From Quality to Slop

In the early 2000s, director Christopher Gans had a pet project in mind: a film adaptation of Silent Hill 2. However, deeming that story too difficult to tell, he instead proposed an adaptation of the original Silent Hill, and after years of development, the film was finally released in 2006. Loosely based on the original game, the Silent Hill movie follows Rose, a mother who must investigate the titular town after her daughter goes missing. Though not the most inventive horror movie of all time, Silent Hill was effective thanks to its palpable atmosphere, smart integration of the source material, and a decent script with worthwhile performances. Although critics didn’t love the movie, fans were happy enough, and if that’s all that ever came of Silent Hill movie adaptations, this would be a different article. Instead, the wrong lessons were learned.

Six years later, in 2012, a sequel was released: Silent Hill: Revelation. Acting as a sequel to the first movie, instead of an adaptation of any specific Silent Hill game, the issues were apparent from the start. Instead of Christopher Gans, writer/director M.J. Bassett was brought aboard, and unfortunately, they didn’t seem to have much passion for the games. Instead, the script was weak, characters were shoddily forced into the narrative, and the whole thing felt like a gimmick. It was a 3D movie from the 2010s with the subtitle of “Revelation”… not much more that needs to be said. Again, if things ended here, it might be forgivable. Instead, the Silent Hill slop was far from finished.

Returning to the Hill

Flash forward to this year, where video game movies are all the rage, and Christopher Gans is back again with another adaptation: Return to Silent Hill. Unfortunately, this too was a blunder. As Gans first desired, Return to Silent Hill is a loose adaptation of Silent Hill 2, but it misses the mark in almost every way. Despite a few decent scenes, Return to Silent Hill is a mess of CGI, terrible editing, and a confusing script that makes very little sense. Even the critics and audience agree that it’s a bad flick, with an 18% critic score and 28% audience score on RottenTomatoes.

So, after two progressively worse sequels, surely Silent Hill movies will take a break, right? If it’s up to Christopher Gans, that’s not the plan. According to some statements made earlier this year, both Gans and composer Akira Yamaoka have expressed interest in making a fourth Silent Hill movie, potentially adapting Silent Hill 4: The Room. Honestly, at this point, I have zero faith that it’ll be a watchable product. Unlike the Resident Evil movies, which were pretty bad but didn’t try to be anything other than mindless action schlock, Silent Hill movies consistently flounder. At this point, it’s probably best to let it rest, but knowing Hollywood, that probably won’t be the case.

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Note: To legally enjoy these ROM hacks, you must obtain your ROM file from a physical copy of your desired retro game using game dumping software. We do not condone the use of piracy or any illicit means of ROM acquisition.

Banjo-Kazooie: Nostalgia 64

Created by Kurko Mods, a true master of Banjo-Kazooie mods, Banjo-Kazooie: Nostalgia 64 is a perfect representation of what makes ROM hacks fun. In this version of Banjo-Kazooie, our bear and bird duo are not exploring Grunty’s Castle, but instead, the inside of a Nintendo 64 itself! To progress through the game, you must travel through worlds that are based on other N64 classics, offering a collect-a-thon through the console’s greatest hits. You’ll talon trot through GoldenEye 007, frolick through Mario 64‘s Bob-omb Battlefield, go on a photo safari in Pokemon Snap, and much more. Not only does BK: Nostalgia 64 offer cool throwback levels, but it also integrates elements of the original games in smart ways, making for an extremely fun and often challenging 3D platformer.

The Legend of Zelda: The Missing Link

Speaking of Nintendo 64, there are few games that are as revered as Ocarina of Time, and though Majora’s Mask offered an entertaining albeit quirky sequel, I always felt like the N64 deserved one more Zelda title. That’s exactly what The Legend of Zelda: The Missing Link sets out to do, by giving us an all-new adventure in the Zelda universe, set between the events of Ocarina and Majora. Borrowing elements from both of those classic games, The Missing Link tells an all-new story, features new items, and a full dungeon to explore. Though it’ll only take you a couple of hours to finish, The Missing Link is a treat for N64 Zelda fans, and one of the best ROM hacks of its kind.

