23. Lethal Enforcers

(Arcade/Various Home, Konami, 1992)
^Check out that girl on the left. BLAM!
Harry Callahan didn't give a shit. A tired, world-weary homicide detective, Dirty Harry, fantastically portrayed by Clint Eastwood, was an awesome anti-hero. Harry dealt with crime his way and had little to no time for paperwork, bureaucracy or his superiors. Just a tall dude in a geography teacher suit packing a Magnum. That's all the rehab San Francisco scum needed.

Konami's Lethal Enforcers arcade was more than a little influenced by Harry's antics (the title screen is lifted directly from the opening of Magnum Force for a start)
Set in Chicago, one or two players take the role of two law officers who are about to be called to a series of incredibly busy crime scenes. Seriously, Jack Bauer would cry if he had to deal with this situation.

Lethal Enforcers is an on-rails shooter that I am officially proclaiming the re-birth of the lightgun game. With digitised graphics, high violence, a selection of weaponry and the "Reload" feature (shooting off-screen) Lethal Enforcers brought the Operation Wolf rail shooter screaming into the 90's.
The players gun through five crime scenes and a shooting gallery, filling anyone who pops up wearing sunglasses with more lead than a pencil factory. The game is backed with wailing guitars and awesomely funny voice samples "You can't kill me, copper!" Yes. Yes I can. As usual, various innocents feel the need to leap into the line of fire and the players must avoid gunning them down with a big blood splat. Other than that, it's anything goes, rapid fire and background destruction is the order of the day. Like Midway's NARC before it, Lethal Enforcers has a wonderfully republican attitude toward crime.

Say no, or die.

Lethal Enforcers is best played today as arcade emulation or the rare Playstation version. The home versions of the day suffered from grainy graphics and in the SNES incarnation, laughable levels of censorship (Going so far as to change "Drug-Dealers" to "Gunrunners" and "Chinatown" to "Downtown" I swear I'm not making this up) Of course, compared to today's double-screen Time Crisis 4 and fifty-inch HDTV House Of The Dead 4, Lethal Enforcers looks rigid and dated, with the digitised sprites and photograph backgrounds looking antique. Don't let that fool you, Lethal Enforcers was an important videogame and Konami kept lightguns alive and blazing when many had long since abandoned the genre.

-"I don't want any trouble like you had last year. Understand? That's my policy."
-"Yeah, well, when an adult-male is chasing a female with intent to commit rape, I shoot the bastard, that's my policy"

24. Kingdom Hearts

(PS2, Square, 2002)
The Walt Disney Corporation has a crazy reputation. Filled with urban myths and underground whispers, the long running billion dollar franchise specialising in animated feature films and merchandising has been the subject of various rumour due to its history and controversial founder, Uncle Walt himself.
Whilst the Walt Disney corp. it can be argued, have questionable ethics and a dark history, we cannot lose sight of the fact that they are responsible for some of the finest feature films ever made. This legacy, in my opinion, has been tarnished in recent years, with more of their films appearing to be churned out, souless, stereotypical CGI crap. For me, the Disney dream is over.

The idea of Square creating an RPG which hybrids Final Fantasy with Walt Disney and places the cast in a completely new universe is kinda horrible. I can't really see the characters working together well and the idea of an intelligent RPG with such a twee child-friendly cast seems doomed to failure. But I shouldn't have bet against Square.

Kingdom Hearts is a very good action based role-playing game. The player controls Sora, an idealistic young boy who is pulled from his desert island home with his friends to a mysterious series of planets that are under attack from "The Heartless" dark, shadowy and soulless creatures. Sora chances upon two knights, Donald and Goofy, who are looking for their king (Take a guess) This trio team up to search for their respective friends but will quickly become part of a much bigger plot that affects everyone in the colour-drained universe.
Kingdom Hearts is a hack-n-slash brawler, but features an identical magic and equipment management system to most Final Fantasies, along with all the levelling up, story twists, summons and item synching you'd expect from your average RPG. The game features beautifully realised worlds based on various Disney features and has a classically orchestrated music score. The game also features an all-star voice cast and many of the Disney characters have their original voices.

A huge array of hidden items and side-quests await any player wishing to explore beyond the main storyline. These players will be rewarded in kind with special items, weapons and XP. The game has a intelligent but not confusing storyline which occasionally succumbs to Disney cutsey-ness, but not so much to make me vomit or anything. As Sora and friends "lock" each world from further invasion, I personally got a real feeling of satisfaction, but this is probably more due to my OCD than anything else.
Variety is provided with interchangeable characters, an underwater world and a mini-game filled Winnie the Pooh novel. Each world must first be travelled to via a colourful schmup-style sequence, for me these didn't work and were a dull chore to deal with. Cameos from Final Fantasy characters are nice but its odd to hear some of them actually speak. Aerith is not only alive but sounds, no other way to describe it, mentally ill.

The Kingdom Hearts series has created a universe many have fallen totally in love with. Just enter "Kingdom Hearts" into YouTube or DeviantART to be drowned in fanart/fiction and homemade tributes, music videos and trailers. Clearly for many, Kingdom Hearts isn't a videogame franchise, it's a way of life.

Being an RPG, there are far too many features and quirks to discuss than I can fit in here. Kingdom Hearts was a joy to play through and whilst hardcore RPG fans may balk at the idea of levelling up Goofy to do battle with Sephiroth, the less precious of us (or those who are crapper at RPGs) should find Kingdom Hearts a pleasing, exciting and more than satisfying adventure.

Most importantly, The Incredibles aren't in it.
Sold.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(Sadly I must take time out to comment on the fact that Kingdom Hearts II sucks hard. A terrible voice cast, bad script, mismatched worlds, confusing plot and almost complete lack of side quests, tactics and variety make it a button-bashing mess. Apart from its great "Tron" level, it is an insult to the game that came before it. Don't let the superfans fool you, KHII is a pretentious cash-in that loses all the magic and wonder of its predecessor. It's the videogame equivalent of "Aladdin IV: Jafar may need glasses")

25. Another World

(Various Home, Eric Chahi, 1991, US Title: Out Of This World)
Another World was the most sarcastic and miserable comic-book and film memorabilia store that ever existed. There, I got that out of the way.
Another World was also the title of an exquisite videogame designed and developed by Eric Chahi, an independent French programmer who singly handled brought the game about from conception to release.

Another World is a cinematic adventure telling the story of Lester Chaykin Knight,a young nuclear physicist who is thrust into a land beyond all comprehension when the particle accelerator he is working with is struck in a lightning storm. After this intro, the game begins and the player is immediately thrust into control, death can follow mere seconds in if the player doesn't hit the ground running. The terrified Lester has no time to take in his surroundings, from the second he materialises, the fight for survival is on.
The journey will take Lester through a stark, minimalist land where everything is a danger and adaptation is the only course of action if Lester is to survive and hopefully find a way back home.

Another World is beautiful. After being inspired by the Amiga's brave attempts at handling Don Bluth's laserdisc games, Chahi conceived a world of characters created out of vectored polygons, allowing for more depth and colour whilst not taking up as much storage space. The land in Another World is a stark and bare, at once enchanting and terrifying, filled with deadly creatures and bizarre inhabitants. Lester is truly out of his depth from minute one and is battling from each scene to the next, completely oblivious to where he is going or why. Lester doesn't have time to figure out how to get home, he's too busy trying to stay alive.

To match the visuals are mysterious sound effects and an atmospheric and cinematic score composed by Jean-Francois Freitas which matches the on-screen action perfectly. With no HUD and no Earth-based dialogue, the player is expected to rely on his wits and an appropriated laser gun to get Lester through his ordeal. While this approach can lead to moments of trial and error, I believe this is warranted as it truly immerses the player in Lester's situation, where he too has no idea what to do next or what his next step should be. Most games have an arrow or map to point the way. Another World just has instinct.

