What's your memories of these Arcades? Sound off here! Also if you're interested in NerdCon, you can find more details at www.nerdcon.co.uk -- should be a good day! Thanks for watching :)
Kim can you do a intervjue with Bo Jangerborg creator of Fairlight and Fairlight 2. ( Spectrum)i think hes one of the most Talen tent programmers spectrum ever had on Matthew Smith caliber .
I know this video is over a year old (and to a certain extent this is just feeding that algorithm), but I'm having such a wonderful time working through your long form content that I felt a big "thank you" was more than appropriate - so THANK YOU! You're a talented documentarian, and I have high standards on this, but the balance of information and entertainment (especially for someone who never played many games) has me enjoying everything. The studio histories are magnificent stuff, and I hope more long-format fans like me find their way to your channel! Absolutely bloody brilliant!
God, yes. I will say that even the non-arcade Konami licensed games were probably some of the best output the company had. Between the Tiny Toons NES game and the Animaniacs SNES and Genesis games, they were to Warner Bros in the 90's what Capcom was to Disney at the time. I think they even planned a Sega Saturn Pinky and The Brain game that got cancelled.
To this day you continue to be one of the most thorough and well presented game documentarians, and your writing and delivery are just superb. I hope this never gets old for you, because I will never get tired of your videos! Keep up the great work, this was a JOY to watch!
30:10 Am glad someone has cleared up the misconception of Bucky O'Hare being a rip-off of TMNT, as someone who's really into anthro animal media it always really bothers me how alot of people that were kids in the late 80's/early 90's often label everything with a team of Anthro animals as a rip off of the turtles. Another license that had an incredible famicom game was Samurai Pizza Cats. People often call this obscure anime dub a rip off of the turtles, but anyone who even bothered to watch it can clearly see it's suppose to be a parody of 80's Japanese pop culture, as it parodies various tokasetsu shows at the time like Super Sentai (which we would later know in the west as Power Rangers) Kamen Rider, and Ultraman, as well as various animes from the time. I mean it's not like the original 1987 series was high art or anything, it was silly kid banter meant sell us toys, Disney's series Gargoyles you could also arguably was a rip off of TMNT, but overall I think Disney's Gargoyles was a much better series that has aged alot better then the original 1987 TMNT series. Are people now gonna say that Netflix shows like Aggretsuko and Beastars are rip offs of TMNT? Cause they have anthro animals, just like TMNT has anthro animals.
Something you left out or just didn't know when describing the Genesis/Mega Drive game, The Hyperstone Heist, is that it's not just a remix of Turtles In Time it's actually a sort of fusion of the 3rd NES game and Turtles In Time. It's essentially Turtles 3.5 in a way.
Now this video is a great lookback to Konami's history, but I will say there's actually one licensed game you missed, though its a really obscure one. Its called Rollergames and its basically a competitive beat em up where you try to earn more points than your opponent by taking out the other team. It even had a different NES that was more of a traditional beat em up, but with platforming elements. Now both games are more of an acquired taste that I haven't really got into, but they're fun enough games that they're worth a look.
Somewhere in 1993 I completed Xmen. Such a unique achievement to finish an arcade game in its original setting. Big shout out to Derek Choi who fought alongside me.
So as mentioned, by Larry down below, it had a character just for the game. Also in The Simpson's game Marge is a rabbit and her hair hides her ears. I found that to be pretty fun. Also Bart wears a blue shirt because of early art work depicted him as doing so. All merchandise had him wearing blue. The X-Men game is based on Pryde of the X-Men failed cartoon which is really odd cause Wolverine is Australian in it.
I can’t remember playing Turtles in Time. But as soon as you said throwing enemies at the screen I must have, I remember doing it with Donatello lol. I have the arcade version and Simpsons game (which we completed as a family) on Xbox one.
Konami was so good at licensed games that even some of their other arcade games looks like they are licensed from some media. Sunset Riders, Mystic Warriors, Metamorphic Force, Monster Maulers and Dragoon Might. When you see them you would swore that they should be based on some anime or cartoon but they are not.
I know everyone loves the other games, but I was a massive GI Joe fan as a kid. They’re still the best toy ever, and I’ve saved mine and given them to my kid, which has ruined all other toys for him because they’re just not as good! Anyway, when I walked into my local Chinese chippy one day in the early 90s and found this Konami game I was so happy. It was only there a few weeks, but finding it is still my favourite arcade memory.
Another cracking video thanks Kim. The fact these went unreleased at home is why I started snapping up the PCBs many moons ago. Fortunate enough to have most of these. Still fun 30 years on.
I'm near Galloping Ghost arcade in Chicagoland area, free play all day if you want for just 20 bucks and all these games here. Just beautiful how it all works and a shame newer gamers dont' get the challenge and joy playing in arcades like this was.
08:21 I always remember that part on the arcade version, when someone "grief when it wasn't trending" keep jumping in the left part of the screen until everybody was dead ....
Kim you are a legend, I love your videos, your voice, your presentation and your supreme professional storytelling … and I hope one day you have a Netflix series with all this retro stuff. I am 39, and from the Uk, and lived through the Spectrum, Atari ST, Amiga, NES, Megadrive etc so all of these shows take me back to the best years of my life. And I hope one day that you cover the crypto gaming market too because it reminds me of the bedroom coder era of the 80s. Look at Gala games… this has the potential to be the next ocean with their licenced games. You are my favourite youtuber to watch while I’m in isolation right now.
