Sega Master System #10: 20-em-1

Developer: Tec Toy

Publisher: Tec Toy

Release Date: 1995

They really pulled out all the stops for this one

 

You can all rest easy now because I went through the Sega Master System library and found a real stinker. I can finally break up the monotony of reviewing pretty good games. And this is the stinker of the stinkers. It’s the Action 52 of the Sega Master System except with an even weirder backstory. Sure Action 52 is bad, but it was made by some fly-by-night company who knew practically nothing about video games. 20-em-1 was made by Tec Toy. If you are a fan of Master System than you have probably heard of them. No company has ever loved a console as much as Tec Toy loves the Master System, and yes, it is in present tense. They’re the Brazilian company that kept producing games for the Master System until 1998. That’s right up until the end of the Sega Saturn. They were some high-profile releases too. They brought games like Earthworm Jim and Street Fighter II to the Master System. Even their more original games are based on franchises that are popular in Brazil. They released big deal franchises, not lazy shovelware. How much do they love Master System? They never quit supporting it. They quit releasing game regularly in 1998, but they still make and sell Master Systems. Their newest console appears to be a plug-and-play, but it’s still incredible that in 2024 you can still buy Master System products from a real game company. That’s what makes 20-em-1 so inexplicable. How could a company that cares so much put out something of such low quality? That’s a question I don’t really have an answer for.

 20-em-1 was originally released as a pack-in with one of their many console re-releases. This is weird for a couple of reasons. For one it’s about the worst possible showcase for the console. Also, the console already had a game built in. A slightly more well-known game called Sonic the Hedgehog. Why they felt it necessary to include a cart of terrible mini games when the console already had Sega’s signature game built-in is beyond comprehension. It’s like if the NES had come bundled with Super Mario Bros. 3 and Rocky and Bullwinkle. Maybe they wanted to include something easy that the kids could play, because that’s about the only audience I could see for 20-em-1.

 

Of course, a multi-cart from the early 90s isn’t expected to have 20 Super Metroids on it, but it’s hard to think of games that offer less. Don’t expect to play most of these for more than a minute. In most of them you either move back-and-forth and catch things or move up-and-down and avoid things. You might know this type of game if you’ve ever played the lowest quality dollar store handheld. I was hoping that the developers actually had twenty ideas for games, but the basic formula rarely changes. In one game you’re a construction worker catching wrenches. In another you’re a mouse catching cheese. In yet another you are a frog catching flies. At least in that one you have to push a button. Actually, I’m pretty sure none of the games used two buttons. I don’t know why they wanted to make 10 terrible rip-offs of Kaboom!, but they did it.

 

What’s worse is that the games that deviate from the formula are even worse. In most of the games the goal is to reach a target score in less than a minute. However, there were a couple of games that were over in less than ten seconds.  There is a motorcycle game that looked fun, but before I even knew what I was doing I had already won. Why did they make the one game I was interested in only last five seconds? There was a similar situation with a sluggish platformer that made me jump over about three hills before it was over. One of the games is a slow Pong clone that has what looks like a chef hitting a cookie into a stove. Yeah, that one lasts about twenty seconds. Am I getting repetitious? Well, that’s how it feels playing 20-em-1. It’s a compilation of the shortest, simplest games of all time. What am I supposed to say?

 

I will say that if you plan on beating it you will only lose about a half hour of your life. Most of the scoring goals are easy to achieve, and some of the more difficult looking games have an easy exploit. Just move your car to the correct spot or stand in one spot and shoot the ever-spawning enemies and you’ll do just fine. It has twenty games that last a minute at the longest with only a handful of them taking more than one try. It’s even hard to go back and improve your scores because the score accumulates every round instead of resetting. So if you want to know if you did better the second time you just have to take your total score and subtract the score you got the first time. I hope you have a calculator. That wasn’t always a given in the mid 90s.

 

Whatever Tec Toy’s goal was with 20-em-1 it didn’t seem to work. The game is extremely rare and never got a standalone re-release. I guess they were too embarrassed to try to sell it to the masses. It didn’t hurt Tec Toy though. They kept chugging along with Master System re-releases and buried 20-em-1 far down in their biography. I guess they realized that while Sonic the Hedgehog might be difficult, it’s still more fun for kids than slowly catching wrenches. So, no surprise but this game is going low. It’s at the bottom of the Sega Master System list and straddling the line of the offensively bad section. This statement always backfires on me, but I don’t see any SMS game ranking lower. It’s hard to beat 20 bad games all at once. Of course, if there is I will let you know. It’s not only my hobby but my sacred duty.

