The UKFF Retro Gaming Thread

[Merzbow]

This is a very cool little find, it's no wonder that it never made it to full production as it just doesn't work as an arcade title.

 

[FLips]

My mate went to some big retro shop in Leeds and picked me up a copy of Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest while he was there.

The Castlevania trilogy on the NES is a bit of a nightmare to be honest, at least the English versions.
Castlevania 1 is fantastic and once you learn the bells and whistles a really fun game to bash through in one sitting.
Castlevania 3 is supposed to be one of the best games on the console but currently people are selling it for £300+ so it can fuck off tbh.
That leaves you with Castlevania 2 which has everything going for it, it's got great music, the sluggish but competent movement of 1 and then it adds in an open world with multiple paths and light RPG mechanics.
The issue stems from the fact that the English translations got butchered so every NPC in the game gives you bad information or in some cases outright lies to you. The way the map connects makes no sense either. You need a guide to play the game or you will never finish it. It almost feels like a FromSoftware game the way it's so vague and characters are just out to fuck you over. It's a damn shame because with a tiny bit of tweaking to the dialogue and maybe a map system (or better connected map in general) it would be fantastic,

[Merzbow]

1 hour ago, FLips said:

My mate went to some big retro shop in Leeds and picked me up a copy of Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest while he was there.

The Castlevania trilogy on the NES is a bit of a nightmare to be honest, at least the English versions.
Castlevania 1 is fantastic and once you learn the bells and whistles a really fun game to bash through in one sitting.
Castlevania 3 is supposed to be one of the best games on the console but currently people are selling it for £300+ so it can fuck off tbh.
That leaves you with Castlevania 2 which has everything going for it, it's got great music, the sluggish but competent movement of 1 and then it adds in an open world with multiple paths and light RPG mechanics.
The issue stems from the fact that the English translations got butchered so every NPC in the game gives you bad information or in some cases outright lies to you. The way the map connects makes no sense either. You need a guide to play the game or you will never finish it. It almost feels like a FromSoftware game the way it's so vague and characters are just out to fuck you over. It's a damn shame because with a tiny bit of tweaking to the dialogue and maybe a map system (or better connected map in general) it would be fantastic,

Maybe if you ever decide to get a flash cart you could stick this fan translation on it and play 2 that way, it seems to be a really well researched patch, too.

https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/1032/

[Big Bully Busick]

Recently started a YouTube channel which is heavily focused on retro 

 

https://youtube.com/@Wizbitsrandomgaming?si=YgXa0M-KHxdyoDZ7

[FLips]

19 minutes ago, Big Bully Busick said:

Recently started a YouTube channel which is heavily focused on retro 

 

https://youtube.com/@Wizbitsrandomgaming?si=YgXa0M-KHxdyoDZ7

Just had a quick look (I’m meant to be working) and as someone who also scours CEX and retro stores at any chance it seems right up my alley! Will watch properly later, nice one.

[SuperBacon]

11 minutes ago, FLips said:

scours CEX

Went in one yesterday as had time to kill before the bus. They had the GTA collection on PS One for £58!!! 

Is this normal?

[Merzbow]

Yeah, they can price high for retro stuff but generally I see them just under the eBay norm. Don't bother with anything Gameboy related from them though, unless they've actually started to look for bootlegs yet.

[Big Bully Busick]

10 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

Went in one yesterday as had time to kill before the bus. They had the GTA collection on PS One for £58!!! 

Is this normal?

Probably cheaper than what you'd find on ebay tbh

[Big Bully Busick]

51 minutes ago, FLips said:

Just had a quick look (I’m meant to be working) and as someone who also scours CEX and retro stores at any chance it seems right up my alley! Will watch properly later, nice one.

Much appreciated 

[DavidB6937]

Nice one - will definitely be watching some. It's the sort of thing I'd love to do if I didn't hate listening to or watching myself.

[FLips]

Yeah CEX fluctuates up and down with retro. Some things they price high but still around Ebay average, but some other things you'll find for beans. You'll find CEX has a better range of rarities than dedicated stores sometimes because a lot of the time the person selling it just wants quick cash and indy shops don't have the money to just chuck around.
My town has 2 CEXs a minute's walk apart and they get decent stuff in. One had an Atari Lynx the other week, the other had an Amiga mini.

When me and the wife were clearing out some of our more decorative items like Amiibos and the Fallout 4 Pip-Boy edition we sold them at CEX because they offer a decent price.

---

On a side note I ordered a knockoff repro cart of Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse from AliExpress today. It's not something I'm particularly thrilled about but I settled on the fact I'd never own the real thing as the PAL-A version sells for hundreds and thousands. I did have a bid on a region free repro of it on Ebay the other day that ended up going for £78 and then got relisted because the buyer never followed through. I shouldn't have bid on it at all really as I knew AliExpress had something similar for £15 and upon close inspection it's the exact same cart.  Saved myself a lot of money there.
Apparently it works by pressing the reset button to change regions so assuming it works as advertised then it should run 100% like the real thing as it's all on original hardware.