After a very short, but action-packed adventure, the ending arrives, usually a scant hour into play. To complain about the game's length is to miss the point, Another World isn't just like "a videogame" it's more of an experience, a cinematic tale of a man thrust into a horrifying situation and instantly taking steps to escape imminent danger so he can give himself space to get his head together and figure out what is going on.
He never will though, from the moment lightning hits his lab, a battle against the complete unknown is on and for all his knowledge, athleticism and education, Lester is doomed.

Eric Chahi created a masterpiece and he did it almost on his lonesome. Another World is one of those games that shows how vision and talent, properly applied, can combine to create something very special indeed.
Videogames couldn't be more cut and paste now. We need another Another World.

26. Wonder Momo

(Arcade/PC Engine/Virtual Console, Namco, 1987)
Did you have to put on stage shows at your school? I'm sure you did, I myself was repeatedly forced to construct, paint and wear the world's flimsiest, cheap-ass costumes in order to pretend I was a thundercloud, Shem from Noah's Ark or a Happy Hungarian Hunter. Once, I played the owner of a marionette show who played a flute to make my puppets dance, the harlequin puppet had a girlfriend and there was some other puppet who wanted her, so he jealously stabbed the harlequin to death. At the end, the harlequin's ghost came back for vengeance.
Indeed, my junior school was dark.

Wonder Momo also puts on stage shows. Momo's shows however have far less fatal stabbings and far more panty-shots than any I starred in. Basically, the player controls Momo as she fights off hordes of creepy looking mutants with a physics defying high-kick. After much brawling, she gains her super-powers and becomes the armour clad "Wonder Momo" which allows her the use of the terrifying "Wonder hoop" to defeat some boss or other nasty creature.

Here's the kicker though: this is all a theatrical play. the action takes place on a small stage (The Namco theatre, no less) with a badly painted backdrop and a sparse audience in the foreground watching the action. Momo entertains with the story of her super-hero battles as she is cheered on by the headband wearing onlookers. In a beautifully perverse twist, When Wonder Momo falls down, you can see her panties, some sweaty-ass guy with a camera runs along the stage constantly and Momo must be careful that this dirty nonce doesn't get a Kodak moment of Momo's momo. Should this happen, Momo becomes incapacitated with embarrasment for a short period.

The game simply plays through the show's various scenes while increasing in difficulty. In between rounds, the curtain drops to reveal various pictures of Momo. For a girl who is shy about getting her photo taken, she doesn't appear to mind having a giant half-naked image of herself emblazoned on stage. Girls have such damn twisted logic.

Wonder Momo is an ok game, it rises above its generic gameplay by having a great concept, cutesy art and voice samples and nice presentation. Momo is a cool character who has since made cameos in various games. Like Time Gal's Reika, Momo is a fun and sassy anime heroine whose failure to get her own game since is mind boggling.
Maybe she's still too traumatised by her paparazzi ruined fifteen minutes of fame.
The paparazzi, they kill princesses and crush the dreams of 80's anime girls.

Anyway, I'm off to the Namco theatre, I've got tickets for Splatterhouse: The Musical.
Jack-6's spoken word show was sold out.

27. Rock Band 2

(Xbox360/PS2/PS3/Wii, Harmonix, 2008)
I'm sure you know how rhythm-action games work, so I'm not going to bore you with details of how to play this game. Instead, I'm going to make pithy observations on the concept and legacy of this style of game. Rock Band 2 in particular.

Now, I don't care what you believe, there is NO music experience better than ACTUALLY CREATING SOUND with a REAL instrument. Rhythm-action games make you press buttons in what is essentially a dressed up quicktime event, so that the program plays a sample of someone else playing an instrument. Not only that, but there is no real room for improvisation, just "Play this note at this exact time" There is simply no freedom.
This isn't up for debate, compared to playing a real instrument, rhythm-action games don't even come close.
HOWEVER, this logic could be applied to any game, as a result, pretending to play a guitar is no more ridiculous than pretending to be a footballer in FIFA, a WWE wrestler in Smackdown or a murderer in Modern Warfare. Whilst I'd encourage EVERYONE who enjoys rhythm-action games to at least try an instrument, even if its a frickin' Recorder, I don't think people should be judged with the hoary old "Play a real guitar, loser" cliche.

Rock Band 2 is, in my opinion, the very best of all the rhythm-action games. I'm not talking just in soundtrack, I think it has the best design, presentation, art, character customisation and atmospheric "live gig" venues, crowds and on-stage camaraderie. I think it shits on Guitar Hero in all of the above departments and leaves the Activision trail-blazer looking like The Jonas Brothers to EA's Slayer.
I have spent many hours playing guitar and bass in RB2, with occasional mis-juged forays into vocals (My residential situation prevents me from enjoying the drums, unfortunately) and over the years have gotten very good, but not excellent, at the game.

I have used the character design to create an awesome band of girls who like to gob in your fucking mouth before kicking your mum's face off. I've been playing as Back Drop Driver for so long now they're starting to feel a little too real, almost as if I've watched them build a career, a career miming to other people's songs, but more of a career than my short-lived real life band got, meh..
RB's true glory lies in multiplayer, many hours have been spent bashing along amongst friends with the sound cranked up to eleven. With hours passing by in minutes and chronic back pain and finger cramps, a marathon RB session can leave one feeling truly beaten, especially on the harder songs or higher difficulty level.
The music warrior in me (See entry #64) truly abhors the fact that these games make music so fucking corporate, strict and cliched (Hey kids, buy another shit load of "Punk" songs so you can fight the power on your Sony/Microsoft console in this Activision/EA game) but so little integrity is left in the majority music scene now that this is more a sign of the times than anything else.
The simple fact remains that when it comes to multiplayer experiences for two or more wannabes, euphoric levels of fun can be had whilst simultaneously enjoying some of the finest music to grace the local popular music beat combo hit parade.

Rock Band 2 is the peak of rhythm-action games, I guarantee you it all goes downhill in that genre from here. Guitar Hero have already resorted to crappy compilation packs and desperate grave-raping celebrity appearances. Even the very best rhythm-action gamers are starting to show signs of burnout and boredom and we all know that anything remotely gimmicky in videogames never lasts forever.
So get some friends together and enjoy a few hours of some of the finest team gaming known to man. Also, please consider learning an instrument, because when you play music, I promise you, it's five Gold Stars everytime.

28. Mortal Kombat II

(Arcade/Various Home, Midway, 1993)
MORRRRTALLLLL KOMBAAAAAAT!!! (Cue awful techno music)
Mortal Kombat was my favourite fighter as a youngster, I really appreciated the darkness of the first game and all the guitar-wailing ninjas. I'd never even heard of the infamous fatalities until one day at the arcade I watched this guy (playing Scorpion) take his mask off to reveal a skull then proceed to incinerate his opponent. I stood agape:
"How did you do that??"
"Secret."

It was on.

So I became an avid MK player. Fast-forward to the arcade release of Mortal Kombat II, I couldn't have been more excited. I'd already bought every U.S magazine I could (Ah, those pre-information superhighway days) to gather all the info on the game and its exciting new characters and features. I studied the move lists and learnt the various background fatalities. The big day finally came and a glossy MKII cabinet was installed at my local arcade. It was time for weeks of revision to pay off, for this, was my moment of glory.

I got fucking annihilated.

