT3xx original)

65 Happy Mice
You need to drop the cake layers down the tubes on each side to feed them to the mice at the bottom. This is definitely a clone of the Game & Watch game Mario's Cement Factory, and according to the wiki, some of the graphics are taken from the Game & Watch Gallery 4 port of that game.

 

[Beowulf]

66 Ball Mania
You can rotate the central white ball as smaller balls come out of the four cannons and get stuck to it, and you need to match colors to remove them. They can get stuck…really far out and the movement is jerky and not perfectly aligned, which means it’s really easy to screw yourself. (VT03-09)

67 Bake Pancakes
Hey, that’s totally Cooking Mama! You need to flip the pancakes once and remove them when they’re perfectly cooked. You get -2 points for removing a pancake too early, +10 for getting it correct, and you get a game over after 9 pancakes burn. This is also called Baking Fun, and I think we’ll see that version later. (VT03-09)

68 Quick Move
Press the button to move the flappers down so the rolling marble can pass. Mess up once across any of the ten flappers and it’s MISSON FAILURE. This was hacked to make Ball Slider. (VT03-09)

69 Grass Cutter
In limited time, clear all the grass. Rain clouds come by and regrow random patches. You can go over spaces you’ve cleared before (it would be impossible otherwise). Apparently there’s a very similar game called Lawn Purge that was made by JungleTac’s “unknown developer;” it’s unclear whether that’s a hack or a clone. (VT03-09)

70 Farm Pinball
The original version of the pinball game we saw as Go Soccer (#50). Functionally, it’s identical. In both graphics and sound, the soccer version was cuter. (VT3xx original)

 

[RT-55J]

Grass Cutter reminds me of the fact that there was a homebrew Lawn Mower game released a decade or so ago that's actually pretty good, all things considered:

 

[Beowulf]

71 Monkey N Fox
The Pooyan clone we first saw as Homeland Defense (#25). In this version, the balls the foxes throw go in arcs rather than straight lines, and I think your shots move more slowly.

72 Birdie Nest
Another Tiltboy title; this was seen as #292 on the My Arcade Go Gamer but that version had a pelican instead of an Angry Bird. You’re balancing the bird (and get a game over if it falls) and have to catch the eggs while avoiding the poops. Catching enough eggs gets you to the next level; catching too many poops depletes your lives.

73 Peg Sweeper
Another copy or version of Dangerous Zone (#28). The frame layout is different but the game is pretty much identical. I can’t find this title on the wiki either; I’m wondering if we’ll see it again.

74 Ogreish Flower
As recolored Kirby, you need to avoid getting too close to the piranha plants and collect all of the other flowers. This is a clone of Zeek the Geek. It was hacked into Canyon Raider and Sprouts Adventure, both coming up. (VT03-09)

75 Take a Smile
You need to take well-timed photos of the (identical) women in cars passing by, but avoid taking pictures of the angry women. Halfway through the time there will be a “Speed up” message and the cars come twice as fast; when time is up you get a high score and the game resets. The women wink at you if you take a good picture, but this still feels like a really creepy concept. (VT3xx).

 

[Beowulf]

76 Gear Race
This is a top-down “racing” game, but you actually get points for nudging other cars off the road so they explode. (You can bump other cars all you want, but going off the road destroys your car and you have limited fuel.) Another Tiltboy title, originally called Runner Car. Numerous VT09 hacks of this were created, including Gear Race, Racing Boat, Road Bumper, Speedy Way X, and Truck Race. It looks like as many as four of them are coming up later on this device. Runner Car itself was #200 on the My Arcade Go Gamer.

77 Road Star
You need to hold the button to charge up force for a jump and land the car on the piece of broken road. I think something happens if you land five jumps in a row, but I couldn’t manage that. (VT03-09)

78 Block Flying
This is a clone of the puzzle/shooter Quarth (aka Block Hole). You shoot blocks up to clear the various shapes; and as you can expect, it’s clunkier than the original. (VT03-09)

79 Puzzle Park
This wasn’t on the wiki. It’s a memory-matching game; you need to move around your character (who I think might be from a Harvest Moon game?) and uncover the green squares to find matches while avoiding the scorpion.

