Reactionary (Strikers 1945 1 and 2, Super Mario Bros. 2 Japan, Clu Clu Land)

(tags game, shmup, Saturn, PlayStation 2, replay-data, side-scroll, Mario)

The demo unit at Sofmap Nipponbashi 2 was a Saturn playing Strikers 1945 1. I sucked at playing as always but it kindled the shmup desire in me, at least for a little while. It wasn't recent, but I picked up the Strikers 1945 I and II combo pack for the PlayStation 2 complete with a Super Play replay DVD disc for about 2000 yen used, which was a deal, maybe. I think I like Strikers 1945 I better right now because it's not as hard, har har. Both are hard anyway, so I keep credit feeding on Normal. Sorry, not macho here. But it's fun to not have so much shmup working set while playing. I suppose if I memorized the levels I would do better though. Actually I have the Strikers 1945 II PlayStation 1 disc and I was playing that a lot during my vert LCD screen days more than a year ago. I was surprised that I remembered some of the details, like where I died most often. Ugh.

Sofmap started re-selling selected Famicom Mini GBA series games like Legend of Zelda, Metroid and Ice Climber for about 980 yen each (originally 2000 yen?). This leads me to Super Mario Bros. 2. I said I had SMB2 Japan (Famicon Mini series number 21), I bought another copy, just to make sure, at 3000 yen (originally 2000 yen?). Expensive. I suppose that it is my second copy, I didn't have more than 1 before, sorry. Also, it seems that I bought the used copy that just entered the store the same day. Talk about good timing.

I broke out my GBA Micro and tried to play SMB2 during transit but I seemed to have forgotten all my "Air" Mario skills. Oh sure, I could get the occasional 5000 point flag pole, but I stress the "occasional" here. SMB2 is so unforgiving and requires impecable timing, but I'm not at the irate stage. Yet. I'm working on beating World 1, ha. Actually I was shocked when I was presented with a Warp Pipe back to World 1 from World 3. Dastardly evil! Well, they don't call it SMB2 for nothing.

Oh yeah, I bought that Clu Clu Land (Famicon Mini GBA series number 12). Warm fuzzies with this game, because this is one I remember that my sister actually tried to approach. Co-op was fun. Besides the music is good.

Don't call it a retro kick. Because of the platforming theme, I wanted to get the GBA version of Yoshi's... what do you call it? Aw heck it was the GBA version Super Mario Collection 3. Yoshi's World? No used copies in most of Nipponbashi, and new copies were 4000 yen retail, ouchie. I actually have the Super Famicom version but the GBA is so much more convenient.

Let's see how much more I can stomach 1980s platforming.