MKII is, for me, the peak of the series, with beautifully animated, digitised models that are much cleaner than the first game and sit better against the imaginative and spooky backgrounds. MKII is alarmingly paced and fights can be over within a matter of seconds for the player who knows his game. A nice selection of well balanced characters with awesomely wacky background stories do battle armed with an arsenal of special moves and a variety of ways to end the fight. Each character was given two "Fatalities", the infant producing "Babality" and the amusing comedy relief "Friendship" move (which was a dig at the super-violent Mortal Kombat reputation garnered at the senate hearings)

The game has very little structure in the way of combos, with most fights boiling down to fast sequences of moves as opposed to an unblockable chain of hits (though these do exist in some form) As such, it could be argued that Mortal Kombat is far less technical than its arch nemesis, Street Fighter. This is true, but I believe that they are two different types of fighter, SF has more of a precise science in learning your character, whereas MK (at this point, at least) seemed more like a straight up, hyper-speed fist-flying, high-kicking battle to the gory death.

MKII also saw the dawn of the series obsession with Easter eggs, hidden characters and moments to get players guessing "What does that mean? Is it a character? a new move? etc" This gave MKII a real "urban legend" feel, with people to this day STILL claiming they've seen people morph into Goro, the sub-boss of the original.
There is also has a hidden mode which simply turns the game into Pong for a bit. Sold.

Mortal Kombat's legacy is a bit iffy. The games have changed a lot over the years, from 2D scrappers to martial arts based 3D fighters, from crappy spin-offs and TV shows to surreal experiments (Though I will add I'm a big fan of the MK vs DC game) Mortal Kombat has become a crazy parody of itself and much of its charm has been lost amongst its many re-launches, comics, cartoons and less than stellar installments. MKII represents a shining light for the franchise and is one of the few games in the series that still holds up to repeated play today. Mortal Kombat II is fast, violent, atmospheric and addictive. It is a definitive classic.

Stand two steps away from your opponent, Hold Block and press Up twice.
It isn't "Secret" anymore. Bitch.

29. Syndicate

(Various Home, Bullfrog Productions, 1993)
-- Guest writer: Swabbleflange --
I was once in a syndicate. For a couple of years I was involved in a fiercely competitive scheme, gambling on overwhelming odds for the promise of great personal gain. My dreams of fortune have so far failed to materialize, but I still play the lottery in hope.

Bullfrog however, did hit the jackpot with this 1993 release, coming at a time when the studio was well on its way to the pantheon of videogame development. Having established themselves as a creative force to be reckoned with in the shape of their Populous series, the Guildford team turned their attention to a decidedly more sinister concept. Cyberpunk was still a fertile framework to hang a game on, and throwing the corruption of big business and government into the mix served up a vicious treat for fans of strategic action.

As the founder of an ethically dubious corporation, the player has to literally take over the world territory by territory. Moral bankruptcy being a distant second to its financial brethren, this is achieved by sending genetically and cybernetically-enhanced agents into the field to assassinate, kidnap, terrorise and otherwise eliminate all resistance and opposition. As each territory is captured and controlled it can be taxed to provide funds to further the R&D on the team. Weapons, gadgets, enhanced body parts and performance enhancing drugs are all on the menu for the lucky agents. Overly brutal taxation results in the territory revolting, which basically just means that the player has to redo the mission to capture it.

Playing out in an isometric viewpoint, all this technology is put to great use as the squad makes its way to each objective. Though the missions are mostly concerned with killing specific targets, there is a lot of freedom in the approach. Storming in guns blazing can be as viable as a sniper shot from a distant bridge, and there's a lot of fun to be had in simply causing mayhem and destruction in the cities (something that earned the game a little controversial press - flamethrowers and civilians can be a potent mix). The squad can be split up or moved as a unit, and performance tweaked on the fly - though a careful balance should be maintained to prevent burnout.

I always consider the 16-bit computer era to truly be the golden age of innovation in game concepts. Early enough in the industry's life to provide plenty of unexplored avenues and technologically advanced enough realise the ideas found there. Syndicate is just another example of the hard-to-categorise games that were rife in the UK/European software scene through the 8 and 16-bit years. Though it later received ports to various formats the Amiga version is to me the definitive one, and even if it's a little rough around the edges these days there's no denying it was a true original.

I haven't seriously revisited Syndicate since it first came out, but I conquered the world with the help of my loyal agents Ripley, Hicks, Vasquez and Bishop*, and loved every moment of it. The setting, blend of real-time action and strategy, (literal) team-building and a wicked sense of humour ensured it a solid place in my affections and a perfectly remembered gaming moment.

(*What do you want from me?)


-- Swabbleflange's views toward various games are dependent on random factors ranging from the weather to what colour smoking jacket he is wearing. Further fantastic musings can be found at: http://swabbleflange.blogspot.com/ --

32. Chase H.Q.

(Arcade/Various Home, Taito, 1988)
What's your dream job?
There's an abundance of vocations I'd like to have, but more than anything else, I wish I had the balls to make a difference. Last night, I was awoken at 3a.m by a loud commotion. Looking out the window, I see some Police cars, a fire engine and an ambulance. In the middle of the road, a man lies handcuffed surrounded by about five officers, two of which are packing heat. Two more officers then smash the crap out of the front door of the house opposite mine before pulling out a second guy. After all the shouting, banging, sirens and alarms are done, the street is silent again. I've missed out on an hour's sleep, but another prick is behind bars, for now anyway. There is still forensics van parked outside.

Real life crimestopping is incredibly hard. With so much red-tape, i's to dot and t's to cross, keeping the streets safe is a demanding and dangerous role that appears to get more bureaucratic by the day. I don't know how they do it.

But if real-life was like videogames, without a shadow of doubt my CV would be winging it's way to the fine people at Chase Headquarters.
Chase H.Q. has the player assume the roles of Lethal Weapon wannabes Tony Gibson and Raymond Brody as the speed down America's highways in their sexy black Porsche 928. Their job is tracking down fleeing criminals, who are attempting to cross the border and get away scot-free from their nefarious deeds, ranging from murder and drug-dealing to kidnapping and espionage. The player is given sixty seconds to catch up to the perpetrator at which point our heroes hit the siren, the theme music kicks in and the player has sixty more seconds to ram the offending vehicle off the road. The Porsche is equipped with three "Turbos" for a sudden burst of ridiculous speed and guidance on time and direction is available from the overhead helicopter and the gorgeous Nancy, who is operating from the offices.

Chase H.Q. is an absolute blast. The cabinet is super stylised with cool controls and great retro-chic art. The game itself is superbly late 80's, with it's Reagan-esque approach to crime, action movie music and Miami Vice style cops, all pastel coloured jackets, wisecracks and high hairstyles. The graphics are crisp and the roads speed by at an alarming rate, requiring quick reflexes and a steady hand on the wheel. More so than anything, Chase H.Q. is simply hugely satisfying to play. The seconds tick by and the adrenaline keeps flowing, then once the siren starts blaring, it's time to take things up a gear. Literally.

Chase H.Q. is another game that is crying out for a new release. With frame-rates and audio/visuals the way they are today, A modern day home version, done correctly, would be mana from heaven for me.
I'm not a big fan of driving games, they're just not really my thing. The ones I do like usually have some kind of kick to them, rather than just being racers.
Chase H.Q. is a driving game where piece of shit scumbags get busted.
That's all the kick I'll ever need.

Let's Go Mr. Driver...

33. Shadowrun

(SNES, Beam Software, 1993)
It's 1993, I'm still at school and I'm broke, I visit Another World, a local shop that sells pre-owned games, I can only afford to trade in one game and a small amount of money I have. This will be my last game in a while, I better make it a good one, one I'm aware of, in a genre I adore and part of a franchise I'm a fan of.