80 MR. Mosquito
You’re a hand holding bug spray; in each round four mosquitos appear and you need to spray the one who isn’t wearing a gas mask. It’s functionally a whack-a-mole game. (VT3xx original)

 

[Beowulf]

81 Let’s Go
This is a clone of Door Door, where you need to open the doors and then lock them when the monsters wander in. Despite being prettier than the original, the hitboxes are weird and it’s not clear what’s an obstacle, and it gives GAME OVER when you take a hit even if you have lives remaining. The main character looks like a stolen Toad sprite (possibly from a Mario & Luigi game) wearing a Santa hat, and the enemies are replaced with Goombas and the Dr. Mario Viruses. (VT3xx original)

82 Elfland
There are three colored pipes and three colors of enemies: If you stand on a pipe you change color, and you can kill enemies you share a color with. (Touching a different-color enemy kills you.) When you kill an enemy they turn into a ghost, and touching the ghost turns them into a fruit (worth points) or a power-up, like a clock that freezes all enemies. Other enemies spawn as you defeat the original set, and eventually you’ll kill enough to move to level 2.

Apparently this is a clone of the 1992 game of the same name that uses the same graphics as the original; according to the bootleg wiki it is not based on the same engine, and was ported from scratch. It is unknown if JungleTac's version was a licensed port or not. (VT03-09)

83 Golf
The wiki calls this “A rather advanced golf game.” It has all the usual trappings: Chose your force level to get the ball to the green, then there’s a different set of graphics for putting. (VT3xx original)

84 Fishing
And this one is “A rather advanced fishing game.” You need to cast and drag the line to the glowing spots on the radar and wait for a fish to bite, then there’s a different mechanic to reel it in. (VT3xx original)

85 Dart
'Cause if they were curious, they would've asked questions. You know? Like, "Have you played a lot of darts, Ted?" To which I would've answered, "Yes, sir. Every Sunday afternoon at a sports bar with my father, from age 10 until I was 16 when he passed away."

A fairly basic darts game (the hand drifts around, time the location and the force to hit the bullseye) with a select screen and a bunch of variations. (VT3xx original)

 

[jpfriction]

While that was a fun scene, I feel like I’ve played the equivalent of a few years of sunday afternoon’s worth of darts and I’m still pretty terrible.

 

[Beowulf]

86 Basketball
A very simple “basketball” game which is just doing free throws from three locations (that rotate through) with a power meter you need to time. The wiki says that some versions have a title screen that uses graphics from Sonic Pocket Adventure; mine doesn’t have it. (VT03-09)

87 Golden Arrow
Time your shots to hit the target. This is a clone of an event from Track & Field. (VT03-09)

88 Dart Champion
Oddly named, because you’re doing skeet shooting with what’s obviously a gun. No darts appear at any point. This is also a clone of an event from Track & Field. (VT03-09)

89 VS. Football
A top-down soccer game. It plays similar to Pong but you need to press the kick button to actually hit the ball or it’ll just roll through you. You need to score enough goals on the strange cat goalie to move up to the next level, but you only have three hearts and lose one when you miss a kick. (VT3xx original)

90 Mini Golf
Exactly what it sounds like, it’s a selection of short mini golf holes with an isometric perspective and bare-bones play mechanics. (VT3xx original)

 

[Beowulf]

91 Hot Racing
This is a shoot-em-up, not a racing game at all! You need to shoot the other cars to destroy them and get power-ups, and you can move freely around the track. (Trying to ram another car, or even clip them, will destroy you both.) Some cars shoot back, and those cars tend to come in big waves together. Fortunately, you have a health bar so you can survive a ways while you figure out the rhythms.
The wiki notes that it’s similar to Spy Hunter, but only in broad strokes. (VT3xx)

92 Space Castle
This is an obvious clone of Space Invaders. You’re shooting at blobs instead of bugs at a…carnival, I guess? There are powerups, but only the clock seems to do anything. (It freezes the enemies for a few seconds if you shoot it.) This was hacked to create Colony, which is upcoming. (VT03-09).

93 Beat the Bird
The title implies there only one bird. It looks like a whole bunch of identical birds, but maybe they’re all somehow the same bird. Clones? Alternate-universe versions? Time remnants? Possibility trees that you’re pruning with each shot?

Anyway, you have to shoot them. You have three lives; you’re trying to reach the “goal” number of birds shot in the time limit, and the birds have wonky hitboxes. I know, I complain about hitboxes not matching sprites a lot with these games, but it really is an issue! (VT03-09)

94 Ant & Bee
This was originally created for VT03-09 as The Night, which will get to eventually. In this case, you’d think you should be shooting the bee, but no, just the orbs, and some things that pop out of the orbs are powerups but some are still hazardous and it’s not terribly obvious which is which.