UK, 41, Spectrum, ST, Gameboy...friends' C64, NES and SNES (a little bit), Wolfenstein and Doom on another friend's PC. Bought Quake 2 and installed on my family PC, but barely played it and my focus drifted off to other things. A SNES mini randomly stumbled upon in Swedish (kind of cheap stuff) shop in Norway where I now live, in 2018 brought gaming screaming back in to my life (and the possibilities of emulation). It was seeing that I could buy and take home SF2, right then and there that swung it (of course so many other ways to do so before that, but I never looked in to it). The early 90s hype totally swept me up, even though I barely played it on my friend's SNES. Strong memories of Neo Geo adds and screen shots in ST magazines. Seemed so perfect and unattainable. Now I can carry the entire Neo Geo library around in my pocket on TWO devices! Still blows my mind...and yes, Kim's vids and enthusiasm are fantastic!
Excellent work here as always. The timing was great for me as I have just been playing both Turtles arcade games quite a bit in the last few weeks. I wanted to get my fill of those before playing Shredder's Revenge. I always loved the first arcade game. I had a tougher time getting into Turtles in Time. The auto-run feature really messed with my mind for a while. The game has a few other quirks too, like the Turtles randomly deciding to try kicking an enemy that isn't quite in range for that, leading to taking a hit. So I didn't like Turtles in Time arcade for a while, but have since come to appreciate it a lot more. I had more fun with it this last time than I ever did before. The SNES port is a great one, though I always preferred the FM synth of the arcade(and Genesis/Mega Drive as well) by quite a bit. Luckily, thanks to the MSU1 hack, I now get to play the SNES version with the arcade audio which really elevates it for me. On a slightly negative note, I could never fully get into Bucky O'Hare or Asterix. Bucky just doesn't engage me like the true beat-em-up games do, and I had some issue with the presentation. As for Asterix, it's silly and fun, but in terms of gameplay, the attacks felt to me like they had no weight or impact, so it could only sustain my interest for part of the game. That's just me and it is not badly made. I couldn't get into Moo Mesa either. Konami's involvement with Moo Mesa reminds me of Capcom with Cadillacs & Dinosaurs. Both were likely trying to get in on what they thought would be a hit new animated series. Obviously, that didn't work out. As for X-Men, that is my favorite of the games here and my pick for Konami's best beat-em-up. That one just really resonated with me and I can play it over and over again. The regional differences make it even more interesting. While the Capcom style beat-em-ups are the best in my opinion, Konami's were also a lot of fun and had a fast and loose feel, in a good way, that was Konami's signature style which I still enjoy a lot. Plus, Konami may have been the best at applying their licenses. Anyway, very enjoyable retrospective here.
I spent a lot of time playing Simpsons and Turtles at the Bury arcade club a couple of years back, truly appreciate the nerdcon headsup, now have VIP tickets :D
What a comprehensive presentation & a deep dive into some of the history. As a lover of Konami arcades, I would love you to do the same documentary for the non licensed Konami Arcade games such as Frogger, Track & Field, Sunset Riders, Vendetta, Lethal Enforcers etc.
Asterix was the only reason I bothered to get a MAME emulator. I find the fact they made an arcade game specifically for a niche European market intriguing. TMNT, X-Men, and G.I. Joe certainly had international appeal, and C.O.W. Boys and Bucky were selling on the trend alone, but something that doesn't have much of a worldly presence, and indeed probably never left the country just needed to be experienced. And I have to say, it's the best looking out of all the games, and the cartoony physics and violence translated perfectly. Music even sounds like the Disney-esque aesthetic the creators absolutely forced on their licensees. And the funny thing is, while the US never got any of the cabinets (never even knew it existed until 10 years ago), we somehow get the console games over here. Saw one for the Switch at of all places a Wal*Mart a few months ago. Apparently, the programmers at Konami, putting them in virtually every other one of these games, really wanted to put ninjas and Japanese imagery in the Asterix arcade, but the creators put their feet down about it. Can't really blame them. The fact Springfield's Channel 6 somehow films Samurai epics and Kabuki in The Simpsons always confused me.
I'm embarrassed to admit that at the onset of the Aliens transition, I was excited thinking you were gonna mention the excellent arcade Contra games until I immediately reminded myself this video is dedicated to "LICENSED" games.
Great upload Kim. I’m always happy to see any mention of Crime Fighters in these videos, as it’s my favourite beat-em up of all time, but never seems to get any love. Both it and it’s sequel Vendetta are available on the psn store if anyone hasn’t played them yet. Just realised also in watching this video how much some of the music in TMNT resembles Crime Fighters too.
Dear Kim Justice, There used to be a GI Joe game for the Commodore 64 computer. I'm surprised you didn't mention that, but I'm not sure if it was made by Konami though. Nonetheless though, it was a 1-2 player game, and it was fun every single time! 👍😎
There were a couple on C64 I believe - there's the Action Force games as well, which is how we got G.I. Joe in Europe :)...none of them have anything to do with Konami though!
We couldn't get ENOUGH of TMNT Arcade. It was about the only arcade game we'd actually get off our home machines to go and play. BTW anyone else remember Teenage Mutant Hero Turds on Spitting Image?
In Wild West CowBoys, Buffalo Bull was entirely made for the arcade game, so Konami could retrofit it into 4 player cabs. He never appears in the show. Also, I did hear Konami worked on an arcade version of Zen: Intergalactic Ninja, but cancelled it after the show's pitch failed to be picked up. Though they did release a NES game still. Speaking of which, the X-Men arcade game is also based on a failed pilot for a X-Men cartoon. Pride of the X-Men, hence why the art style is different from the comic and later animated series. The pilot is on UA-cam if you want to check it out.
22:35 Wait... There was a C64 version of The Simpsons? Seriously? How the bloody hell did I not know about this until now?! I would have killed to play that back in the day!
Great video I used to love the turtles arcade then when I saw a screenshot of turtles in time for the SNES in mean machines magazine. I was so excited now and it was coming to my SNES
Great documentary! I love old school Konami. They used to literally churn out hit after hit. I've been watching your stuff for years now Kim, and it's always of the highest quality. 👌
Surprisingly, the Amiga's terrible port of the TMNT arcade game has some hidden incomplete music tracks too, and they sound great. You can find them on UA-cam
You're wrong in that TMNT Tournament Fighters didn't have an arcade version of some kind. I absolutely remember seeing it in an arcade in my native Sweden, during a vacation. I was 7 years old at the time and I remember it vividly, because to this day, I am salty that I didn't have a chance to play it. It's genuinely one of my most vivid memories from that trip, for that reason.
I do so miss this era of Konami, and am also very much looking forward to that Turtles collection, will be nabbing that on Steam so I can play through them again. Looks like I'll be firing up Mame again as well for a few other titles in this video.
Great content and give us so much good and interesting information. Love being taking back to my youth with your videos . Growing up in UK it great to see a UK base game channel. Thank you 🤟🤟🤟
I remember one of the UK mags (Nintendo magazine system' or its latter iteration of official Nintendo magazine I believe) marking down turtles in time for the snes purely due to their lack of love for the turtles franchise as a whole. Not the only time that magazine displayed unprofessional personal bias in their opinions and reviews. One of the reasons that I preffered independent publications back in the day.
I played The Simpsons a lot at a holiday camp near Hastings (along with Three Wonders, a Capcom game no one knows about). Put alot of money into it and managed to beat it Co-op once. Loved the team attacks in it. Was really shocked when I went to Southend a few years ago with some friends (2014 or 2015 I think) to find it in a really unique cabinet. It was a big sit down one that had the screen in a replica of The Simpsons' TV. It wasn't in the greatest condition as some of the buttons didn't work and the CRT seemed to be failing.
Got really excited about that Nerdcon because I love the Arcade Club in Bury but it's on a Wednesday of all days, us nerds have to work you know!! great video yet again Kim thanks.
Somewhere out there is an alternate reality where licensed games aren't lost in limbo as soon as the license expires and these are all available on current gen systems. But yay for TMNT anyway.
So many memories. I remember seeing the first Turtles arcade in the summer of 1990 with our local fair and it was redefining. It was always surrounded by kids and that theme was booming. It just shaded everything else until SF2 came along. Brilliant vid Kim!!
I remember seeing an Asterix cocktail cabinet all the way out here in the middle of SouthEast Asia, in the Philippines! I so wish I took a picture of it (would have been expensive in the 1990s to do so ofc) as I see now it's hard to even find pictures of any original Asterix cabinet. Now I'm not so sure that that cabinet was a custom job by the arcade operator, who may have been a huge fan, but who knows? I really hope if this was a thing Konami made themselves evidence for it pops up eventually
Also we got all of these games on our arcades at the time, a very interesting time when shopping malls weren't making as much money, so video game arcades lined entire floors wall to wall. I distinctly remember playing Moo Mesa while it was on TV for us. But of course it was the TMNT and Simpsons and X-Men arcades that were the most popular for us, as much as I'm sure it was for the rest of you
My dad insisted MSX was the future, so I had a hard time getting games and had to get Konami carts from a place called Tavistock HiFi. I was a Konami fanboy for their support my first home computer that wasn't the c64 I wanted that Xmas. Now they're a disaster.
I remember losing tons of quarters to these games. These arcade games were wild. Bummer so many games were left in the arcade. Konami Arcade Collection. C'mon. But we can keep dreaming I always wondered about Moo Mesa, of it was indeed Sunset Riders sequel. Haha I was right. X-Men & TMNT. So so good
It is time for Konami to work on a big arcade collection with all of their gems since they have allot of money to spend even in licenses! Pachinko works a really good buck for playing them,why not release something like that for all the systems once & for all?!
Used to love playing Turtles at the arcades at the Metrocentre that year. Got the other version hoping I could transfer a bit of that magic to home. Got the CPC coin-op version years later an after using it as couldn't get it on Amiga. Entered a phone in competition to try an own the cabinet and harboured ambitions to own it more recently... and wasn't even into Turtles, probably seen one episode and only seen one movie. Thats how lush that game was.
Great video as always Kim, I actually owned TMNT Turtles in Time on my Japanese SNES....like you say, one of the best SNES games out there along with CastleVania 4
This just shows how late 80s arcade boards were too far ahead of nes/other home hardware. I remember coming home from the arcade, especially after playing sf2 arcade or of course killer instinct and thinking how godlike arcade games were, we didn’t get close to true arcade perfect home games till Sega Saturn and cps2 X-men vs sf with the 4mb ram cart but by then beat ‘em ups were dying ps1 was taking over in America.
I actually finished The Simpsons arcade game with my sibling as a kid. No doubt it took a shit load of one pound coins, but I mostly remember being really happy with myself
"and not all of that has to do with the arcade version" got me on the edge of my seat again hahaha. Love your narratives/work. I would really love to see you do a ISS/Winning Eleven/Pro Evolution soccer documentary and hear your take on it considering your love of footy games.
We got a castlevania compilation, contra compilation and a turtles compilation. Now we need the rest of their arcade fighters compilation, simpsons, x-men, aliens, please make it happen!
It's always amusing when I get reminded of the UK's moral panic in the 1980s over ninjas that led to TMNT being called TMHT there. Such a bizarre hangup.
@@jcardboard See I can sort of get a middle aged moral guardian getting upset about "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" or something, at least there's a vague argument you could possibly make that it's a negative thing to have around. But ninjas just don't seem to be any sort of threat at all!
Like you say Kim, Turtles in Time seems so much more popular on the Snes…but do you remember seeing it over here on Arcade? I would’ve been 8 or 9 years old at the time and an absolute Simpsons and Turtles nut at time of release. Spent most of my youth in Leysdown arcades and I don’t remember ever seeing it!?
I never played the NES version of TMNT but I remember enjoying the Speccy port that was pretty colourful even if there was no 128K audio or at least I never got any on my +2.
