Collection Additions Volume 10: Tax Return Season Glory

Hello dear readers and welcome back to the game room, where video games are the only thing on my mind when I get those lovely checks in the mail from the federal government and the state of New York. I unfortunately have to make this entry another quickie since I have a lot of very important things unrelated to video games to do today (what a world we live in, right?), but I did get quite a nice haul from my latest venture, too good not to discuss. That said, let's have a look:

It may not look much, but this pile of plastic and metal cost nearly $500. Amazing, right? It was mainly due to the Turbo Grafx 16 games, which if you're unfamiliar with, are the baseball card-sized chips on the bottom (and one in a jewel case on the left). I've developed a bit of an addiction to buying TG-16 games, since they are often quite obscure and the console on a whole had a pretty small library (only 94 so-called "TurboChip" games). As with any other console, its library ranges from dime-a-dozen sports type games to very uncommon and rare games like Super Star Soldier (the one on the right). I honestly don't know what makes these games so rare, if they are just great games or had a low print run or what, since I haven't been able to really sit down and play each one of them in an extended session yet, but some of them do look quite interesting. The aforementioned Super Star Soldier, for the example, is a shoot-em-up space shooter type game, the very Japanese kind of "bullet-hell" games which launches about a thousand projectiles at you in a minute. But it looks and plays really well, and I will definitely be playing that one quite a bit when I have more time. And on first glance at the others, Devil's Crush is a pinball game very similar to Alien Crush (which I mentioned in my first "collection additions" segment that was also entirely about TG-16 games), Dragon's Curse is like a side-scroller mixed with an RPG, and Neutopia is a bit of a Legend of Zelda knockoff. Tricky Kick, I honestly have no idea. Anyway, like I said, I will have to examine all of them more closely in the future to make sure I get my money's worth.

Moving on, we have an undisputed video game classic for the Super Nintendo, one that any 90's kid will probably remember well: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV: Turtles in Time. This game was an absolute hit in the arcades and kids would be lined up around the block to take control of their favorite turtle and battle Shredder and the Foot Clan. Unlike many other arcade games though, it managed to gracefully make the jump to home consoles and retain its fantastically fun gameplay. It's a side-scrolling beat-em-up, which do tend to get monotonous after a while, but Turtles in Time still manages to keep it fun throughout and still have a lovely sheen on it over 20 years later. Just grab a second player and you have an instant afternoon's worth of fun.

Lastly, we end on two related games for the Nintendo 64: Chameleon Twist 1 and 2. These aren't rare games by any means at all, but they are definitely fun games worth owning. I distinctly remember renting the first game from Blockbuster back in the late 90s and spending a weekend trying to beat it, ultimately never being able to do so. So I have a long-standing grudge to settle there, and although I've never actually played the second one, if its anything like the first one I will be able to move right onto it after I finish the first.

So that's all for now, I apologize once again to the most likely two or three people who read this regularly that I've been slacking on entries lately, but after my big test next Saturday I'll be able to focus a lot more on gaming that I have been lately. So for now, thanks for reading and as always, game on.