95 Night Wings
JungleTac apparently made a VT03-09 licensed port of the Konami game Scramble, then hacked it into this. It’s a primitive horizontal shoot-em-up that looks vaguely like Gradius but is new to me. And I’m pretty sure I’m missing something critical about how it’s played, because I ran out of fuel quickly and couldn’t get more.

 

[Beowulf]

96 Skies of War
JungleTac made a VT03-09 clone of the rather primitive arcade game Depthcharge called Sea War, and hacked that to create this. You’re in a helicopter shooting down at the planes, tanks and soldiers who are running by and shooting up at you. I first think of Air-Sea Battle for the Atari 2600 whenever I play anything like this.

97 Submarine War
A Battleship game. You get to keep taking additional turns as long as you keep hitting, which I don’t remember from the classic game, but that combined with the handicap the computer gets (there are “islands” filling some of the squares of the opponent’s board, so you have fewer places to try) and the fact that the enemy AI is really stupid makes this easy-breezy. (VT03-09)

98 Hunting Madness
This title isn’t on the wiki, but I think it’s a hack of Beat the Bird (#93). The birds are small and the graphics are different, but the gameplay is identical.

99 Sea War
Oh, hey, that’s a fast turn-around. The same game as Skies of War (#96), just with submarines.

100 Sky Mission
A clone of Astro Robo Sasa, the game where you have to shoot down to jump up, starring some sort of big-nosed prospector dude. And it continues the trend of being an obvious clone that’s worse than the original.

And that’s lucky number 100! We’re still at 93 non-copied games, which seems pretty good.

 

[Beowulf]

101 Fruit Rotation
A clone of Fruit Fall, featuring the same gameplay: You rotate the screen to make the colored beads fall to the bottom, and try to link up all of the matching ones so they disappear. (VT3xx)

102 Fun Craw
A sorta-kind simulation of a claw machine, because while there’s limited time, there’s unlimited “grabs” and the claw successfully picks up everything you aim it at. Thereby defeating both the point and the staggering frustration of claw machines. And the title is clearly intended to be “Fun Claw.” (VT3xx)

103 Air Circus
This is a different hack of Firefight Bro, a clone of Game and Watch Fire, that we first saw as Spring Bros (#43). In this case, two lions in tutus must bounce all the clowns across the circus. The wiki notes that Air Circus uses a custom graphic of Circus Charlie based on the arcade machine's artwork.

Side note: This is where my first set of batteries ran out! Think I’ll be able to finish this project on the second set?

104 Imp and Cubes
First off: False advertising; this doesn’t contain any imps nor any cubes! It’s a puzzle game where you control the two Casper the Friendly Ghosts (Caspers the Friendly Ghost?) and fire whatever colored shape they’re holding from both sides at the same time. If you link up three of the same shape they disappear; enough matches lets you go on to the next level. (VT3xx)

105 Juggle
Press left and right to wiggle the clown’s hands whenever the ball gets close to juggle it. The ball explodes if it hits the ground. This is a clone of the Game & Watch game Ball. (VT3xx)

 

[Violentvixen]

False advertising; this doesn’t contain any imps nor any cubes!

Well that's silly.

 

[Beowulf]

106 Hide and Seek
A “shell game” with sheep hiding in one of eight haystacks. I think the sheep is specifically Shaun the Sheep. The bootleg wiki thinks this might be a modified Lonely Island minigame, but I can’t say either way. (VT3xx)

107 Move Fun
Another variation of the match-3 game we saw as Fruit Fall (#53).

108 Happy Farm
A clone of the Flash game Happy Pill. You need to line up the carrot and fire it on a diagonal, then hit all of the rabbits with the carrot as it bounces around. Hitting them makes them blush, but if you hit the same rabbit too many times you lose. (VT3xx)

109 Pair Up
Originally made as Pair Memo (which is coming up), this is a hybrid of Tetris and memory card-matching game. The bar fills to indicate your time until more cards are spawned from the bottom. Matching two cards removes them and enough matches clears the level; the game is over if the cards reach the top of the screen. (VT03-09)

110 Dream Bubble
This is another Tetris clone, which is apparently coded differently from Magic Diamond rather than being a hack. An octopus spits the pieces at you, which is cool. There are also bombs that you can use to destroy pieces if you get desperate. The game features a "special mode" which turns the screen upside down, something we last saw on the Pro 200. (VT3xx)

 

[Beowulf]