I bought that Turtles in Time Reshelled for X360, I went back to play it on my x360 recently just to retry it. Aged like fine milk is great accurate description.
9:13 Never noticed that was the Watchmen logo on the skateboard. Cool to see a high resolution image of this artwork as it was what was used on the NES cartridge in the US. Looks like Watchmen issue 1 (with the cover art being the bloody smiley face) came out in 1986 and TMNT II for arcade came out in 1989. Very cool reference for the time, especially given how dark the original TMNT comic was.
I had the DOS version of the Simpsons arcade game and among all my friends everyone was envious of me because it just wasn't available for SNES or Genesis
I liked a lot of Konami coin-ops back in the day, Sunset Riders being an early favourite, I enjoyed Aliens too. When I first saw TMNT here in blighty I found an arcade that had priced the machine at 20p per credit with 9 lives per credit so I got to complete the game very quickly and really enhoyed it. At that time I was really getting into side scrolling arcade beat em ups and while I enjoyed some of the Konami beat em ups that followed TMNT I found myself leaning more towards what Capcom were doing with this game theirs. By the time I played The Simpsons arcade and later X-Men I felt that Konami's beat em ups had got kinda stale and Konami had not really taken enough risks with the game mechanics. Meanwhile Capcom were trying all sorts of ideas with theirs and putting out heaps of varied and quality beat em ups. I must admit I never actually tried Turtles in Time when that dropped and it sounds from your video like it would have been worth a try. However by that time I was off the Konami beat em up train and feeling that the big licences were now more important for Konami beat em ups than fresh new ideas. Ultimately when I look at Capcom's efforts after FInal Fight, (a game that I must have completed in 5 or 6 different arcades back in the day) such as Alien Vs Predator or Cadillacs and Dinosaurs it's clear that Capcom were and are the true King of the arcade beat em ups............ PS. btw ... when it comes to the home console beat em ups, just like Mr slopes I am a massive fan of Streets Of Rage 2 .. but that's another story :) ... Nerdcon looks good ... I may try and go if I don't have to sell everything I own to afford the fuel to get there 😅
When it comes to the 16-bit TMNT games, I gotta go with Hyperstone Heist over Turtles in Time. I love both the Genesis and SNES, I still have two my original machines, but I love the Genesis just a little more and I always preferred the YM2612 audio when a good composer was at the helm. Elsewise TMNT, Simpsons, G.I.Joe, and X-Men were definitely hallmarks of those arcade days for me, probably sunk a small fortune in quarters into those cabinets. Money well spent though I say though, wish I could go back sometimes.
35:45 No, the Asterix arcade is certainly very fondly remembered in France and it sold decently enough at the time. But, in the 90's, the character was already quite old (created in 1959). So, it felt like what you were reading at your parents' house. It's certainly a bit of fun but not really "cool". We were a lot more excited by the Turtles and Simpsons games, for exemple. Which is a shame because the Asterix arcade is genuinely very good.
I'd say if you want a Sunset Riders followup that can actually hold a candle to it, there's always Mystic Warriors made by the same team. Definitely a lot better than the COW Boys game.
I'd say there's a lack of emphasis on the fact C.O.W.Boys was a younger kid's property than Sunset Riders was. The game is a lot more forgiving having multiple health points and full screen clearing attacks. They didn't even have guns in the cartoon series, no thanks to ABC's infamously prudish Broadcast Standards and Practices department. Probably the reason why it wasn't successful, that and the fact it was far closer to a Wild West version of Talespin than TMNT. I don't think any of the show's staff enjoyed the experience, and I SWEAR there's an episode of Angry Beavers (same production company and staff) that's one of the writers venting. It was about this cowboy named Kid Friendly.
What's your memories of these Arcades? Sound off here! Also if you're interested in NerdCon, you can find more details at www.nerdcon.co.uk -- should be a good day! Thanks for watching :)
i remember the lines, even in a small town pizza place, for tmnt
Kim can you do a intervjue with Bo Jangerborg creator of Fairlight and Fairlight 2. ( Spectrum)i think hes one of the most Talen tent programmers spectrum ever had on Matthew Smith caliber .
I remember them but never played any of these. In Southend in the late 80s/early 90s I was more into Gauntlet, Sega Hot Rod and Tekhan World Cup.
alien from konami is, in my opinion, the true Contra II
Kim - can we have a a documentary on Essex based developers Graftgold responsible for Uridium, Paradroid, Rainbow Islands etc.
I know this video is over a year old (and to a certain extent this is just feeding that algorithm), but I'm having such a wonderful time working through your long form content that I felt a big "thank you" was more than appropriate - so THANK YOU! You're a talented documentarian, and I have high standards on this, but the balance of information and entertainment (especially for someone who never played many games) has me enjoying everything. The studio histories are magnificent stuff, and I hope more long-format fans like me find their way to your channel! Absolutely bloody brilliant!
God, yes. I will say that even the non-arcade Konami licensed games were probably some of the best output the company had. Between the Tiny Toons NES game and the Animaniacs SNES and Genesis games, they were to Warner Bros in the 90's what Capcom was to Disney at the time. I think they even planned a Sega Saturn Pinky and The Brain game that got cancelled.
To this day you continue to be one of the most thorough and well presented game documentarians, and your writing and delivery are just superb. I hope this never gets old for you, because I will never get tired of your videos! Keep up the great work, this was a JOY to watch!
30:10 Am glad someone has cleared up the misconception of Bucky O'Hare being a rip-off of TMNT, as someone who's really into anthro animal media it always really bothers me how alot of people that were kids in the late 80's/early 90's often label everything with a team of Anthro animals as a rip off of the turtles.