In the mail also is a Nintendo Super Scope and game that I'm excited to play. The game itself doesn't look outstanding but I've only ever known one person own one of these when I was a kid. Weirdly the same house where I first experienced DOOM on PC which his older brother had, and also I was round there once and his older brother called us both in to watch him fight Psycho Mantis on Metal Gear Solid. A lot of good gaming memories round there, but we used to just use the Super Scope as a bazooka when we were playing with toys (that Fisher Price castle with all the knights and catapults and stuff!).

I also (someone please stop me doing this) bought yet another PS1. The model 100X I got as a stand-in a couple of month ago has been more trouble than it was worth. First having to get a dedicated cable to play chipped games in colour, and even with a laser swap it picks and chooses what games it wants to load. I just bit the bullet and bought a 9002 model which aside from a missing gameshark port has all the bells and whistles my beloved 7502 model had. Comes with an official multi-tap too so if I find two more friends I'll be laughing.

Edited April 30 by FLips

[Keith Houchen]

@FLips Do you have a blog or vlog or whatever else the kids watch these days instead of licking lead paint and getting kicked in the head like we did as kids when it was better before woke etc?

Its just your standard of Video Game writing shouldn’t be, and I hope it isn’t, only viewed on here as it should have as many eyes on it as possible. 

[FLips]

4 minutes ago, Keith Houchen said:

@FLips Do you have a blog or vlog or whatever else the kids watch these days instead of licking lead paint and getting kicked in the head like we did as kids when it was better before woke etc?

Its just your standard of Video Game writing shouldn’t be, and I hope it isn’t, only viewed on here as it should have as many eyes on it as possible. 

I don't do anything outside of here. I've said it before but I'm a UKFF exclusive haha. I did do the Twitch thing during lockdown and back in my late teens I used to write for a couple of websites/magazines but like with most things in my life I never pursued it fully. You're not the first person on here to ask me about doing stuff outside of the forum and I'd love to say one day I will but I'm sure I'll always find an excuse!

[DavidB6937]

You'd be perfect for something like Retro Gamer which is the only magazine I actually subscribe to these days. Your writing is superb.

I actually love writing myself but I'm terrible at having the attention span for it.

[FLips]

My PS1 came yesterday and the seller was nice enough to send a couple of chipped games that he didn't advertise as part of the bundle, South Park and Croc: Legend of The Gobbos, along with the advertised TOCA World Tour Cars and Official Multi-tap which are both legit.

I already had Croc in my collection. It's a fantastic game for an early years 3D platformer and if it controlled a little smoother I think might be spoken about in the same breaths as Crash and Spyro quality wise. In terms of people naming PS1 mascots though I think he's deservedly already in the conversation. Cute character, catchy music and lovely bright graphics make up a decent package from the creators of the original Starwing, Argonaut Games. At my request a while back, my crafts-crazy wife made me a little crochet Croc which, if I say so myself, is perfect. She also made me an Ono-Michio from the Yakuza/Like a Dragon games and Mr Drippy from the first Ni-No-Kuni game. I did request a Psygnosis Owl but she's yet to make that after discovering how to make socks.

South Park is a first person shooter, which like the other South Park games on the PS1 (Chef's Luv Shack and South Park Rally) are real stinkers. That's not to say I didn't get my money's worth at the time though as I was South Park mad as a kid, as most my age were during the boom. I had a room full of plushes, figures, keyrings, and other bits. I remember playing this one on a wet november night with my mate after school. We played this, watched The Worst Witch and then went to the local hall that used to do an after-school club with footy and a tuck shop and that.
Even for a PS1 FPS it's rough though. Riddled with fog, sluggish mechanics and what very well could be the most annoying enemy in a game ever with the turkeys. They're the most common enemy and they come at you in swarms gobbling, but it's like the sound team never capped the volume so you get high pitched turkey swarm noises relentlessly. You can upgrade your snowballs by pissing on it and throw farting Terrence and Philip dolls though, so 10 year old me couldn't get enough.

I did some extensive testing on some of my own games too and everything seems to be running spot on. Much faster and full of energy than the replacement launch 100X model I had and so far hasn't had any issues reading and playing discs. It also plays NTSC games in colour without the need to use that Scart cable I had to buy for the 100X so all in all really happy with it. I've never played TOCA so might give that a go at some point but for now it's relegated to the pile under our bed.

My SNES Super Scope came today too and I gave that a go during my lunch. It's a strange thing that I'm not sure there is a comfortable way to hold. It takes 6 AA batteries!
The smaller scope attaches diagonally to the side of the gun and has one of those small circle inside of a big circle gimmicks for more precision aiming. I played 15 minutes and my shoulder and neck were knacking. It seems accurate though and I was aware when I bought it that it would be a thing I'd rarely play and just wanted to experience. I'll give it a better go at some point as I also want to pick up the weird rail gun shooter Yoshi's Safari for it.

Edited May 2 by FLips