Midway Arcade Treasures 2

I had the joy of reviewing the first offering of Midway Arcade Treasures a while back. That was a fun blast to the past with only some controller issues to keep it from being a more-often played game. As is the case again here, some of the classics do not translate will into platform consoles with modern (too fancy) type controllers. Still, there's a lot of bang for the buck with this bodacious bundle.

MAT2 brings us back to the golden age of arcade gaming with classics such as "Wizard of Wor" and "Xenophobe", as well as more "modern" oldies like Mortal Kombat 2 & 3, and the once hilarious "Arch Rivals". I remember seeing games like "Pit Fighter" and being amazed at how they had taken actual people and digitized their bodies into a game you could control. That was groundbreaking stuff back then. If you grew up in the current generation of games, the evolution has not been as dramatic. Yes, Doom has changed a lot from 1 to 3, but in between those versions there has been a lot of competition and the evolution is not as easy separate. Back in the heyday of coin-op games, these games made us drop in quarters without thinking. I remember walking up to some of these machines and knowing that one simple roll of quarters would never be enough for the night. 

The afore-mentioned Wizard of Wor is the oldest game in the collection that I can identify. I remember playing that in the 80s, and being quite good at it. I was delighted to see it in this bankroll of games, but quickly found out that the newer controller made me worse at it than the more simple 4-way position one that the arcade version had. That was the worst game in this pack as far as translation goes. Most of the others were not as severely altered by the newer controller. 

I actually did better at a lot of these games than I did years ago when paying for playing made you try harder. Trust me... you take a game much more serious when you have $10 worth of tokens in it. I am still terrible at Mortal Kombat(s). I was always better at the lesser-liked Pit Fighter, and that still holds true. I did not play Arch Rivals much in the arcade (always too busy with people waiting), but liked it when I did. You actually got to cheat at a sport! My inexperience with it shows, as it took a long time to get half-decent at it, but never enough to do well. Narc was a game that I did not do well at years ago, but kicked butt now. I guess it's the years of side-action scrollers that helped me. I plowed through it much more easy than when it was new. The same goes for Total Carnage and Rampage: World Tour. The latter-mentioned game was a friend's favorite. I only played it because he was good at it and that helped me succeed. Now, I am good at it myself, though it's still not a great game. It's just a sequel to something more unique at the time. It never did well once the novelty of controlling your own Monster wore off. 

I never played Spy Hunter 2 in the arcade. Never even saw it, actually. I was not good at this at all. It was slow (action) and quite lame, actually. Also new to me were Timber, Wacko and APB. I recall seeing Hard Drivin' as a sit-down game for the first time. That was amazing, but on my TV with a hand-held controller, the luster fades. It did not hold much fun to me, as I could not separate it from new, more fun driving games. Usually, I have no problem keeping generational issues in my head as I play, but some games do not allow me to utilize that separation. Some games are just bad-- then or now. Hard Drivin' was a great sit-down game, but not as a controller-based driver with difficult steering.

The sounds were 100% authentic to the originals. That is not a hard feat to accomplish. What's new is having some of them in stereo separation through my surround system. I never knew some of them could sound like that! Though some of the sounds and "talk" is silly to hear now, I found it refreshing to experience it through a modern acoustic system.

The graphics, like the sound, are exactly reproduced here. That's a good/bad thing. The bad traits look worse on a large TV, but the cool subtle things are still fun to see. Though I am not inches away from the action like the arcade days, it's better to have them on a bigger screen with nice color. Nothing was worse than paying to play a game that was encased in a cabinet with a shoddy monitor. Particularly better were fighters like MK2 & 3. 

Until there is a hand-held controller (I am aware of the huge arcade-style ones out there) that mimics older cabinet controls, we'll be cursed with games that do not translate well. Despite settings, some just never allow you to move well. Some of these games have only 4 positions, but your controller may have multiple. Added to the conflict is using the triggers for some of the action. That does not feel natural with some of these games, and it's a hard learning curve. Buttons are buttons... triggers require a totally different motion and use of the fingers. Tell me how to squeeze the trigger to block a punch with the same finger you need to execute a killing move? 

Aside from those usual complaints, it's a great collection of games. If you liked playing them in the arcades, you will probably like them here as well. If you are a slow-learner when it comes to adjusting to the controller, your gaming will suffer. If you have no problems, and pick it up fast, you'll thrive in the endless-quarter action offered here. There's the ability to save scores (not games/levels!) and get online for play. There's no waiting and never-ending "Continue Game?" action. Keep them coming, Midway... though I am not sure what's left, I look forward to them all. Despite spending hours playing them, I still have not had the urge to kill anyone-- as the screaming parents of the old Mortal Combat days warned us back then. 

Graphics: 10 
This is the first perfect score I have ever given for a game. It's a no-brainer, as they have reproduced the arcade graphics 100%. Hence, the high score. You can see a (fascinating) difference between the evolution of MK2 and version 3. The oldest game I recognize is Wizard of Wor, and it looks downright clumsy next to MK3, but nonetheless perfectly rendered to the smallest detail.  

Sound: 10
If I give the graphics a perfect score, I have to do the same for sound. Yes, some of the sounds and music are terrible, but graded as being authentic to the way they were "back then", they are perfect. Perfectly terrible in some cases, but flawless. Even better is to have the sound running through a modern, home system-- without the distractions of people chattering and other machines beckoning you to come closer, as in the arcades.   

Concept: 8.0 
This is always the hardest to rate, as they are not new-- but new to many and a great way to bring the fun past into the home. I'd like to see someone come out with a "retro controller" set. Maybe a simple stick and a simple paddle controller or something. That would make playing some of these games much easier to pick up. I see that some hand-held TV games are out there that have these controllers (like the "Pong" controller for Atari), so they can make them for X-Box. 

Overall: 9.0
I am thoroughly enjoying these retro games as they come out. Less so much the Atari 2-bit games, as many were bad then, and playing them with complex machines is just misery. The more advances games translate a lot better and have a lot of replay value. These are games that were designed for maximum fun-- not trying to make a tolerable game work with lavish backgrounds and cell-shading. Back then, they had less tech to work with so they had to focus on the maximizing the action in front of you, and your imagination had to help out- a lot. Being able to play them again, without plopping down pounds of quarters and inhaling ozone all night, is fabulous. I hope they keep coming. It may not be "Pac-Man fever", but it's close!