Sod it, I'm gonna get this RPG I know nothing about and have no previous reference to.

It could of been a tragedy, but the gods of gaming were smiling down on me that day.
Shadowrun is an isometric RPG set in a dystopian cyberpunk future where firearms, technology and magic have combined to create a dangerous and hostile exsistence beneath the corporate skyscrapers that litter the skylines of Seattle. Based on a classic pen and paper RPG, Shadowrun tells the story of Jake Armitage. Gunned down in the streets, Jake awakens on the mortician's slab. Jake is alive, but why? and who wanted him dead in the first place?

These questions and many more await players lucky enough to play through this marvellous but difficult game which combines action-adventure with deep RPG storytelling and inventory management. Jake makes his way through a dirty, grimy underworld where many want him dead and every building is a potential ambush. Fortunatly, Jake is able to arm and protect himself and even hire protection to follow him through the mean streets and subways of Seattle. As the story unfolds, corrupt politics, evil corporations and the art of cyber-jacking will all come into play before Armitage finally faces the truth about himself and his destiny.

Shadowrun is a dark game, with sleazy characters populating an unloving environment. The graphics of the humble SNES convey the locations incredibly well and the game is backed with fantastic, atmospheric music (One of my favourite SNES soundtracks) A keyword based dialogue system allows Jake to learn words that will open doors for him once dropped into conversation with other characters. Usually these doors will lead to certain doom, as Jake can't tie his laces without somebody taking a pot shot at him.
I very much made the right choice that day many years ago, as Shadowrun not only kept me playing long after I could afford another game, but it was good enough to secure a place as one of my favourite games of all time. Further attempts to revisit the franchise have been made and have assuredly failed, but I'm convinced it's only a matter a time. One day the right formula and the right studio will get together and Shadowrun will return with a game worthy of its SNES predecessor.

Hang with the drekheads, but don't go unarmed. Life in Shadowrun is absolute murder.

34. Garou: Mark Of The Wolves

(Arcade/NeoGeo/Dreamcast/Xbox360, SNK, 1999)
Garou: Mark Of The Wolves is the evolution of fighting games to an art form.
The ninth (and possibly final) episode in SNK's Fatal Fury series, Garou takes everything that was good about those games and ramps it up tenfold, whilst eliminating the aspects that had become dated or redundant (such as plain shifting)

Set ten years after the previous incarnation, Garou follows the story of Terry Bogard, who has raised Rock, the son of his deceased arch rival Geese Howard, as if he were his own. Southtown has become a safer place to live, but that all changes when then aristocratic brother-in-law of Geese, Kain Heinlen, opens a new fighting tournament as a roundabout way to become the new crime lord of the city.
Upon hearing of the tournament, a variety of fresh new faces sign up, all with their own reasons for entering, be it intrigue, money or good old fashioned revenge.

Garou is a beautiful game, with gorgeous, wonderfully animated sprites and detailed, intricate backgrounds, it's in game graphics, cut-scenes, special effects and fight intros pushed the Neo-Geo console to its absolute limit and proved that there was still life in the old dog yet. There are a great array of characters that are fine-tuned to perfection, ensuring that Garou is one of the most balanced fighters ever released. A deep fighting engine, known as the T.O.P system, allows the player to decide when and where he is able to perform one of his special moves, choosing to unleash it to get an early advantage, or save it until things are looking grim. These special moves are two-tier, with the strong "S-Move" evolving into the powerful "P-Move" If in T.O.P status, then an incredible T.O.P move can be unleashed, resulting in much whiz-bang flashes and chaotic background effects.

Garou is a fighter's fighter, a game that insists on you learning each and every attack at your character's disposal. Fighting gamers who like to rely on special moves or fireball spamming need not apply, as Garou's basic strike system is designed to be far more effective and devastating, when used correctly. Anyone expecting crouch and HK to result in a legsweep for every character will be sadly disappointed. Garou is a game which rewards players who take it seriously and learn it's intricacies.

Cleary, I'm a Garou fan, after playing on home MVS for many years, I'm also now able to play on 360 (though online competition is sadly hard to find, especially considering the huge lag issues) I'm not great at Garou, only competent, but I keep coming back again and again, no matter how much my ass is handed to me. This is simply because Garou is a joy to play and humbling in its class and style. Garou could be considered the SNK answer to the awesome SF Third Strike, which was released the same year, but in my opinion, Garou has better designed characters and is simply more fun to play (Don't bother complaining fanboys, It's my opinion and I'm not interested in arguing)

Whilst Garou: Mark Of The Wolves isn't my favourite SNK fighter, it's more than likely their very best game and will be played by its fans for years and years to come.
Garou: Mark Of The Wolves rises above most games in the fighting genre, maybe any genre, as an example of what can result from nothing more than a great idea and an absolute commitment to excellence.

"Bootifull Victollllly!"

35. Mutant Fighter

(Arcade, Data East, 1991, AKA: Death Brade)
A real oddity here, you have to dig deep for this gem of poo.
Mutant Fighter is a one on one arena fighter from the dawn of the 90's. One or two players pick a warrior from a list of eight mythical creatures and go into battle, either against each other or in co-op, in order to win control of the entire kingdom.
The characters have no names and are instead referred to by race. Such as Werewolf, Minotaur, Dragon, Amazoness and erm.. "Fighter" and "Hercules"
Hercules and Fighter are apparently races.
You know, when I think of mythical beasts of legend battling to the death, two things spring to mind: Pro-wrestling moves and SLAP BASS!!~~

Mutant Fighter is essentially a wrestling game, super clunky characters dawdle about the trap-filled battlegrounds, their strikes constantly ghosting until they lock up in a grapple, after some hard button bashing, one of the two fighters launches into a vertical suplex, piledriver, neckbreaker or whatever. Until you've seen a blonde werewolf hitting a frankensteiner on a five headed snake, you haven't lived.
All this is backed by wacky music, with some of the most dated synth drumming ever committed to the planet. When a fighter finally falls, his carcass his carried off by this little monk dude and his portrait is hilariously replaced by a skull with a bloody sword sticking in it and the word "DEAD" splashed across it.
Seriously, It's like it was designed by a fourteen year old.

The main issue with Mutant Fighter is its insane level of difficulty. The fights begin with some awesomely useful Engrish tips, such as "Danger when he dashes, or is apart." Thanks, now I truly have the upper hand. A true credit eater, Mutant Fighter's controls and attacks are so clunky and useless that grappling is the order of the day. The only problem is, the CPU is really stingy on the grapples and no matter how hard you mash, it will, in most cases, only allow you one move to its three. You also have a "Super Throw" which the computer will allow you to do, but generally only AFTER it has performed its own.
You will get the crap kicked out of you as you play Mutant Fighter. It appears to be part of the programming. At least it sounds ace while doing it, the fighter's even shout hilarious quotes to each other like "I will mash you!" and "Feel the authority of my horn!" (I'm saving that one for my next real-life fight)

People like to argue about which is the most "Hardcore" fighter. Let me tell you something, I played Mutant Fighter whilst on holiday in 1992, I took on a series of opponents who then watched as I battled the computer, hammering the controls in a desperate attempt to make them work for me and my Golem guy. This kid watching suddenly goes "Oh..crap." I look down and the control panel is splashed in blood. In my SUPER THROW~ induced craziness, I had sliced my finger open on the base of the joystick and been playing for the last five minutes with blood pouring down the cabinet.

I know Hardcore. Hardcore is blood and slap bass.