Pokemon: Unbound

There are so many Pokemon games that it’s almost impossible to list them all, but for retro gamers, there are few as memorable as the Game Boy and Game Boy Advance series. Pokemon: Unbound does its best to merge the worlds of retro Pokemon and modern Pokemon, providing a wholly original game built around the bones of Pokemon: FireRed. With a Pokedex that contains Pokemon up to generation seven, tons of missions, and some significant post-game content, Pokemon: Unbound has a lot of content. Often, this feels less like a ROM hack and more like a brand new game for the GBA, fusing some of the best aspects of the series’ history into one unbelievably fun retro title.

A Plumber For All Seasons

In the ROM hack scene, Super Mario World is easily one of the most active communities, with new levels being created almost daily. Though many of these custom Super Mario World games are often very challenging, some are still enjoyable for players of all skill levels. Of these more casual ROM hacks, A Plumber For All Seasons stands out, thanks to its gorgeous pixel art and refreshing level design. Each world is based on a different season, and with 37 levels, there’s enough variety regardless of whether it’s Spring, Summer, Fall, or Winter. While other Super Mario World ROM hacks like to chew up the player and spit them out, A Plumber For All Seasons offers a picturesque stroll through the seasons with just the right level of difficulty.

TMNT: Shredder’s Re-Revenge

Back in the 16-bit era, beat ’em up games were all the rage, and after playing one for just a few minutes, it’s easy to see why. In this brilliant genre, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Streets of Rage were two of the best franchises, both of which have seen modern reboots in the past few years. However, TMNT: Shredder’s Re-Revenge does something different: it takes the base Streets of Rage 2 game, but updates all of the characters, enemies, and bosses, all reminiscent of the new TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge game. When combined like this, you get a Streets of Rage 2 experience that’s familiar, but with the smooth movement and excellent animation of the modern TMNT titles. It’s a cross-over that’s super fun to play, and if you’ve already played Streets of Rage 2 to death, this is one of the best ways to keep it fresh.

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One Day to Make Soda

Soda Drinker Pro is the brainchild of Will Brierly, an indie developer who was apparently so infatuated with drinking soda, that he made an entire game out of it. In a 2013 interview with Giant Bomb, Brierly jokingly explained that “One night, I woke up at 4 AM because I was so thirsty, but I didn’t have any soda. But I could make a game about drinking soda. So I sat down at my computer, and by 11 PM the next night, the first five levels were done, and it just went from there.” Though the base of the experience was created on that fateful night in 2008, development continued for another 8 years until it was finally released.

Currently, Soda Drinker Pro holds a paltry 30% approval rating on Metacritic. After playing the base game for a few minutes, it’s easy to see why. Over 100 levels, you walk around crude environments at a snail’s pace, sipping on a soda, collecting “bonussodas”, and that’s it. Once you drink all of your soda, it’s onto the next level. Rinse and repeat until you’ve drank soda in more places than you might care to.

The whole experience is a super weird and irreverent joke with very little gameplay value, which led many critics to bash it, including Destructoid, who confidently remarked: “there are no redeeming qualities to Soda Drinker Pro”. Funnily enough, any critic who completely disregarded Soda Drinker Pro also exposed themselves a bit, as the secret game inside, the “real” game, if you will, is actually pretty damn fun, assuming you know that it exists. Like Frog Fractions or other game-within-a-games, Soda Drinker Pro goes from a waste of time to a worthwhile purchase once you discover this hilariously well-kept secret.

Psychedelic Mini-Games

Accessing the hidden game in Soda Drinker Pro is actually very easy, provided you know what to look for. In the second level, The Park: Walking With a Nice Cold Soda, you can spot a crudely drawn cabin on one of the walls. If you walk toward the door of the cabin, you’ll actually clip through the wall, prompting a load and putting you at the title screen of the secret game: Vivian Clark.

