Retro Gaming Australia

Crazy Taxi 3 is the somewhat maligned final numbered entry in the Crazy Taxi series. Originally an Xbox exclusive, it was released to Arcades as the Chihiro driven Crazy Taxi: High Roller, with a PC release following years later. The game takes some of the maps from the first two games and throws in the new Vegas-inspired map, Glitter Oasis.

Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance was part of the first wave of “good” games for the PlayStation 2 in late 2001, following a kind of lacking launch lineup. It’s relatively light as far as RPGs go, but it really shines in co-op.

After Sega discontinued the Dreamcast, they spread their development efforts across the competing consoles. One of the titles the Xbox got was Jet Set Radio Future, a sequel to the cult hit Jet Set Radio. It’s a little bit different from the original, offering way bigger stages and a little less emphasis on tagging.

Earthworm Jim: Special Edition is an expanded version of the first game in the series which features an extra level, Big Bruty, 1,000 extra frames of animation, alternate endings and a remixed CD soundtrack. It was originally released for the Mega CD, with a Windows 95-based PC version released some months later.

Like any big name film in the late 80s and early 90s, the Warren Beatty-led incarnation of Dick Tracy received multiple video game incarnations. This ad is for the NES one which is a totally different beast to the Sega published games, focusing more on being a gumshoe than gunning down gangsters.

Berzerk is a popular arcade shooter released by Stern. It’s also remembered for the game that was being played when 19 year old Jeff Dailey died of a heart attack while playing the game.

NARC is one of Midway’s more controversial arcade hits, and, as you’d expect, a cut down version made its way home on the NES courtesy of Rare and Acclaim. The NES version had just about all references to drugs removed by virtue of Nintendo of America’s heavy handed censorship.

Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles for the GameCube marked the triumphant return of the Final Fantasy series to Nintendo hardware after 5 years. It was quite the departure from the standard Final Fantasy fare – it was a multiplayer action RPG which required use of the Game Boy Advance link feature for the full experience, much to the chagrin of some at the time.

Mario’s Super Picross is a member of a rather exclusive club: Mario games that Nintendo never localised. As you’d expect, it’s very close to Mario’s Picross on the Game Boy, but the lukewarm market response to that title meant Nintendo passed on releasing the sequels outside of Japan until the rise of the Nintendo DS.

Hagane: The Final Conflict is one of those games which flew under the radar and now commands a ridiculous price on eBay and the like, owing in part to the North American release being a Blockbuster rental exclusive, and the European print run being tiny. The concept is pretty cool – Hagane is a ninja who survives a nearly fatal attack from a rival clan and is giving a new lease on life with a cybernetic body.