![]() While players encountered elves, orcs, samurai, wizards, etc., these fantasy tropes were presented with a unique futuristic flair. The game was set in a cyberpunk metropolis during the year 2050 and followed a crime-noir plot loosely based on the novel Never Deal with a Dragon, written by game creator Robert N. Shadowrun, based on a tabletop roleplaying game of the same name, stood out from its contemporaries thanks to its unique setting and real-time action gameplay. The SNES is fondly remembered as one of the bastions of the Japanese role-playing game, but one of the system’s best RPGs had nothing to do with crystals, medieval castles, or ancient magic. Thanks to critical and commercial success, Star Fox went on to become a long-running Nintendo franchise, but the original game still stands as one of the best - and that includes the un-canceled Star Fox 2. The gameplay highlighting each stage as you piloted the iconic ArWing was reminiscent of 2D shoot-’em-up side-scrollers, but from a perspective that gave the feeling of actually flying the starfighter, which was something console gamers had never experienced before. Each stage also varies in difficulty, with branching paths, making for high replayability. Star Fox’s graphics may have been impressive at the time - they haven’t aged well, as is the case with most games with early 3D graphics - but the reason it makes our list is because it was a rush to play. The action unfolds across numerous stages, each taking place on different planet or sector of the Lylat solar system. Star Fox flipped that, focusing on 3D polygonal graphics and using sprites for additional flair. Generally, the effects the Mode 7 chip churned out were minimal, likely just flashy 3D animations over 2D sprites. But many often overlook the inclusion of the Mode 7 Chip - a small addition that allowed for 3D rendering. The SNES is most often remembered for pushing 2D graphics, especially given some of the most beautiful sprite work ever done appeared on Nintendo’s 16-bit hardware. Unless you want to get the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Arcade1Up system, it’s the best way to play it at home. This is an integral part of what made Turtles in Time so great and why it remains a joy to play. The controls felt smooth and responsive and maintained the speed and fluidity of the arcade version. The SNES version was a minor step down graphically from the arcade version, but otherwise, it was a near-perfect port. Taking up the bandanna of Leonardo, Donatello, Michelangelo, or Raphael along with a friend and testing your mettle against Shredder and a host of enemies plucked from different eras of history was every ’90s kid’s dream. Turtles in Time is, bar none, the best beat ‘em up on the SNES, and potentially the best game the genre has ever produced. That said, there are some games that overcame the trappings of their genre to live on as something worthwhile. ![]() ![]() Even by the late ’90s, video games had, for the most part, evolved past the “beat everyone up and move right,” design philosophy. A product of a time when arcade games were difficult and sought to continuously milk gamers of their pocket change, beat ‘em ups often feel repetitive and flat by today’s standards. ![]() The sad truth is, of the classic gaming genres, beat ‘em ups simply haven’t aged well as others. Of course, Mortal Kombat III introduced new characters and expanded the series’ fiction, but from a gameplay standpoint, Mortal Kombat II was the progenitor for what the series has become today: a pillar of the fighting game genre.įor a genre as emblematic of the late ’80s and early ’90s, it may come as a surprise that this list features just a single beat ‘em up. In hindsight, they were certainly more juvenile than “mature,” but along with games like Doom, the Mortal Kombat series pushed the appropriate-content envelope and made video games appealing to older audiences. In the context of the series, Mortal Kombat II was an important game because it brought quicker gameplay and new combos that would go on to define the way subsequent games series played. The hyper-violent gore was novel, but it also was one of the first game to feel like an “adult” experience. Admittedly, the early Mortal Kombat games have been long-since surpassed in terms of gameplay, but at the time they were something special. The original Mortal Kombat made waves because of its gruesome and theretofore unseen levels of violence, but the second installment made waves because it was a damn good fighting game. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |