Tag - Video Game

Single Button Games for C64 – Mini Reviews

29th July 2018

Here’s a quick look at the new C64 ‘Single Button Games’ collection from K&A Plus including screenshots of each of the 5 games on the cassette.

I always enjoy getting packages in the post from foreign countries, seeing the strange looking stamps on them and of course trying to remember exactly what I’ve ordered from where to guess what may be inside! You know how it is with a lot of retro stuff – often it can be weeks or even months after you place an order before it arrives.

Anyway, this time it was ‘Single Button Games’ from K&A Plus Magazine in Poland. As the name suggests this is a collection of games that you can play by only using your joystick fire button.

The Cassette Case

The Complete Package – includes some cool little stickers!

Amazingly there are 5 little games packed onto this cassette; 2 on side A and 3 more on side B. All of them utilise a turbo loader so you won’t have to wait too long for them to load. Even so, they all feature loading music and loading screens to entertain you whilst you wait for the games to load – just like being back in the 80’s!.

The Inlay Card

Taking a Look at the Single Button Games

As mentioned already there are five games included – let’s insert the tape and take a brief look at them all, in the order in which they appear on the cassette.

Binatone Data Recorder with the Single Button Game Collection Inserted – Ready to Play!

SIDE A

Captain Cloudberry (Tape Counter – 000)

You control a small Bi-Plane and have to destroy weather balloons found around the screen whilst avoiding hitting the frozen clouds. The fact you can only use a single button press to control the plane ensures that this is nowhere near as easy at it sounds! Clicking the fire button causes the planes direction of flight to rotate 45′. Each subsequent press rotates it another 45′ until you have come full circle. Just imagine trying to play ‘Snake’ with just a single button to rotate the snakes head and you’ll get the idea.

Captain Cloudberry Loading Screen

Captain Cloudberry Title Screen

Captain Cloudberry Game Screen

Pixel City Skater (Tape Counter – 057)

This is a screen flipping ‘endless runner’ where you have to perform skateboard jumps over various obstacles to progress as far as you can before you inevitably collide with something and fall off.

Pixel City Skater – Loading Screen

Pixel City Skater – Game Screen

Side B

Fire To Jump (Tape Counter – 000)

This is very similar to the previous Pixel City Skater game but features very minimalist graphics with the same principal of jumping over objects in a screen flipping ‘runner’ style game.

Fire to Jump – Loading Screen

Fire to Jump – Game Screen

Flappy Bird (Tape Counter – 059)

This game surely needs no introduction? It’s a faithful reproduction of the frustratingly addictive game that took the mobile world by storm a few years ago. This version is a perfect recreation of the game right down to the same maddeningly difficult gameplay!

Flappy Bird – Loading Screen

Flappy Bird – Game Over Screen – Expect to see this within seconds of loading the game!

Flapper (Tape Counter – 102)

The final game in the collection should really be called ‘Chopper’ as it sees you trying to control a small helicopter. You have to navigate it through a side scrolling landscape very reminiscent of the old ‘Scramble’ arcade game. The faster you press the button the faster the rotor blades spin and the more lift you get. It plays a little bit like Flappy Bird but is easier to control.

Flapper – Game Screen

And that’s it – a really great little collection of games that I’m very happy to add to my C64 collection. I enjoyed all 5 games but if I had to pick a favourite it would be Captain Cloudberry which has that ‘just one more go’ quality in spades. It’s presentation is top notch too and it has a delightfully quirky little rendition of ‘Lady Madonna’ as its’ theme music which I can’t get out of my head!

If you would like to get hold of your own copy then you should head right on over to the K&A Plus website here. They also produce a terrific magazine that covers both the C64 and Amiga computers which is well worth taking a look at whilst you are there.

A Closer look at the Cassette

Just to finish I thought I’d show a few close-ups of the cover and the cassette itself which has been really well produced.

