Sunday, October 18, 2020

Jack Red reviews Streets of Kamurocho and Golden Axed

 Hello everyone I'm Jack Red, Sega within a week was releasing free mini games to help celebrate their 60th anniversary. The later two really caught my attention. I'm a life long Streets of Rage fan as well as an Golden Axe fan. Of course, I had to try these mini games out myself. Now this is strictly my opinion alone.

Streets of Kamurocho is a parody mess up between Yakuza and Streets of Rage series. You play as Kiryu or Majima or Ichiban whose the hidden character. Now this does play similar to rom hacks with different characters. But it still was refreshing to play this. One weird joke they done is each character gets a different reaction to the sword.

Majima simply gets the sword while for Kiryu it transforms into a traffic cone or for Ichiban a wooden plank. This is one stage that endlessly loops until you lose. It does seem to get harder each round you're playing. I felt despite replaying the first stage of SOR2 repeatedly. I loved how they replaced characters with those from Yakuza series.

Personally, I felt they could've went a little further. This is a short game that's surprisingly fun to keep playing. Overtime, it likely could get boring or faster to those not fans of the genre. This was a fun concept that deserved some praise. For a free game that's new it's one of the better free games I gotten in a long time.

Golden Axed is a more interesting game to talk about. This was a prototype of a cancelled Golden Axe game. Which was suppose to lead up to more reboots of Sega franchises like Streets of Rage or Shinobi. Sadly, that division making the game closed down back in 2013. A year following Sega Vintage Collection: Golden Axe.

You play as Ax Battler taking on a handful of enemies. Some beat em ups doesn't change the enemies up much. Yet remain enjoyable games in their own right. Also considering this is a cancelled game I can't criticize it in that regard even if I wanted to. A few spoilers, Death Adder cameo I absolutely loved it.

There is no actual boss fight in this at all. There is magic but no additional potions you can pick up. The game will roughly end to go right back to the main menu which isn't much of one. I absolutely love the title for this, easily one of my favorite things about this. I kinda wish the one stage was a bit longer.

Maybe this is just me but the stage seem shorter than the one in Streets of Kamurocho. Honestly, I'm glad Sega done something for Golden Axe on this particular anniversary. Sure it would've been nice to have something for Shinobi but this is fine. The game itself looks way better than 3D remake of Golden Axe as well as Golden Axe: Beast Rider.

This prototype was great on how it controls which was another surprise I wasn't expecting. Some of it's members came back to make this possible for Sega's 60th Anniversary. There is no creatures to ride on in this game. Can I be brutally honest? I actually prefer this over 3D remake of Golden Axe & Golden Axe III.

I felt the difficulty curve was balanced. It actually looks great for that franchise. There wasn't much music presented though. Which might turn some people off. Especially those who absolutely love the original Golden Axe game. There isn't much depth for this. Streets of Kamurocho had an hidden character with the weird weapon joke going for them.

Golden Axed is a cancelled game that had strict conditions. Sega was desperate getting their stuff together but were rushing to do so. This is something that happens at times in game companies. Honestly, I'm a bit disappointed the dwarf whose my favorite among the original playable character isn't presented here.

I would say it's worth seeing at least once. Beyond that it's not likely going to have more runs. It is much easier to do that in Streets of Kamurocho's case. I would say it's not the best Golden Axe game. I would even say Golden Axe II has many things over it. But it is far much better from the worst cancelled games I ever played.

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