NES Works Gaiden #043: Pooyan / City Connection / Hyper Sports (Patreon)

Published:

2022-08-24 12:10:06

Imported:

2024-04

Tags:

Jaleco axes art amuse city connection famicom hudson hyper sports konami nes nes works nes works gaiden pooyan track & field

Content

I hope to have both the Segaiden and NES Works Gaiden books complete and published in time for both systems' 40th anniversary next July, so—here's another look at ’85 Famicom software as we hurtle forward to the NES launch. These are mostly pretty good! Assuming you don't mind that Hyper Sports doesn't really feel like full justification for a standalone retail release, that is.

Files

Pooyan / City Connection / Hyper Sports retrospective: Pigs all the way down | NES Works Gaiden #043

Some familiar faces show up this week on Famicom, along with a few that didn't make their way to NES. Konami's Pooyan headlines this episode with a simple but charming and masterfully designed single-screen arcade game hailing from the early career of one of retrogaming's most infamous minds, Tokuro Fujiwara. It's less soul-crushing in terms of difficulty than Ghosts ’N Goblins or Mega Man. He was still young. He hadn't realized that his calling in life would be to reduce millions of children to tears. Also stepping into the post-Super Mario void, we have City Connection—a good game on NES and a better one on Famicom due to simple release timing. A Flicky-style platformer feels a lot more of-the-moment in 1985 than it did in 1988! And, finally, Hyper Sports, the other set of the raw materials that Konami would combine into Track & Field. Like Hyper Olympic, it feels like half a game. That's because, for those of us in the U.S., it literally is half a game. Production notes: Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! Plus, exclusive podcasts, eBooks, and more! NES/Famicom footage captured from @Analogue Nt Mini; arcade footage captured from MiSTer with thanks to @MiSTer Addons. Video upscaled to 720 with @Micomsoft xRGB Mini Framemeister.