Developed and published by Capcom in 1991 Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Al82_Retro Add me on Google+: http://bit.ly/1tPwL1u For today's video we will be taking a look at another classic Capcom brawler based on the venerable CPS1 arcade system. The game is based on King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table , although quite why Capcom omitted 'Table' from the title remains a mystery to me. In a somewhat surprising departure from the usual fighting games of the day, Capcom stepped back in time to the days of the Arthurian legends for some swords 'n sorcery action. The game feels very much like an evolution of Sega's seminal hack 'em up, Golden Axe. Whereas Sega's game was a near-pure arcade fighting game, Capcom introduced a blend of RPG-lite elements into the game (something they would later refine in their Dungeons & Dragons arcade titles). The game's story begins with Arthur, having recently removed Excalibur from the rock, being dispatched on a quest by Merlin to defeat the evil King Garibaldi and reunite Britain under his banner. Along the way, Arthur must deal with all manner of foot-pads, knights and even the occasional tiger (let's not get too hung up about historical accuracy on this occasion). Having deposited a coin, the player can select from one of three playable characters, each of which has varying levels of speed and attack strength. Each of the characters increases in strength and ability throughout the course of the game, usually levelling up following successful completion of each mission. With each new level, the characters gain bigger and better weapons, as well as donning ever-more impressive looking armour, which also improves protection against enemy attacks. The game features a combo system similar to most other fighting games. Tapping the attack button initiates a flurry of strikes that can be chained to together, ultimately ending in a powerful finishing move. It's also possible to parry incoming blows with a well-timed combination of button presses, which also has the benefit of granting the player a few seconds of invulnerability - it's risky to perform and requires good timing, but it can be a risk worth taking. Also making an appearance in the game is mounted combat, enabling the player to strike at foes from atop a valiant steed. Not only do horses move more quickly, they also have a useful charge than can be used to send opponents flying. The down-side to this is that it's all too easy to get dismounted by an enemy that manages to land blow; not only will you spend precious time scrambling from the floor, certain enemies will steal the horse, using it to strike back at you. Another interesting feature is the way that treasure dropped by defeated enemies can be split into smaller quantities. Give ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5oOKnm1t44

Developed and published by Sega in 1990 Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Al82_Retro Add me on Google+: http://bit.ly/1tPwL1u The game was ported and released for the Sega Mega Drive in 1991, later released in a three-pack compilation and was where I first discovered the title. It wasn't until much later that I became aware that the game was actually released first as a coin-op in 1990 - whilst my visits to arcades in the UK were infrequent, I don't recall ever seeing a cabinet in the flesh. As far as plot goes, Earth has been invaded by a race of deadly aliens and the only people capable of repelling the invaders are the Alien Busters, a crack special forces team that seem to double up as travelling purveyors of fast food! Supporting single or two players cooperatively, the objective of the game is to repel the aliens and liberate Earth and it's endangered inhabitants. On the subject of the aliens themselves, the designs are quite striking, even down-right disturbing. The betentacled, bubble-gum pink horrors that attempt to swallow the player whole are particularly gross - top marks must go to the art department in terms of originality! Conceptually, the game shares many similarities with another Sega classic, Golden Axe. The game is broken up into multiple side-scrolling levels that play just like a standard beat 'em up where the player must defeat waves of enemies while trying to reach the end of the level. Despite swapping swords and magic for flamethrowers and bazookas, the combat system between Alien Storm and Golden Axe is practically identical. Hitting the attack button performs a combo that stuns opponents, followed up by a knock-down move that knocks the opponent down for a short time. There are a number of different animations featuring different weapons that change depending on the distance between the player and the target. The sci-fi weaponry means that the designers could be more creative with the animations and the characters will whip out submachine guns, rocket launchers and all manner of gadgets to dispatch the bad guys. In another nod to Sega's previous game, Alien Storm features special moves for each of the characters, allowing them to attack all enemies on the screen with deveastating effects. The ability to perform these attacks is restricted by the amount of energy the player has stored in their backpack, as displayed by the energy gauge at the bottom of the status window. Whereas Golden Axe featured multiple levels of magical power and consumed all potions when used, Alien Storm uses a fixed damage model system that uses a set amount of energy per use. Although players can call on these attacks more frequently, they're arguably less visually impressive than the magic attacks from Golden Axe and are, in my opin ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBsgHTvzTes

Developed by Capcom and published by Sega in 1993 Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Al82_Retro Add me on Google+: http://bit.ly/1tPwL1u Whilst side-scrolling beat-em ups existed prior to Final Fight, it was Capcom's seminal side-scroller that really perfected the template and set the standard for genre. Boasting super-smooth scrolling, brilliant graphics and a fighting system that was super-easy to pick up and play, Final Fight was the mainstay of any decent arcade in the late 80's and early 90's. Capcom ported the game to the SNES in 1990, but it lacked much of what made the arcade version so great. Not only did it lack a 2-player mode, Guy was absent from the game altogether, as was the entirety of the fourth level. Needless to say, many players felt that Capcom could have handled the conversion a lot better. Capcom would later release a version of the game for Sega's CD add-on for the popular Mega Drive/Genesis platform in 1993. Boasting a full CD soundtrack, I thought it would be interesting to play through this version of the game and see how it compares to the arcade, as well as the lacklustre SNES conversion. The most significant upgrade that the CD format brings to the table is the fully mastered CD soundtrack and, I have to say, it's seriously impressive. Not only has all of the in-game music been recreated to a high standard with proper instruments and synths, Capcom also recorded voice-overs for the intro and ending sequences; it's pretty cheesy (as you'd probably expect for early 90's), but it's still a cool feature given that FM synthesis and scratchy speech samples were still the norm for console games at the time. On the subject of the intro, I noticed that there are a couple of new scenes added to this version not present in the original arcade version; I'm unsure as to whether these are exclusive to this port or whether it's present on other conversions, but it's a small, if neat addition. In addition to the Red Book CD soundtrack, all of the digitised effects samples from the original arcade board feature in this version as well, and they sound excellent. I don't have any information to hand, but I suspect that Capcom made use of the Ricoh PCM chip in the Sega CD unit to play these samples; the quality is far too good to be using the base console's sound chip. Of course, fancy graphics and audio would be for nought if the gameplay wasn't any good. As you might expect from Capcom, the game plays just as well as the arcade version - everything from the controls to the fighting action feels absolutely spot-on; some of the enemy AI behaviour felt slightly different to that of the arcade, but this is just an observation, not a complaint. The game features excellent graphics and include all of the animation from the arcad ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-Ly3ByTuUQ

Follow me on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/Al82_Retro Get Great Retro Scene News @ http://www.vintageisthenewold.com Developed by Special FX and published by Ocean in 1990 0:00:00 - Intro (music by Keith Tinman) 0:02:04 - Level 1: River Rouge Complex 0:09:20 - Brainstorm 1 0:10:28 - Shooting Range 1 0:11:10 - Level 2: Tokugawa Brewery 0:17:00 - Brainstorm 2 0:18:00 - Shooting Range 2 0:18:48 - Level 3: Civic Centrum 0:22:14 - Ending Credits Coding: Ian Moran Graphics: Colin Rushby, Karen Davies Musician: Keith Tinman ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K845O9IPAvs