Just when I think my love for the work of Hamster Corporation has peaked, the team goes and finds a whole new level. Arcade Archives is doing the good lord Hatsune Miku’s work in preserving a whole bunch of arcade games that the rights owners either can’t, or see little value in. Now, the team is turning its attention to…
Hamster’s Arcade Archives is doing important work in preserving classic arcade games that most other publishers wouldn’t bother with. Even when the licensing is straightforward. Take Bandai Namco, for example. Pac-Man is a game that the company finds worthwhile to preserve, because it’s iconic, continues to sell robust numbers of…
Snow Bros. Classic Collection is a misnomer, as the classic Snow Bros.…
Android-based consoles, such as those Anbernic produce, are made for an application…
I’m a big fan of itch.io for the freedom and open platform that it allows for developers to be creative, experimental, and directly canvas the audience for feedback for games that are not yet ready for primetime on Steam and its ilk. In addition, itch.io allows you to be transgressive,…
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The Dee Dee Zine is a magazine for people who love games, music, film and art from Asia and independent artists. Every month we produce a magazine filled with essays and culture… and have we got a cracking issue for you this month! In the May 2022 magazine: – 13…
Read MoreNippon Ichi is at its best when it is at its most inscrutable and inaccessible. The more heavily a NIS game’s humour leans into a surrealistic anime-style over-the-top tone (whether for comic effect or otherwise), and the more numbers the game can throw at players, the more they tend to…
Read MoreWe’re just about to dig into the second NIS Classics volume, but NISA has announced the release date for the third volume in the series. Prinny Presents NIS Classics Volume 3: La Pucelle: Ragnarok and Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure is a mouthful of a title, but it launches on August…
Read MoreIn 2022, the view of retro gaming is almost always tilted towards classic console systems, leaving the computers that were for many of us foundational aside as mere curios. That’s a huge shame, because it ignores a rich trove of gaming history, creativity and innovation. If you’re talking all three…
Read MoreIt’s the Game Boy’s birthday this week. It was released in Japan on April 21 back in 1989, and remains one of the all-time great consoles, both in terms of the games that were released on it (so many are still highly playable to this day) and the impact that…
Read MoreI’m finally back into streaming after really struggling to find any time to do anything. I thought a retro game that I’ve always wanted to play (but never have) would be a great place to kick things off again. So here we go! This is the first hour or so…
Read MoreTaito Milestones is undeniably cynical. The publishers have the gall to claim that it is a compilation of some of Taito’s most important historical work, and yet there are some absolutely massive, glaring omissions in the library. More than that, though, it’s disappointing that one of the best retro arcade…
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Once upon a time, before BioWare announced itself to the world with Baldur’s Gate, and long before Atari got the rights to Dungeons & Dragons and then all but buried the iconic property (in terms of video games, at least), there was a company called SSI. SSI was perhaps better…
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In 2013, developer M2 and Sega began releasing a series of 3D-enhanced ports for the Nintendo 3DS in Japan. Later that year, this series was localised for North American and European markets. The project caught people’s attention immediately, because M2 are known to be emulation experts, and rather than just…
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