Another license that had an incredible famicom game was Samurai Pizza Cats. People often call this obscure anime dub a rip off of the turtles, but anyone who even bothered to watch it can clearly see it's suppose to be a parody of 80's Japanese pop culture, as it parodies various tokasetsu shows at the time like Super Sentai (which we would later know in the west as Power Rangers) Kamen Rider, and Ultraman, as well as various animes from the time.
I mean it's not like the original 1987 series was high art or anything, it was silly kid banter meant sell us toys, Disney's series Gargoyles you could also arguably was a rip off of TMNT, but overall I think Disney's Gargoyles was a much better series that has aged alot better then the original 1987 TMNT series.
Are people now gonna say that Netflix shows like Aggretsuko and Beastars are rip offs of TMNT? Cause they have anthro animals, just like TMNT has anthro animals.
Something you left out or just didn't know when describing the Genesis/Mega Drive game, The Hyperstone Heist, is that it's not just a remix of Turtles In Time it's actually a sort of fusion of the 3rd NES game and Turtles In Time. It's essentially Turtles 3.5 in a way.
Now this video is a great lookback to Konami's history, but I will say there's actually one licensed game you missed, though its a really obscure one. Its called Rollergames and its basically a competitive beat em up where you try to earn more points than your opponent by taking out the other team. It even had a different NES that was more of a traditional beat em up, but with platforming elements. Now both games are more of an acquired taste that I haven't really got into, but they're fun enough games that they're worth a look.
21:23 back in the 90s no Chuck E. Cheese birthday was complete without at least one token in the SImpsons game
44:00 that balloon looks surprisingly close to Shreck
Somewhere in 1993 I completed Xmen. Such a unique achievement to finish an arcade game in its original setting. Big shout out to Derek Choi who fought alongside me.
So as mentioned, by Larry down below, it had a character just for the game. Also in The Simpson's game Marge is a rabbit and her hair hides her ears. I found that to be pretty fun. Also Bart wears a blue shirt because of early art work depicted him as doing so. All merchandise had him wearing blue. The X-Men game is based on Pryde of the X-Men failed cartoon which is really odd cause Wolverine is Australian in it.
I can’t remember playing Turtles in Time.
But as soon as you said throwing enemies at the screen I must have, I remember doing it with Donatello lol.
I have the arcade version and Simpsons game (which we completed as a family) on Xbox one.
Konami was so good at licensed games that even some of their other arcade games looks like they are licensed from some media. Sunset Riders, Mystic Warriors, Metamorphic Force, Monster Maulers and Dragoon Might. When you see them you would swore that they should be based on some anime or cartoon but they are not.
I know everyone loves the other games, but I was a massive GI Joe fan as a kid. They’re still the best toy ever, and I’ve saved mine and given them to my kid, which has ruined all other toys for him because they’re just not as good! Anyway, when I walked into my local Chinese chippy one day in the early 90s and found this Konami game I was so happy. It was only there a few weeks, but finding it is still my favourite arcade memory.
Another quality video. How KIm hasn't got thousands of more views and subscribers is beyond me. Keep up the good work
Cool video! I didn't know about the bucky o hare or Asterix games, I'll have to check those out. Thanks Kim!
Another cracking video thanks Kim. The fact these went unreleased at home is why I started snapping up the PCBs many moons ago. Fortunate enough to have most of these. Still fun 30 years on.
I remember turtles in time releasing. Anyone who had it for snes was everyones best friend.
I'm near Galloping Ghost arcade in Chicagoland area, free play all day if you want for just 20 bucks and all these games here. Just beautiful how it all works and a shame newer gamers dont' get the challenge and joy playing in arcades like this was.
Heard about that place from SpawnWave, Avgn and others too. Awesome place
They missed the opportunity to call the turtles collection "cowabundle"
08:21
I always remember that part on the arcade version, when someone "grief when it wasn't trending" keep jumping in the left part of the screen until everybody was dead ....
Kim you are a legend, I love your videos, your voice, your presentation and your supreme professional storytelling … and I hope one day you have a Netflix series with all this retro stuff. I am 39, and from the Uk, and lived through the Spectrum, Atari ST, Amiga, NES, Megadrive etc so all of these shows take me back to the best years of my life. And I hope one day that you cover the crypto gaming market too because it reminds me of the bedroom coder era of the 80s. Look at Gala games… this has the potential to be the next ocean with their licenced games.
You are my favourite youtuber to watch while I’m in isolation right now.
UK, 41, Spectrum, ST, Gameboy...friends' C64, NES and SNES (a little bit), Wolfenstein and Doom on another friend's PC. Bought Quake 2 and installed on my family PC, but barely played it and my focus drifted off to other things. A SNES mini randomly stumbled upon in Swedish (kind of cheap stuff) shop in Norway where I now live, in 2018 brought gaming screaming back in to my life (and the possibilities of emulation). It was seeing that I could buy and take home SF2, right then and there that swung it (of course so many other ways to do so before that, but I never looked in to it). The early 90s hype totally swept me up, even though I barely played it on my friend's SNES. Strong memories of Neo Geo adds and screen shots in ST magazines. Seemed so perfect and unattainable. Now I can carry the entire Neo Geo library around in my pocket on TWO devices! Still blows my mind...and yes, Kim's vids and enthusiasm are fantastic!
The childhood memories of these games! Mainly Ninja Turtles, The Simpsons and X Men, Konami could make great beat em ups!
Excellent work here as always. The timing was great for me as I have just been playing both Turtles arcade games quite a bit in the last few weeks. I wanted to get my fill of those before playing Shredder's Revenge. I always loved the first arcade game. I had a tougher time getting into Turtles in Time. The auto-run feature really messed with my mind for a while. The game has a few other quirks too, like the Turtles randomly deciding to try kicking an enemy that isn't quite in range for that, leading to taking a hit. So I didn't like Turtles in Time arcade for a while, but have since come to appreciate it a lot more. I had more fun with it this last time than I ever did before. The SNES port is a great one, though I always preferred the FM synth of the arcade(and Genesis/Mega Drive as well) by quite a bit. Luckily, thanks to the MSU1 hack, I now get to play the SNES version with the arcade audio which really elevates it for me.