111 Jewel Quest
This title doesn’t appear on the wiki, but I figured out that it’s a hack of a game we’re going to see later called Lucky Lawn Mower. You’re in a lawnmower/tank thing and need to clear the grass and collect the gems, but the rocks will fall from above and crush you if you cut the grass below them and don’t move out of the way. I feel like I should recognize the mechanics, but it’s not coming to mind. It’s sort of like Lode Runner or Flappy, but not quite? (VT03-09)

112 Closed Shell
Click on a shell to open or close it, and also swap all the surrounding shells (in a plus-shape). You want to close all the shells in each level. This is a clone of the classic puzzle Lights Out!. (VT3xx)

113 Blox World
This was apparently originally created as Happy Diamond, a clone of Puzznic with a Christmas theme. Then apparently it was hacked to remove the Christmas theme and create this...so it’s just a Puzznic clone. (VT3xx)

114 Bounce
You control four paddles (up and down control the side one; left and right control the top and bottom, and they move together) and you need to bounce the ball between them without it going out of bounds. I found this really difficult because the ball heads for a corner immediately and you need to maneuver both sets of paddles right off the bat. (And no, I don't know why the paddles are candy canes; maybe this was also from some kind of Christmas-themed collection at one point?) (VT03-09)

115 Mystic Totem
A Tower of Hanoi puzzle game with an increasing number of rings, and you need to move them all to the indicated totem. This was hacked to create Move It, which it doesn’t appear we’re going to see. (VT3xx)

 

[Beowulf]

116 Build up Road
This is a clone of Pipe Mania with a few graphics changed. Consistently this is one of those games that would work better with a mouse. Also…they’re clearly pipes. They just put in a truck of some sort to be your pointer. You’re not building any roads. (VT03-09)

117 Pile the Box
The treasure chests (that graphic looks familiar, maybe an edit of the Kirby Squeak Squad chest?) swings back and forth and you press the button to release it, and have to build a stack. When you get high enough the stack starts swaying to make it more difficult, and if you miss you can knock the second box off the stack, too. You get three misses before Game Over. (VT3xx)

118 Brains Diamonds
A platformer puzzle game. You can jump the cube straight up (through platforms) or roll it to the side, but you can’t jump over obstacles, and you need to get every coin before you go to the star (exit) block. (VT3xx)

119 Sudoku
A sudoku game, apparently different from JungleTac’s Number Quest, which I don’t think we’re going to see but I’ll keep an eye out for. Sudoku remains a pain in the butt without a mouse (or pencil—I first started doing them in the newspaper and I still prefer that). (VT3xx)

120 Ball Slider
Oh, we’ve seen this before. It’s the flapper game we saw as Quick Move (#68).

 

[Beowulf]

121 Pool Quiz
Basically a “step on all the squares” puzzle, in that you need to flip all the gray tiles to pink within the limited number of moves. The very first level requires you to step off onto the green and then back into the starting tile, which is amazingly unintuitive and a lousy tutorial to boot. (VT3xx)

122 Garden Weeder
This is a new take on a “step on all the squares” puzzle: You need to choose the right starting space and then maneuver the mower to cut all the grass without going over any spots twice...and you can’t stop going in any one direction until you hit something. The raccoon creatures (the wiki thinks they’re the Pokemon Bibarel) function as rocks. The wiki also notes that the cow in the bottom-left corner is Otis from the movie Barnyard. (VT3xx)

123 Right Spot
You have one open spot and have to get the fuzzies into their correctly-colored rings. The version of this with dogs from the Family Sport was better. (VT03-09)

124 Find the Way
You need to set the bridge in the right place so that the chicken, who’ll take every available turn, will reach the egg. Why am I blanking on the name of the classic game this is based on? It was one of the stage-end bonus games in Super Mario Land 2. (VT3xx)

125 Secret Bottle
Rotate the balls within the brackets to match the setup shown to the side. According to the wiki, this is apparently the same concept as JungleTac’s game Fish Quiz, which is coming up. (VT3xx)

 

[Torzelbaum]

Why am I blanking on the name of the classic game this is based on? I

Do you mean Japanese lot-drawing / Amidakuji / Ghost Leg ?

 

[Beowulf]

Do you mean Japanese lot-drawing / Amidakuji / Ghost Leg ?

Amidakuji! That's the stuff!

 

[Kirin]

(the wiki thinks they’re the Pokemon Bibarel)

The wiki is absolutely correct.

Also it's weird that the same irritated/blushing rabbit sprite is showing up in multiple games. I feel like there must have been some farm-themed collection that shared some assets that some of these are coming from.

