MONTHLY 5 - July 2025

July has been an eventful month, not least because I caught a nasty bout of Covid halfway through. We saw Dinosaurs return to the cinema screen, Wimbledon return to London and a welcome return to form for both Marvel and DC.

Jurassic World: Rebirth was a touch better than the last two movies in the franchise, but still tread old ground by being another trek through a jungle. Perhaps playing DinoPark Tycoon (1993 MECC) is the better option. If you enjoyed Fantastic Four: First Steps as much as I did, revisit the classic comic book in digital form with Fantastic Four: Interactive CD-ROM Comic Book! (1995 Pixel Technologies & Marvel Entertainment Group, Inc). Sorry, no Superman stuff (you can find a bunch in the Batman vs Superman Collection), but it's the best blockbuster movie I've seen in quite some time. The hyperbole may be setting in, but it might just be my favourite big-screen iteration of the man of steel yet. Quite the statement considering the theatre is where I likely caught Covid.

If you're wanting for some sport, you can't get much better than Virtua Tennis (2000-2002 SEGA Corporation). The first game in the series is one of the best ways to swing a digital racquet ever. It almost makes me want to take up the sport. Almost.

But the best of the month have nothing to do with the tenuous links to popular culture or current events. They are old-school adventures through-and-through. Golden Gate (1997 Ix Entertainment & Panasonic Interactive Media Company) wows as a cozy treasure hunt set in a contemporary San Francisco that has more puzzles than people. Lastly, Missing on Lost Island (2000 Mayhem Studios & Riki computer games) captures that old-school LucasArts feel that kept me glued to it until completion. And it's not just because it has pirates in it. There's also aliens.

I've a few updates to mention too. Extreme Assault has its MP3 soundtrack added as a separate download - something I was planning to add originally but forgot. Horror Zombies from the Crypt got upgraded to version 4 which meant adding a bunch of manuals, the Atari ST version and updates to the emulators. Likewise Ghost in the Shell has also updated its emulator to make use of new graphical enhancements. I've also added the Japanese artbook and US manual as well as other improvements. Check out each game's review page or the Game Updates section for more information.

That's it for this month! I'll see you at the end of August for more, unless Covid rears its ugly head again.

MONTHLY 5 - February 2025

February is over, and with that comes the latest batch of games from the Collection Chamber. Pick of the bunch is RedJack: Revenge of the Brethren (1998 CyberFlix, Inc), a piratey point-and-click adventure. We also have a unique take on Cluedo with the puzzle board game Case Closed (1999 David Sakadelis). Head to some strange lands and learn about magical beast in The Great Myths and Legends: Monsters & Mythical Creatures (1995 E.M.M.E.) before kicking them in the face with the first-person action-RPG ShadowCaster (1993 Origin Systems). To round off the quintet, we have an archaic version of Rocket League with the vehicular sports game Wild Wheels (1991 Red Rat Software & Ocean Software Ltd).

We'll soon be heading into the month of March where movies will be the theme of the year. The Oscars - my World Cup or Super Bowl - is in a couple of days so I'll be celebrating it with some movie adaptations. They're yet to be decided, but what is locked is my predictions for who will win the Golden Statuette. I'm usually quite good at this, but never really post any proof so I'm gonna do it here;

We'll see how well I did in a couple of days. As for the games, check them out after the jump...

MONTHLY 5 - January 2025

The first month of 2025 is at an end, and boy has it been an eventful one. To distract you from those January woes, why not try one of these five resurrected gems from the past.

In the case of B.C. Racers (1994-5 Core Design Inc), that's the distant past. Pre-history even. A mascot kart racer with some nice sprite-scaled visuals playable on DOS, SEGA CD, SEGA 32X and 3DO! Next, board the Black Pearl in the late 17th century and flip off some balls in Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean Pinball (2005 Disney Interactive). 

Head over to war-torn Europe of the 1930s and beyond and platform through some of Tintin's most famous escapades in Tintin: Destination Adventure (2001 Infogrames). From World War II to Woodstock, peruse the pages of the famous weekly periodical in The Face of Life (1994 Time Inc & Creative Multimedia), a fascinating educational multimedia CD-ROM.

Finally, head on to the cyberpunk future of 2095 and take on the role of a Neo Hunter (1996 Virgin Interactive Entertainment Inc). From the imagination of Orson Scott Card (Ender's Game) and developed by ex-LucasArts employees who took the cancelled project with them, it's an epic gallery shooter with a heavy dose of adventure.

Still to come in February is my rundown on the TV shows of 2024 but more gaming goodness will arrive on the last day of the month. I'll see you then!