The best way to describe Vivian Clark is “WarioWare on drugs”. Much like WarioWare, Vivian Clark involves clearing dozens of unique mini-games, all of which are exceptionally weird, without losing your continues. At the start of the game, you control a raindrop that has freshly fallen from its cloud, and if you run into one of the many objects floating in the sky, you start a mini-game. In one mini-game, you dash around space in a ship, shooting your enemies and collecting power-ups like Asteroids. Another tasks you with completing a 3D obstacle course, while another has you driving around, dodging giant monsters.

If you fail during a mini-game, you’re sent to a mysterious cave where dozens of portraits surround a campfire, and three stopwatches sit nearby. Picking up one of these stopwatches throws you into another mini-game. Once you run out of stopwatches, it’s game over, and the entire loop resets. In total, there are over 50 mini-games to discover, and the game never explains what the goal of each mini-game is. Because of this, the game feels like a constant psychedelic trip, where you’re never quite sure if you’re making progress or playing the game “correctly”. In my opinion, though, that’s kind of the point.

When you hear Will Brierly talk about Soda Drinker Pro, he clearly doesn’t take it seriously at all, and you can tell that the game came from a truly creative person. It kind of makes the whole thing even funnier. What kind of madman would develop an unhinged mini-game collection and then decide to hide it within an objectively bad “simulator” game? In my opinion, the same kind of developer who probably gets a kick out of every bad review, as he knows he pulled a fast one on the critic. Even if Soda Drinker Pro and Vivian Clark aren’t really your thing, you have to admit the whole package is a pretty funny prank on the player and media, even if it stunted its own popularity.

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To call it a success is quite an understatement. Yet, for as entertaining and engrossing as Expedition 33 is, it would not be nearly as good were it not for the games that came before it. Across the experience, the game mashes up the best parts of RPGs from the past..

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The Slug Comes to Life

Metal Slug was developed by Nazca Corporation, a creative studio formed by ex-employees of arcade and pachinko manufacturer, Irem. Though not generally known by name, retro gamers should be familiar with some of Irem’s most popular titles, namely the classic beat ’em up, Kung-Fu Master, and the beloved shoot ’em up, R-Type. Unfortunately, Irem ceased creation of video games in 1994, leading several developers to spin off and form Nazca Corporation.

Due to their experience working on other run ‘n gun games like In the Hunt and GunForce II, Nazca Corporation looked to create a new title in the same genre, but one that was a bit more methodical in its pacing. Inspired by the animated films of legendary director Hayao Miyazaki, they focused on hand-drawn visuals, a goofy and comedic vibe, and accessible controls.

At first, Metal Slug mostly put players in control of a bulky tank, battling through several brief but explosive missions. However, after several play tests around Osaka, Japan, the game was completely overhauled. Though the story remained the same, the new version removed the emphasis on tanks, extended the level length, and added more platforming elements.

A Metal Success

When Metal Slug was published by SNK and released in arcades circa 1996, it was met with a somewhat muted response. Though players enjoyed the humor and evocative visuals, they felt the replay value was limited, especially considering the high difficulty and short gameplay length. Still, Metal Slug was massively popular, and work began on ports for several home consoles, including the Neo Geo, Sega Saturn, and Sony PlayStation. At one point, a version for the Game Boy Advance was in development as well, but was ultimately canceled.

A startling success in and out of arcades, it was immediately clear that Nazca Corporation and SNK had a winner on their hands, and it wasn’t long before sequels and spin-offs started to crop up. A direct sequel, Metal Slug 2, was released in 1998, followed by Metal Slug 3 in 2000, which is generally seen as the best entry in the franchise. The series eventually wrapped up in 2008 with the release of Metal Slug 7 on the Nintendo DS, but remakes and spin-offs have continued.