 

Sega Master System Quality Percentage: 7/10 or 70%

Sega Master System 

1. Sonic the Hedgehog 
2. Alex Kidd in Shinobi World 
3. Alex Kidd: The Lost Stars 
4. After Burner 
5. Alex Kidd in Miracle World 
6. Aerial Assault 
7. Alex Kidd: High Tech World 
8. Ys The Vanished Omens 
9. Action Fighter 
10. 20-em-1 

Sega Master System #9: Aerial Assault

: Sanritsu Denki

Publisher: Sega

Release Date: 1990

Aerial Assault feel like a bit of an outlier among 90s Master System games. It came out within a year of the Master System’s end in America. Many of the games released around this time were ports of Genesis and NES games with much more familiar counterparts. I already wrote about Sonic the Hedgehog, and there would be several others such as Golden Axe and Castle of Illusion on the horizon. Aerial Assault is certainly one of the least famous later releases. There is a version on Game Gear, but that doesn’t raise its profile much. It’s just a low-key horizontal shooter, and that’s part of the charm. It feels like a game that should’ve come out in 1986 instead of 1990. I don’t mean that as a criticism either. It just feels so familiar. Of course I’ve played thousands of video games at this point,  so probably every game I review is going to feel somewhat familiar. But Aerial Assault is one of those games that brings back memories even though I never played it until a couple years ago. It’s so familiar that it’s a little hard to write about. I feel like I’ve written this review before.

Actually, despite it being a side-scrolling shooter it reminds me of Contra. They both have a vaguely military setting that starts out at least somewhat realistic and then builds into something sci-fi and alien. Aerial Assault also has a couple of similar bosses where you hit the red spot and blow them up piece by piece. A closer influence would probably be Gradius though. Of course what side-scrolling shooter wasn’t influenced by Gradius? I might as well say a platform game was influenced by Super Mario Brothers. Still, the horizontal waves of enemies and frequent power-ups will probably ring a few bells. It also shares the previous games’ difficulty. Aerial Assault lured me in with a false sense of calm with the relatively easy first level, but each level adds more and more enemies until it almost becomes ludicrous. I enjoy intense difficulty in shooters though, and I think that I could at least finish this one on easy mode if I practiced. There are seven continues available, but it still wasn’t enough to get through the whole game.

 

Actually, my main criticism is also similar to Contra. Aerial Assault has a ton of power-ups, and while this is typically a good thing, all the icons on the screen can mess you up. My strategy with Contra was to find a spread gun and keep it the whole game. All the other power-up icons were downgrades. This can happen in Aerial Assault as well. There will often be clumps of power-up icons appearing at the same time. It’s hard to learn what’s what, so it’s easy to end up with a weapon that you don’t want. I’m not very good at memorizing visual symbols in the first place, so I found it especially confusing. I couldn’t remember which ones were extra ground missiles or pea shooters. There are also a few instant death icons out there. I don’t know who thought that was a good idea, but there are a bunch of old games with instant death power-ups, and nobody liked them. I don’t know why they kept doing it. It’s not like there weren’t enough things in Aerial Assault to kill me.

 I should try not to start ranting too much. Aerial Assault really is an enjoyable shooter. The power-up situation can be a little annoying at times, but it also keeps the game from feeling hopeless. Even completely powered down I never felt like I couldn’t still win. I usually didn’t, but at least I knew I could. So here we have another Sega Master System game that’s going into the good column. I know it’s starting to look like the Master System had the best quality control in history,  but I am cherry picking a bit. I have mostly been focusing on games I already know are good or games I’m not as familiar with over my decades of playing. I’ll get to the bad ones, but it’s hard to play a game I already know I don’t like. It still might have one of the highest quality percentages, but that’s because I don’t imagine any console having that high of a good game count. Also I’ve been trying to review all the games that start with “A” and I ended up liking all the Alex Kidd games. Speaking of Alex Kidd, I’m going to rate Aerial Assault just the same as I rated High Tech World. It’s now #66 right behind Lords of Thunder. I wonder how many SMS games will end up in the lower half of the good section? Only time will tell.

 

Sega Master System Quality Percentage: 7/9 or 78%

Ranking List.docx

Sega Master System #8: Alex Kidd: High Tech World

Developer: Sega

Publisher: Sega

Release Date: July 1988

 Sega Master System has a relatively small lineup in the United States, and it is a library largely devoid of extremes. Unlike its rival NES, there aren’t a ton of masterpieces or complete disasters. It’s one of the most pleasantly pretty good consoles of all time, and this is one of the reasons I enjoy it so much. It’s not the most fun for reviewers however, so when a bad game is found it tends to really get pummeled. Nobody is going to pass up a chance for a really snarky review. Nobody becomes a critic if they don’t want to be snarky and negative sometimes. So going into Alex Kidd: High Tech World I knew I was playing a game that is largely reviled by modern critics. I think many critics would put it near the bottom of the US library. Well, I’m sorry to disappoint everyone. I really wanted to find this game hilariously bad. Unfortunately, I ended up having quite a bit of fun with High Tech World. It’s just quirky and interesting enough to be a low-key sleeper.

