showing 6 games
| name | publisher(developer) | year arrow_downward | description | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gradius III | Konami | 1990 | [142]*** [111]*** [49]*** [33]*** [17]*** [22]***Japanese version [63]***Japanese version [52]*** [37]***Return as the pilot of the Vic Viper starfighter to battle the onslaughts of the Bacterion Empire. Blast through 10 action-packed levels in space, destroying everything in your path. Customize and power up your ship with weapons and upgrades including speed-ups, missiles, lasers, options, and shields.***Konami's first Super Famicom experiment - and what a game it turned out to be! A loose conversion of the frustrating coin - op, Gradius 3 manages to squeeze in all the levels of the arcade game together with exquisite graphics and thumping sound and compress the whole lot onto a minuscule 4 Megabit cartridge (that 512k folks!) Unfortunately, Gradius 3's main flaw is dreadful sprite slowdown and (to a lesser extent) flicker. Konami's programmers blamed the games lack of finesse on the systems feeble processor (the wholly inadequate 3.58 Mhz 65sc816 - basically a compatible hybrid of the old Rockwell 6502 inherent in the NES), however I suspect unfamiliarity with the new console's hardware combined with established programming techniques were more to blame. That said, I love this game and would much prefer to play it than the slowdown free conversion of SNES Parodius (serious shooters rule.) If you can find it, buy it. [Andy Laggan] | labelimagesubject |
| Darius Twin | Taito | 1991 | For countless millennia, the space tyrant Belser and his cosmic marauders have terrorized this once peaceful galaxy. Now, no sector remains safe from these stellar mercenaries and their evil empire. The Galactic Federation has finally called on two of its ace pilots and their sleek Silver Hawk warships to do battle with Belser's malicious metal menaces and reclaim the beloved planet Darius. Climb into the pilot's seat for a solo mission against Belser's forces; or engage the enemies with a fellow Federation pilot in a two-player simultaneous team attack. The future of the galaxy rests on the success of this perilous quest.*** [22]*** [52]*** [32] | labelimagesubject |
| Flying Hero | Sofel (Sting) | 1993 | labelimageminimize | |
| Plok! | Pickford;Software Creations;Tradewest (Tradewest) | 1993 | labelimageminimize | |
| Doom | Ocean (Sculptured Software;id Software) | 1994 | Go to Hell and back in DOOM, as you battle through 59 levels of infernal action. Use pistols, chainsaws, shotguns, chain guns, rocket launchers, plasma rifles, and the BFG-9000 to blast demons, mutant spiders, possessed marines, and other creatures of the night. With a higher framerate and ambient light sourcing, DOOM has never looked better. Take a trip to Hell and keep the demons from taking over the Earth in DOOM.*** [46]*** [32]*** [29]*** [27]***There are conflicting reports about development of Doom for SNES. John Romero says Sculptured Software developed it completely in secret and brought a finished product to id. However, multiple witnesses in print describe a SNES version [i]being developed[/i] at id software. Id mainly developed their version on a NeXT 68k system the used and Apple IIgs to compile the code. Sensible to efficiently produce optimised code since IIgs has much more in common with the SNES than any 68k system; mainly, the IIgs and SNES use the same CPU. It is clear that there were two versions and that id's in-house version was scraped when Sculptured Software (Randal Linden) presented their's. [s]On the other hand, one wonders how Sculptured Software managed to do such a good job with the doom source code (which was still proprietary at the time) if it was done secretly[/s]Randal Linden rules. Well, Randal Linden has set the record straight and proven it by releasing his source code (or, a version of it). He set about _creating_ Doom for the Super Nintendo. Not having access to any version of Doom source code required him to resort to publically available information and study of the DOS version directly. He quickly realised he'd have to use the SuperFX2 to have a chance of success. Basically, Doom required too much math for the SNES cpu. He didn't have access to a SuperFX2 development kit (there never was an official one?). So he created that too using an Amiga with a modified Star Fox cartidge wired in and SNES controllers adapted to the paralell port. He made cuts and clever hacks to force decent performance from the SNES and SFX2 chip. Some things that were rendered and calclated as needed for most versions had to be pre-rendered and pre-calclated for the SNES. This contributed to the filling of 16Mbit of ROM in the cartridge and some levels had to be removed. The SFX2 chip was incapable of seeing more than 16Mbit (this would later be overcome, but not by Linden nor before SNES Doom's release). Linden's version includes SNES Mouse support (which should work) and XBAND support (which would have worked). References in the source are made to the Super Scope but support was appearently not actually implimented (or removed from the final version). | labelimagesubject |
| Cannondale Cup | American Softworks;Life Fitness;CEG (Radical Entertainment) | 1994 | The various versions were released variously as Exertainment Mountain Bike Rally, Mountain Bike Rally, and Cannondale Cup. Some versions allow for the use of an exercise bike peripheral. Some version alter the names of tracks and players, but are otherwise identical. Except only the versions published by Life Fitness seem to support the exercise bike peripheral. The races take place in a realistic timescale, 10 game minutes will get you ten minutes of exercise in the real world and cover [i]about[/i] the same speed and distance as the player could go in the real world. Powerups will slightly alter the speed-distance realism. | labelimagesubject |
