MicroProse (at a later stage, good old pal Sid Meier founded Firaxis) and Maxis had a fundamentally opposed nature: the first offered reflexive, long, deep and slow paced products, while Will Wright‘s company designed kind of humorous games of a certain fantasy fashion. I am excited to imagine what could come out of this joint venture.

It was 2002 when Sid Meier’s SimGolf came out, produced by Electronic Arts in a time in which the company was engulfing other myth-enshrouded companies. The result is a surprising mix of company management with the loaded people’s sport. Again surprisingly, despite bearing the name of the Civilization saga creator, it is a game not of an excessive complexity, straightforward enough for everyone to play with the funny touches of a Sims game. Everything in a very visual interface, with a golf playability part in the style of role playing games. (you aim and I’ll shoot)

The player has inherited a sum of money which would use to buy a plot of land to make his dream come true: design and build a golf course worthy of the SGA (Sim Golf Association) and winning the million-dollar prize. Everything while juggling budgets so posh people will continue burninig  simolleons in the 18 course. The way to do this is rather simple: we decie the distance between the tee and the green, we add the fairway and decide the difficulty of the hole with hazards and break. Everything while managing club facilities to make our guests stay more enjoyable, as well as the club staff of gardeners and “refreshment” sellers who will walk our paths.

Technology used is not a wonder, even considering it is more than 15 years old at the moment of writing. Its 2D graphics are pleasant and music is very appropriate for the game, but there are very few settings and you can’t even change the 800×600 pixel resolution. You can’t barely change the difficulty, which is not explained at all throughout the game, so it’s unknown to me how does it work or what does it do. It is not possible to expand or mod anything, and does not have any multiplayer capabilities. Its interface is also a nuisance (suddenly it’s your turn to hit the ball, but you are clicking elsewhere to edit a green, so you hit a homerun with the darn ball). It would be acceptable for an early 90s game, but for it sure downplay a 21st century product in an absurd way.

It is true that it has many negative technical points, but the playability is so fun it makes you forget (partially at least) these aspects. It’s not only joyful to build the holes, it’s very gratifying to watch these old fogies trying to carry the blessed-be ball to the hole. That and watching them dropping the simoleons when finishing, whose quantity depends on how fun was the hole itself. We can see them chatting, having “histories” like “my goldfish is ill” or “I saw an UFO” (literally). We have to manage the beverage distribution so they don’t get dry, give them electric carts and deterring them to slack so they play fluidly.

A very fun aspect of the game is the sound. Fitting in a CD is no problem for having many funny sound effects, with multiple details (as playing classical notes in each click building the fairway) or playing Hanna Barbera effects. Musical effects, even when they aren’t a hit, give some colour and contribute to the general ambient of the 90s rich celebrities. Part of its charm is actually the imagenierie of this subculture like the sims-like cartoons.

The sporty part of the game complements perfectly the management end, and it’s all the unenforced we like. Of course the vital objective of the main character is to win the course tournament, but we can ignore it completely and just concentrate being a mogul. If we like to play the sport there’s no hurry either, and doesn’t need any special dexterity. In fact it is more in the like of japanese role playing games: the character has some statistics (dive, irons, hook/slice etc.) and we’ll just indicate him the hits to be done. Depending on our abilities the shot would be more or less successful. In the long run we will be able to get better on every aspect of the sports and win the tournament. Well, or get utterly thrashed.

The reception of this launch was colder than a mother-in-law hug. It wasn’t big on news, and people was more worried praising (or giving criticisms) the Sims games, or shooting in some Grand Theft Auto. In any case critics gave mostly positive scores to the game… and player critic was mostly non-existant. As a curious note there was another launch titled SimGolf programmed by Maxis in 1996, which received even less attention. Was this game a second attempt? Beats me.

Playing nowadays Sim Meier’s SimGolf is still a fun experience. Graphics are not severely outdated and the only real downsides are the technical problems or the out of date interface, which can be ignored with not a lot of effort thanks to the fun factor. Well, unless you use Windows 10: the damn DRM exploited an operating system flaw that was corrected in Windows 10 and it’s no longer possible to play it “legally” in this operating system. (Hint: it will work if updated to 1.02 version and properly cracked thanks to the MyTH crack scene group)

This is yet another game to add to my “deserves and remake and won’t have” list. Too bad it ran mostly unnoticed, since Electronic Arts will never do something similar again. In golf games we recently had Golf Story (Sidebar Games, 2017) in Nintendo Switch, and in the business management gameplay it could be compared to Theme Hospital (Bullfrog, 1997). There’s no big deal after even after all these years.

