Developer: Indies Zero

Publisher: XSEED Games

Release Date: Feb. 10, 2009

System: Nintendo DS

ESRB Rating: E

Official Web site

0:00 As a big retro gamer, the idea of playing a game based on playing retro games intrigues me. The actual gameplay in Retro Game Challenge didn't actually intrigue me that much for the five minutes I played it at E3 '08. Let's see if that changes...

0:01 Some quick static and old-school TV test patterns flash by, then some retro-sounding bells play as the title appears on a slow-scrolling starry background. And I didn't even have to blow in the cartridge!

0:02 My gender choices are simply M and F. I name my guy Ace and we're off, with the story scrolling by in Star Wars-style yellow-on-black lettering. "Having been utterly defeated by his friends in every current-gen multiplayer game, Arino longed to become a game master." So he digitized himself into a DS and haunts gamers with retro challenges. "You have been challenged ... on his home turf ... the '80s." Yes! I love the '80s!

0:04 "Now you've done it! You've turned it on!" says an angular 3-D face that reminds me of Brain Age's Dr. Kawashima, except he's wearing a crown. He's Game Master Arino. "You're quite the gamer, yes? It's so obvious!" What gave me away? With a cry of "Gaaaaaaaame! Oooooooooooon!!" he turns me into a kid and sends me back to the '80s.

0:06 So it's 1984 but it's not the real 1984 because Cosmic Gate just came out and that's like not even a real game in the real world, but anyway me and this other kid are on the bottom screen and the TV is on the top screen and the other kid is Arino and he says "Who're you? What are you doing in my house?" and I tell him the story of how a future version of him sent me back in time and he says "Wow, you're kinda weird," and I think this game is kinda weird...

0:07 So Arino says that Cosmic Gate is "super-popular at the arcades" and that "you're in this cool fighter jet, and you shoot down Insektors!" and that he's amazed games like this are available at home and I'm thinking "I've been to the future and believe me the game there will BLOW YOUR MIND!"

0:08 So future Arino just popped up and challenged me to beat Stage 5 of Cosmic Gate and I'm like, "Cool!" because I can't wait to play Cosmic Gate and I really like the dramatic music as he gives me the challenge.

0:09 So young Arino finally believes my story because he saw future Arino give me the challenge too and now he wants to help me get back to my own time and he says, "What are you waiting for?! Let's do this!" and I wonder if future Arino remembers helping me battle against himself when he was younger and ow, my head hurts.

0:10 So I crawl over to the cabinet and get Cosmic Gate and put it in the Famicom and it loads up on the top screen and the story scrolls by in blocky text against a starry background and it has misspelled Engrish words like "scurge" and "humany" which even 7-year-old me thinks is funny.

0:13 So Cosmic Gate is a lot like Galaga except Galaga doesn't even exist in this world, so like weird, huh, and like even the enemy patterns are the same, except Cosmic Gate has this missile power-up thing that cuts through enemies and has an Asteroid Stage in Stage 3 where you have to destroy Asteroids and it tells me "You shooted 33 Asteroids. Special Bonus: 10,000" and it's pretty cool.

0:14 So as I play young Arino yells out stuff like, "Yeah!" and "Niiiiice!" but his voice sounds like an adult's for some reason...

0:15 So I beat Stage 5 without losing a single life and the bottom screen is all like "CLEAR!" with trumpet music and young Arino's like "Hey, you're pretty good! Not bad at all!" and I tell him it's my first time playing and he's like, "You are, like, super-awesome," and man I love games that tell me stuff like that.

0:16 So Arino is super-excited about his new issue of GameFan Magazine and we have a short conversation about the pros and cons of reading manuals and this is what I really was like when I was 7 years old!

0:17 So old Arino challenges me to use the warp gate twice before dying and he's like, "How do you make warp gates appear? You don't know?" and I'm thinking, "I bet the magazine will tell me how to do it!"

0:18 I tell young Arino more about his future self and he's like "What? Are you serious? I play videogames all day??? AWESOME! Bet I'm super happy! The future me is so rad! But ... I kinda feel bad for being so lucky," and dude that's exactly how I feel about my super-awesome game journalist job!

0:20 So GameFan is a pretty cool magazine with lots of screenshots and cartoon heads of the writers and tips and tricks and stuff for how to shoot the flashing ships to get the warp zones and the editor-in-chief of the mag is named "Dan Sock," and his picture looks a lot like real-life former EGM editor Dan "Shoe" Hsu which is SO TOTALLY AWESOME!