36. K.C. Munchkin!

(Odyssey/Videopac, Ed Averett, 1981)
Look at this game's title. k.c. munchkin... K.C. MUNCHKIN!!
Surely you're sold already? but if not, here's some more info. Way back when, Pac-Man ruled the videogame roost but had yet to be ported to home consoles. Back then there was very little in the way of copyright law in the wacky world of gaming and many arcade classics were shamelessly ripped off by small companies and rush released to the various home consoles of the time. K.C. Munchkin! changed all that.

Munchkin was a Pac-Man clone with a few cool differences and even a maze editor. Atari had the rights to produce the first home version of "Pac-Man" itself, so when they saw a game so incredibly similar to what they thought was going to be their cash cow, they sued the pants of Phillips and the furry Pac-Man wannabe found himself in the dock, like a common smack dealer. It took several months and two judges, but Atari won out and production was stopped on poor old K.C (though in the meantime, the game had made a lot of money and been quite popular amongst those eager for home Pac-Man thrills)

The awesome irony lay in the fact that when Atari finally got their Pac-Man unleashed on the home market, the game SUCKED BALLS. A terrible port of the arcade, full of graphical glitches and bearing very little resemblance to the original. Atari's Pac-Man sold on name alone and in that amusing twist that you only get with gaming, most of the unlicensed clones, Munchkin included, were far more playable and interesting games (and had far more terrifying covers)

So K.C. Munchkin! is the little sprite that couldn't, but Munchkin is a game that set a legal precedence in what was acceptable when creating a program that was similar to an already successful franchise. Whilst this rip-off tradition happens to this day, especially with Nintendo DS shovelware, the difference is that those games usually pale in comparison to the original, whereas K.C. Munchkin! was superior to the home version of the game it ripped off. FAR superior.

Have you played Atari today?
If it's Pac-Man, then fuck no.

37. Knightmare: The Computer Game

(Various Home, MD Software, 1987)
"Where am I?"
Knightmare, the TV series, was Bad.Ass. Broadcasting from 1987, Tim Child created the children's gameshow which was inspired by the Spectrum classic Atic Atac, no less. The show featured contestants super-imposed against a computer drawn series of dungeons, facing monsters, riddles, puzzles and physical tests in order to conquer the deadly kingdom. Blinded by a helmet, the player had to be guided by three arguing friends and the dungeon master, Treguard, a dark but likeable man with a twisted sense of humor.
At it's peak, it was the best children's show on television, maybe just the best show on ALL television. As with everything, it got watered down as it went into the 90's, becoming a Scrappy-Doo bastardized version of it's season 1-3 peak. Knightmare is a staple of my youth. Though dated now, it was children's TV at it's finest, the kind of show that children today are missing badly amongst their tacky faux-anime cartoons and pint-sized reality show shit.

I was over the moon when a videogame of the show was announced, I came crashing back to Earth when I played it. Knightmare: The Computer Game is a dull and tedious psuedo-RPG. The player controls an avatar in the famous helmet and walks through endless identical rooms, using a text based menu system to perform such deadly tasks as opening doors and picking up rocks.
Very few of the characters, enemies or traps from the show feature in the game, it's just room after room of brick walls and doors, with the occasional guard thrown in.
There are some nice riddle rooms, but no real logic to the items, combat or spells. Other than a nice rendition of the theme tune, some ports of the game play in total silence, there is also a lack of colour and incredibly repetitive graphics.

The issue here is that Knightmare was incredibly cutting edge, using some expensive computer technology, interesting concepts, D&D style characters and of course, was held together by human beings, would could improvise, help or simply yell "cut" if needs be. Ironically, for a TV show that looked and played like a computer game, Knightmare was almost impossible to MAKE into a computer game, taking out the human element and the guiding eyes of the players friends took a lot of the danger and difficulty out of the concept (and believe me, it was a VERY difficult show, with a very small contestant to winner ratio)
The Knightmare game is simply a dull and boring adventure game with little charisma, scares or intrigue. It isn't the fault of the developers, they just jumped on a concept that on paper was custom designed for videogames, but in reality could never have worked. A different Knightmare game was released in 1991 for Amiga and Atari ST, this game was a straight RPG with very little elements of the show at all.
Knightmare is a shining beacon of glory in the annals of children's television, full of excitement, danger and hilarious epic fail, but Knightmare: The Computer Game? Well, to quote the great Treguard himself...

"Oooooh Naaaasty..."

(Visit Knightmare.com for encyclopedic reference on this classic TV show)

38. Street Fighter IV

(Arcade/PS3/Xbox360/PC, Capcom, 2008)
When it comes to the bare-bones concept of two people facing each other and locking horns in a battle of martial arts and mystical powers, one name stands out amongst all others. Street Fighter.
Since it's incarnation in 1987, The Street Fighter franchise has had many incarnations, spin-offs, compilations and remediations. Whatever your preference in the fighting genre, there is no denying that, in name at the least. Street Fighter is the king of the one-on-one fighters.
I also want to take this moment to say that the Street Fighter movie was AWESOME, anyone who gets angry about it was missing the point entirely, as it's FAR less embarrasing than any video game movie that takes itself seriously.

2008 saw the arcade release of Street Fighter IV. Returning the series to it's basic, tried and tested roots, SFIV removed some of the more elitist elements that the series had in the last few installments and went all out to attract a major, mainstream audience. Whilst for many, myself included, the SF series had become a hardcore, intelligent and deep fighting series, Capcom were looking to rejuvenate the spark that brought people flocking to the earlier smash hit Street Fighter II Turbo.
SFIV is an incredibly straightforward, no questions asked, one-on-one fighter. An array of classic SF characters team up with four new entrants in a return to the glory days of SNES Vs. battles.

With a much simpler system and a diversion from the parries, custom combos and other features that made Third Strike and friends tournament mainstays, SFIV is a game that people who have never played a fighter in years can pick up and start to learn very quickly, whilst still having a nice technical edge to keep the faithful somewhat satisfied.
SFIV has a great selection of characters and well designed backgrounds that really have life in them. The game has some cool music and solid sound effects. The graphics are crisp, colourful and clean, but some of the models are hideous, Ryu is now the whitest, most American man youve ever seen and Blanka is presented purely as a comedy character. The battles flow as smooth as silk regardless of the skill of the players involved. SFIV has a magic touch that makes it accessible, playable and exciting to gamers of all abilities, marking a return to the series just being "fun" above all else.

The home versions were incredible, with a huge selection of extra features and modes, a reliable online system and, above all, a whopping selection of extra characters, including three of my favourite cuties, Rose, Cammy and Sakura. The home versions feature some brutal, story based, anime cut scenes. These look as bad as the very worst Saturday morning Americanised anime and are ear-rapingly bad in their English dub. These scenes take away from the high standards Capcom committed to the rest of the game.

There are very few issues, the aforementioned cut scenes and a cheap, un-original and uninteresting boss are the only black marks on Street Fighter IV, Well, in the game itself anyway, on the human side of things, many players online are big time whiners and a few months after the game's release many were complaining that they hated the game because they "weren't winning" which was both hilarious and depressing.
Whilst I'm a hardcore fighting games fan and find much integrity in installments such as Third Strike and the Alpha series, with IV I have been able to rediscover the pleasure of playing an enormous range of human opponents and hooking up with friends for entire afternoons of rematches. Street Fighter IV may not be the deepest or most technical of fighting games, but it's one of the easiest for all to pick up and as a result, one of the most fun.
The updated Super Street Fighter IV is on the horizon, promising a new selection of backgrounds, tunes, bonus stages, online modes and another huge chunk of characters. The good times are set to keep rolling.

Street Fighter is back. Indeed, it's indestructible.

