Random Hoo Haasthe blog with the guff

The vicious Bomber Quintet!

Saturday, March 7, 2026 at 6:03 pm Comments (0)

The Bomberman shrine updated for the first time in a bit, with some translations I churned out a year or two ago, and also putting the NES Bomberman page to rest by documenting it in as much depth as I could muster (the mobile phone and Palm OS versions will have to wait ’til another day!).
There’s also some sprites (Big Action Mega Fight,Bomberman ’94, Bomberman Special, Bomberman Story DS Brute Force, Bugs Bunny Rabbit Rampage, Cave Story Secret Santa, Double Dragon Gaiden, Dynamite Dux, Golden Axe, King of the Monsters 2, Ninja Senki DX, Pipi’s & Bibi’s, Princess Crown, Snow Bros., Transformers Beast Wars 2, Wonder Boy in Monster Land), but it’s not a conversation piece. Not this time anyway.

One of the idle notions I’ve had for the Shrine Place is to have more ‘introductory’ articles — teaching people how the games work, a rundown of the series history, and maybe even suggested games to start with, ala Mandi Paugh’s Top Mega Man Games.
The problem is, if someone were to ask where’s the best place to officially play any of these old games, I’d have to say “there isn’t one!”
The last time a game was reissued was Bomberman 64 on — get this — the Wii U Virtual Console. A week after the Switch and Super Bomberman R launched, even!
Since then, Nintendo’s old eShop platforms have all since shuttered, the PS3 and Xbox 360 digital libraries relegated to increasingly obtuse means of access, while the bloody Windows Store with its lonely copy of Bomberman ’94 sits there, taunting us.

Pair that with the recent addition of the Virtual Boy to the Nintendo Classics library on NSO, but with Panic Bomber mysteriously absent, you can’t blame me for thinking Konami were adamantly against making the older games available. I was convinced they were dedicated to sunk cost fallacy, holding out for people to plonk $50 or more on Super Bomberman R 2 if they wanted a whiff of that gameplay on modern consoles, no matter how stinky and feature-poor it is. (i finally sampled 40 minutes of SBR2 recently, and pals ShaolinTurtle and ThatOneKaiju were not kidding, it is a shockingly bad and depressing product)
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Some games I played in 2025: Flinthook

Monday, January 5, 2026 at 6:11 pm Comments Off on Some games I played in 2025: Flinthook

It’s that time again — time to grouse about a Tribute Games production that made a great impression in its announcement trailer, only to hear back after people had gotten hand-on with it and realise… this isn’t the game I wanted. I figured I’d splash the £4 on it during a Summer sale to get a feel for myself, because as eternally vexing as the studio’s output is to me, there’s always a glimmer of something salvageable in there.
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Some games I played in 2025: Big Action Mega Fight

Wednesday, December 31, 2025 at 1:05 pm Comments Off on Some games I played in 2025: Big Action Mega Fight

I swear to god I thought I’d posted this back in the Summer — I might have thought “I can’t queue up multiple posts about beat-em-ups, for crying out loud,” but it’s not like I’ve had opinions on anything else this year!

This is a game that’s been on my Steam wishlist for a million billion years, long past the point of remembering what gameplay footage endeared it to me, but I assume, “if I put it on my wishlist then I must still be interested in it, surely!” A generous thank you to RifeXD for finally sating my curiosity.

I do feel bad that most games I’m gifted end up being critiqued to shreds, but I am grateful for the gesture and consider it nourishment one way or another. If it’s a good game, hooray! If it’s a not so good game, then I get to chew and gnaw at it like a dog on a bone ’til I can hopefully glean some faint praise for it, or at least an understanding of why it didn’t click. Everybody wins!(?)
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Some games I played in 2025: Assault on Cobra Island

Monday, December 29, 2025 at 3:14 pm Comments Off on Some games I played in 2025: Assault on Cobra Island

Looking up resources for G.I. Joe: Wrath of Cobra, I was curious what reception was like from G.I. Joe fans — lord knows beat-em-up fanatics were not thrilled with its offerings. While some were pleased with its fanservice, the consensus seemed to be that it wasn’t anywhere near the quality of standard as Turtles, and that it had no hope of winning over anyone who wasn’t already a fan of the franchise.
A pity! I don’t know how often it happens in this day and age, but I’m certain a number of franchises owe some of their popularity to a knockout video game tie-in, and part of me wants to see it more often. I’m hesitant to include Turok among those examples because motherfuckers are not reading the comics. I’ll change that one of these days, I swear.

