Category Archives: Famicom

Retro gaming store in Japan

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So today I took another trip to the Super Potato store in Akihabara. This time I spent hours just looking through all the retro gaming goodness they had to offer ^_^ And on the way to the store I took the opportunity to drop by a couple of arcades, like this one:

So here’s a couple of things you could find in the Super Potato store:

Famicom games, 4 shelves (only 2 are in the picture) all organized in alphabetical order.


On the opposite side just as many shelves with Famicom games in original boxes, all in really nice condition.

Super Famicom games, also 4 shelves in alphabetical order.


Super Famicom games in boxes, super nice condition.

Game Boy games! They also had shelves filled with boxed ones, and lots of GBC and GBA games too ^^

Lots and lots of Game & Watch!! ^_^

Nintendo 64’s that looked like new, came with controllers and all cables for like 2000 Yen (about 170 SEK, or 25 USD) o_O

On the first floor they also had a bunch of Sega, everything from 8bit to Dreamcast ^^

On the second floor they had all the PS1, PS2, comics, literature such as walkthroughs and guides, all soundtracks to games and lots more ^^

I really wanted to buy this Super Metroid book, but I had already picked up sooo many games that I had to stop myself somewhere :/

And of course they had all the machines where you can get little game related thingys like straps and keychains, I got some Mario stuff there ^^

On the third floor they had an arcade, and no regular arcade, they only had old games, 8bit and 16bit, like Pacman, Pac-Land, Donkey Kong, Final Fight, Splatterhouse, Ghost n Goblins, Street Fighter, Metal Slug, Space Shooters and lots lots more. I stayed there for a while and tried out most of the games, a japanese guy wanted to play Final Fight with me and we got quite far. It was a lot harder than on the console version O_o They also had this really cool chair made out of Famicom cartridges glued together! I sure hope those games weren’t in working order, otherwise it would be a waste :(

Also Pac-Land was a lot different from the Famicom version which I have previously reviewed here and re-visited here.

Here’s some pictures of the different arcade machines, especially Pac-Land ^^

Ghosts n’ Goblins

XX Mission

Final Fight

Final Fight Game Over :(

Pac-Land!


Twin Famicom & Attack Animal Gakuen

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It’s working! I’m still in Japan, but managed to connect the Twin Famicom I bought yesterday to the TV in my hotel room.

I’m probably not gonna have time to go through and try all the games I bought for Famicom, but at least I know the system is working ^^

The first game I opened up was something called Attack Animal Gakuen (アタックアニマル 学園) and it kind of resembles Space Harrier. Not nearly as good, but still an entertaining game.


I haven’t been able to try the disk station of the console yet, since I didn’t buy any Famicom Disk games, but I will try to find some of those tomorrow so I can make sure it works completely :)

Look at those cute controllers!!!!

OMG Japan!!

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Retro gaming store in Tokyo Japan. Three floors just filled with retro heaven! This one was only Famicom ^_^

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So many things, I just wanted it all!

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And the prices were reasonable!

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Akihabara, also known as the ‘Electric Town’ in Tokyo. This is where you will find some of the Retro Gaming stores I’ve been visiting today :)

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Here’s some of the things I’ve picked up today. A Twin famicom! A bunch of Famicom games, some Super Famicom and a Sega Mega Drive game (just to see if it works on my PAL system).

Shufflepuck Café for Famicom

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This is a game I’ve been playing quite a lot lately. It’s fun, entertaining, but super hard o_O


You have a bunch of opponents in some kind of cyber-futuristic café (looks more like a bar) where you can battle each of them in a game of “shufflepuck” which resembles air hockey.

The story: “You are the galaxy’s most successful Krypton-3 salesman on the way to close the biggest sale of your career. Your brand new Nash Sombrero has blown a capacitor in the reactor valve. You exit the gravy and coast down into the wrong side of town. Now all you need to do is find a phone and a repair sled will be on its way. The only signs of life seem to be coming from a shoddy structure three doors down and across the street. Opening the door you make your way down a flight of debris-covered stairs. Something loathsome scampers over your feet on its way to the activities below. A shout of recognition is heard as whatever it was enters the smoke-filled room. You stumble into the room and suddenly it’s as silent as the depths of space. Several pairs of hostile eyes, and a few sets of three, challenge you to enter. The only thing that stands between you and the telephone is eight galactic misfits, and obsolete droid and a few “friendly” games of shuffle puck. Relax, if you lose, you’ll earn their contempt. Win, and you’ll earn their resentment.”

All of the opponents are different, they all have different styles of playing and various difficulty levels (where most of them are ridiculously hard, and some even unbeatable!!)

The only easy one is Skip, some kid that just moves in slow-motion when you’re playing against him.

The goal is to get a score of 15 first. There are only 2 or three other opponents that I have even a chance of beating.

This is Vinnie, winning over me.. .>_<


This is Visine beating me..