MONTHLY 5 - January 2023

It's 2023 and a full month has gone by. Other than collecting my musings of the movies and modern games I've encountered over the last year, it's time to get back to the old stuff. We have five interesting obscurities to kick off the year, starting with the fantasy Tomb Raider clone Asghan: The Dragon Slayer (1998 Silmarils). Next up is a recently translated PlayStation platformer featuring the first creation of Dragon Ball's Akira Toriyama called Dr. Slump (1998 Bandai). Then we have the racing sequel Monster Truck Madness 2 (1998 Microsoft Corporation & Terminal Reality) complete with dozens of fanmade tracks and trucks. Travel the high seas and shoot your way to treasure in Overboard! (1997 Psygnosis) otherwise known as Shipwreckers! in the US. Lastly, guest reviewer Austin takes on a crazy ride with the action-arcade-strategy hybrid that is Space Dude (1996 Evryware).

That's not all. A minor improvement to the site sees the list of all of the Labels in full view at the very bottom. It was something I didn't even think about until a random comment popped up, so hopefully it'll prove useful when browsing the hundreds of game reviews (we're edging towards 600!).

Talking about the games, we have a few updates. Shannara now uses DOSBox-X (but may have an issue so the last version remains - expect the fantasy adventure to appear here again next month), Nocturne now has some tweaks for better compatibility while also adding an editor and soundtrack too! Lastly, MetalTech EarthSiege fixes the crash at the end of Campaign 4, Mission 8 while also getting upgraded to DOSBox Daum as its emulator of choice. You can see their full details of their game pages or on the Game Updates page found to your right.

For the others, go check them out by clicking after the jump...

MONTHLY 5 - JUNE 2021

I'm getting June's post up just in time, though the video will take a little longer I'm afraid. Still, there are some doozies in this quintet of interactive gems. First up is an educational title set in the Medieval times; Crusader: A Conspiracy in the Kingdom of Jerusalem (1997 Index+). Anyone who ever had a Windows PC in the 90s played Full Tilt Pinball (1995, Maxis) or at least the Space Cadet demo the operating systems came with.  Next up is Galapagos: Mendel's Escape (1997 Anark Game Studios), a unique puzzle game that uses artificial intelligence in a disopian 3D world.  We also continue our adventures with Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002 Electronic Arts) - more of the same, but better; just how I like it! The last game is an adventure set in the ruins of an ancient necropilis in Qin: Tomb of the Middle Kingdom (1995 Learn Technologies Interactive). Enjoy, and I'll see you soon for the predictably late video rundown...

MUPPET TREASURE ISLAND

If you're anything like me, Christmas isn't Christmas without the Muppets. They've disappeared from public life of late, thanks to an ill-conceived Office-inspired television show that killed any goodwill the modern cinematic outings may have earned. In the mid-90s, however, Jim Henson's loveable creations could do no wrong, and that included the 1996 re-telling of the Robert Lewis Stevenson's quintessential pirate tale. And 'cos we're the Collection Chamber, Muppet Treasure Island (1996, Activision) inevitably saw a computer game tie-in!

CLAW

Back in 1997, Claw from Monolith Productions (Blood, F.E.A.R., Shadow of Mordor) was something of a rarity; a PC exclusive platformer. And a good one at that. This tough-as-nails 2D side scroller proved that home computers could play host to such a game without playing second fiddle to the genre's prolific nature on consoles.

THE PAGEMASTER

I have a soft spot for traditional cell animated movies. You can see the effort of every ink and painter up there on the big screen. Even when, like The Pagemaster from 1994, the movie itself is a little mediocre there's no doubt I'll put aside its misgivings and thoroughly enjoy it. That same year, a number of videogame adaptations came out, including this little known adventure game published by Turner Interactive.

MARVELOUS: ANOTHER TREASURE ISLAND

Being the iconic gaming behemoth that they are, Nintendo's in-house creations have always gathered a huge fanbase. That's not what has happened with Marvelous: Another Treasure Island, the Super Famicom game that convinced Shigeru Miyamoto to give the Zelda reigns over to its designer Eiji Aonuma. That's partly due to it never travelling beyond Japan's shores but thanks to a superb fan translation, the west can now witness just how marvellous Marvelous is.

SKIES OF ARCADIA: LEGENDS

The ill-fated DreamCast saw the birth of some great franchises from a company at arguably their creative peak. Unique franchises such as Crazy Taxi, Jet Set Radio, Space Channel 5 and Shenmue all got their start here. Skies of Arcadia, created by SEGA's Overworks division contained some of the best RPG goodness the system had to offer but suffered in sales (it was released in the West in 2000 around the time SEGA announced the discontinuation of its hardware division). In 2003 after the DreamCast was put to sleep, an enhanced port quietly sprang up on store shelves for their onetime competitor: Nintendo's GameCube.

SEA LEGENDS

Sea Legends is a fun strategy game released in 1996 that sees you conquer the Caribbean is a way that has brought comparisons to Sid Meier's Pirates! This games ups the ante from this classic which hit shelves five years earlier by improving the graphics and adding a very welcome and intriguing plot.

TRAPS N TREASURES

Traps n Treasures is perhaps the rarest and most expensive Amiga game to have ever existed. It was initially released only in Germany in the summer of 1993 before a small run in the U.K. a year later. It is also perhaps one of the best games on the Amiga.