La entrada Sid Meier’s SimGolf – Retroview se publicó primero en Nobody comes after the last.

There is something in Kero Blaster (2014) that dispels all my doubts at first glance: it’s signed as the second completa game by Daisuke “Pixel” Amaya, the mastermind after the legendary Cave Story (2004).

Kero Blaster premises are obvious: a run’n’gun game that mimics classics from the 20th century in playability and multimedia aspects. Its resemblance is even beyond Cave Story‘s as this time there’s almost any dialogues or exploration, being all the levels all linear. This isn’t a bad thing per se, just a design option, a well used choice and justified by a good level design.

This is a game initially released on iOS, but released not much later on more accessible platforms as Steam. Even then, controls don’t resent at all (I’ve played only the PC version with a controller) and allows to be played without problems. Moreover, it introduces a concept I loved: when the fire button is pressed, the character will continue facing its direction until released, making boss fights much easier and enjoyable.

Back to the playability, it will undoubtedly satisfy you. It might add a bit of difficulty comparing to Cave Story kind of games, as it introduces a bit of inertia, but not as much as Super Mario Bros. (Nintendo, 1985). The game offers a classic experience, which however allows modern elements as game saving and many different enemies on screen. I believe limiting video memory to 64K won’t have done much for a more credible experience anyway. 

There’s not a lot to say about graphics, but almost everything is good. It is true that they are simple, not very colourful and in low resolution. But that’s part of their charm: Daisuke Amaya is precisely known for expressing a quite lot with just a fistful of pixels. It’s to be said that the main character is a bit so-so, but for the rest they are perfectly created, and even with a simple bunch of pixel they are create with, they even appear to have their own expressions and everything.

The game sound is on par with other aspects, and helps the general aspect of the game to be genuinely retro. Well, it’s no better compared to Cave Story, but even then they are fidel to Pixel‘s style. So melodies are so authentic and it achieves a warming charisma for the game. Not having the exploration component in this game, is it possible to compose music with less restrictions.

The game keeps a great quality throughout the game, with a good enemy, level and enemy design. The story is quite simple, just a worker of a teleport company doing some works, some of the which gets complicated. Even when the dialogues aren’t passionately deep they are perfectly translated to a lot of languages (Spanish included) for our own comfort. The worst point of the game is its length, which is about a hour and a half for a not-so-good player (me), but it’s warranted that all that time we’ll be well hooked. Also it has something I love: a shop to spend all our moneis and getting our weapons and vitality better.

Well, we don’t really have to settle with the hour and a half the game offers, because completing the game will unlock the “overwork” game mode. This is, additional levels remixed from the first run, which aren’t as surprising as the first but still good if we want more the same. Two spin-offs were made, too: Pink Hour (2014) and Pink Heaven (2014), short but free.

Whether you liked Cave Story or you just like run’n’gun games this is a great choice to spend the afternoon, as it’s usually at a competitive price. I’m personally looking forward to Pixel Studios next production.

La entrada Kero Blaster – Impressions se publicó primero en Nobody comes after the last.

In 1996 they created a game strongly inspired in the great Sim City 2000 (1993, Maxis), this is, a city simulator. However its subject is so unique and different: instead of cities we must create and take care of Heaven and Hell, so Planet’s souls can have their eternal rest. With the advice of our two assistants, we should make their journey to the Great Beyond profitable for us.

As previously stated, the view and the game planning are awfully similar to Sim City 2000‘s, so much that at first glance it seems a blatant clone. Isometric view, roads, zones, buildings… but of course, there’s no one city, but two; which correspond to Heaven and Hell. Neither there are police or fire departments, but some unique structures to make the rewards and punishments work as intended.

The souls coming to our Afterlife, depending if they have done good or bad deeds, will inhabit our Heaven or Hell. Depending on how have they lived their lives, they will be assigned a punishment or a reward based on the seven capital sins and virtues of the catechism: humility/pride, charity/avarice, chastity/lust, peacefulness/wrath, temperance/gluttony, satisfaction/envy, diligence/laziness. Well, literature in this theological subject varies a bit between authors, but these are the ones used in the game.

