Battle of the Ports

Ooooooooh now this is a "biggie" looking forward to sitting down and watching this.

 

I hope you enjoy the show.

 

Never seen an actual Contra arcade cabinet, but the game will always be remembered because of the NES / Famicom port. One of the rare occasions the port outperforms the original game.

By the way, i never knew the Famicom port had all those extras. The good old days of Konami.

 

There used to be a contra arcade machine In New Brighton, a 30 drive from where I lived in Liverpool. That arcade had all the big names including a 4 player Turtles in Time. Their contra was odd though as it used square buttons!

 

Another awesome episode, though now I want to track down Contra for my Famicom... I still remember managing to beat Contra via my Playchoice 10 cab, good times indeed. I've never put much time into the arcade version of the game so I'm most used to the NES version which I can't get enough of.

The Spectrum port makes me cringe though. Not being able to walk backwards is just insane!

 

Fantastic episode. Really enjoyed it, in fact was that good it inspired me to spend the last hour on Contra III!

Damn that game is tuff or maybe I'm just shite at it.

Anyway good to see all the ports, although I knew there were some differences between NES and Famicom I didn't realise they were so big, that extra animation is noticeable.

As for some of the other versions WTF!!! I mean the Speccy port was a disaster, I didn't like the PS2 remake either, had no charm like the original.

 

IMO, the Spectrum version isn't the worst. The biggest issue is needing to press space bar to jump; but the same issue is present in the Commodore 64 one. The changed overall pace and progression through it mostly alleviates that, as well as the issue of not being able to run left. Plus, its controls are way better than on C64. Enemy bullets camouflaging with the backgrounds can be a problem, but it's situational.

The C64 Gryzor controls pretty badly (running too fast, jumping like on helium, etc) and either enemies take too many hits or your guns are too weak or slow. The audio can also get annoying. The base stages are also not well designed, partly as a result of your bullet speeds.

 

Following on from the last show we have Super Contra!

 

Battle of the Ports - Dynasty Wars

 

Ah great, another Capcom comparison

I've only played the PC Engine version of Dynasty Wars, looks like I chose wisely as the only other port that looked fun was the C64 version. The whole idea with different planes isn't a bad idea, and the pace/smoothness of the game is top notch, certainly much better on the C64 compared ports like the Amiga version (which looked painful to play!).

 

The Amiga port is horrible. In my honest opinion the Amiga is the worst system EVER when it comes to arcade ports. The amount of crappy ports outweigh the good ports 10 to 1. Now, Amiga original games are a whole different story. They were made by developers who cared.

 

Yeah, almost all of my favourite Amiga titles were not arcade ports - bar Rainbow Islands which I absolutely loved on the Amiga.

I'm working my way through Capcom's back catalogue at the moment - initially my plan was to work through their arcade games and the games respective ports to consoles and computers. Then I whittled it down to the consoles/computers I owned when I grew up (as playing that many versions of 1942 would drive me insane), but now I'm just sticking to console ports of their arcade games, as the Spectrum and especially Amiga stuff was disappointing (to put it mildly). Even better Amiga ports like Ghosts n Goblins were harmed by control issues (up to jump, not being able to jump backwards and shoot at the same time)... Pity as that port was almost perfect...
The less said about the Street Fighter 2 computer ports the better!

 

All your base are belong to us

 

I used to love Zero Wing, in fact I still do.

Picked it up for the Mega Drive in a Woolworths bargain bin for £10 back in the day.

I was hooked from that moment I played it to death until I finished it. Looks like it holds up well versus the arcade and is still fun these days.

Nice comparison Yakumo and a great bit of nostalgia, cheers.

 

All your nostalgia are belong to us.

Anyway, another great episode yakumo. I was actually surprised this never got ported to the X68000 or any of the european computers.

 

Another Battle of the Ports where the Amiga version doesn't suck. Twice in one year!

 

how about super off road?

 

Yep, that one will be covered some time in the future. It's on the list of titles to do.

This week however we have Rod.Land by Jaleco.

 

The worst beat'em up of the 90's get's the Battle of the Ports treatment

 

My god tell me you didn't have to play through them to get the footage! Will give this a watch later but I'm sure it will be equally as painful!