61 Frames Per Second : ghosts 'n goblins

Up All Night: Trojan

John Constantine — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 19:00:00 GMT

Capcom’s early NES games had pretty clear premises. Commando tapped the throbbing Stallone-Schwarzenegger vein of the one-man army shooting faceless baddies on a foreign battlefield, Section Z was the same thing in space, and Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins was the same thing but with, um, ghosts and goblins. Then there was Trojan. Twenty-two years after it’s release and I still have no idea what the hell was going on with Trojan. You’re a guy wearing overalls who, I suppose, is named Trojan. Despite the fact that Trojan is carrying a sword, he is not a soldier of the ancient city, Troy. He is also not a spokesperson for male contraception.

Trojan fights bugmen and European knights in what appears to be Detroit for most of the game. In between stages, you get a look at a map of your progress through the mean streets and mountains of Detroit on the way to a room with a giant skull over it. Nothing says “final boss” like a skull room. When you get to the skull room, you fight a bigger guy with red overalls and engage in one of the game’s sword duels. These duels were actually pretty novel in 1986, a nice change of pace from the Kung-Fu left-to-right fighting. When you kill the boss, little Trojan stands on the map, the skull room crumbles, and you find out red-overalls was named “Achilles”. The game put the quotes on, not me. It’s like they were making fun of their own attempt at some kind of silly Greek mythology theme.

Trojan is not a lost classic. It is not a classic of any kind. It is, however, pretty fun. Don’t hunt down the NES cart or anything, but if you already have the PS2 Capcom Classics Collection, it wouldn’t kill you to give it a try.

Previous Up All Nights:

Dark Sector
Ex-Mutants
Nightmare Creatures
Bad Dudes
P.N. 03

Game Center CX is Charming as Hell

John Constantine — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 14:00:00 GMT

61 Frames Per Second took a field trip to the IFC Center yesterday morning to catch the New York Asian Film Festival’s final screening of a localized Game Center CX. For anyone not up on the Japanese pop-culture, Game Center CX, renamed Retro Game Master for us yanks, is a strange mix of Jackass, classic Iron Chef, and videogames. Comedian Shinya Arino is “The Kacho” (midde-manager) and each episode finds him marathon playing (sometimes for well over eight hours straight) classic games from the 8 and 16-bit eras. Sitting in an all but empty theater at 11:30am and watching a middle-aged Japanese funnyman lose at Ghosts 'n Goblins for six hours might sound like a strange way to have a good time, but, let me tell you, it’s a blast. Even beyond the laughs and nostalgia fueled empathy a gamer compulsively feels watching The Kacho die repeatedly at the mercy of archaic game design, the show’s got a great vibe. It legitimately feels like everyone involved is having a good time making such silly entertainment. Most of the show is subtitled but the hokey English narration should be reconsidered if distributor Stylejam decides to bring the whole series across the Pacific.

Many thanks to Infinite Lives for tipping us off to the NYC screenings.

The Ten Greatest Fire Levels in Gaming History, Part 1

Peter Smith — Thu, 29 May 2008 22:30:00 GMT

Videogame designers have found a great deal of inspiration in elemental dichotomies. Wood versus stone, wind versus lightning, ice versus fire — these natural conflicts are excellent bases for compelling environments and rich atmospheres. What better than tangible extremes like hot and cold to convey a sense of place to a player? To celebrate the imminent arrival of summer, 61 Frames Per Second is going hot with our first top-ten list, looking at the greatest fire levels in gaming history. If you're sweating, don't worry — we'll get to ice soon enough. — John Constantine

Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts — Crucible of Flame

Nobody would subject themselves to the brutally difficult Ghosts 'n Goblins series if the games didn't feature Capcom's usual immaculate production values. Dying a hundred times in Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts' third stage, the Crucible of Flame (and you will) is made marginally more bearable by the brooding music (forever seared in my brain after a misspent youth) and the characteristically idiosyncratic twist on the usual "fire level" theme: instead of a generic inferno, the Crucible of Flame finds you in some kind of metallurgical hell. The stage has a lot of character; as fire levels go, it's more of an oozing, molten nightmare than a pyrotechnic fun fair. (In fact, some would say there's nothing fun about it.) A word of warning: it only gets worse from here. — Peter Smith

Dracula X: Rondo of Blood — Dinner of Flames

The games in the original Castlevania trilogy all open with scenes of civilization. In the original, Simon Belmont approaches Dracula's titular castle via a gate on a road. The second finds Simon in the town of Jova, and Simon's ancestor Trevor passes through Wallachia Town and a cathedral at the opening of the third. All of these places feel oppressed by evil but, even when full of monsters, they've got a lurking malevolence. They're not overtly violent. The opening stage of Dracula X: Rondo of Blood, Dinner of Flames, is a different story entirely. Veros — a town neighboring Jova in Castlevania 2, for a nice garnish of continuity — is literally burning to the ground around Richter Belmont while the metal chords of "Divine Bloodlines" play in the background. The flames don't directly affect your passage here. They do, however, make the stage completely fucking sweet. — JC

F- Zero — Fire Field

When F-Zero first came out, its sense of speed was awesome, and nowhere more than in its ultimate track, Fire Field. If you made it through the fourteen previous tracks, you might — just might — have the skill to make it through this godless collection of hairpin turns, speed traps and exploding mines. The soundtrack matched the intensity of the track layout, with one of the game's most memorable hard-rock grooves. Some would argue that the "fieryness" of Fire Field is purely incidental, with no direct relevance to gameplay. But as a thought experiment, imagine Fire Field as a frozen wonderland, or a barren ocean. Not quite the same. No, there's a distinctly combustive quality to this level, as any King League veteran would be quick to tell you. — PS

Click here for Part 2.
Click here for Part 3.

Capcom to Date, By the Numbers

John Constantine — Tue, 27 May 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Late spring is always an interesting time to watch videogame publishers. With the close of the fiscal year, companies sit their investors and the media down to talk about how things have been going, what people are playing, and, most excitingly, what’s on the horizon. They also occasionally drop information that is ripe for trivia. For example, Capcom, the publisher you may remember as the one I have an unhealthy relationship with, released a list of all-time series sales numbers for the company. The usual suspects like Street Fighter and Mega Man are all over the list but, surprisingly, neither of those series take the top spot. Capcom’s best-selling series over the past twenty-five years has been Resident Evil, with over fifty games released world-wide and 34.5 million sold. Mark that down for quiz night.

Series Sales, 1983 - 2008
1) Resident Evil Series (50 titles, 34,500,000)
2) Mega Man Series (120 titles, 28,000,000)
3) Street Fighter Series (59 titles, 25,000,000)
4) Disney Series (33 titles, 13,200,000)
5) Devil May Cry Series (10 titles, 9,500,000)
6) Onimusha Series (12 titles, 7,800,000)
7) Monster Hunter Series (10 titles, 6,300,000)
8) Dino Crisis Series (13 titles, 4,400,000)
9) Ghosts 'n Goblins Series (15 titles, 4,300,000)
10) Final Fight Series (10 titles, 3,200,000)

Head over to Next-Gen for more.