Review #187: Capcom Classics Collection vol. 2

 Classic Arcade action!

 I'm a huge fan of Arcade games, as I have previously stated, which made this a collection I needed to own. It contains 20 games, of which I will sum-up how I felt about each of them.

 Something that holds true for each game is that you can unlock Art, Tips and Music from each game just by playing it. The requirements for each unlock are fairly easy, usually it entails achieving a certain highscore(Fairly easy), finishing the game(Varies) and defeating the boss located midway through each game. The art collection for each game is decent, although the quality isn't the best. You can also unlock cheats(Usually invulnerability) by playing the special Capcom-themed quiz game. A fantastic feature is that you can save your progress at any time on every game. There's also an special Street Fighter II tutorial vid, which is pretty decent, but it doesn't give you a chance to try out the lessons as you learn them, still, a nice extra.

 One thing to keep in mind is that all of these games were made to suck the quarters out of you. These are very challenging games, and very unfair, some more than others. This is somewhat mitigated by the ability to play with another player and use infinite continues, but some games run on a checkpoint system, still, you can just unlock the Invulnerability cheat, which is rather nice since it allows you to experience the whole game. The game doesn't allow you to tweak much of each game, you can choose difficulty, and sometimes mess with how many lives you get per 'credit' or when you get extra lives. It's fairly skimpy on options, and it could've allowed you to mess with the dip switches, but no big loss. As for the games:

 Black Tiger: You are a warrior and you must explore somewhat large levels, climbing and jumping. Control is a bit stiff, particularly the jumping which is based on momentum. You can collect money and use it to buy better weapons and other power ups at shops, which appear randomly when rescuing old men. It's very cheap, enemies spawn all the time and in large quantities, but the bosses, in contrast, are very easy, just figure out the pattern and attack their weak points. It seems to be a sort of predecessor to Ghosts and Goblins since Red Arremeer appears both as a boss and an enemy. All in all, it's pretty dull.
3/10

 Street Fighter: Bad. Very, very bad, but it's nice to have as a curiosity. Sprites are bad, the animation is bad, the controls are unresponsive and the movement is awkward, the music and voice clips are bad. It's a bad game, very, very bad. But it's nice to have as part of the collection, it is part of Street Fighter history after all.
1/10

 Strider: A challenging action game in which you play as the famous Strider Hiryu. It's a classic for a reason, while it can get frustrating. Really, really frustrating. The filled with memorable moments, like riding atop dinosaurs only to have a robot dino-creature maul your ride to death. Or when dinosaurs and a mechanical gorilla try to sandwich you. Or when you storm a battleship and escape will it explodes.... it's a fun game, when it isn't frustrating you. I found the controls to be a bit stiff, particularly the jumping, but you can have infinite continues, so it evens out.
8/10

 Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo: The final revision of Street Fighter II, I've already talked about it on my blog, but it's a great game and has aged most gracefully. On the other hand, this is probably isn't the ideal version to own, since you can't tweak much(Like number of rounds or the timer). Regardless, it is a phenomenal game and this game alone makes the whole collection worth it.
10/10

 The Speed Rumbler: This one's a bit weird, and I had never played it before. You play as Super Joe as he attempts to rescue his friends from the bad guys, very deep stuff. You start of in a Car, but you can exit from it whenever you want, ideally when it's about to explode, since Super Joe can only take one hit. It's somewhat charming and simple, but not something I'd want to spend much time with.
 4/10

 Tiger Road: You play as a Monk as you go around defeating all manners of martial artists. It's a simple game, and while I couldn't care less about the character sprites, I really liked the backgrounds. All stages play about the same, you go from one exit to another, defeating enemies, if you like, until you reach the sub-boss and the boss of each area. It's decent.
 5/10

 Quiz & Dragons: A board-game/quiz game hybrid, if you play the original version you might not enjoy it too much, seeing how many questions are rather outdated... however, this collection features an updated question-set based on Capcom trivia, this is the version that you want to play, it's ten times as fun.
 3/10 Original
 7/10 Update

 1941: Fairly entertaining shooter, you are a ship on a vertical playing field trying to blow up all the other ships. And tanks. And eventually moving walls filled with guns. It's a bit of a bullet hell, but it's fairly easy, still, quite enjoyable for what it is.
7/10

 Avengers: Not related to Marvel's Avengers, it's a top-down brawler in which you play as some dude trying to rescue girls, and he does so by punching and kicking everyone. I came across some Kunai once too. It's repetitive, simple and a bit dull, but it's a bit of fun. Plus, it's a tad better in multiplayer.
 4/10

 Block Block: An arkanoid clone. I felt like the controller was a wee bit too sensitive. There's not much else to say about it, it's an Arkanoid clone.
 6/10

 Varth: Another vertical shooter, it's very similar to 1941, but much prettier and harder. The backdrops look phenomenal, and this time around, you die in one hit! Definitely worth checking out if you liked 1941.
 7/10

