Make Your Own Mon-Yu ⊟

Hi, everyone! It’s been… four months?! since the last Tiny Cartridge post, which was about a toilet game, and I’ve been dragged out of de facto retirement for an equally important reason. And that reason is Mon-Yu: Defeat Monsters And Gain Strong Weapons And Armor. You May Be Defeated, But Don’t Give Up. Become Stronger. I Believe There Will Be A Day When The Heroes Defeat The Devil King.

Now, I have yet to play Mon-Yu: Defeat Monsters And Gain Strong Weapons And Armor. You May Be Defeated, But Don’t Give Up. Become Stronger. I Believe There Will Be A Day When The Heroes Defeat The Devil King, and I uh, actually don’t usually go for dungeon crawler things like this, but it’s giving me some Vita nostalgia vibes, and I’m delighted every time I see the title (Mon-Yu: Defeat Monsters And Gain Strong Weapons And Armor. You May Be Defeated, But Don’t Give Up. Become Stronger. I Believe There Will Be A Day When The Heroes Defeat The Devil King).

In honor of M-YDMAGSWAAYMBDBDGUBSIBTWBADWTHDTDK, I have a (legally distinct online text game inspired by) a Mad Lib for you! Usually Mad Libs work better if you don’t already know the text, but it should still be fun! And the game probably is too!

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The wait for Gekisou! Benza Race - Toilet Shooting Star is almost over

After learning about this game, a toilet racer, I am now retroactively spending the last year anticipating its May 15 release.

An exciting toilet racing game that lets you experience a toilet revolution.
Many circuits and toilet racers are waiting for your challenge.
After customizing the toilet and getting your stomach ready, it’s time to start the race!

Can you seriously read the words “toilet revolution” without being overcome by curiosity? And that screenshot with the amazing “weird arcade game” or even “weird WiiWare game that would never be localized” vibes!

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IREM game collections for me to collect ⊟

Tozai Games, who memorably brought me Spelunker HD, has announced five volumes of collected IREM games for Xbox, PS5, PS4, and Switch, with big ol’ physical versions coming from Strictly Limited.

This first release comprises Image Fights 1 and 2, and X Multiply, three shmups that I definitely haven’t played and definitely want to. I also, in general, support the release of collections from this very cool, very defunct publisher!

Finally, hi, I haven’t been writing many posts recently. But my 10 year olds are at a coffee shop having a graphic design coworking session, so I’m entertaining myself by sitting in a big fancy coffee shop chair and flailing textually at old games. Life is pretty weird!

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Wonder Boy, Bust a Move, New Zealand Story today⊟

Hey y'all, it’s been a while, as evidenced by my trying to spell “Tumblr” with an O while logging in. Tomblr. Tumblor. Toumblro.

Anyway I’m back with more old games on Switch. It’s becoming my brand and I’m ok with that. Today’s Nintendo Download includes a whole entire Wonder Boy Collection (also on PS4/PS5), with multiple versions of each game including Master System, Game Gear, arcade, and Genesis (not all for every game of course!) and multiple regional versions. I don’t know developer Bliss Brain, and I didn’t play their previous game, the Princess Maker remake. So I can’t speak to the quality of the ports. But as long as they’re not totally busted that’s such a cool collection!

Also on eShop today: Puzzle Bobble™2X/BUST-A-MOVE™2 Arcade Edition & Puzzle Bobble™3/BUST-A-MOVE™3 S-Tribute, a collection of Saturn ports. More importantly, it’s just a king’s ransom of moves to bust and puzzles to bobble. “Enjoy ports of the arcade games Puzzle Bobble 2X and Puzzle Bobble 3, as well as four home console versions released in Japan and abroad, with added original modes.”

Finally, there’s an Arcade Archives port of another Taito classic, The New Zealand Story. I might be doing some shopping as long as my house continues to have electricity!

Keep it locked for infrequent updates about ports of old games onto Switch. I’m… I’m doing my best you guys.

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Big news for exactly me: new Arkanoid, from Pastagames

Tiny Cartridge faves Pastagames (Pix the Cat, Rayman Legends, Maestro: Jump in Music) releases a new game today, and… it’s a new entry in a legendary franchise, Arkanoid (that one big NES box I bought when I was like 7, the game that used that cool paddle controller on DS).

Arkanoid Eternal Battle updates the formula with, what else, a battle royale mode?? But also a single-player mode with new levels and new powerups, split-screen multiplayer, and what appears to be an emulated version of the original Arkanoid?

The game is currently on sale for $27, normally $30.

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I’m a fool for not already being hyped for SpiderHeck ⊟

I’ve gotten a few press releases for SpiderHeck from publisher TinyBuild, but such has been my Situation recently that I made a point to get back to them and then, I don’t know, gone to deal with the toilet that fell apart or adopt kittens (!) or whatever.

Today, the game is actually out on Switch and basically everything else, and I finally scheduled myself a few minutes to watch a trailer and, yall.