This is the grim reaper.. or I mean, Nerval (!?)…

Here’s the drunken Lexon getting wasted whenever he scores…

Here’s the General:

Here’s DC3 the Robot waitress with nipples o_O

And Biff with anger management issues.. damn, he really wants to kick your ass!


I did get a few hits in there though.. ^^ pure luck…

And this is Bejin, the worst opponent there is.. she cheats by using the force!!

All in all, an entertaining game which also brings quite a lot of frustration ;D

Here’s a video I put together of the gameplay, the music is quite good :) in between stages that is, during stages you only have the sound effect of the puck bouncing around >_<

Gorbachev’s Pipeline (or ゴルビーのパイプライン) for Famicom

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Yes, it’s a japanese Famicom game featuring the former President of the USSR, Mikhail Gorbachev, and the goal is to lay a pipeline throughout Russia. Each dot on the map represents a stage, and the difficulty rises progressively.

Gorbachev however only appears on the Title Screen.

It’s actually a quite entertaining game if you like puzzle games. It resembles Tetris a bit, except here you have pieces of two pipes in each falling block and you will have to connect a pipeline from the right wall to the left by rotating and placing the blocks correctly.

There are quite a few games that resembles this one, like for example Pipe Dream for Game Boy. However Gorby’s Pipeline has a uniqueness to it. There’s different music on the stages, I only played through the first three, but they were all different. I guess it will start looping eventually. Both the animation and music has a very USSR feeling to it, the japanese have portrayed a very cosy image of old Russia. It makes me think of ballets like the nutcracker and swan lake, snowy landscapes, and of course the old fashioned Tetris.

It was fairly hard though, if you are not used to puzzle games it will take some time to think where to put the pieces. I myself have played quite a few puzzlers and love the genre, but Tetris is always easier. (Unless you’re playing NotTetris2)

Here’s a movie I put together of the gameplay:

80’s gaming day!

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Had an 80’s saturday with my friend and we spent most part of the the day playing NES, SNES and Famicom games ^_^
 

We started off with some Caveman Games for NES, it’s kind of like Track & Field except it’s set in the stone age and you’re cavemen playing various sports that could have been set in that age, like fire starting, dino racing, mate tossing etc..

Mate tossing was quite entertaining ^^  It was kind of hard to figure out which buttons you were supposed to press for most of the sports though since we didn’t have a manual. However most of the games we figured out.. except fire starting >_< but it was a fun competitive game, containing just as much button mashing as Track & Field but more laughs! =)

We also tried playing some Toobin, a Tengen game for NES. It’s about a guy floating down rivers on a rubber ring, collecting power ups and avoiding obstacles such as twigs, crocodiles, fishermen and other enemies that occasionally shoot at you. It’s a fun game, we played through quite a lot of levels before quitting, like a jurassic level with dinosaurs lying around in the river, the Nile where egyptians where shooting at you and an ice level with penguins and icebergs! ^_^

“Game over, Dude!”  :D

My friend also made it further in Time Lord than I ever did. Time Lord is an interesting game, where you play as a futuristic guy traveling through different epochs of time, like the middle ages around 1260 with knights and dragons and then 1800’s etc..

It’s tricky to figure out how to advance. On each stage you have to collect five orbs to continue time traveling, and to find the orbs you have to trigger certain things on each level and these are not always easy to find….

We also played Sunsoft’s Batman for NES, this is a great game =) Lots of different weapons and nice graphics.

I also forced my friend to try Punch Out since she’s never played it, she knocked out Glass Joe and then gave the german Von Kaiser a good match, but then she gave up.

I also got her to try 大迷路 (Dai Meiro) for Famicom. It’s a great game! You basically try to get to the end of a labyrinth, but first you have to find all the chests containing pieces of the key, when you have the key you can go to the exit. Now the hard part is that at every third step you take you loose a heart, so you can’t make a lot of mistakes or get lost. Also there is a map you can look at by pressing select, however this drains 3 of your hearts. So you just have to memorize the paths you took! I actually made it through 5 levels of this game, and I felt really proud ^_^ There are mini games you can find in the maze that can give you objects that help you along your way, however they cost a heart if you don’t succeed. It was Jeewario on Youtube who made me aware of this game, so I thank him for making his awesome videos of recommending famicom games! (you can watch it here).

After this we tried out some Mega Man for Game Boy briefly, mainly just to hear the awesome music! ^_^

LIKE SNAKE MAN!!! =D =D =D

And finally we were at the final event of the evening, the thing we had prepared for and looked forward to. Super Star Wars Trilogy for SNES!

I will make an entire post dedicated to the Super Star Wars game, since it did take us about 4-5 hours to beat it and I also have a lot of pictures. I speed-ran it this morning and finished it in 1 hour 40 minutes so I will also upload some videos after editing.. ^^

Until then!