39. Mirror's Edge

(Xbox360/PS3/PC, Digital Illusions, 2008)
I don't have a head for heights. Inside a building, it isn't a problem, but out in the open, I get an incredible urge to jump from high places and a horrible weakness of the knees. Standing on a footstool and looking up and down does very little for me, if I catch the view out of a window, my eyes tend to do a dolly reverse (Accomplished by moving my eyes backward whilst simultaneously zooming in....or something)

Faith Connors however, suffers no such trauma, if she did, she would be on the unemployment line. Faith is a "Runner" a maverick courier whose job is to deliver packages to their destinations away from the prying eyes of her city's totalitarian leaders. In a world where constant observation has eliminated crime. All communication is monitored, Faith and her friends are here to ensure that your private business stays that way. High above the prying eyes, The runners travel from building to building. at the peak of physical perfection, they are fast, agile and fearless. When Faith's sister Kate is framed for the murder of an eminent politician. Faith must use all her skills and more to save her sister's reputation and maybe her own life.

Played in first-person, Mirror's Edge attempts to accurately capture the feelings of speed, disorientation, balance and adrenaline felt by the world's finest Parkour artists. The player controls Faith as she makes her way through various zones of the picturesque city, avoiding the various government hit-squads chasing her and, of course, doing her best not to become a sticky mess on the streets way down below.
It is like no other game, it strongly encourages the player to avoid combat (though high-flying melee attacks are available) and concentrate on moving through the scenery with grace and fluidity, using all the acrobatic moves at Faith's disposal to make the journey fast, but as smooth as possible.

The graphics are basic but this is presumably to keep the speed up, the city is brilliantly portrayed as being crystal clear and squeaky clean, whilst still conveying the dark "1984"-esque overtones of its totalitarian government. The game has no HUD in an attempt to truly allow the player to immerse in their surroundings. The music is beautifully composed and conveys both the calmness and isolation of the silent rooftops along with the pulse pounding action of running from gunfire some seventy stories above the ground. Once the player has mastered the controls, getting Faith from A to B can be a thing of beauty as she runs, jumps, slides, rolls and vaults her way to her destination without missing a beat.

Mirror's Edge isn't for everyone, the gameplay doesn't vary much and many players may get bored partway through. A first-person game without an emphasis on shooting may even terrify some players (I earned an achievement for finishing the game without ever firing a gun. A proud moment in my gaming lifetime) the game also has frantic camera-bob and much spinning and rolling, so it's really not for the motion sick.

I thought Mirror's Edge was artistic, stylish and sublime and have played it through several times. Special mention should be given to the character of Faith Connors, a down-to-earth, attractive, capable, brave, strong and intelligent protagonist.
Mirror's Edge did badly in the sales, pushed aside by the more obvious first-person experiences. The really sad part was Mirror's Edge lack of success conveys to developers that originality is a no-go area and guarantees us crappy cut-and-paste shooters for many more years.
Fortunately, it appears Mirror's Edge will be getting a sequel, so the people who did enjoy it have reason to celebrate.

Please take the leap of Faith, because if you make it, it'll be poetry in motion.

40. Time Gal

(Arcade/Various Home, Taito, 1985)
As of this writing it's the very beginning of the year 2010. Now, to me, 2010 sounds pretty much like it's "The Future" (Although SNK always assured me that the future "is now") but as I look around I see that, sadly, old movies and 1940's Bugs Bunny cartoons were lying all along, I have no hoverboard, no laser-gun, no spaceship car and The Running Man isn't a legitimate gameshow (Yet) What I'm missing most of all though, is super cool anime girls time travelling in ridiculously small costumes. For that, I still have a couple thousand years wait left, until then, 1985 will have to suffice.

Time Gal is the second Laserdisc game to enter the 100 list. I explained at length in my Dragon's Lair entry what LD games mean to me and why, so I'm not going to fight for their existence here. You know how the game works, video plays out and you react to the linear controls with split second timing in order to prevent our heroine from a grisly demise. In Time Gal, the player controls Reika, who appears to be some kind of law enforcement official in the year 4001. The game begins with the evil, beardy, Luda stealing a time-travelling device capsule and laughing like only a badguy can as he disappears into the fabric of time to wreak havoc.
Reika is hot on the case, using a small gem in her smaller costume, she travels through various time periods taking on every single deadly situation known (and not yet known) to man. Armed with a laser pistol and the ability to briefly pause the action "TIME STOPPU!" Reika must track down Luda and stop him before any paradoxial damage can be done. Reika is Sarah Conner and Luda is Miles Bennet Dyson.

Time Gal is one of my favourite Laserdisc games, with classic old-school anime art and a wide range of action packed scenes that take much pleasure in re-writing events that may or may not have happened. For example, did you know the world was full of ghosts in the year 666A.D? or that Godzilla roamed the earth in the year 70000000B.C? Time Gal can certainly teach you a lot about history you didn't know. The game also correctly predicts the Gulf war by having the 1990 level take place on a tank filled desert battlefield. Taito and their wacky crystal ball. If I was in charge, Time Gal would be a part of the education curriculum.
I love Time Gal, the game and the girl herself, Reika is a beautiful and lovable heroine, her blantantly sexist design counter-balanced with her skilfull abilities and quick wits. Time Gal, being a Laserdisc game, suffers all the perils and pitfalls that come along with that genre, linear non-gameplay, lack of control and much trial and error.
But if you've been reading this far into my project, you'll know that I'm beyond caring about those issues in a game like this. Time Gal has great art, nice tunes and a real eighties feel to it, more so than any other LD game I've played (and believe me, I've played them all) For anyone wishing to try it out, I strongly recommend the rare Playstation version for glorious video and some nice dip-switch options.

If girls in the future are as cool as Reika, Y'know what? You can shove your hoverboard, Marty.

41. Last Ninja 2

(Various Home, System 3, 1988)
Ninjas are back in the 100 Videogames list, in fact they're "Back With A Vengeance" (It says so right here on the poster.) Armakuni is no Mystic Warriors pink and green ninja though, Armakuni is the LAST ninja, clad head to toe in black, trained to mental and physical perfection, as fast as a cheetah, as deadly as a shark and as quiet as a snake. Armakuni is the most dangerous man on earth.

Just don't ask him to jump over a lake. PLEASE DON'T.

Last Ninja 2 was released at the end of the 80's for a variety of home formats. An isometric 3D adventure, Last Ninja 2 sees Armakuni, the last of an assassinated ninja clan, flung from ancient Japan into 1980's New York by the evil Shougun Kunitoki. Given no time to become accustomed to his frightening surroundings, Armakuni must rely on his training and mastery of the martial arts to track down his sworn enemy and end their rivalry.

Last Ninja 2 is an incredibly sophisticated game, with artistic graphics, fantastic dark music, well designed levels and an intuitive combat system. The various scenes in and around New York are nicely created and feature a wealth of puzzles to solve and brutal fights to overcome, be it by fist, staff or nunchunk. Armakuni must negotiate his new world and it's many obstacles and does so with the true spirit of a golden ninja warrior. Upon facing Kunitoki, a battle to the death will decide on Armakuni's fate once and for all (Well, until Last Ninja 3)
Last Ninja 2 is a well drawn, well composed and generally sound product, the real problem here isn't with Ninjas, or Shoguns, or New York...

..It's with lakes.

You see, Last Ninja 2 suffers from unbearable depth perception problems, which makes jumping an incredible chore. Despite being a finely honed ninja master, Armakuni seems unable to leap accurately or stick his landing. At the end of the first level (Central Park) Armakuni has to leap onto a moving boat then off again to cross a lake. Whilst the problem varies depending on the format played, this sequence is an absolute nightmare and is infamous in the retro-gaming community, having cost many frustrated players many lives.
Once the lakes are crossed, the player will not have to suffer a similar sequence until a much later level, but after the loss of a life or two, the damage may already have been done.