There’s been a game about spiders grappling around arenas and attacking each other with lightsabers this whole time? I want to say “and I wasn’t informed?” but I definitely was, multiple times!

You can try this through Xbox Game Pass or for free through Steam until Sept. 26, and like, I want to do that. Let’s try this. It might join the rotation of party games, I think.

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There’s a new Puzzle Bobble and it’s very important  ⊟

Don’t just take it from me, the person who drinks coffee from a Bubble Bobble mug every morning and is on stage 1174 (oh no) of Bub’s Puzzle Blast, a game I only found by accident while looking for a new Bust a Move/Puzzle Bobble.

Look at the above video, with its four-player co-op (including Story Mode), hi-res Bub, Bob, Peb, and Pab, little Miniroons, and so many bubbles. Everybubble, in fact! Puzzle Bobble Everybubble will be out on Switch next year.

New Bubble and/or Puzzle Bobble games aren’t always… good, but I’m getting my hopes way up anyway. Sky high! I definitely won’t survive even a slight disappointment.

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Publishers old and new bring me games old and old ⊟

One of the most weirdly unlikely domino-meme developments recently is the one that starts with THQ’s bankruptcy in 2012 and ends with me playing a Sunsoft Famicom game from 1992 on my Switch. But that’s basically what happened?

Nordic Games Licensing bought a lot of the THQ back catalog, then went through a series of acquisitions, later adopting the apt name Embracer Group, and just opened a subdivision called Embracer Freemode to focus on retro games. Part of Embracer Freemode is Bitwave, who is developing a port of Gimmick! for Xbox, PC, Switch and PS4.

This news has Sunsoft re(re)-entering the gaming space, following the last WiiWare iteration. They announced a Gimmick soundtrack release, a port of Ufouria, and a new roguelike game based on the very old, beloved kusoge Ikki.

Simultaneously, the reliable ININ Games announced three – THREE – Ninja Jajamaru-kun collections, compiling the platform games, two “lost” RPGs, and all of the above respectively. I am deeply personally invested in this, if only because NInja Jajamaru-kun was one of the main inspirations behind the brilliant Haggleman minigames from Retro Game Challenge. Preorders for the physical PS4/Switch collections will open on the 21st, and I can only presume that they’ll also show up on the eShop in some form.

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Romance of the three Kunios today ⊟

Put me on record as a Kunio Liker (actually, I guess across over a decade of writing, I have put myself on said record dozens of times) and my favorite development of late has been the Weird Alternate Kunio. Take the River City Ransom crew and recast them as fantasy wizards, or give WayForward a chance to remake the universe from a different perspective, and I’m down.

So here’s River City Saga: Three Kingdoms, which moves the characters from the streets of contemporary Japan to ancient China, where they reenact famous battles, and help us “learn the basics of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms!” Finally, another subject I may soon be able to kind of sound like I know something about.

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Cool DIY Super Famicom kit turned into cooler mini-TV kit ⊟

I’m pretty impressed with Columbus Circle’s barebones DIY kits, basically just clone Super Famicoms or Famicoms without cases. You can then put it into whatever container you can imagine, like this toaster!

What Youtuber LimoneWorkshop did, however, is to put the tiny kit into a custom-built miniature Sharp SF-1. And it totally owns.

I’m trying to imagine what I would do with one of these Super Famicom kits, and I think it’s “put it on a shelf and then decide to sell it 3 years later.” But for other people, what a cool idea!

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Corporate consolidation is good, actually (in this one weird specific case) ⊟

Toy company Bandai and video game developer/publisher Namco merged in 2005. Four years later, Koei and Tecmo merged their game-making operations.

Now, the two megacorporations have leveraged Tecmo’s beloved Monster Rancher series and Bandai’s long-standing Ultraman license to create this weird-ass thing, a game where you can use songs or NFC cards to generate monsters from Ultraman shows, then raise, battle, and, why not, merge them.

I don’t think it really makes sense to apply Monster Rancher’s semi-random generation mechanic with an existing set of characters (since, like, people basically would know who they wanted to raise?) and it definitely doesn’t make sense to make an Ultraman game without Ultraman. A lot of dominoes had to fall in just the right way to lead to this ill-advised but also completely awesome outcome.

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My Famicase Exhibition opening in LA ⊟

My Famicase Exhibition, the gallery of imagined games displayed as Famicom cartridges, will come to the USA for the first time in 18 years tomorrow. Traditionally hosted by Tokyo game shop Meteor, the annual exhibit will open with a special Los Angeles show at the Capsule Corner gashapon booth and art gallery (located in the Hive Gallery & Studios).

“253 original cartridge designs will be on display from artists, illustrators, designers and creators from over 29 countries! … Visitors of MY FAMICASE EXHIBITION - LA will have an opportunity to cast their vote for USA’s favorite Famicom design as is tradition in the Japanese exhibit.”

The exhibit runs from July 1 to 24, with an opening reception for the first three days that you can RSVP for here. Capsule Corner will also feature works by Froyo Tam, Mel Haasch, and Nelson Wu at its gallery.