On a slightly negative note, I could never fully get into Bucky O'Hare or Asterix. Bucky just doesn't engage me like the true beat-em-up games do, and I had some issue with the presentation. As for Asterix, it's silly and fun, but in terms of gameplay, the attacks felt to me like they had no weight or impact, so it could only sustain my interest for part of the game. That's just me and it is not badly made. I couldn't get into Moo Mesa either. Konami's involvement with Moo Mesa reminds me of Capcom with Cadillacs & Dinosaurs. Both were likely trying to get in on what they thought would be a hit new animated series. Obviously, that didn't work out. As for X-Men, that is my favorite of the games here and my pick for Konami's best beat-em-up. That one just really resonated with me and I can play it over and over again. The regional differences make it even more interesting. While the Capcom style beat-em-ups are the best in my opinion, Konami's were also a lot of fun and had a fast and loose feel, in a good way, that was Konami's signature style which I still enjoy a lot. Plus, Konami may have been the best at applying their licenses. Anyway, very enjoyable retrospective here.
I spent a lot of time playing Simpsons and Turtles at the Bury arcade club a couple of years back, truly appreciate the nerdcon headsup, now have VIP tickets :D
What a comprehensive presentation & a deep dive into some of the history. As a lover of Konami arcades, I would love you to do the same documentary for the non licensed Konami Arcade games such as Frogger, Track & Field, Sunset Riders, Vendetta, Lethal Enforcers etc.
Asterix was the only reason I bothered to get a MAME emulator. I find the fact they made an arcade game specifically for a niche European market intriguing. TMNT, X-Men, and G.I. Joe certainly had international appeal, and C.O.W. Boys and Bucky were selling on the trend alone, but something that doesn't have much of a worldly presence, and indeed probably never left the country just needed to be experienced. And I have to say, it's the best looking out of all the games, and the cartoony physics and violence translated perfectly. Music even sounds like the Disney-esque aesthetic the creators absolutely forced on their licensees. And the funny thing is, while the US never got any of the cabinets (never even knew it existed until 10 years ago), we somehow get the console games over here. Saw one for the Switch at of all places a Wal*Mart a few months ago. Apparently, the programmers at Konami, putting them in virtually every other one of these games, really wanted to put ninjas and Japanese imagery in the Asterix arcade, but the creators put their feet down about it. Can't really blame them. The fact Springfield's Channel 6 somehow films Samurai epics and Kabuki in The Simpsons always confused me.
I'm embarrassed to admit that at the onset of the Aliens transition, I was excited thinking you were gonna mention the excellent arcade Contra games until I immediately reminded myself this video is dedicated to "LICENSED" games.
Great stuff as always, Kim. No idea how you have the time to put this stuff together. Fully appreciated.
Great upload Kim. I’m always happy to see any mention of Crime Fighters in these videos, as it’s my favourite beat-em up of all time, but never seems to get any love. Both it and it’s sequel Vendetta are available on the psn store if anyone hasn’t played them yet. Just realised also in watching this video how much some of the music in TMNT resembles Crime Fighters too.
09:21 Lol, kinda weird how they look straight at you after they've landed.
Dear Kim Justice,
There used to be a GI Joe game for the Commodore 64 computer. I'm surprised you didn't mention that, but I'm not sure if it was made by Konami though. Nonetheless though, it was a 1-2 player game, and it was fun every single time! 👍😎
There were a couple on C64 I believe - there's the Action Force games as well, which is how we got G.I. Joe in Europe :)...none of them have anything to do with Konami though!
We couldn't get ENOUGH of TMNT Arcade. It was about the only arcade game we'd actually get off our home machines to go and play. BTW anyone else remember Teenage Mutant Hero Turds on Spitting Image?
Aliens and The Simpsons takes me back to childhood trips to Skegness, playing them in the back of the Oasis arcade! 😊
In Wild West CowBoys, Buffalo Bull was entirely made for the arcade game, so Konami could retrofit it into 4 player cabs. He never appears in the show.
Also, I did hear Konami worked on an arcade version of Zen: Intergalactic Ninja, but cancelled it after the show's pitch failed to be picked up. Though they did release a NES game still.
Speaking of which, the X-Men arcade game is also based on a failed pilot for a X-Men cartoon. Pride of the X-Men, hence why the art style is different from the comic and later animated series. The pilot is on UA-cam if you want to check it out.
22:35
Wait... There was a C64 version of The Simpsons? Seriously? How the bloody hell did I not know about this until now?! I would have killed to play that back in the day!
This was quite the tear Konami was on from like 1990-1993 with these arcade games. Unbelievable
Great video I used to love the turtles arcade then when I saw a screenshot of turtles in time for the SNES in mean machines magazine. I was so excited now and it was coming to my SNES
Great documentary! I love old school Konami. They used to literally churn out hit after hit. I've been watching your stuff for years now Kim, and it's always of the highest quality. 👌
Surprisingly, the Amiga's terrible port of the TMNT arcade game has some hidden incomplete music tracks too, and they sound great. You can find them on UA-cam
You're wrong in that TMNT Tournament Fighters didn't have an arcade version of some kind. I absolutely remember seeing it in an arcade in my native Sweden, during a vacation. I was 7 years old at the time and I remember it vividly, because to this day, I am salty that I didn't have a chance to play it. It's genuinely one of my most vivid memories from that trip, for that reason.
I do so miss this era of Konami, and am also very much looking forward to that Turtles collection, will be nabbing that on Steam so I can play through them again. Looks like I'll be firing up Mame again as well for a few other titles in this video.
