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I hate to admit it, but I’ve had a hard time dealing with all this Coronavirus stuff.  Well, I guess it hasn’t been TOO bad, but bad enough that I’m a bit disappointed with myself for not dealing with it better.  But I’m still really scared and anxious about all of it.  I have to say that I’m super happy that Animal Crossing: New Horizons came out when it did.  Couldn’t have come out at a better time.  It gave me a sense of normalcy and saneness during all of this.  I’m also glad that I’m still able to review games for that same sense of normalcy.  Speaking of which, here are more games I’ve reviewed lately over at GamerDad.com.  Please click on the links and read as many as you can, and maybe post a ‘like’ or comment or two.  I’d really appreciate it!

Oh, but before we do that, here are Switch friend codes for me and my mom, who also plays Animal Crossing.  Just in case you have the game and want to visit islands and such.  I’ll probably post a blog about the new game next time here.

Cary: 1395 7159 9988

She-Ra: 0699 4185 2793

Vitamin Connection (Switch)

Meet the Sable family.  Mom, Dad, an elementary school kid, a baby, and a dog.  When they get sick, it’s up to Vita-Boy and Mina-Girl to pilot a vitamin capsule inside their bodies to stop a bacterial infection…and maybe even save the world in the process.  Vitamin Connection is a Switch exclusive for one or two players.  You’ll use your Switch JoyCon controllers in unique ways as you steer the vitamin capsule through microscopic mazes while avoiding obstacles and defeating bacteria with your Vita-Blaster!  It kind of reminds me of a cross between Life Force and Irritating Stick, with some WarioWare style mini-games for good measure.  Two things to note about this game.  The guy who directed it is one of my Facebook friends!  I even met him at PAX West last year.  And I also can’t believe how timely this game is with everything going on right now.

Double Dragon & Kunio-Kun: Retro Brawler Bundle (PS4)

Hey kids!  Are you ready for a video game history lesson?  Sure you are!  Anyway, back in the mid-80s, game maker Technos created one of the first brawlers featuring a character named Kunio.  He’s a hot-blooded high school student who sometimes gets into fights, but always stands up for his friends and against bullies.  His first arcade game was a hit in Japan, and they brought it to the US under the name Renegade.  A few graphical and name changes were made.  The character now sported a sleeveless leather jacket instead of a Japanese school uniform, and instead of locations like an outdoor train stop, you fought in places like an underground subway station.  It was a modest hit in the US and got a version on the NES, but it was nowhere near as big as the original game in Japan.  The bosses at Technos wanted to recreate that success in the US, so they tasked the team to make another brawler that would really appeal to overseas audiences.  So they created Double Dragon.  Needless to say, that was a huge hit with countless arcade sequels and ports, a cartoon, and even a live action movie (it was famously bad, but fun in a B-movie sort of way).  And now you can play almost every NES and Famicom version of the Double Dragon and Kunio-Kun series in a collection on the PS4 and Switch (reviewed on PS4 here).  It even includes Renegade’s ‘sequel’ River City Ransom, as well as sports spin off titles like Super Dodge Ball!  Yes!  Super Dodge Ball was my favorite sports video game until Wii Sports came along!

Code Shifter (PS4)

And speaking of Kunio, in Code Shifter, you play as Stella.  She works as a programmer at a fictional video game company testing codes and deleting bugs.  When a malicious virus threatens the company’s latest release, Stella is on the case with a program that lets her avatar “Sera” defeat the bugs in a 2-D platform jumping cyberspace world.  But the cool part is that at certain moments in the levels, you can switch to 8-bit pixel versions of characters from other Arc System Works games and licenses they own.  These include games like Guilty Gear, BlazBlue, Double Dragon, River City Ransom, and more!  The game kind of reminds me of an old GameCube title called Mega Man Network Transmission, what with the cyberspace setting and all.  Some of the characters you can play as include Abobo from Double Dragon and even the River City Girls!

Boulder Dash 30th Anniversary (Switch)

I’m such a staunch console gamer now that you might be surprised to learn that when I was a kid, I started out playing home games on computer.  Our first PC was an Apple ][+, and outside of arcades, that’s where I played most of my games until I got an Atari 5200.  One of the games I remember playing on that old computer was Boulder Dash.  It was an action puzzle game that was kind of like Dig Dug in that you dug through the earth, collecting gems while trying not to get squished by falling boulders.  And now you can celebrate its revival with Boulder Dash 30th Anniversary.  At first I was like, “Isn’t Boulder Dash more than 30 years old?”  And yes, it is.  This Switch version (reviewed here) is just a port of an older version that was released a few years ago on PC and mobile when it really was Boulder Dash’s 30th anniversary.

Psikyo Shooting Stars Alpha & Bravo Special Editions (Switch)

A few weeks ago I reviewed Psikyo Shooting Stars Bravo, a collection of scrolling 2-D shooters from the 90s and early 2000s.  I liked it so much that I got the physical copies of both Alpha and Bravo, which only come as special editions with extra stuff.  So let’s take a look at them!

Hidden Through Time (PS4)

When I was little I used to read Highlights magazine.  One of my favorite pages in it was the Hidden Pictures page.  Years later I remember the Where’s Waldo books getting popular.  I was a little too old to get into them then, but I sure do remember seeing them everywhere!  I wonder if those books are still around?  Well, if you liked those books, you may want to check out Hidden Through Time, an object finding game very much like Where’s Waldo. 

Metal Slug Infinity (iPad)

And finally, this game has been out for a while, but a reader requested I review it (you know who you are), so here you go.  A while back I heard about an endless clicker game featuring Metal Slug.  Metal Slug is an SNK 2-D run and gun game series that features some of the best sprite artwork I’ve ever seen.  So the fact they made an endless clicker about it for mobile devices (reviewed on iPad here) got me curious.  As per usual with endless clickers, it didn’t hold me interest for very long.  But graphically, it’s one of the best looking endless clickers I’ve ever seen, at least.

And that’s all for now!  Thanks for reading my reviews and posting ‘likes’ and comments.  Please be safe and healthy out there, and keep praying for a good end to all of this!  --Cary