Most recently, a tactical strategy game, Metal Slug Tactics, was released to decent fanfare, but many fans still hold out hope for a Metal Slug 8 sometime soon. Either way, we can look back fondly on the original Metal Slug and Nazca Corporation’s appreciation for run ‘n gun gameplay, as it birthed one of the best arcade staples of the 90s, an action-packed romp that is still just as fun to play today as it was 30 years ago.

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Sonic didn’t copy Super Mario, instead, it took the platforming genre and turned it up to 11, creating a sense of speed that is rarely matched, even to this day. Fueled by adrenaline, gamers have long loved action delivered at a breakneck pace, and boy, did Sonic go fast…

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In many cases, games on portable devices are often seen as inferior versions of their console counterparts, but that wasn’t really the case with Game Boy Advance. Many titles were bursting with personality and felt tailor-made for portable gaming, providing bursts of entertainment wherever needed. As we celebrate 25 years of the Game Boy Advance, let’s take a quick look back at some of the best games to ever grace the system! Listed in no particular order, these are the best GBA games ever made.

1. Mario Kart: Super Circuit

In short, Mairo Kart: Super Circuit offers everything you’d want out of a fun and lighthearted kart racer. It’s got colorful, exciting stages, a cast of beloved Nintendo characters, fun power-ups, and a fine selection of both single-player and multiplayer content. Three single-player modes and four-player competitive multiplayer keeps the fun alive for hours on end, and even if it’s a little lackluster when compared to handheld kart racers of the future, there’s no doubting that Mario Kart: Super Circuit kickstarted the trend. Nowadays, the Mario Kart franchise has found its footing on both consoles and handhelds, but with millions of copies sold on handheld devices like the Nintendo DS, we owe a lot to Mario Kart: Circuit for getting the party started.

2. Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire

Pokemon and Game Boy go together like peanut butter and jelly, and Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire showed us just how improved that proverbial sandwich would be on the Game Boy Advance. Packed with color, improved graphics, and tons more Pokemon to catch, Ruby and Sapphire felt like the perfect next step after Pokemon Gold and Silver. As with all of the Pokemon games, this third-generation of sequels sees you controlling a new Pokemon trainer, eager to go out into the world to find, catch, and train their very own Pokemon team. Exploring the Hoenn region and discovering its many quirks and unique Pokemon was an absolute treat, and an experience that fans continue to come back to. Don’t just take our word for it: combined, Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire are the best-selling Game Boy Advance games of all time, and by a major margin. With over 16 million copies sold, it’s clear that Game Boy fans can’t get enough of Pokemon.

3. The Legend of Zelda: Minish Cap

It’s nigh impossible to write a list of the best GBA games without including our green-clad hero, Link. For a franchise as beloved and successful as Super Mario Bros., Nintendo is not afraid to take some chances with The Legend of Zelda, and that’s exactly what happened with Minish Cap. In this prequel, we follow Link as he sets out to save the Picori, a tiny race of magical fairies that have been threatened by an evil villain. In truth, the story is passable, but it’s the gameplay that sticks out. Like other Zelda games, you control Link from a top-down view, exploring the world, battling enemies, and solving puzzles. However, Minish Cap taps into the tiny vibes of the Picori by shrinking Link down to miniature size, making way for some truly memorable dungeons and boss encounters. Despite its small scale, The Legend of Zelda: Minish Cap was a well-designed and engrossing adventure akin to A Link to the Past, and it fully deserves its spot on our list of the best GBA games ever made.

4. Golden Sun

The Game Boy Advance is home to quite a few stellar turn-based RPGs, including Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, Fire Emblem, and more. That said, the best of the best has to be Golden Sun, a long-overlooked genre gem exclusive to the GBA. Originally planned as a Nintendo 64 game, Golden Sun follows a group of magic teens who look to save their world from an emerging evil. It’s pretty standard fare for a turn-based RPG story, but the execution of Golden Sun is where it earns its reputation. Not only is the world beautiful and fun to explore, but the battle system is engaging, the fight scenes look awesome, and there’s a great gameplay loop. When it comes to RPGs on handhelds, none did it quite like Golden Sun, which refused to dumb down its systems in the jump from console to GBA. Better than most SNES-era RPGs, Golden Sun is a game that’s worth owning a GBA for, even if you never play anything else.

