Gaming Trend

Gaming Trend Review

by Keith Schleicher

Certain gaming companies have been around for so long, they started out developing for the arcades before developing for the home consoles.  Companies like Sega, Nintendo, Capcom, and Midway have been around for so long that they have dipped into their libraries of classic games and re-released them for new consoles.  Now Konami is getting into that game with the Konami Classics Series Arcade Hits (KCSAH).

KCSAH features fifteen arcade games made by Konami and released between 1981 and 1987.  The games provide range from Scramble, Time Pilot, Roc’n Rope, Track and Field, Yie Ar KUNG-FU, Gradius, Rush’n Attack, and Contra.  Are these classics worth revisiting, or were they better left off hidden in the Konami game vault?

Grading the graphics in any compilation is difficult because the graphics of these games are naturally old, so they aren’t going to be good compared to modern standards.  The games do look very much like their original arcade counterparts.  The jerky movements because of the few frames of animation are the same as they were when they premiered originally in the arcade.  As you progress through the different games, you can definitely see an improvement in graphics from the older games to the newer ones.

Konami has taken a unique approach to the DS.  Instead of stretching the games out over both screens, the top screen contains the game and the bottom screen contains the little instruction sheet that shows how to play the game.  If you’ve played these games before, it’s a little bit of a nostalgia trip.  For those who haven’t, it’s a quick way to learn what the objective of the game is.  You can change the screen so that it stretches across the screen, or change the screen so you hold the DS like a book and play it that way.  It’s nice to have this option, but the game really is difficult to play that way.

While the games are recreated accurately, the graphics are a mixed bag.  Some are good.  I was actually impressed with the animation of Yie Ar KUNG-FU.  Since some games originally appeared on a vertical screen instead of a horizontal screen like we are accustomed to now.  Because of this, some of the lines are missing from the screen.  This is very distracting in the games that this happens in.  This graphic discrepancy is especially noticeable where there is text on the screen.

The original bleeps and bloops are recreated just as you’d hear them in the arcade.  The music has the familiar MIDI sound to them.  The DS speakers aren’t the best for playing these sounds, as they do sound a bit tinny.  The sounds don’t take advantage of the sound capabilities of the DS, but they are faithful to the original games.

The original Track and Field actually had some speech to it.  If you ever heard the Speech Synthesizer on the TI 99-4/A, then you have a pretty good idea what it sounded like.  Those sounds are in the game and it’s nice to actually see that these were included.

The games back then usually didn’t have many buttons, maybe two or three at the most.  Most of the games use the D-pad and two or three buttons.  This works for most of the games.  The games seem to work fairly well, but the D-pad just seems small and limiting.  Also, in Track and Field, the A, B, and Y buttons are just too small to hit even if you have a flat surface to place the Nintendo DS on.  Controlling the games are awkward if you change the screen to display in vertical mode.

With a compilation, if you jump into it expecting to get games that are repetitive, designed to have a few minutes of play before having to pop another quarter into the machine, then you probably won’t be disappointed.  If you played any of these games in the arcade, then they might have a special significance for you.

Some of the games will be instantly noticed by fans of classic gaming.  Time Pilot, Track and Field, Gradius, Rush’n Attack, and Contra are the more notable titles on the cartridge.  These games do play just like the originals, but a couple of them suffer from the screen shrinkage mentioned in the Graphics section.  You can also get Gradius on the Gradius Collection for the PSP.  Track and Field’s controls aren’t good because of how small the buttons on the DS are.  Contra is the arcade version, which isn’t bad, but you’ll have a difficult getting through the game without the old code.

Some of the games are puzzling to be included in this collection.  I had never heard of Circus Charlie, which includes having a lion jump through hoops and jumping over monkeys while on a trapeze.  Road Fighter feels like it wants to be a cross between Turbo and Spy Hunter, without being good at either.  Basketball really isn’t a basketball game, but a game where you try to score as many points from out-of-bounds within a specific time period.  In Roc’n Rope you try to save a lucky bird Mario style, except you use your own rope instead of having set ladders to climb.  Yie Ar KUNG-FU is a precursor to Street Fighter II, but you can only play as the character Oolong.  The games are rounded out by Horror Maze, Pooyan, Time Pilot, and Shao-lin’s Road.  While I found some of these games enjoyable for a short time, they really didn’t hold my interest for long.  The other games felt really terrible to play.

Most of these games are hard to recommend playing on their own.  I’d say that I found maybe half of them worth playing, even for a short time.  Some of the games on here are real stinkers, and it’s hard to imagine why they were included in this collection.

You do get fifteen different games with KCSAH, which usually is a good value, but because the games are so bad, you don’t want to really play them.  However, there are a few nice extras.  Each game has a short reference, explaining when the game was released and what the object of the game is.  It also includes instructions how to play each game with the DS buttons and tips on how to play the game.

There are a few multiplayer options.  You can also record your gameplay and exchange them with other DS players who own KCSAH.  You can also play Co-op with another person who has KCSAH.  If someone doesn’t have it, you can wirelessly transmit a demo to another DS.  That demo is available until the DS holding the demo is powered down.

I am a huge fan of compilations like this.  Usually it is fun to revisit the past, even for a short while.  Still, these games should be fun when you go back to replay them.  That isn’t the case in this instance though.  The games provided on Konami Classics Series Arcade Hits are a mixed bag from mediocre to bad.  Unless you are a collector of classic game series like this, there really isn’t any reason to add this to your collection.

Gaming Trend Score

63

1. Graphics: 58
2. Audio: 75
3. Controls: 75
4. Gameplay: 50
5. Value/Replay: 70
6. OVERALL:63