Last Ninja 2 has artistic graphics and an awesome music score, It has a nice range of weapons and some intriguing levels and puzzles. The C64 port is arguably the finest version and the one I'd recommend to anyone wishing to try it for the first time.
Those jumps can be so frustrating though, that many may never have the forgiving nature to commit to experiencing the full beauty of the game.

42. Do! Run Run

(Arcade/MSX, Universal, 1984)
The cherry-loving clown is the star of a series of arcade classics which in one way or another "borrow" liberally from other arcade classics, the fourth game of the series steals ideas from Qix, Pac-man, Congo Bongo, Mappy and the original game of the series, which in turn, stole from Dig-Dug. Even the game's title is stolen from a song.

Just one thing though. Mr Do! doesn't give a shit what you think.

The most punk rock of all the early video game heroes, Mr Do! spends his time in Do! Run Run running full pelt over a multi-tiered board, collecting Pac-Man's dots and drawing boxes around them with Qix's line in order to turn them into Super Pac's fruit products, he must do all this whilst avoiding Dig-Dug's dragons.
An incredibly frantic, fast-paced and frankly confusing game, Do! Run Run sees the player either gather the dots or take the time to draw a box around them in order to turn them into various high-scoring fruits. Chased by several monsters, Mr Do! can either throw a ball at his enemies or crush them under rolling logs. A board is cleared once all the dots/fruit are collected or all the monsters are killed. After a set period of time, the monsters change design and speed up. On top of all this, collecting letters makes MORE monsters appear which Mr Do! must defeat to collect MORE letters to earn an extra life.

Mr Do! loves to plagiarise, but he does it with such style and fashion that you can't help but love the little bastard, this disregard for copyright law, coupled with his ability to create some of the surrealist arcade classics ever, make Mr Do!, in my eyes, one of the damn coolest characters to exist in videogames. Do! Run Run is so rebel yell it even has a hidden diamond which gives the player a free credit. Take that Mappy you police-mouse prick.

Finally, the game has awesome music, with the game's first board wailing out one of my favourite pieces of frantic VGM ever. To summarise, Mr. Do! is so hardcore he got his own Neo-Geo game, he is a clown who eats cherries, owns a castle, crushes Dragons and has an exclamation mark in his name. Rumours persist that if you fail to leave cherries outside the Taito offices, he turns up in your bed at night....

...With a knife.

I love Mr Do!, My girlfriend CALLS ME "MR. DO!"
When a girl pet names you after a small pixellated ball throwing clown from 1984, it doesn't get any better than that, my friends.

43. Metal Gear Solid

(Playstation/PS3/PC, Konami, 1998)
Do you think love can bloom, even on a battlefield?
It's an incredibly emo question, but we're dealing with an incredibly emo game.
Hideo Kojima's Metal Gear Solid hit the Playstation running during the classic gaming year of 1998 and immediately blew everything else out of the water. Resurrecting a long dead franchise and simultaneously defining a whole new genre, MGS managed in one fell swoop to go one better than most games previous to it and become the blueprint for many, many games to follow afterwards. It was as if MGS arrived and arrogantly stated to all other developers "This is how action gaming should be done and how you are going to do it from now on"

Assuming you are a gamer yourself, you know what Metal Gear Solid is about, with its espionage based, "Trust no one" plot and its tactical stealth gaming, but over ten years later, it's easy to forget how inventive the game was back in '98. MGS re-wrote the book on many things in videogames, story-telling for example. For those who weren't RPG savvy, the idea of having videogame characters with REAL emotions, lives and backgrounds was shockingly cutting edge. MGS broke rules by encouraging players to stay AWAY from gunfights and to look for quieter, less violent routes. It dared have long cut-scenes and the controversial Codec screens which at the time seemed to go on forever (but are borderline subliminal compared to the series' current standards) These are all examples of features many games have today and we should be reminded of where their influence lies.

MGS has superb controls and a smart inventory system which keeps the game flowing smoothly even during frantic action scenes or the epic boss battles that feature from time to time. Special attention must be paid to the game's attitude toward music, voice acting and writing which, despite the debate as to whether a game should "be like a movie" or not, provide an engaging atmosphere, with great effects and instantly memorable music. Hum a tune from MGS right now, I bet you can. I bet it's the "Guards on alert" theme.
An essay could be written on the narrative itself. The script manages to be deep, intelligent and enthralling whilst simultaneously being over-wrought to the point of cringe-worthy. The beauty of the Metal Gear storyline lies in it's pro's and its con's though, as to have a storyline that wasn't brain-meltingly complex and a script that wasn't eye-rollingly emo wouldn't be Metal Gear. Don't get me wrong, I find the MGS writing immersive and emotional in many places, the aftermath of the Sniper Wolf battle for example, but some exchanges between characters are so "Get over yourself" that they reach a level of groan inducing.

It appears Hideo Kojima's series is set for further incarnations, including games in different genres and expeditions into the backstories of other characters. The Metal Gear franchise was revived twelve years ago and goes from strength to strength. There's a good chance however, that no game will match the initial "Wow" factor that MGS had.

Once again, here's a game that deserves way more justice than I can hope to give it here. Metal Gear Solid is an unmissable experience that should played by anyone who has an interest in picking up a controller. It's violence, tragedy, action, excitement, music and almost zen-like sensibilities make MGS an opera in videogame form. It's one of the finest works to grace our humble hobby, as while many games can entertain, very few have heart and soul.

Do I think love can bloom, even on a battlefield?
Yeah, I do.

44. Golgo 13: Top Secret Episode

(NES, Vic Tokai, 1988, JPN title: Kamigami No Tasogare)
Duke Togo AKA Golgo 13 is an assassin for hire and the world's greatest sniper. Appearing in many Manga books, anime and live action films since 1969, The brainchild of Takao Saito has travelled across the globe silently executing targets in the unlikeliest of situations with paranormal precision whilst still finding time to bang every hot girl he comes across. A silent, unmoving and emotionally blank man. Golgo 13 has a perfect record. If you're on his list, you're already dead.

He can't flying kick to save his life though.

As one of two NES games featuring our boy Togo, Top Secret Episode features side scrolling fighting, helicopter schmupping, scuba diving action, third-person dialogue exchanges and first-person sniping and tunnel sections, a lot for our humble NES to comprehend. Golgo has been hired to investigate the disappearance of a biological weapon known as "Cassandra" which has fallen into the wrong hands. The adventure takes Golgo around the world as the player controls our lanky hitman in one of his deadliest adventures yet (Oh, and into a fight with HITLER'S BRAIN).
Golgo 13:TSE is REALLY difficult, both in its design and in its unresponsive control system, Golgo's sprite trundles along with a small variety of attacks that have a habit of "ghosting" through the enemies, along with a super high flying kick that's fairly useless. Occasionally someone will take a shot at Golgo and the game switches to an Operation: Wolf style shoot-out. Once Golgo makes it to his contact there is a long dialogue cut-scene before he's sent back to his clunky war. Occasionally, Golgo will enter a building and the game will switch to a very basic first person section as Golgo negotiates a maze of corridors, trying to avoid booby traps with the aid of the provided map. As mentioned above, there are also scuba diving sections and very occasionally, a sniping situation which proves very unlucky for any man on the business end of Golgo's rifle scope.

So the game is quite sluggish and gets incredibly unfair once gun turrets and robots come into play against our ambling hero, but in the game's favour there is some great music, an intelligent storyline and an attempt to squeeze a whole host of genres into the NES's tiny memory. Top Secret Episode is more a victim of biting off a little more than it can chew and whilst it handles the shootouts and first person sections bravely, the side scrolling levels leave a lot to be desired.