C64 Single Button Games Cassette Case

Side ‘A’

Side ‘B’

Issue 1 of Fusion Magazine

3rd July 2018

Steven

Amiga, Commodore 64, Gaming, Playstation, Retro

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This has just arrived in the post – the very first issue of ‘Fusion’ a new gaming magazine that covers everything from old school 8-bit classics right up to the current 4K consoles.

Fusion Magazine – Contents Page

I spotted this on Kickstarter and pre – ordered it – it’s only £3.99 plus postage per issue. It’s A5 in size, really well produced in full glossy colour and contains 52 pages.

Fusion Magazine – Atari VCS Article

There’s a good mix of content and although I’ve not read the whole thing yet the quality of writing of the stuff I’ve actually perused has been great. The Atari VCS article (a project I’ve been following for a long time) particularly rang true. There’s a great review of Hyper Sentinel and even Far Cry 5!

Fusion Magazine – Hyper Sentinel Review

I must confess – at first glance I was a little disappointed that there wasn’t more coverage of retro games. However that was before I’d actually read through everything on offer. There’s a really nice mix of old retro games, brand new ones and a lot of stuff in between. I really liked the spotlight on new games that have a strong retro feel to them. Hyper Sentinel, Horizon Chase Turbo and Celeste for example. Those last two games I’d never heard of before but after reading about them in Fusion I couldn’t wait to add them both to my collection!

I’ve already placed my order for issue 2 and can’t wait for it to arrive. If you’d like to find out more about the magazine or order yourself a copy head on over to their website here.

Reset 64 issue 11 has arrived!

23rd June 2018

Steven

Commodore 64, Gaming

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What a great month June has been for 64 magazines! Just a few days ago Freeze64 arrived and this morning I received a Protovision package in the post containing issue 11 of Reset 64 magazine!

Contents Page

As usual it’s a nice thick edition which should provide a good few hours of 64 reading goodness. There’s a ton of reviews for many recent C64 games such as Galencia, Planet Golf, Sam’s Journey and many more. There are also lots of 64 related articles covering news, interviews and much more.

Back Cover

There’s also a coverdisk – remember those? I love getting these as it takes me right back to a time when a coverdisk (or tape) might have been the only new software I got that month. Well that and typing in listings!

You never know what you are going to get on these disks and discovering what’s on them is all part of the fun!

Cover Disk (Mix-I-Disk)

Reset 64 is a bit different from Freeze64 in that they only do a limited physical print run but they do offer downloads of past issues and the cover disks. If you are interested in finding out more or getting a copy take a look here.

July Issue of Freeze64 & Corruption Adventure Game

21st June 2018

Steven

Commodore 64, Gaming

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Just thought I’d share a couple of cool things that arrived in the post a few days ago. Namely the latest issue of ‘Freeze64’ and something I’ve been chasing down for about a year now – Corruption for the C64!

For those of you who are not aware, Freeze64 is a brilliant monthly Commodore 64 Fanzine that contains game reviews / cheats and interviews with game designers from yesteryear. Recently it has started to feature regular articles from Julian Rignall (of ZZap 64 fame) too. Anyway I heartily recommend it – it’s a very entertaining read. Take a look for yourself here.

Corruption – Box Contents

I’m a big adventure game fan, particularly of the Magnetic Scrolls graphic series. I’ve already got The Pawn, Guild of Thieves and Jinxter but tracking down the rest of the collection is proving quite difficult. I’m pretty pleased with this find though – it’s in superb condition and has all the Filofax pages that give you clues and background material for the game. Sadly it is missing the audio cassette so I still need to track that down, or at least an audio file of the contents! Now I just need to find copies of Wonderland and Fish! to complete my collection.

By the way, if you have any of these and would like to sell them – please get in touch!

Project Cars 2 Collectors Edition Unboxing

24th April 2018

Steven

Gaming, XBox

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A little late to the party but I was really impressed with my recent purchase of Project Cars 2 Collector’s Edition. It certainly seems to me that a lot of thought was put into the design of the packaging and the content. The whole package was simply a delight to open up with layer after layer of content to be discovered whether it be tucked inside something or hidden behind it. This is definitely a Collector’s Edition that I will cherish for years to come.

