All-Pro Basketball (NES review)

Developer: Aicom
Publisher: Vic Tokai
Released: 1989

All-Pro Basketball is a 5-on-5 sports game that was released in Japan and North America.

+ Players have unique stats, abilities and stamina, and you can substitute them during any dead-ball situation.

+ Includes a handy password feature that saves all of your progress during the 1-2 player (co-op) League mode.

+ Close-up dunk animations are inspired by Double Dribble (1987, NES), but there's less flicker here and more camera angles.

- Gameplay options are lacking, as you can't change quarter length, difficulty, or even play an exhibition match vs the CPU.

- Your teammates are useless and consistently shy away from opposing players when they're heading toward the basket.

- Screen rotates 180° when crossing centre court, which is disorientating and ruins your flow due to the action pausing.

- There's only one music track during gameplay that repeats incessantly, and there's no option to switch it off.

Vice: Project Doom (NES review)

Developer: Aicom

Publisher: Sammy

Released: 1991

 

Vice: Project Doom is an action-platformer that blends elements from other genres into its gameplay. 

 

As Quinn Hart, your mission is to investigate the source of a neon gel that's being used by an alien race for nourishment. Although most of the game is an action-platformer, the opening stage sees you driving a car as you shoot enemy vehicles. These stages are fast and frantic, and play more like a vertically scrolling shooter as you blast everything in your way. They could easily be an entire game in their own right and it's fun causing mayhem on the road! The action-platform stages make up the bulk of the levels and at your disposal is a Whip, a .44 Magnum and Grenades. They're a joy to play due to the interesting level design and great controls that compliment the twitch style gameplay. There's tons of enemy types, and each attack in different ways to keep things fresh. Ammo is in limited supply but you never have to worry about using weapons liberally as lots of pick-ups are available. The action is challenging but never punishing, and there's unlimited continues to encourage you to keep playing. The bosses are innovative and each has a distinct, intriguing pattern. Finally, there's the first-person, auto-scrolling stages where you need to defeat enemies as they pop-up. It's similar to the FPS sections in Alien Storm (1991, Mega Drive) with destructible scenery and layers of enemies to create perspective. It plays nicely with a fair difficulty, but the crosshair is a touch too slow and there's no Zapper support. Overall, I wish there were more FPS and driving stages as there's only two each in the entire game! There's also some beautiful cut-scenes that perfectly set the premise for upcoming levels.

 

Vice: Project Doom is a clever mixture of Ninja Gaiden (1989, NES) due to its relentless enemy waves and precision platforming, and Golgo 13: Top Secret Episode (1988, NES) for its diverse gameplay styles and storytelling. It's an ambitious title that succeeds at every turn and manages to pull off the tricky multi-genre approach with ease.

 

 

 

Random trivia: The game featured on the cover of Issue 24 of Nintendo Power magazine.

Takin' it to the Hoop (Turbografx-16 review)

Developer: Aicom
Publisher: NEC
Released: 1989

Takin' it to the Hoop is a sports game that was also released in Japan as USA Pro Basketball.

It supports 1-2 players and you can choose either Tournament, League or Exhibition modes. There's some nice options available as you can swap out players based on their individual characteristics and even select the type of defense you want to play. The game clearly takes inspiration from Double Dribble (1987, NES) and features some awesome court-level angles when you take a free throw or attempt a slam dunk and they're fairly well animated. The dunk sequences are fully interactive as you need to release the button once the meter reaches the red zone to pull off the slam. The best part is that you can play defense when your opponent goes for a dunk and it's exhilarating when the action zooms in and you manage to swat the ball away with a correctly timed button press! That's where the positives end though as the rest of the game is boring and a chore to play. Firstly, the controls are unresponsive and it's tricky to select a player; most of the time the game ignored my commands and I had to let go of the d-pad for it to register anything. Your teammates are absolutely useless and prefer to stand around and wait for you to take control of them rather than trying to defend. Each quarter lasts a lifetime and there's no way to change the time period length. The music is atrocious and starts skipping at times (as if the SFX interrupt the individual sound channels of the track) and there's no way to turn it off in the menus. To top things off there's even some humorous typos that flash up during a match including the phrase 'Back Cort'.

Takin' it to the Hoop has lots of nice features but they're redundant due to the dull gameplay and awful controls. It's just unfortunate that it's one of the only basketball games on the Turbografx-16 and probably the best!

Random trivia: This North American version of the game is much easier than its Japanese counterpart called USA Pro Basketball as the computer A.I. was dramatically dumbed down.