Namco Museum for the GBA
by
phungus
,
in Movies, Books at Epinions.com
,
Dec 20, 2004
Pros:
Galaga and Ms. Pac-Man
Cons:
I'd rather have Enduro that Pole Position
The Bottom Line:
This is a must-have set of games for the retro gamer.
|
|
Overall Rating:
|
 |
|
Author's Review
The Namco Museum collection for the GBA is one of those must-have titles that make the GBA worth owning. It contains five different classic arcade games that can be played over and over again. Right now, it can be purchased new for $9.99 in some stores, if you dig hard enough. That’s $2.50 per game, and well worth the price.
On an interesting note, I got this game as an early Christmas present and when I went to open the box, it was empty! The manual was there, but no game! It was purchased at Toys r Us, so I went to their exchange desk and explained what happened. They happily replaced it with another one and told me that it had happened before. If you are buying a Game Boy Advance system for someone this Christmas and this is the only game you buy to go along with it, you might want to make sure the game is actually in there or you'll have one perturbed littler gamer on your hands.
The following games are included in this collection:
Ms. Pac-Man: This is arguably the best game in the Pac-Man series. I remember playing it on a rare tabletop style machine in a local pizza buffet. I wonder if they know how much that thing is worth.
DigDug: The classic Atari 2600 title. You create tunnels and kill monsters. This was always a strange game to me and I never really could get into it. A good bit of strategy is involved with making it work.
Pole Position: One of the first racing games. Honestly, I didn't like it all that much on the 2600 and it is just as tough here. The controls respond a little too much, making this a very difficult game. This is one that needs to be played with a joystick for full effect. It is still cool for nostalgic purposes.
Galaga: Yes! I love this game! It is like Space Invaders on steroids. The aliens all shoot back at you and move in crazy formations. This is a pure shooting gallery type game and I adore it.
Galaxian: This is like Space Invaders revisited. It is a toned down version of Galaga and not as fast moving. It makes good practice for playing Galaga and is still a great game.
One cool feature about these games is that you can hit the Start button to bring up a menu that will let you adjust the difficulty and other aspects of the games, as well as give you hints. I don't remember having these options in the original titles, at least not in a menu form. The hints and tips sections are really cool.
My only real complaint about this collection is that it doesn’t save your high scores. I was hoping to have some healthy Ms. Pac-Man scoring competition with my girlfriend since she claims to be the master of all things Pac-Man, but now we don't any lasting way to prove our mad dot-eating skills.
I like that these games are complete and in their original form. The sound is very crisp on the GBA and actually seems better than what I remembered. The small screen on the GBA makes the graphics look better than they did on my 1-inch television back in the early 1980's.
If you are one of the many adults (like me) who play the GBA, then you will love this collection. Younger generations may complain about the low-fi graphics, minimal sound, and simplicity of game play, but they really don't know what they’re talking about.