Good video. I hope you do one on Capcom's licensed arcade titles in the future.
Great content and give us so much good and interesting information. Love being taking back to my youth with your videos . Growing up in UK it great to see a UK base game channel. Thank you 🤟🤟🤟
I remember one of the UK mags (Nintendo magazine system' or its latter iteration of official Nintendo magazine I believe) marking down turtles in time for the snes purely due to their lack of love for the turtles franchise as a whole. Not the only time that magazine displayed unprofessional personal bias in their opinions and reviews. One of the reasons that I preffered independent publications back in the day.
I played The Simpsons a lot at a holiday camp near Hastings (along with Three Wonders, a Capcom game no one knows about). Put alot of money into it and managed to beat it Co-op once. Loved the team attacks in it.
Was really shocked when I went to Southend a few years ago with some friends (2014 or 2015 I think) to find it in a really unique cabinet. It was a big sit down one that had the screen in a replica of The Simpsons' TV. It wasn't in the greatest condition as some of the buttons didn't work and the CRT seemed to be failing.
Got really excited about that Nerdcon because I love the Arcade Club in Bury but it's on a Wednesday of all days, us nerds have to work you know!! great video yet again Kim thanks.
Take a day off it will be worth it
Awesome video Kim! I remember playing the original Turtles Arcade around 1991 at the local Fairground. Every kid wanted to play on that machine! 💪🏼
Somewhere out there is an alternate reality where licensed games aren't lost in limbo as soon as the license expires and these are all available on current gen systems.
But yay for TMNT anyway.
So many memories. I remember seeing the first Turtles arcade in the summer of 1990 with our local fair and it was redefining. It was always surrounded by kids and that theme was booming. It just shaded everything else until SF2 came along. Brilliant vid Kim!!
Class video mate, was a nice chilled informative watch! :D
Very enjoyable video, didn’t know some of these games, I’m definitely playing them!!
I remember seeing an Asterix cocktail cabinet all the way out here in the middle of SouthEast Asia, in the Philippines! I so wish I took a picture of it (would have been expensive in the 1990s to do so ofc) as I see now it's hard to even find pictures of any original Asterix cabinet. Now I'm not so sure that that cabinet was a custom job by the arcade operator, who may have been a huge fan, but who knows? I really hope if this was a thing Konami made themselves evidence for it pops up eventually
Also we got all of these games on our arcades at the time, a very interesting time when shopping malls weren't making as much money, so video game arcades lined entire floors wall to wall. I
distinctly remember playing Moo Mesa while it was on TV for us. But of course it was the TMNT and Simpsons and X-Men arcades that were the most popular for us, as much as I'm sure it was for the rest of you
Great to see the long-form documentaries are back😀🥰
I love the documentaries on this channel! So thorough and informative and well put together. 🤩❤️
My dad insisted MSX was the future, so I had a hard time getting games and had to get Konami carts from a place called Tavistock HiFi. I was a Konami fanboy for their support my first home computer that wasn't the c64 I wanted that Xmas. Now they're a disaster.
I remember losing tons of quarters to these games. These arcade games were wild. Bummer so many games were left in the arcade. Konami Arcade Collection. C'mon. But we can keep dreaming
I always wondered about Moo Mesa, of it was indeed Sunset Riders sequel. Haha I was right.
X-Men & TMNT. So so good
Outstanding once again Kim.
It is time for Konami to work on a big arcade collection with all of their gems since they have allot of money to spend even in licenses! Pachinko works a really good buck for playing them,why not release something like that for all the systems once & for all?!
Used to love playing Turtles at the arcades at the Metrocentre that year. Got the other version hoping I could transfer a bit of that magic to home. Got the CPC coin-op version years later an after using it as couldn't get it on Amiga. Entered a phone in competition to try an own the cabinet and harboured ambitions to own it more recently... and wasn't even into Turtles, probably seen one episode and only seen one movie. Thats how lush that game was.
Simpsons, TMNT, and X-Men are like the triforce of arcade beat em' up games. There where more but those where always my fav.
Just come across this channel, absolutely fantastic!!! Thanks.
Excellent video as always Kim!
I didn't knew about that Asterix arcade game. It looks absolutely stunning!
Great video as always Kim, I actually owned TMNT Turtles in Time on my Japanese SNES....like you say, one of the best SNES games out there along with CastleVania 4
This just shows how late 80s arcade boards were too far ahead of nes/other home hardware. I remember coming home from the arcade, especially after playing sf2 arcade or of course killer instinct and thinking how godlike arcade games were, we didn’t get close to true arcade perfect home games till Sega Saturn and cps2 X-men vs sf with the 4mb ram cart but by then beat ‘em ups were dying ps1 was taking over in America.
I actually finished The Simpsons arcade game with my sibling as a kid. No doubt it took a shit load of one pound coins, but I mostly remember being really happy with myself
"and not all of that has to do with the arcade version" got me on the edge of my seat again hahaha. Love your narratives/work. I would really love to see you do a ISS/Winning Eleven/Pro Evolution soccer documentary and hear your take on it considering your love of footy games.
Great job as usual! Love your work. 👍👍
"I am Magneto, master of MAGNET!"
Fantastic professional documentary, Thanks Kim.
Excellent video Kim. Reminded me that I've actually played Asterix and the sixplayer X-men cab back in the day. Thanks for the memories. :)
We got a castlevania compilation, contra compilation and a turtles compilation. Now we need the rest of their arcade fighters compilation, simpsons, x-men, aliens, please make it happen!
Great content as usual. Completed aliens with my son at the weekend there. He loved it.
Well done and thank you for another great video!
It's always amusing when I get reminded of the UK's moral panic in the 1980s over ninjas that led to TMNT being called TMHT there. Such a bizarre hangup.