If you can’t make it to LA this July, you can view the Famicom cartridge designs virtually at Meteor’s site, or purchase a print catalog collecting all 253 entries through Capsule Corner’s online shop. There’s a killer commemorative sticker (sized at 4"x3.5", shown above) illustrated by Billie Snippet that you can pick up, too!

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A match made in the eShop ⊟

I don’t know much about Why pizza? the “platformer, physics puzzle and delivery job simulator at the same time.” The visuals are somewhere between “intriguing” and “deeply off-putting,” and it looks challenging in a QWOP/marionette kind of way, and I do believe I want to try it.

With 100 percent certainty, though, I can say this is such a perfect pairing with this week’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge. Whatever eShop sommelier (or more likely, total coincidence, but let me live in my beautiful fantasy) put these together, magnificent.

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Are you the absolute maniac who will buy Bob with no Bub ⊟

I don’t think such a person exists, yet First Press is selling plushes of the player 2 Bubble Bobble character separately from the more well-known Bub. Nothing against Bob, and in fact I prefer the blue color, but I feel like Bob has yet to achieve Luigi-level breakout status.

Both are also being sold as pricier, more “limited” versions that play Bubble Bobble sounds.

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What if you… listened to Retronauts this week ⊟

I don’t need to tell you this, since the Venn diagram of Tiny readers and Retronauts listeners is probably one tiny Tiny circle inside another much larger circle, but what’s the point of having a website if I can’t use it to brag on my co-editor when he kills it on a podcast?

Sure, the latest Retronauts episode tackles the relatively morose topic of things to get on Wii U and 3DS eShops before they die, but it’s a really delightful listen, as Eric, Jeremy Parish, and Chris Kohler drop important recommendations and personal memories of these dying consoles.

If you like it, be sure to let Jeremy know you did, and perhaps that you’d like to hear more from us on the podcast!

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Gotta Protectors is back and a little weirder on Switch ⊟

Pretty excited to play the next iteration of Ancient (and Yuzo Koshiro’s) Gotta Protectors, the Famicom tribute game that’s also a legit action-tower-defense-that’s-still-cool-if-you-don’t-like-tower-defense!

This time, in addition to rad music, meta humor and wild musou-esque combat, there’s… a castle on a train? Collectible NES parody cartridges? This looks like it ramps up the distinctive frantic silly Gotta Protectors-ness in just the right way.

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Taito Milestones out April 15 ⊟

I’ve been obsessive about retro compilations on Switch recently. I want to gobble them all up. Even so, I’m unconvinced about Taito Milestones, the collection of 10 mostly ancient, mostly historically interesting arcade games.

Without knowing a price, I’m not sure how into Alpine Ski or Wild Warriors I’ll be, or how willing I am to try a different version of the Bubble Bobble precursor Chack'n Pop (I have the Famicom cartridge). But The Ninja Warriors is cool, and Qix is always fun. Also, I want everyone to keep making these collections.

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PAC-MAN MUSEUM + - Release Date Announcement Trailer

Great news for your PAC-PASSION ⊟

No longer will you have to keep your PAC-PASSION repressed. There’s a place for people like us, and it’s the Pac-Man Museum+. I may sound like I’m joking, but anything that includes Pac-Man Battle Royale, one of my all-time favorite games, stokes the flame of my PAC-PASSION.

Though it seems weird to do a furniture collection and room layout minigame while still playing Animal Crossing daily, I also really, really want to design my own arcade in this thing.

I’ll be picking up the Switch version on the May 27 release date, but if I had an Xbox I could get it on Game Pass that same day. What a dang deal!

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Give me all the PC Engine ports ⊟

When Moto Roader originally came out on Turbografx-16, it totally failed to get my attention, my brain just filing it away in the “sports games I’m not interested in” category next to Takin’ it to the Hoop.

But now, with the benefit of time, I know that any TG16/PC Engine game I get to discover for the first time is precious and wonderful. And so I’m pretty stoked about Moto Roader MC, the formerly Japan-only, PC Engine CD-only sequel, which I just played on my dang Nintendo Switch.

It’s a top-down single screen racer, sort of like a Super Off-Road deal, with weapons and increasingly weird gimmicky tracks. My favorite feature allows you to toggle between control schemes at any time. I can never play these top-down racing games because my brain doesn’t understand whether to push left and right to turn or to push the direction I want the car to go on the screen. With this game, I can do whichever makes sense to me at the time.

There’s also a rewind feature, visual options, and the other nice modern stuff. In all, this seems like a weirdly small game to give such a treatment… and that’s cool.

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Thanks for making this for me, WayForward ⊟

Is there anyone else out there who would make an original song and animation for a port of a Super Famicom Kunio game? In fact, River City Girls Zero also includes a whole new soundtrack by Megan McDuffee and DEMONDICE.

I’m trying to imagine anyone who would treat a niche retro port like this so seriously and so lovingly. I mean, I would, if I had the resources, and/or the talent.

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