 Alex Kidd: High Tech World is divided into two main sections that don’t play like any other Alex Kidd games. This is one of those Super Mario Bros. 2 situations where the game was originally made as a totally different game in Japan and then changed into an Alex Kidd game for American audiences. I don’t really think this is a bad thing though. Miracle World doesn’t play all uniquely to begin with, and while Lost Stars is a fun game, I didn’t really need another game just like it. It’s always fun to play a black sheep sequel. High Tech World is part adventure game and part ninja side-scroller. In the first section of the game Alex is on a mission to collect pieces of a destroyed map so he can find his way to High Tech World. The title is a bit of a misnomer as there is nothing high tech about Alex’s world. It’s just a place he is trying to go to that we never get a good look at. The actual environments are a low-key castle, ninja-infested forest, and pointless small town. It’s a bit less exciting than some kind of futuristic side-scroller, but it works.

 I enjoyed the adventure section of the game, but I can see why people might get a bit turned off. Alex only has one life in this section, and certain mistakes will lead to instant death. It makes sense that an electric shock might kill, but it’s a bit more ridiculous with something like forgetting to pick up an item or meeting your friend too late. Embarrassment is just as deadly as the sharpest ninja star in this game. I didn’t mind this very much, however, because the adventure section is relatively short, and some of the deaths are kind of funny. They were going for a funny tone, so absurd deaths fit the overall premise. Besides, there is a time limit for finding all the map pieces so it will take several tries. You’re supposed to die a bunch of times in adventure games. I had a lot of fun solving the puzzles and trying to do it as quickly as possible. Nothing was too hard to solve, but there was one section which required me to go in and out of a room several times to get the necessary characters to show up. Since going into rooms takes the most time off the clock it might not be something the average person would try. Most of it made sense though, and it was a fun little adventure for 80s console players who weren’t too familiar than the genre.

 The second half is mostly a side-scrolling forest with a small town in the middle. The platforming was difficult and fun in that old school way. There is a password for this part of the game and continues are allowed. The clock becomes a non-factor as it only progresses a minute or so for each life lost. This was much appreciated as progress was slow, but I always felt like I was doing a bit better. Alex throws ninja stars in this one, which is an improvement over his short punch in my opinion. The town is fairly useless outside of collecting a vital item. You earn money and can buy things, but I couldn’t find any use for them. To get the needed item you have to pray at the shrine 100 times. This sounds tedious, but it really didn’t take very long. I’m not sure if I did something to shorten it, but it felt more like thirty times.

 

Overall, I was charmed by this quirky game. The gameplay was fun and refreshingly different. It’s obvious that it was not originally an Alex Kidd game, but that doesn’t bother me. It was fun having so many characters to interact with even if they aren’t in any other Alex Kidd games. It’s also supposed to be funny and absurd, so I didn’t mind it when the game pulled my leg a little. It made me smile much more than it frustrated me, and it has a ton of personality for an SMS game. So yeah, I’ll put it in the good section. It’s #66 overall just behind Lords of Thunder (Sega CD). It’s the lowest ranked of the SMS Alex Kidd games, but it’s still worth playing. It’s interesting that I’ve now covered all the North American Alex Kidd games not counting the 2021 reboot. I haven’t finished reviewing any series yet, and Alex Kidd is just the type of oddity that appeals to me. So sorry gaming fans, no Mega Man reviews yet, but you can read all about Alex Kidd.

 Sega Master System quality percentage: 6/8 or 75%

Sega Master System 

1. Sonic the Hedgehog 
2. Alex Kidd in Shinobi World 
3. Alex Kidd: The Lost Stars 
4. After Burner 
5. Alex Kidd in Miracle World 
6. Alex Kidd: High Tech World 
7. Ys The Vanished Omens 
8. Action Fighter 

Atari 2600 #19: Pac-Man

Developer: Atari

Publisher: Atari

Release Date: 3-16-82

 If you know anything about gaming in the pre-NES days than you probably already know that Pac-Man on the 2600 is notorious, often considered to be one of the most disastrous video game releases of all time. It’s often credited, along with E.T., as destroying not only the Atari 2600 but the entire American gaming industry. It’s also the best-selling game Atari ever released to the home market. It sold around 8 million copies when there were only around 9 million consoles sold. It’s hard to imagine a video game owned by almost 90% of a console’s users, but this is how much faith Atari had in Pac-Man. Atari never marketed a game so heavily, and never had more confidence. The old legends states that they produced 12 million copies in the expectation that Pac-Man would get people to buy a console the same way Space Invaders had a couple years previously. It’s one of those game like Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt that even if you’ve never played a video game in your life you will inexplicably find a copy of it when you’re cleaning out your attic. So how does Atari’s biggest and most important release up to that point end up going so horribly wrong? Well, that’s the story Atari fans have been trying to figure out for the last forty years.