 Eco Fighters: Another shooter, a horizontal one this time around, and my favorite of the bunch. This time around you control two things at the same time, your ship, and an arm that you can spin around with two other buttons. You can also carry two weapons at a time, one on your arm and one on your ship. It takes a while to get used to controlling the arm, but it's worth it. All in all, looks amazing and it's fairly original.
8/10

 Last Duel: A vertical shooter, what makes this one different from the others is that there are two alternating types of stages, in some you drive a Car and in others you fly a ship. Maybe I was burned out from so many other shooters, them not being a genre I like a lot, but I didn't like it much. The car stages were decent, but the ship ones were so slow...
 4/10

 Side Arms: The last shooter in the Collection, this time around you play as a robot, but it's still very much on rails, allowing you to move around the course to dodge shots, pretty much like the others. Stages are a bit uninspired, and enemies and bosses get recycled throughout the entire game, heck, one of the 3-4 bosses is fought over five times. OVER. FIVE. TIMES.. The main feature is that you get 5 different weapons that you can power up. I didn't care for the gameplay or its lackluster graphics, but the music is nothing short of amazing. At the end of the day, you will remember this one for the music and nothing else. It's not absolutely terrible, just unremarkable, generic and uninspired.
 3/10

 Mega Twins: A cutesy adventure game in which you play as a young swordsman, slashing your way through enemies. It's fun and very colorful, the music is really good as well, but some of the sounds, particularly the "Low health" and "Magic charged" beeps, can get very irritating. A bit on the short side, but very fun.
 7/10

 Three Wonders: Three mini-games in one,  Midnight Wanderers is the 'Action game', It's just an average jump and gun game, nothing spectacular, but entertaining for what it is. Chariot is a horizontal shooter in which you play as the same character from Midnight Wanderers, except that his time they are on a Hang glider. Your melee is tied to your tail, which is also tied to yous Special shots, which is kinda interesting. I liked it, it's quite exciting and fun to play. Don't Pull is the last game, a puzzle game, you play as a cutesy bunny and must defeat enemies by smashing them with blocks that you can push. I didn't really care for this last one.
7/10

 Captain Commando: I love this one. Looks great, the music is good and it has everything a good beat'em up needs. There's a lot of variety when it comes to normal moves(Two normal combos for each character, Neutral A and forward+A), a huge amount of jumping attacks(Jump+A, Jump+Down+A, Running Jump+A, neutral Jump A, etc), it also has every trope covered, every enemy in the book is here, the gang banger, the dominatrix, the ninja, oh and it also has a surfing stage! Not to mention the attention to detail, there's many dying animations, both for the player characters and the enemies, and other minutiae like a different fallen sprite when falling against a wall. I love this one, and I don't understand why it never got popular.
 9/10

 The King of Dragons: This one is, probably, the simplest beat'em up in this collection. Really, there aren't even combos by mashing the A button, no hidden moves, no nothing. But it is an original beat'em up, it's styled after Dungeon and Dragons and the like, you pick from a class(Warrior, Cleric, Archer, Wizard and Dwarf) and beat up on enemies like Orcs, Minotaurs and Dragon Riders. One cool little touch, is that by amassing points you earn level ups, which means more HP per life! You'll also come across different weapons that change how the weapon sprite looks. As simple as it is, it's quite fun, and worth playing through at least once.
 8/10

 Knights of the Round: One of my favorite beat'em ups ever created. Set in the world of Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table... kinda, you can choose between Percival, Lancelot and Arthur. What sets this one apart is the large(For a beat'em up) amount of moves per character, not only do they look different but they have different uses, for example, Arthur has a very slow, very powerful slice, while Lancelot gets a swift flash kick. Another gimmick, which I love, is that as you earn points you level up, which changes the sprite of your character! Arthur and Lancelot get more armor and bigger swords, while Percival gets... bald, and a bit of armor. It's very neat. Then there's defending and parrying. Yes, parrying, on a beat'em up! You've so many options, that this is one of the few Arcade beat'em ups that actually feel fair. You can also hit big chests or food items to divide them into smaller items, allowing you to share the booty... or keep it to yourself, it's worth more that way! This game, as far as I'm concerned, is pretty much perfect. Perhaps the last boss is a bit disappointing, being a headswap from a previous boss, but I still enjoy it to this day.
 10/10

 Magic Sword: An action side-scroller in which you play as a barbarian. Your objective is to climb a tower, and as you go along you must collect keys to open doors and unlock CPU allies. You'll also get stronger weapons after defeating each boss. I like it, it's simple, fun and action packed. The screen will get swarmed with enemies, but it doesn't feel too unfair.
 9/10

 Personally, I think this collection could've used more variety. There's too many shooters, which I don't particularly like, and not enough beat'em ups! I understand the reason for the lack of Final Fight, the first one was on the first collection, and the rest were console exclusives, plus, a ton of other Capcom Beat'em ups were licensed, but what about Battle Circuit? What about Cyber-bots? Regardless, it's a nice amount of games, and even though I might've been hard on some, you've to keep in mind they were different times, and these games wanted your money. Badly.
 8.0 out of 10