1980's movies, TV, and video games greatly overexaggerated the odds that the average person would fall afoul of ninja-related crime.
It was sort of tied in with the whole 'video nasties' thing. Very silly.
@@jcardboard See I can sort of get a middle aged moral guardian getting upset about "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" or something, at least there's a vague argument you could possibly make that it's a negative thing to have around. But ninjas just don't seem to be any sort of threat at all!
"you just walk over it"
Like you say Kim, Turtles in Time seems so much more popular on the Snes…but do you remember seeing it over here on Arcade? I would’ve been 8 or 9 years old at the time and an absolute Simpsons and Turtles nut at time of release. Spent most of my youth in Leysdown arcades and I don’t remember ever seeing it!?
I have to say that I don't really remember seeing it much in my parts.
Hands down one of the best gaming channels on youtube
Great video again Kim. Another pseudo-sequel to Sunset Riders is Mystic Warriors, same gameplay but different setting, well worth trying.
Fantastic video.. some classics right there.❤
Thanks for the video!
I really enjoyed this. Great stuff!
Thank you for the continuous amazing content, KJ! Wishing you continued success.
I never played the NES version of TMNT but I remember enjoying the Speccy port that was pretty colourful even if there was no 128K audio or at least I never got any on my +2.
Oh to even MENTION vendetta. That was a game and a half. Esp if you get to play the uncensored version.
I bought that Turtles in Time Reshelled for X360, I went back to play it on my x360 recently just to retry it. Aged like fine milk is great accurate description.
Aged milk sounds sour lol. No thank you ✋✋
Nailed it! Great work KJ!
Thanks Kim, I'm really looking forward to this.
9:13 Never noticed that was the Watchmen logo on the skateboard. Cool to see a high resolution image of this artwork as it was what was used on the NES cartridge in the US. Looks like Watchmen issue 1 (with the cover art being the bloody smiley face) came out in 1986 and TMNT II for arcade came out in 1989. Very cool reference for the time, especially given how dark the original TMNT comic was.
Bucky o hare was awesome ... I loved it ...
I had the DOS version of the Simpsons arcade game and among all my friends everyone was envious of me because it just wasn't available for SNES or Genesis
great stuff as always. I always look forward to yours. :)
I liked a lot of Konami coin-ops back in the day, Sunset Riders being an early favourite, I enjoyed Aliens too. When I first saw TMNT here in blighty I found an arcade that had priced the machine at 20p per credit with 9 lives per credit so I got to complete the game very quickly and really enhoyed it. At that time I was really getting into side scrolling arcade beat em ups and while I enjoyed some of the Konami beat em ups that followed TMNT I found myself leaning more towards what Capcom were doing with this game theirs. By the time I played The Simpsons arcade and later X-Men I felt that Konami's beat em ups had got kinda stale and Konami had not really taken enough risks with the game mechanics. Meanwhile Capcom were trying all sorts of ideas with theirs and putting out heaps of varied and quality beat em ups. I must admit I never actually tried Turtles in Time when that dropped and it sounds from your video like it would have been worth a try. However by that time I was off the Konami beat em up train and feeling that the big licences were now more important for Konami beat em ups than fresh new ideas. Ultimately when I look at Capcom's efforts after FInal Fight, (a game that I must have completed in 5 or 6 different arcades back in the day) such as Alien Vs Predator or Cadillacs and Dinosaurs it's clear that Capcom were and are the true King of the arcade beat em ups............ PS. btw ... when it comes to the home console beat em ups, just like Mr slopes I am a massive fan of Streets Of Rage 2 .. but that's another story :) ... Nerdcon looks good ... I may try and go if I don't have to sell everything I own to afford the fuel to get there 😅
Wait wait wait, this place in bury exists only 40 mins away and I had no idea it existed? :o
I got excited too, I thought you were talking about bury St Edmunds:(
its Europes largest arcade and best kept secret - defo worth checking out 17/08/22
I was in Manchester 6 years ago, shoulda taken the train and checked this out.
I can't image the amount of hours it took you to make this video. Congrats!
When it comes to the 16-bit TMNT games, I gotta go with Hyperstone Heist over Turtles in Time. I love both the Genesis and SNES, I still have two my original machines, but I love the Genesis just a little more and I always preferred the YM2612 audio when a good composer was at the helm. Elsewise TMNT, Simpsons, G.I.Joe, and X-Men were definitely hallmarks of those arcade days for me, probably sunk a small fortune in quarters into those cabinets. Money well spent though I say though, wish I could go back sometimes.
No offense, but the Hyperstone Heist sound compared to the Turtles In Time on the SNES is scratchy and static.
Awesome video as always Kim. 👌
35:45 No, the Asterix arcade is certainly very fondly remembered in France and it sold decently enough at the time. But, in the 90's, the character was already quite old (created in 1959). So, it felt like what you were reading at your parents' house. It's certainly a bit of fun but not really "cool". We were a lot more excited by the Turtles and Simpsons games, for exemple. Which is a shame because the Asterix arcade is genuinely very good.
The best best classic arcade video I seen recently
I'd say if you want a Sunset Riders followup that can actually hold a candle to it, there's always Mystic Warriors made by the same team. Definitely a lot better than the COW Boys game.
I'd say there's a lack of emphasis on the fact C.O.W.Boys was a younger kid's property than Sunset Riders was. The game is a lot more forgiving having multiple health points and full screen clearing attacks. They didn't even have guns in the cartoon series, no thanks to ABC's infamously prudish Broadcast Standards and Practices department. Probably the reason why it wasn't successful, that and the fact it was far closer to a Wild West version of Talespin than TMNT. I don't think any of the show's staff enjoyed the experience, and I SWEAR there's an episode of Angry Beavers (same production company and staff) that's one of the writers venting. It was about this cowboy named Kid Friendly.