Those responsible of executing this punishment (or satisfying these awards) are of course angels and demons. At first they will come from other realms, thus costing a quantity of pennies (in game currency), but after a while we should train some, too. We shall take other parameters into account, as the capacity of our entrances and exits provided by our gates and karma trains. These trains by the way will allow the souls finally leave our realm when their journey is finished, thus leaving space for new ones. All of this must be planned to be as stable as possible, so punishments and prizes are as efficient as possible, and so our economy wouldn’t suffer by a bad planning.

One of the strong subjects in the game is its trademark humour, sometimes pop culture referred and religion in others. For an example, some disasters in the game (this is shamelessly taken from Sim City 2000, too) are Disco Inferno, or The Hell Freezes. This humour is also brought by our assistants, Aria Goodhalo and Jasper Wormsworth (Jasper Turbator in Spanish release), impeccably dubbed in the Shakespeare’s language by the way. (And so they are in Spanish)

Dub is also other of the great virtues of the game. Either in Spanish or English this is a remarkably well done job, even with some jokes lost in translation in Spanish the quality and professionalism is very high. The rest of the sound aspect is not left behind, being on par with the rest of the production. In the Spanish version, however, sometimes it’s a mess of yells and cries and it’s a bit annoying.

Graphical aspects of the game also holds firmly. Buildings are very original, and each reward and punishment have a multitude of them. Our assistants, too, are very well animated and the graphical art as a whole is coherent with the overall quality of a George Lucas company. Game introductory video, even when it’s original, it’s not unheard of, but it’s another of the odd pleasures of this game. (and dark humour)

In general it could be said that the game production is very looked after and worth of a great company as Lucas Arts. What is the playability like, then? Well, again it’s blatantly taken from Sim City 2000, and it’s a playable game from the beginning. It also come with very comprehensive tutorials narrated by our assistants that will let us know how to get started. From building roads, entrances, exits, buildings or rewards to balancing our delicate, celestial and infernal budget.

Wow, what a great game is this! How is it possible to be so obscure? Well, this could easily have been one of the genre’s references because its variety, originality and its great craft. Unfortunately it suffers from some problems that made it pass through history without trouble or fanfare. In the first place, even with the entertaining and complete tutorials, it’s impossible to get how the game economy works, and we will lose pennies a lot while we ask ourselves what the hell (heh, heh) are we doing wrong. This brings the second matter: it’s absurdly difficult and not intuitive at all, and even when we have dozens of graphs, maps and hints it’s terribly easy to make the budgets fly off and lose our temper to our creation.

The game has a rather complex simulation, and we will have to keep an eye in Planet’s inhabitants beliefs to accordingly plan punishments and rewards that will accommodate them. We could even not to need a Heaven or a Hell depending on that beliefs, as they could not believe in Heaven, Hell or nothing at all. We would need to look after their technology too, because they can go all idiot blowing themselves up with an atomic bomb. All of this while prancing and dancing around with the most delicate budget in the world, if we can even figure out the damn thing.

With so many virtues the game has it’s a real pity that the game has such an unforgiving difficulty, and such an unworthy arbitrariness when it comes to balance its difficulty. Have these points been more polished we could be talking about a very different game, in the likes of Will Wright did in the past.

If we want to get the game ee will have to settle with a budget “games for Windows 95” CDs. It can be however bought from stores like GoG for a mere five euros, but again we will have to settle with the MS-DOS version, as the Windows version misfires more often than Kayne West at Jeopardy. Also as usual in this hallowed store they completely ignore the Spanish speaking community and it’s only available in English.

Even with all these problem the game has it’s worthwhile having a look and giving a try to it. Even today the game holds still, and the original themes it has makes it interesting nowadays. It’s good enough to remember it, although it is true that this is a game that really could use a remake, rather than the plethora of “classics” in the like of Carlos Duty and endless Mariozeldas. Not because it appearance might be outdated, but in order to fix its compelling health issues. I’m afraid however that its low popularity won’t help.

La entrada Afterlife – Retroview se publicó primero en Nobody comes after the last.