Come on, do it. How fun is each individual game, how long does each last, how much variety is there REALLY, etc.

Get the damn game and play it. There, I convinced you.

Well - look. Will you enjoy it? I don't know. Frankly, you seem to have very discriminating and modern tastes. That's the impression I get. These aren't modern-day games that just use 8-bit graphics for kitsch stylistic reasons. These are 8-bit games, made recently, with the same limitations, and which blatantly borrow recognizable gameplay elements from older games.

You know those human evolution charts, with the fish, the caveman, etc? Well, the lineup of games in Retro Game Challenge is like an evolutionary chart of NES-era games. The theme of the game is to cheesily recreate the 1980s gamer experience. THe game begins and a head that looks like Dr. Kawashima cackles evilly and says he's putting a curse on you to transform you into a kid from the 1980s, and he's now going to make you play 80s games. You're even provided with a 'best friend' who sits next to you, banters with you a bit, watches you play, and gives you new games and magazines. When you are playing retro games, you WILL hear him reacting to you. He will cheer you on, groan when you die, show surprise when you do something, express boredom. Once or twice I think he hit on me. I dunno. He's weird. And you'll be 'challenged' by the evil Alien Head to do complete challenges in the games. These are not really challenging at all. They're usually easy. REALLY easy. All they're for is introducing you to each game, testing out the mechanics. You'll be enjoying them on your own.

You'll start with a game called Cosmic Gate. It is blatnatly a modification of Galaga. Formations of aliens fly in, you control a ship on the bottom that moves left and right and you shoot the aliens. You play for points. THere are 99 levels, and it's very easy to warp.

Second, you play Rally King. I liked Rally King. You will hate it. It will probably finish RGC for you. You will hate Rally King for two reasons: One, is that while it's ostensibly a racing game, it's similar to Spy Hunter, and I know how youf eel about Spy Hunter. Compounding that is the fact that you will have to play Rally King two separate times. That's right, two of the games in RGC are the same game, with slightly more challenge the second time around.

Next is Haggle Man. It is typical of early platforming games. And when I say platforming, I don't mean "Get to the end of the level." I mean that the level is static (you can scroll left and right, and after awhile it repeats). Your objective is to kill every enemy in a level to open up a door to the next level. You do this by either jumping on their heads, or by using a clever little game mechanic: THere are little doors all over the level, of different colors. You can hide in these doors to be safe from foes, but more importantly, when you open a door, every other door of the same color swings open. Any enemies inf ront o fthem are damaged. You can use this to hit enemies from afar. Seems cheesy at first. In later levels, it's your best friend. This game starts out easy, but it is quite challenging, for all it's simplisticity. I found it brilliant. Later on, you will get a game called Haggle Man 2. It will have identical gameplay, but with larger levels and tons more enemies. I love me some Haggle Man 2.

Star Prince is a shmup game, like Gradius, only you move up instead of left. You shoot enemies that fly at you, as well as ground targets. This game is stupid fun. It is also stupid hard. You will be glad for the cheat code, which will doubtless seem VERY familiar to you. It is also longer and more complex than what you've played up til now.

The last two games are the most technological. One you will perhaps love, the other you will hate. The one you will hate is Guardia Quest. It is a short(er) version of Dragon Warrior II. It's a classic turn-based RPG. Two dungeons, each of which is visited twice. I liked it, you will be bored by it.

The last game, however, is the best. It is a platformer adventure game, of the "get to the end of the level" variety. I could explain in detail, but instead, I'll just say it combines the best gameplay elements from Metroid, Castlevania, Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden and others. It's challenging, even frustrating, but also entertaining.

The thing is, not one of these games would stand up today. The thing is, however, if any of them had actually existed in the years they claimed to, these games *would* have been classics, by then standards, and well-remembered today. That's what it boils down to.

So, I'm thinking for you, probably a no. I got a kick out of it.

Good, I wanted to hear from someone with convictions and I figured it would be you. I get tired of "there's this cool lil' throwback game it's so neaty-neato, but it ain't for everyone!".

While the game is something I find conceptually interesting - despite your assessment that I have modern tastes, I probably spend equal time in the modern and retro worlds - my primary concern was that I would be getting 8 'snippets' of games instead of a genuine collection of 8 classic-esque titles. See, in the confines of a collection I have a lot more tolerance for simplistic concepts like what you described as Haggle Man. All the same, I don't want 8 minigames or 8 games that combine in length to the duration of a single NESer. 8 refined NES games that I've never played before, however, is quite tempting. Star Prince and Haggle Man 3 immediately appeal to me. Then of course the question raised about those is, would I just be better suited playing Super Star Soldier and Ninja Gaiden?

Mostly though, it's the idea of the challenges that draw me. I'm the kind of person that reaches for the reset button every single time I die - I own plenty of games that I haven't finished because I'm not good enough at them and I refuse to use continues. Gradius V, for instance. Or Ghosts to Glory. The point is that I find challenges like "get a high-score" or "clear no-miss" to be quite engaging. I played Star Soldier R for quite a while! Unfortunately it seems your opinion is that these 'challenges' are really quite pointless.

So in the end, your description included some of both my fears and my hopes. I think in reality, I could probably enjoy Haggle Man 3 and Star Prince, possibly the earlier Haggle Men. That just leaves too much questionable content. I'll pick it up for $10 somewhere down the line, and until then, I think I'll continue to relish in Space Invaders Extreme.

Now comes the really hard decision of whether the sequel to that is worth $35.

The games are neither as long as real NES games, nor as short as WarioWare mini-games.

Cosmic Gate has 99 levels, which is frankly too much. You will warp through most of them. Haggle-Man 1 and 2 have 8 levels each (and after you complete them once, you always have to play through a second time, with the difficulty ramped way up).

Rally-King and Rally King SP have four tracks each. Star Prince, I want to say, has four levels (and, again, a Hard Mode). Guardia Quest can be beaten in about 10 hours. Haggle-Man 3 has three very large levels.

The challenges really are negligible. The first challenge in Haggle-Man, as I recall, was just "Bounce on two enemies without touching the ground." The second involves simply using the door trick to kill an enemy. Then again, the last challenge in each game is always "beat the game, by any means neccessary. Rampant cheating welcome."

Given what you've said, I'd conclude you would be much better served by Retro Game Challenge 2. Many more titles, and much better ones, in my opinion.

Don't get your hopes up, though. It's Japan-only, and will stay that way, so sayeth the guy who localized Retro Game Challenge - unless it spontaneously sells another hundred thousand by some miracle. And don't bother importing: One of the games is a text-based mystery game. Enjoyment of that game requires English.

Oh well. :\

Yeah honestly, I had decided not to bother with this game when I noticed there existed a more appealing Game Center CX2. Then of course it became clear that it wouldn't be making the transition between continents, and my attention turned back to the original. Text-based mystery or not, I'm not really much of an importer.