 

[Beowulf]

126 Sprout’s Adventure
Another hack of Ogreish Flower (#74), the clone of Zeek the Geek. In this version, you play as a Pokemon Trainer (potentially from Pokemon FireRed) and try to collect flowers while avoiding piranha plants.

127 Firefight Bro.
And finally the original Firefight Bro., which we’ve seen twice before starting with Spring Bros (#43). This version uses Mario and Luigi with their mustaches removed as the main characters, catching helmet-wearing Marios from Wrecking Crew '98.

128 Flying
I’m not quite sure why it’s called “Flying”, you’re sliding a square in a Labyrinth-style puzzle; you continue in one direction until you hit something and need to reach the red square without going off the side. (VT03-09)

129 Lucky Lawn Mower
The original of the game we saw as Jewel Quest (#111); the graphics here are a little more primitive and I think the level designs are different.

130 Garden Maze
This is kinda neat—it’s a klotski puzzle that people are slowly walking across, and you need to arrange the tiles so they can reach the exit. I’m reminded a little of the board game Labyrinth. This was hacked to create Puzzle Quest. (VT03-09)

 

[Beowulf]

I'm going to be traveling all weekend, so you're getting the Saturday post a little early:

131 Awake baby
A fairly standard slide-block Klotski puzzle, though it doesn’t feature babies; instead it gives you the option of three kinds of farm animals to use as your blocks. I think the meter on the left is a very slow-moving timer; I couldn’t figure out what the fruits on the right do. (VT03-09)

132 Fantastic Farm
This title didn’t appear on the wiki, but it’s clearly a hack of Grass Cutter (#69). The first screen is laid out exactly the same and the gameplay appears unchanged.

133 Winlinez
A clone of Lines, or some variation thereof; you need to move the colored balls to make a line of five or more and make them all disappear, but two new balls appear every turn that you don’t destroy a line. I’ve never seen this exact style of puzzle before; it’s kind of fun. The background music is noteable as a tinny version of “Hello Mudduh, Hello Fadduh!” (VT3xx)

134 Wison
A clone of Gamtec's Wisdom Boy, another puzzle game that I’m not sure I’ve played before. It’s a relatively simple concept, you need to fit the blocks you’re given into the space available, and can move and rotate them to make them fit. Fun if you grok it. (VT03-09)

135 Freak Number
This involves picking the various number tiles in combinations that add up to the number in the upper-left to make them disappear. (Of course, half the time the number is 1-5 and you just need to pick a single tile.) The third in a series of new-to-me puzzle games that are actually kinda fun. It’s a shame they buried these in the middle of the list. (VT03-09)

 

[Beowulf]

136 Fish Quiz
You need to rotate the fish around any one fish to make the pattern match the picture on the side. Similar to Secret Bottle (#125), but clearly not the same game. “Degree” is the number of moves you have available, if that’s not clear. (It isn’t.) (VT03-09)

137 Magic Diamond
A Tetris clone, with the addition of "bombs" that can wipe out bricks. It’s not terrible, but pieces aren’t that responsive and lock very easily. (VT03-09)

138 Puzzle Quest
A hack of Garden Maze (#130), only this time you have a moogle and a penguin walking across ice floes.

139 Happy Diamond
We saw this Christmas-themed Puzznic clone as Blox World (#113). The graphics seem more primitive; it’s easy to believe this was made first.

140 Crazy Hit
An eight-hole whack-a-mole game that doesn’t appear on the wiki, with an odd control scheme: You can only hover over the middle hole, you need to use the d-pad and the B button at the same time to hit a mole as it pops up. I don’t think we’ve seen this exact game before, but I’m curious if we’ll see it again.

 

[RT-55J]

Magic Diamond sounds like a clone of Bombliss, specifically.

 

[Beowulf]

Magic Diamond sounds like a clone of Bombliss, specifically.

It's not quite the same: Bombliss embeds the bombs in certain bricks. This just give you three bombs you can press the other button to activate wherever you put the cursor.

In other news, we’re hitting a block of shoot-em-ups, and then we’re going to have a few solid days of nigh-identical racing games. Get excited!