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Moga Pro Review – PS Vita killer?

20th June 2013

Steven

Gadgets, Gaming, Reviews

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Today I finally received my Moga Pro pre-order from Game and I’m very happy to say it was worth the wait!

Moga Pro Box

Just in case you’re not aware of what one is – it’s a bluetooth hardware gamepad that works with Android phones and tablets to give you a more ‘console like’ experience and overcome the problems of using touch screens to play.

Moga Pro Box (flap open)

The devices retails for £40 and comes in a very attractive retail box with a fold out magnetic front flap that shows the device in action with phones, tablets and even a TV. Inside the box you get the pad itself, a plastic tablet stand, USB charging cable, instruction booklet, quick-start guide, QR code to download the driver for your device and a code to download a free copy of N.O.V.A. 3 from the Gameloft’s own store.

Moga Pro Box (back)

First thing you need to do is charge the pad up as it is powered by an internal rechargeable battery. An LED flashes yellow to indicate the unit is charging and extinguishes when fully charged. While the pad is charging you can scan the QR code with your phone which will take you straight to the MOGA Pivot app which you need to install on your phone or tablet.

Moga Pro Gamepad

Once the gamepad is fully charged you can move onto the next stage which just involves running the Pivot app and following the simple on-screen instructions to pair the pad with your phone. It will also give you an opportunity to get a free copy of Pacman*, redeem your Nova 3* game code and register for updates. I received an email a few minutes after registering with instruction on how to actually get the game. The whole process couldn’t be simpler and my pad paired and worked first time with no issues at all. As well as letting you setup your pad the Pivot app also acts as a central hub where you can see all of your installed Moga Pro compatible games and also browse and download new ones.

Moga Pro Box Contents

*In order to install both of these games you have to allow installs from Unknown sources on your phone. The option can be found in Settings>Security>Unknown sources. This is because the apps are being downloaded from outside the Google Play store.

Moga Pro with Galaxy Note 2

The build quality seems to be first-rate and the design has clearly been based on the XBox 360 pad as the dimensions, stick layouts, triggers and buttons are all virtually identical, even the XYAB letters on the buttons are same! This is fine by me – the 360 pad is by far the best I’ve ever used on any system and the Moga Pro is just as comfortable and precise to use. Where it differs from the 360 pad is that it incorporates a flip out spring-loaded arm which holds your phone in place securely while you game. The arm dimensions are extremely generous so don’t worry about your phone fitting – I have a Galaxy Note 2 and it fitted comfortably even with the phone in a Spigen case! It feels perfectly balanced once the phone is in place and very little effort is required to hold the whole thing steady. It could easily have been top-heavy and tiring to hold but it’s obvious a fair bit of thought gone in to the placement of the arm and it works well.

Moga Pro phone holder arm

I tested the game with a copy of Gameloft’s Modern ~~Warfare~~ Combat 4: Zero Hour. This is a Moga Pro enhanced game which basically means it fully supports all the features of the Gamepad. The Modern Combat games have always looked and sounded the part but been seriously let down in the control department with the virtual sticks and touch screen controls being awkward at best and a downright hindrance at worst. Not to mention that you’ve got your thumbs obscuring a good chunk of the screen. The Moga Pro was a revelation – before I knew it an hour had passed and I was really enjoying myself. The sticks are really responsive, dead-zones almost non-existent and lining up head shots quickly became second nature. Familiar Call of Duty console button configurations also helped too, with bumpers launching grenades, X to reload, Y to switch weapons and so on.

I have a Playstation Vita which is a really great handheld system, the best I have ever owned in fact. However having experienced the Moga Pro coupled with my Galaxy Note 2 I’d have to say it’s a better gaming experience than the Vita. The screen is bigger, the whole thing is easier and much more comfortable to hold and the full-size pad and analogue sticks really are of console quality. The final kicker is that at just £4.99 the Gameloft COD clone is a darn sight cheaper than Black Ops DeClassified too!