0:23 So I hit the flashing enemy on the first stage and a wormhole appears and I shoot it and shoot it and shoot it and it warps me to Stage 4 and then there are no more flashing guys until Stage 5, but that flashing guy gives me a power-up instead of a warp zone and I'm like, "Grrrr!"

0:24 So I die when a ship flies right into me and young Arino's like "That's just ... sad," and I'm like hey, man, if you don't have anything nice to say...

0:25 So there's like a flashing enemy at the start of Stage 9 but then he stops flashing before I can hit him and I'm like, "GRRRRR!"

0:27 So young Arino keeps saying stuff like, "Dude. Whoa, mama! Look out! Jeez!" when I do good and it's kind of cool but it's also kind of annoying because he keeps saying the same stuff over and over.

0:30 So I just beat Stage 17 and there haven't been any flashing enemies in like FOREVER and I have no idea what this stupid game WANTS from me!

0:33 So the enemies are getting faster now and I just died again and lost my missiles and I'm still not finding any flashing enemies and I'm on Stage 22 and forget this I'm gonna reset and try again.

0:36 So now I get it, the flashing enemies stop flashing if you hit a non-flashing enemy and why didn't they say that in the magazine? I'm totally cancelling my GameFan subscription!

0:37 So I get the second warp and clear the second challenge and young Arino asks me "how often do you play videogames?" and I tell him "All the time." And he's like, "I knew it! You have this look on you that screams 'I love games!'" And I'm like, "huh?"

0:38 So Arino's Mom just offered to bring us some snacks but Arino told her to stay away because "She's so nosy ... Forget about her, let's play!" and I'm like, I want snacks!

0:39 So the next challenge is to destroy a big Asteroid in the Asteroid Zone and I've done that like a BAZILLION times already but the Arinos act like it's supposed to be really hard and the want me to do it again so I'm like "Ugh, whatever!"

0:41 So I destroy the first big Asteroid I see on Stage 3 and the challenge is over and I'm like that was way too easy, man.

0:42 So since I'm so good, Arino says he won't have to buy new controllers anymore and I'm like "Huh?" and he's like "Are you saying you don't smash your controllers when you lose?" and I think young Arino has some problems with rage and with his mother and no wonder he becomes a maniacal villain in the future and he's like, "You're supposed to smash your controller, dude. It's the law!"

0:43 So the final challenge is to get 200,000 points and young Arino is like, "So I guess if you beat this one, it's goodbye. That kind of sucks," and I wonder if future Arino knows how sad he's making young Arino and TIME PARADOX!

0:45 So I look in GameFan for some cheats to help me get to 200,000 points and I see Dan Sock says "there's more to life than gaming," and I'm like, "Yeah, right!"

0:50 So, 200,000 points is like a LOT of points and it's Stage 7 already and I barely even have 100,000 points but the missile gets me a lot of points when it hits a lot of enemies at once it like multiplies and those big asteroids are worth a lot of points too, so, yeah.

0:53 So I finally got 200,00 points in Stage 14 and I'm like "Is there a harder mode or something because this is too easy for an awesome gamer like me."

0:54 So Future Arino says that wasn't the final challenge just the final Cosmic Gate challenge and young Arino is upset because "I got all sad for no reason. How embarrassing! Like totally!" and I unlocked freeplay and young Arino says "We can play games there 'til our brains explode," and I'm like, "Ick!"

0:55 So now it's 1984 and Haggle Man just came out and Ooh, I read about this in the latest issue of GameFan and it looks SOOOOOO cool you guys I totally can't wait to try it!

0:57 So in Haggle Man there's this like Japanese princess but she gets captured by a guy in a green suit who jumps in and is like "Rargh!" and the princess is all like "Help!" and then the robot ninja runs in and chases them into a construction site with green guys and flipping doors and a boss that's a skull and OH MY GOD IT'S SOOO COOL!

0:58 So like for the first challenge I have to jump on two enemies which is like super-easy and I do it in like two seconds but then Arino's mom comes in and is like "Arino, go out and get me some groceries," but he's like, "I'll do it later Mom, jeez!" and she totally leaves us alone which is awesome.

Would I play this game for more than an hour? Yes.


Why? Oh my god I totally have to get to the last level of Haggle Man and then there's like more games to play I WANT TO PLAY THEM ALL OH MY GOD!

This column is based on a retail copy of the game that was, like, totally provided by the publisher.

Read Ryan Kuo's review.

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