PixlBit

Yes, scouring through the store on Xbox (and other systems) has its rewards. I never know what stealth released title I'll come across. My eyes bugged wide when I saw the following collections. 

Toaplan Arcade Collections Vol. 1, 2 were released Aug 14 for all systems. Volume 1 has two of my favorite scrolling shooters, Flying Shark and Fire Shark. This is the first time I've seen the perfect arcade ports of those games! I have Flying Shark on NES and Fire Shark on Genesis both with much reduced graphics. The collection is expensive though at $35 for each volume, so I'll wait for a sale, but I'm excited to finally get to play these in their original glory when the price is right. 

Now for the Plays: 

NES (used a Retron 3) - 1942 - It's a good port and just as hard as in the arcade, maybe harder with the NES controller. That soap bar controller actually hurts my hands a bit with actions games. The penalty for being a library page and carrying a lot of books all the time. 

Atari 2600 Junior - Sky Diver - I got the power supply for the Junior and got it running. It's a little bit fuzzy/crackly but perhaps some cleaning will improve it, but it's functional. Yippie! Sky Diver is a surprisingly interesting game and trickier than it seems at first. You drop your parachutist from planes with the red button and then release the parachute by pulling down on the controller. Timing is everything along with considering which way the wind is blowing and how hard. Difficulty settings change the size of landing sights or have them moving. Two-player mode has you playing for points which you only get if you stick the landing. This game has just enough elements to make it challenging and fun. A surprise hit for me. 

Game Boy (played on a GBA SP) - Alleyway - Again. I can't get enough of it. It's Breakout with bonus screens and moving walls and catchy music. It's a perfect handheld game for me, my Tetris for Game Boy. 

Xbox Series S:

RoboCop: Rogue City - I really enjoyed it up until the battle with the Ed-209 battle mech where I got killed. Maybe I'll return to face it again. The game mixes FPS, crime investigation, dialog choices, a few puzzles, and evidence collectibles in an enjoyable romp. It has an old school feel with current, but B-tier, graphics and an upgrade system that utilizes a puzzle game. I like it but in that battle, RoboCop is very slow with no crouch or jump ability and little cover. The Ed fires constantly and your health just widdles away. 

Far Cry Primal - A very interesting survival game in prehistoric times. I got to a part where I'm defending a tribe so they can join mine. I see some guy throwing a spear at one of my people (or so I think) and so I attack him. Turns out, he was one of ours and the whole tribe turns against me. I run for my life and get attacked by wild animals (since it's night time) until I'm dead. I hate it when you can't tell friend from foe and one mistake turns everyone against you. Story of my life. 

Ant Bear - Played within Atari 50. Interesting game but I found the controlls less than responsive. You have to retract your tongue fast to avoid enemies. 

The Black Hole - This is an 80s pinball machine within The Pinball Arcade collection. It has two levels, the lower one being reversed with the flippers on the top instead of at the bottom. It's quite fun and I almost topped the high score chart locally. 

State of Decay - This first game in the series is a favorite of mine, however, this time I got a bit frustrated with it. There's an early mission to recover medicine from a vet. I drive there, my basemates meet me there, we get the stuff, fight some zombies, and then I say, "get in, let's drive back". Well the one raging control freak says, "no cars", because it attracts zed. But it's a pickup truck that can plow right through them no problem. So I say, "get in, dumb asses!". And they just repeat the "no cars" thing and won't move. I drive back myself but the mission won't complete, and I am just like, "if I can't do this any old way, I'm out!". And so I stopped playing. It's a good game though, I just wasn't in the mood for following the rules. 

Puzzle Quest Immortal Edition - Another stealth drop I noticed in the Xbox store last week. It was on sale right away for $10 and so I and my friend Mad Krammer got it and started playing. It's a remaster of the original Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords from 2007. I've played this game on so many different systems over the years. This time, though, I really got annoyed by the obviously not random jewel drops in certain battles. Every so often the game decides it's your turn to lose and there's little you can do about it. Enemies get every advantage and the whole thing seems rigged. I absolutely loathe that sort of thing and I couldn't put up with it that day. I'm sure I'll return to it though. I love a good match-3, RPG game. 

After all that I was getting quite frustrated with gaming in general and reset all my games on Xbox to reflect my 1980s theme installing Capcom and Namco collections and searching for related stuff which led me to discovering the Toaplan collections. I think next week I may break out my Switch and go through the NES and Game Boy offerings and check up on my wish list. 

Reading: Gene Wolfe's The Shadow of the Torchurer. James Wallis' Everybody Wins: Four Decades of the Greatest Board Games Ever Made. 
Listening: Audio books Howl's Moving Castle and A Brief History of Time. eBook: Cosmos by Carl Sagan. The Wipers's Is This Real album, Music League playlists, What Went Wrong podcast's 80s movies shows.
Watching: Star Fleet, Japanese marrionette scifi show from the 80s with music by Brian May on youtube.