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Remake Please...
My brother recently managed to get an Amiga emulator running and he then called me at work and said "Listen to this!" Next thing I know I'm getting sucked back 10 years to the early 90's as the sonorous wonder that is the Turrican 2 theme poured out from the phone receiver and into my ear. Well that was it. Nostalgia trip! I remember ordering the game from one of those magazine based mail-order services. I remember one Christmas looking downt he list trying to choose which game to order and selecting the Turrican sequel. Then, that 25th, unwrapping the eight inch box which had had me in eager expectation for weeks. There it was in all its glory, smelling new and with the armoured Turrican in some inexplicable but very cool pose on the front.
I remember the blue discs and booting it up for the first time. Seeing the Turrican logo glitter down as I was mystified by the most wonderful gaming theme I'd ever heard sounding through the air. Rather than my usual practise of just skipping through everything to get to the game I remember just sitting there listening and watching the intro story sequence. The game had me transfixed and I hadn't even played it yet.
Eventually I hit the yellow fire button on my Competition Pro and felt the expectation rise as the screen filled with metallic grey panels and the music changed, building my anticipation. Soon enough, though it felt like minutes and minutes the screen cleared and here is was face to face with a futuristic warrior in an amazing fantasy world taking on some of the coolest bad guys I'd ever seen. I remember being blown away by the little touches - the array of weaponry, the ability to transform into a small spinning star, the invisible blocks to discover and of course, jumping on the heads of those mini ED-209 types - how satisfying it was to crush them down and send them running with that little robot squeak.
Perhaps the three best aspects to the game though were the weapons, the music/sound and the level design. The tunes themselves were amazing and worthy of someone remastering them and releasing an album. The sound was perfect, with Turrican's voice calling out "Bounce", "Laser", "Shield", "Power Up", "Laser", "Multiple", as well as the weapons sounds, the enemies. I mentioned the little 'walkers' but then there were the robotic snakes from the first levels, who would make a kind of screech as they rose from the ground.
Of the guns bounce might have been my least favourite. I loved the laser, but even more than that, I loved the really cool extending beam which could be rotated at will creating an arc of destruction.What made everything even better was the simple but satisfying power-up system which meant you could focus on collecting the power-ups necessary to give you a really potent and impressive looking attack. Then of course there were the special attacks. I could go on and on.
As for the levels, from watefalls and cliffs to factories and ships, underwater ruins to really creepy alien hives reminiscent of 'Aliens'. How about always keeping an eye open for the secrets hidden around the levels? The invisible blocks or hidden passages. Just finding those stashed power-ups and bonuses could turn the level upside down.
Turrican 2 has to be one of my all-time favourite games, and what I want to know is when is someone going to do an all-out, lots of effort, shiny new remake, perhaps in first-person? Having said that, I do miss good platformers.
I could start to talk now about how so many recent games rely more on technology and less on creativity but I don't want to spoil the warm-fuzzies!
Anyone else join me on this one, or perhaps other classic favs?
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Q-Bert I used to love that game when I got my Atari 2600 when I was about 4 years old.
Originally Posted by Vaul
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