5. Metroid Fusion

Metroid is a curious franchise, as despite excelling with almost every release since its inception, it’s a series that Nintendo doesn’t celebrate as much as its other “big” names. Sure, there are a few stinkers here and there (Metroid: Other M, anyone?), but the great games far outnumber the bad ones. Standing as a beacon of quality on the GBA is Metroid Fusion, the fourth overall installment in the franchise, which sees Samus Aran trudging through a mysterious space station while battling a parasitic race of foes. More challenging than most other sidescrollers of its ilk, though linear in progress, Fusion offers everything you’d want out of a 2D Metroid game. Great boss fights, interesting puzzles, and wondrous exploration await in this vastly underrated GBA title. If you pine for the glory days of Super Metroid on the Super Nintendo, Metroid Fusion is the next best thing, and any fan of the franchise owes it to themselves to give it a try.

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Creating a Worldwide Craze

Pokemon was originally conceived by a Japanese gaming journalist named Satoshi Tajiri, who, in his teens, created the independent gaming magazine, Game Freak. Though the magazine met its end in the early 1980s, Tajiri made several connections through his work, and by 1986, had started working on a game development team. Also known as Game Freak, the studio’s first official project was a puzzle game called Quinty, released in 1989, and soon after, Tajiri found inspiration in his childhood memories. Similar to how Shigeru Miyamoto was inspired to create The Legend of Zelda franchise, Tajiri looked back fondly on his youth, where he would explore the Japanese countryside while collecting bugs, and thought to rekindle that feeling of adventure through an RPG.

As early as 1989, the team at Game Freak began whipping up ideas for a game called Pocket Monsters, with a focus on collecting insect-like creatures, trading them via the link cable, and battling against other “trainers”. Though initially envisioned as a small, contained adventure, the project continuously expanded in scope, and Game Freak found its complexity far too overwhelming. By 1991, development on the game had mostly ceased, with only occasional tinkering from the team, until the summer of 1994. With plenty of fresh faces on the team, a more focused effort was put toward Pocket Monsters, and by late 1995, the game was fully finished.

Given the extensive development window, by the time Pocket Monsters was ready for release, the Game Boy was well past its prime. However, this ended up working in the long run, as millions of people already owned a Game Boy, and its low price made it affordable for all players. So, when Pocket Monsters was finally released on February 27, 1996, it was a notable success. Thanks to a partnership with the popular manga magazine, CoroCoro Comic, Game Freak found meaningful marketing despite their small presence, and by September 1996, the game had already sold over 1 million copies.

Pokemon Goes Multimedia

Multimedia adaptations were swift and prolific for the Pocket Monsters/Pokemon franchise, even before the game found its stride. Due to Game Freak’s relationship with CoroCoro Comic, a manga adaptation was the first out the door, which was written and illustrated by Masakazu Kubo. The first run lasted for 14 volumes, with publications from 1996 to 2003, before the manga’s storyline was shifted to align with current game sequels.

Outside of the manga, Pocket Monsters found even more footing with its trading card game, which was designed by a small team of developers who worked closely on the original Game Boy games. At the time, trading card games were mostly unseen in Japan, but, citing the success of 1993’s Magic: The Gathering trading card game in the United States, the team was inspired to give it a go. The very first Pokemon Trading Card Game set was released in October of 1996, and though mostly ignored by popular media, it was a huge success. Nowadays, it’s common to see original, mint condition cards sell at auction for hundreds of thousands of dollars, which is crazy to think about, considering the card game’s humble beginnings as a means of advertising a video game product.