141 Valiant Rescue
A relatively simple top-down shoot-em-up, and according to the wiki it’s based on the same engine as Bolt Fighter. If the power-ups did anything, I couldn’t tell. (VT03-09)

142 Delta Fighter
Another top-down shooter; this one feels more primitive. I missed a screenshot of this one, unfortunately. (VT03-09)

143 Star Ally
Yet another top-down shooter. This one is clone of Recca. There is an alternate UM6578 version (produced by the "unknown developer") called Space War. I found this noteworthy for the quality of the death explosion animations. (VT03-09)

144 Aero Engine
A horizontal shoot-em-up and clone of Gradius. This one also has an alternate UM6578 version (again, produced by the "unknown developer") called Alien Attack. And this one was originally made for the Tiltboy!

145 Zero Tiger
Another shooting game based on the Bolt Fighter engine; it feels just like Valiant Rescue and has the same useless power-ups. (VT03-09)

 

[Beowulf]

146 Bolt Fighter
And finally, the original! A top-down, scrolling shooter taking place in a desert. Unlike the hacks of this we just saw, this has actually good power-ups (though you lose them when you get hit) and isn’t as insanely difficult right off the bat. (VT03-09)

147 Last Cabra
A top-down shooting game originally made for the Tiltboy. Curiously, the graphics are very close to Zero Tiger but the power-ups and death explosions are the same as Star Ally. I’m guessing the same developers made several of these and just pasted various pieces together.

148 Colony
Another version of the Space Invaders close we saw as Space Castle (#92). The aliens are stars and the power-ups seem to work the same.

149 VR Racing
Originally made as Motor Rally, this is a pseudo-3D racing game similar to Pole Position. Irritatingly, if you hit another racer you don’t explode, you just immediately come to a dead stop and flash a few times. It’s like a character death in an early jrpg. I believe we’re going to see both the original and the other hack, Bump Lorry Race. This is another game where the original was made for the Tiltboy, and I can actually understand why.

150 Big Racing
A top-down racing game on a horizontal track; zoom along the track and avoid other cars as you pass them. If you hit another car, it’ll keep going but you’ll spin out and crash. The blue cars will actively try to hit you. The wiki tells me that in the original UM6578 version, the car drives around a circular track; in the VT09 version (which I have here), the track is just a straight line. (VT03-09)

 

[Torzelbaum]

141 Valiant Rescue
A relatively simple top-down shoot-em-up, and according to the wiki it’s based on the same engine as Bolt Fighter. If the power-ups did anything, I couldn’t tell. (VT03-09)

Those graphics sure took a lot of "inspiration" from Contra.

 

[MetManMas]

149 VR Racing
Originally made as Motor Rally, this is a pseudo-3D racing game similar to Pole Position. Irritatingly, if you hit another racer you don’t explode, you just immediately come to a dead stop and flash a few times. It’s like a character death in an early jrpg. I believe we’re going to see both the original and the other hack, Bump Lorry Race. This is another game where the original was made for the Tiltboy, and I can actually understand why.

That motorcyclist sprite was swiped from the 1991 Road Rash.

 

[Beowulf]

I hadn't caught either of those, but yeah, there's definitely a lot of "inspiration" here. I think our continuing take-away here is that JungleTac is much more willing to "borrow" assets than Nice Code was. (I suspect there have been other instances of copied assets that I didn't catch or comment on, too.)

151 Runner Car
Because it’s been a while: This is the original version of the top-down racing game made for the Tiltboy that we saw on the My Arcade Go Gamer. Numerous VT09 hacks of it were created, including Gear Race, Racing Boat, Road Bumper, Speedy Way X, and Truck Race. (And we saw Gear Race as #76.) In this version you need to collect the coins, and avoid the potholes and other cars. If you hit something, you freeze and blink before respawning.

152 Space Blocks
Another version of the Quarth clone we saw as Block Flying (#78).

153 Speedy Way-X
Another version of Runner Car (#151), this time on a motorcycle and the track zig-zags. (I’m guessing the title is a play on Speed Racer and Racer X? Maybe?)

154 GP Race
The wiki says this is a hack of Road Fighter (rather than a clone) featuring motorcycles. It gives the following history: “The first release of the game was a very basic graphics hack; a more common later version is much more advanced, changing the layout and graphics considerably. A VT09 version was also produced, but it was seemingly reprogrammed from scratch, no longer using any original Road Fighter coding. Was also re-hacked to create Road Hero (UM6578).”

155 Bump Car
A top-down racing game on a broken road, where the player must hop to avoid obstacles. The wiki doesn’t say whether this is also a Runner Car hack, but I’d believe it was, because the jumping is the only thing that really changes. The graphics are basically the same mish-mash they use for all of the racing game hacks. (VT03-09)