More than one Steam review also made the comparison that this officially-licensed product simply wasn’t as good as Assault On Cobra Island, a fangame in the same vein made in the OpenBOR engine. Well, I guess I gotta investigate this too if I wanna be thorough!
OpenBOR, or Beats of Rage, is an engine used to create your own side-scrolling beat-em-up, similar to your MUGENs and what-have-you. I’ve known of it for decades, I think because of some light coverage on the olde Streets of Rage Online fansite? Back when folks really had to spelunk to find new entries in their favourite genre, but this is my first time getting hands-on with one of its creations.
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Some games I played in 2025: G.I. Joe: Wrath of Cobra

Monday, December 8, 2025 at 10:00 am Comments (1)

It’s been a funky year, to put it politely. My rambling ass has been spewing thoughts into a dictaphone for the sake of possible blog posts, some of them even about subjects that aren’t beat-em-ups, but having the energy, time, motivation, and other variables required to get things done is a bit of a crapshoot in this weather. Thank you for your patience. In the meantime, more freakin’ beat-em-up opinions.
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Some games I played in 2025: Battletoads

Monday, July 14, 2025 at 11:28 am Comments (1)

This is a long one and I haven’t got it in me to do a preamble. I’m still on my Double Dragon kick, and it feels only natural to finally dabble in the Battletoads series as well. I honestly quite liked the look of this reboot based on its cutscenes, even if seeing them next to gameplay did one-eighty my perception, but it’s only fair to give it a swing myself.

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Some games I played in 2024: Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind

Monday, June 16, 2025 at 1:28 pm Comments Off on Some games I played in 2024: Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind

While I enjoy a good brawler, I tend to stick to the ones I’m comfortable with, but pal ShaolinTurtle very much keeps up with what’s hip and happening, and had been keeping tabs on Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind. Ever since Shredder’s Revenge, there’s been a whole swathe of pixelated beat-em-ups based on retro properties — the Karate Kid, Toxic Crusaders, G.I. Joe, even Jay & Silent Bob… and no doubt more I’m forgetting, there’s so flippin’ many!

What made Rita’s Rewind stand out is that it showed more than just standard brawling — shooting galleries, auto-runner vehicle sequences ala Konami’s G.I. Joe arcade game, and even Punch-Out style Megazord battles. It certainly got my attention!
Full disclosure, I did not purchase this game, I simply took part via Steam Remote Play, and have not been back to the game since. My positivity and defence of it might come from not paying for the experience…! The game’s since announced major updates to remedy quirks and feedback, so what I describe is likely a thing of the past.
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Some games I played in 2024: Fast Food Rampage

Monday, June 2, 2025 at 1:25 pm Comments Off on Some games I played in 2024: Fast Food Rampage

So, uh, playing Maiden Cops might have encouraged me to pick up other games on Steam for the sole purpose of ripping their sprites, whether I enjoyed them or not. I played Fast Food Rampage for less than twenty minutes and my verdict was “criminally unsatisfying.”

I wasn’t aware of its history at the time, but apparently the roots of this game began in an animation for the YouTube channel Mashed, a parody of Hatred — god, remember that? The same self-serious monologue about the inferiority of others, only it’s delivered by a fast food mascot bemoaning the rising popularity of health foods as he weaponises the McDonalds menu to make people explode from overeating.
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Some games I played in 2024: Maiden Cops

Monday, May 19, 2025 at 2:07 pm Comments Off on Some games I played in 2024: Maiden Cops

I continue to be zonked out of my gourd, and the insistence of Northern Ireland sporting unpleasantly hot weather really isn’t helping matters. I would love to be writing or drawing or doing any number of things, but in these circumstances I gravitate towards whatever quick-fix distraction feels even mildly productive… which is a long-winded way of saying the sprites section updated with a bunch of guff:
We’ve got Arvoesine; Bomberman ’93, GB and Quest; Bubble Bobble Double; Bubsy in Fractured Furry Tales; Double Dragon Gaiden; Drake & The Wizards 2; Elevator Action Old & New; Fast Food Rampage; The Flintstones (GB); Frogger 2 (XBLA); The Itchy & Scratchy Game; Neutopia II; Rampage (Lynx); Shamisen Brothers; Snoopy Tennis; Street Fighter (PCE); Strikey Sisters; and Toryumon.

Which ties into today’s ramble: a game I picked up for the sole purpose of ripping its sprites, but The Spriters Resource has obliged with a temporary removal on request of its devs until it gets its full release on all platforms. I figure it’s good manners to do the same as well. I’ll then proceed to befoul those good manners by being disparaging towards the game in the ensuing ramble, and for that I apologise!
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Some games I played in 2024: Earthworm Jim 1 & 2

Sunday, April 13, 2025 at 8:29 pm Comments Off on Some games I played in 2024: Earthworm Jim 1 & 2

While sorting through comics I found my sole issue of the UK Earthworm Jim series, and was reminded of my uneven feelings for the franchise. The cartoon is the only part I ever truly clicked with — the two games I’d played were not exactly its shining hours in any way (Earthworm Jim 3D and the botched port of the first game on GBA), but I felt like there had to be something in this that resonated with me…! The first two games have since been added to Switch Online, and I felt compelled to give them as earnest a try as I could muster. Will they work for me this time? (before you start holding your breath, the answer is no)
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