Even more so than the manga and the trading card game, the Pokemon anime has left its mark on pop culture, but surprisingly, it was mostly opposed at first. Though Masakazu Kubo saw huge potential in the franchise for an anime adaptation, Nintendo, Game Freak, and most of the developers saw the project as a risk. With an upcoming sequel in the works, they worried that the anime would fall out of step with the games, and saturating the market with Pokemon content would cause people to move onto the next fad. Despite these worries, Kubo’s convincing proved powerful, and the first season eventually premiered in April of 1997. From there, it caught on in a major way, becoming the highest-rated TV show in Tokyo, persisting for decades on its own. In fact, it’s likely that more people around the world recognize the protagonist Ash Ketchum and his companion, Pikachu, than those who recognize the original game.

Decades of Pokemon

From there, the tale of Pokemon is one etched in pop culture history. In 1998, the franchise made the jump to the United States, with a name change from Pocket Monsters to Pokemon, and was welcomed with millions more sales. The anime continued to climb the charts, the trading game bustled, and by 1999, Nintendo saw a 250% increase in profits, mostly attributed to the success of Pokemon. Though the global Pokemon craze slowed down in the mid-2000s, the franchise has still persisted, with dozens of mainline sequels and spin-offs, often becoming the best-selling games on their respective systems.

30 years is no anniversary to scoff at, and so, to celebrate, Nintendo has re-released Pokemon FireRed and Pokemon LeafGreen onto the Nintendo eShop. The trading card game continues to be popular, with anniversary events galore, and now, there’s even a Pokemon pinball machine. So, no matter what way you want to celebrate, we highly recommend spending a few hours catching your favorite Pokemon. With 30 years behind us, there’s a good chance Pokemon will continue for another couple of decades, with no sign of slowing down in the foreseeable future.

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The Origins of The Legend of Zelda

Development on The Legend of Zelda began in 1984, meant to be a launch title for the upcoming Famicom Disk System, and was developed concurrently with Super Mario Bros. The brainchild of two distinct creators, Shigeru Miyamoto was responsible for overall production, while Takashi Tezuka wrote the story. While Mario excelled with its linear design, Zelda was produced with the opposite philosophy, encouraging players to be observant and experiment within its open-ended world. Much of the game’s vibe was inspired by Miyamoto’s childhood experiences growing up in Kyoto, where he often wandered around the wilderness with no map, blown away by the constant feeling of discovery.

Countless concepts and ideas swirled during the development of The Legend of Zelda, and ideas for Mario that didn’t work with its linear nature were often folded into Zelda‘s design. At the start, the game had futuristic elements of technology, taking place in both the past and the present. This is where the name of our hero derives from, as “Link” was meant to connect the two time frames. While these ideas never came to fruition in the Famicom original, they can clearly be found in sequels like The Ocarina of Time and Twilight Princess. Generally speaking, tons of production material was created for The Legend of Zelda, specifically for the game’s dungeons, with enough content to fill up two “quests” for players to enjoy.

A Legacy of Link

For their effort, Miyamoto and the rest of the team saw great success, as The Legend of Zelda was an instant hit, selling over 1 million copies on its release day in Japan. It was just as big of a success in the West, as Zelda topped the NES sales charts in the United States, selling over 3 million copies by 1990. Seeing this success, many other developers rushed to try to clone the game and borrow its concepts, deeply influencing both the adventure and RPG genres for decades after.

So, how is Nintendo celebrating this major milestone of one of its most beloved and influential games? Unfortunately, with a severe lack of fanfare. There is still plenty of time for announcements, but as of now, Nintendo has no plans for a remaster, re-release, or any type of notable celebration. With the live-action Legend of Zelda movie arriving in theaters in 2027, many assume that Nintendo will celebrate by showing off the debut trailer, but this rings a bit hollow in my opinion. If you have the time, I highly recommend booting up The Legend of Zelda on your console of choice and at least running through the first dungeon. It’s amazing how much it holds up 40 years after its release; clearly one of the most timeless experiences in all of video games.

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