Then again, tell me another game where smoking cigarettes and working the chicks gives you EXTRA HEALTH.

Now that's how you level up, Square.

45. Fiendish Freddy's Big Top O'Fun

(Various Home, Gray Matter, 1990)
Many things were created to bring joy and laughter, things that bring a smile to your face and a song to your heart. Somewhere along the line, someone thought that the epitome of fun was a fully grown human in terrifying makeup and garish clothing, climbing out a tiny car and attacking his friends. Someone, somewhere, thought Clowns were damn funny.

I don't fear Clowns, but I know people who do and I understand their reasoning. Clowns are scary and sinister, that's why they are a staple of nightmarish horror: The Joker, Clownhouse, Stephen King's IT etc. Fiendish Freddy is the worst type of Clown, he's not an Auguste, or a Pierrot, or even a Hobo clown, he's one of those "wants to kill your employees and run you out of business so they can build an apartment complex in his name" clowns.
Fiendish Freddy's Big Top O'Fun consists of a series of circus act mini games, not like a Wii circus game though, as the titular clown has been hired to ruin your acts by bringing slapstick death and destruction to your performers, from throwing explosives at your juggler to obscuring the vision of your knife thrower and, as a comical coup de grace, cutting your tightrope walker in half with a circular saw.

Clowns sure are funny.

The player performs the various acts to the best of their ability, in spite of Freddy's interference and is judged by EVEN MORE CLOWNS after each act. Successful performances will cough up the cash to keep your circus up and running, but a string of failures will bring the final curtain down on the big top o'fun. Up to five players can take it in turns at each act, with the winner being the player who draws the most cash overall.

Fiendish Freddy's Big Top O'Fun is a novel game featuring large, cartoony sprites, classic circus music and a sick sense of humour. The games are fairly enjoyable but a little trial and error, often requiring several plays before you get the hang of each act. The Spectrum and C64 ports do very well to incorporate all the scenes, sound and music of the Amiga version but the C64 loses graphic quality and the Spectrum loses ALL colours (The entire game is in black and blue)
One massive problem holding the game back is a horrible loading system, on tape it's incredibly hard work and multi-loads everything, you seem to be pressing play every two minutes. The Amiga version still suffers from lengthy load times which break the natural flow of the game.
Fiendish Freddy is still a good concept idea though, with a warped vision of entertainment and a nice visual and aural style which captures the classic "Roll up Roll up" circus feel. It's worth trying out just to experience it. With all the horrible family mini game packs pouring out, maybe someone should give Freddy a call to come along and liven things up.

And, now, from a Sesame Street episode, proof that Clowns are HILARIOUS!

I swear after he said "Me too" I thought he was gonna put a gun to his head.

46. Wayne's World

(SNES/MD/Genesis, Radical Entertainment, 1993)
Read through my list (please) and look at some of the beautiful works people have created for your interactive entertainment. These are the results of hard work and dedication of talented and committed people. They put drive, passion and effort into creating something that will bring escapism, joy and pleasure. Works that will last through the ages and be referenced for years to come. These people got paid for their work and are rewarded with successful careers doing what they love.

The people who made Wayne's World got PAID.

Straight for the jugular here as I'm not going to bore thee with details of the movie (which I am fan of, incidentally) Wayne's World was crapped onto consoles amongst the early 90's rage of saying wacky things like "Not!" which was as nauseating as people today saying "How random!" (No, actually it wasn't as annoying) A horribly made platformer, the game follows Wayne Campbell as he searches for Garth who has been taken by something or other. Armed with his guitar, Wayne fails to make his way through each scene, attacking things like drum kits and milkshakes in a series of totally nonsensical and badly designed levels.

In between the levels we get misplaced attempts to capture the feel of the TV show, which features bad digitised stills of the characters reading long monologues that lose any potential humour when displayed as written word. The in-game samples are fuzzy and badly clipped, they are also sampled straight from the movie, as the actors I'm sure were not available to take part in the making of this abortion. Thankfully.
The controls are unresponsive, Wayne's jumping is unreliable and his attacks are slow, leading to much energy loss and repeated shoutings of "NOT!" "NOT! "NOT!" with him finally crying out "NOT WORTHY!" when he runs out of energy. The backgrounds are boring and repetitive and even the basics such as collision detection and difficulty balance have had no work put into them.

There is no reason whatsoever to play this, it's a crime against videogames and against Wayne's World. It's horrifying to think of the undiscovered talent that was struggling to find a place in the industry whilst these fucking cunts got paid to puke this pile of shit onto the shelves.
There's a bigger story here. You see, my rage isn't solely because of Wayne's World itself or with Radical Entertainment, it's just this game reminds me of the forever existing culture of video game companies that pay people to churn out bad games that they are fully aware are terrible, but knowingly release it to "con" gift buying relatives, franchise fans, movie goers or simply naive gamers into parting with their money for a product the company KNOWS isn't worth paying for.

Games that fit that description still exist today, maybe more so, as do the people who make them. Games with misleading titles and box art, bad games based on popular kids franchises, game shows or movies, made lightning fast and rush released, long before they've reached any level of quality control. If you are involved in the making of that type of game then you are a prick. I hope you lose your job and have to give up your house. Stay the fuck away from the industry we love, you are con artists shilling your wares and exploiting unknowing customers in order to make a quick buck, so you can grab the few undeserved sales you can and vanish into the night, leaving your unlucky victims disappointed and out of pocket.

Fuck you and the horse you rode in on.

47. Kikstart 2

(C64/Spectrum/Amiga/Amstrad, Mr Chip, 1987)
As of this writing, many people are classing Trials HD as their game of the year for 2009, the downloadable stunt fest is simple in concept but incredibly difficult to master and dangerously addictive. It has attractive 3D on 2D plain graphics and is all about the physics of gravity, motion, momentum and balance. As a package it is a superb score/time attack experience.

Back in the 80's Britain had a TV series by the name of Kickstart, it featured an array of mentalists attempting to complete wacky courses on trials bikes whilst simultaneously trying not to die. It was very popular and ran for nearly ten years.
Off the back of this show's popularity, Mastertronic released two games that were mysteriously similar to the show (they just dropped the "C" from the title) Today, we look at the superior second game. Kikstart 2 was a bare bones bike trials simulator in which one or two players would race along a course, negotiating a series of jumps, water hazards, fences, pot-holes, lakes and many other obstacles, using the physics of speed, momentum and balance to traverse the trickier sections. Failure to judge the terrain or stick a landing would result in the rider performing an awesome 30 foot forward flip over the handlebars (A stunt I achieved myself once at the age of about six)

There was an impressive selection of courses but the real beauty came from the in-game course designer, which allowed players to build their own death tracks from all the items available. I spent hours with my friend Gary designing what we thought were the ULTIMATE stunt environments, looking back, we just stuck a bunch of ramps together and added fire, but hey, I was like seven years old, ramps, wheelies and fire were pretty damn exciting.
Kikstart 2 was fun, smooth and incredibly competitive, the C64 version had the one of the single most memorable and catchy SID tunes ever composed. Like the current success of Trials HD shows, just over twenty years later, some concepts never change, you can ramp up the graphics and sound for the new generation, but as long as the "hook" is still there, you've got playability for life.

True story. When I played GTA: Vice City, I attempted the bike trials arena and repeatedly failed. Thank God for my friend Linus, who then sang the Kikstart 2 tune on a loop whilst I tried the course once last time.
I passed with flying colours. Sometimes, it's all about the motivation.