With Your Host, Rob Remakes

Tag: Arcade Page 1 of 5

Play This: Annalynn

Annalynn is a few years old now on the PC but I’ve only just got round to it now it’s got a Switch release.

This past year or so has seen a handful of really nice arcade homages make their way on to the Switch so I’ve been feeling a bit spoiled rotten of late, all of them – Annalynn included – have been absolutely gorgeous looking too.

I certainly don’t mind games looking as scrappy as all get out (in fact, I can’t get enough of scrappy or strange looking games!) but I’m certainly not going to complain about something looking too nice either, right? I like pretty games!

Annalynn isn’t the hardest game to pick up either, it’s pretty familiar stuff all told. Jump between platforms, don’t get caught by the nasties, collect all the gems to get to the next stage.

Having spent quite some time with it now, it plays a bit more like an earlier home computer game than the kind of game that started life in the arcade (there’s definitely a bit of the old “imagine if home computers could have matched the look of arcade games more” to it, and that’s kinda nice, really.), it doesn’t quite have the immediacy and flow of a coin gobbler, settling instead for a more sedate and measured pace.

Difficulty wise, it’s tough enough but not too taxing or brutal either. In the words of Goldilocks, “this one is just right”.

Which is a pretty good summary of how I feel about the entire package, I guess — Annalynn is just right. It looks great, sounds good, plays well. That’ll do me.

Annalynn | Nintendo Switch download software | Games | Nintendo
Chills! Thrills! Test your skills! Summitsphere presents… Annalynn from Cruise Elroy!
www.nintendo.co.uk


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Play This! A cracking bunch of Pico 8 remakes for your edification

Pico 8 really is a gift.

I’ll confess I amused myself earlier reading over one of those terribly cringeworthy developer profiles people used to write around a decade ago that positioned Lexaloffle’s other virtual videogame console, Voxatron, as The Future, especially when combined with Also The Future Kinect. Well. That was certainly one future that never happened, bless.

Whilst Voxatron ticks along nicely enough in a post Kinect world, it was its lowkey alternative Pico-8 that videogames embraced wholesale. Turns out developers kinda like easy-ish ways to write games, fixed specifications to aim for, pretty colours and letting people play the end result without too much trouble. Who knew!

Over the past seven or eight years since Pico 8 got thrown out into the world there’s been just so much stuff made, it’s been truly fab to watch. Whether it’s something like Celeste or some of the stuff demosceners wrench out of it, it’s all kinda lovely.

It’s also been a lovely little corner for a bunch of people to go and remake old games in. There’s plenty to be found out there but a whole bunch of recent favourites come courtesy of chum of Punching Robots and all round remaking legend, Minion.

I’m not even going to pretend I’m unbiased here! For the past twenty years I’ve admired the stuff Min’s been quietly putting out there, a bunch of their old Dark Basic (one for the old people here) remakes were best in class by a few leagues and then some. It helps, also, that they’re an absolutely lovely human being.

Min’s Pico 8 remakes seem to have flown under the radar a little bit despite there being a bunch of corkers in there (I’m super fond of Manic Miner, been playing that a bit the past few days but Scramble is the all timer for me) so really, this is just a post to remedy that somewhat because here’s a fabulous bunch of remakes that deserve to be played.

So, erm, go and do that and you can thank me later.

MinionSoft – itch.io
minionsoft.itch.io


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Cataloguing The New Arcade: This is not a drill. New Radian Games alert.

Rhythm Storm then. Holy shit.

Confession time. When Luke (Radian Games) first dropped Joy Joy on XBLIG I was a right miserable sod about it. I was wrong, as I often could be, and it was perfectly fine but for whatever reason, I gave it a right grumpy old write up.

I know, I know. I think it’s well documented that past me was a complete clownshoe of a human at this junction but really, I remember Joy Joy especially because without a shadow of a doubt, Luke’s games are ones I look forward to the most now. Filed alongside Yak and Giles, Hermit Games, Vertex Pop and Pumpkin Games, a new one is a really exciting prospect.

Like most of us who work the arcade beat, we all generally know it’s playing selling games on hard mode so it was no surprise to me when the incredible Devastator looked to be Luke’s final foray into the arena shooter. Getting by in games whilst making this stuff is a tough gig and well, at least Devastator would have been one heck of a game to go out on (The Donlan knows).

So, yeah, getting another Radian arena shooter is one of the nicest and most unexpected surprises. Getting one where even the menu screens look remarkable and the game even more so? Bit rude, really. In all the very, very, best ways.

I can’t wait!


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