 Since you already know what Pac-Man is like I’m going to speculate just a bit. Hey, it’s what Atari fans do. Pac-Man is a deceptively simple game. It has one map, a bunch of dots, some ghosts, one fruit per level, and Pac-Man himself. It just doesn’t sound that difficult to reproduce. By this point Atari had started to develop a reputation for respectable home ports. Their port of Space Invaders was home gaming’s first major hit, and they had also recently been making high quality versions of their own arcade games like Asteroids and Missile Command. Unfortunately, technology moves quickly, and the 2600 was nearly five years old by the time they tried to port Pac-Man. That’s usually around the time a company starts planning to upgrade to a new console. Atari would do that with the 5200 later in the year, so they knew they weren’t going to be able to get by on 1977 technology for much longer. Pac-Man was so complicated that developer Tod Frye had to make concessions just about everywhere. By all accounts the game was worked on extremely hard. It wasn’t quite the rush job that E.T. was. Frye put in everything he had hoping for a miracle. He ended up with a miracle, but only a miracle for video game writers. It’s one of the rarest of all video games. Pac-Man is an arcade port that gets almost nothing right. It is the most spectacular kind of failure that will still be talked about for generations. Am I being too harsh? Well, let’s look at the details.

 

Close your eyes and think of Pac-Man for a moment. What do you see? I bet even if you only have a passing interest in video games you can picture it. It’s all about that iconic blue maze and solidly colored ghosts. There is only one maze, but it’s designed well enough that it’s always fun to traverse. Pac-Man has that constantly flapping mouth with his iconic waka-waka sound. There’s the iconic fruit that changes every level. Everybody loves that fruit. Even the smaller details, like the placement of the teleporter holes, are iconic. Well, Atari 2600 Pac-Man has almost none of these things. The color scheme is all messed up with a weird brownish color replacing the iconic blue and constantly flickering, pale ghosts that mostly look the same. Pac-Man’s mouth opens straight up and down instead of triangular, and the waka-waka is replaced with more of a generic Atari bloop. The fruit has been replaced by a big rectangle. Even the scoring is off. The last zero was taken off the scores which means all the points are divided by ten. Single dots are only worth one point and you know how much I hate things only being worth one point. One of two major changes from the arcade game would be alright, but it’s the fact that everything is different that really hurts. The only thing worse would be if the maze was completely ruined. Well I’m happy to say that in this version the maze is in fact completely ruined. Hey, bad things can make me happy too.

If your game only has one screen than it better be a great screen. Pac-Man manages this by having a classic maze full of twists and turns that takes longer to learn than it appears. Strategies will change depending on where you are and what the ghosts are up to. The Atari version eliminates the challenge of the maze by replacing practically everything with uninspired rectangle loops. It really is one of the most boring mazes I have ever seen. There’s no strategy here. Just move around in your little rectangles and try to stay away from ghosts. There are a couple of lanes where you can go all the way from bottom to top, but something about this feel weird and I can’t quite explain it. The maze doesn’t make the game unplayable, but it sure makes it dull. If you’re putting everything you have into the most important game you’ve ever made than you sure don’t want it to be boring. How depressing is it that all the concessions made to get the game on console didn’t help make it any more fun. Everything was stripped away and it still ended up slow and boring. You can ruin the graphics and mostly get away with it, but ruin the gameplay and the battle is lost.

 

It’s not hard to see why this game left a bad taste in people’s mouths in 1982. Atari released several other versions of Pac-Man on other consoles in 1982-1983, and this might’ve even made things worse. All of Atari’s other versions were much more faithful to the original, including one on the competing Intellivision console. Did Atari just not care about their main user base anymore? Why is the one they actually expected to sell end up so bad when versions on lesser-known consoles fare so much better? It almost feels like one of those conspiracy moments where they released a bad version on their old console to get people to buy the better version on 5200. Of course, if that were the case, they wouldn’t have made millions upon millions of Pac-Man carts. No, it’s just the typical depressing reason. The money was more important than the quality, so it was released even though it obviously wasn’t very fun.

 

So now it’s time to rate this thing, and I don’t think it’s going to go quite as low as I expected. It’s dull but not egregiously awful. It still has a passing resemblance to the real thing, so it’s not completely devoid of entertainment value. I hesitate to call it fun, but it’s definitely disappointing. It’s certainly helping me meet my quota for adverbs at least. I can’t quite bump it up into the okay section, but it’s not the lowest ranked Atari game either. I’m putting it at #129 overall which puts it right above Space Jockey. Two spaces down and it would’ve ended up in the shockingly bad section. Hey, I’m not mad Pac-Man, just very disappointed.