Sega Game Pack 4 in 1 (Game Gear)

It might seem strange to review a compilation, but this isn't a compilation of previously released games, the games on here were made specifically for a compilation. Not this compilation, though. Three of the games were originally part of two Japan-only releases called Kuni-chan no Game Tengoku Volume 1 & 2. The other game, Penalty Shootout was made especially for this cartridge, which appears to have been released only in Europe, mainly as a pack-in with the console, but apparently there's also a very rare boxed release of it too.
You might say that a console pack-in might not be obscure enough to fit this blog's remit, but it's not like you see people posting about this game everywhere, is it? It seems to have been mostly forgotten, which is good enough for me.
So, on to the games!
First up is Flash Columns, which, as you might guess from the title, is a cut-down version of columns, featuring only the "Flash mode" from the full version. If you don't know, flash mode gives you a stage partially filled with jewels, some of which are flashing. Get rid of the flashing jewels and go on to the next stage. There are a couple of differences between this version and the version you might be used to, though. Firstly, although the jewels still fall in vertical columns of three, to make them disappear, they have to be arranged so that at least four of the same colour are touching, non diagonally, as opposed to the normal columns rule of putting three in a row, in any direction. The other difference is the scoring system, or rather, the lack of one. In this game, you get one point for every jewel you make vanish. No extra points for chains or disappearing large amounts at once, and also no time limit to get the falshing jewels in. This is the flaw that ruins the game, with no rewards for speed or skill, it feels like a tedious trudge.
The second game is the one made especially for europe, Penalty Shootout! Essentially, it's a guessing game. You choose which direction to make the guy kick the ball, and how high. Then you hope the goalie doesn't jump in the same direction. After five shots, you switch places. There's no way of knowing what the computer player is going to do, making the whole thing a pointless waste of time. Don't bother with it.
The third game, which is referred to by most of the internet as just "Rally", though I'm sure I remember it being called something like "Pan-American Grand Prix" in the manual, though I no longer have the manual, and of course there are no scans of it online (as far as I can tell), so wo knows? Anyway, this is definitely the best game of the four. It's an Outrun-clone, but with no branching paths. So I guess you could also call it a Hang-On clone, but in a car, if you wanted to. Whatever you want to call it, it's fast and fun and has nice graphics. The only downside is that it's really really short and easy. But that's not a massive downside, is it?
The last game, which is also the second best game on the cart is Tennis. It plays exactly like Nintendo's Tennis game on the Game Boy. Obviously this version is infinitely better though, for three reasons: it's made by SEGA, it's in glorious colour, and instead of Mario being the referee, Sonic is the referee. Other than those differences, I assume it's only the game's relative obscurity that stopped there being any kind of lawsuit, as it really does play exactly like Nintendo's game.

Lock n Chase (Game Boy)

The story of me and Lock n Chase is a short, pointless and boring one. This summer, while I was subjected to only a mobile broadband dongle with very limited bandwidth, I noticed somewhere that the entire ROMset for the Atari 2600 took up only 5MB. Seeing this as good value for bandwidth, I downloaded it, and put it onto my GP2X to play while watching repeats of Everybody Hates Chris and 60s Batman.
Overwhelmed by the huge list of games, I started playing the familiar games I played on a real 2600 in times long past (Carnival, Stampede, Othello), then games with interesting titles (Aquaventure, Cosmic Ark) and also, games that I remember seeing advertised in the old (as in pre-dating my birth) Marvel and DC comics I used to buy from the book stall on the market in my teenage years. Lock n Chase was one of those games.
But I'm not writing about the Atari 2600 version, or the arcade game of which it was a port. Today I'm writing about the much later Game Boy port.
It's pretty fun. It's a Pacman clone, as was the fashion at the time, themed around a bank robber being chased by cops. The characters all look like the chicken nugget people that McDonalds had among their many mascots a long time ago (I specifically remember during the 1992 Olympics, Happy Meals came with little plastic nugget-men, each one engaged in a different sport, not letting their lack of limbs stand in the way of their ambitions), and are all wearing hats. The cops are wearing the kind of hats you see cops wearing in old gangster movies, and the player is wearing the kind of hat you see gangsters wearing in old gangster movies.
You waddle around the mazes avoiding cops and collecting round things (which I think we can assume are coins). As usual, collect all the coins and you go the the next stage. There's also moneybags and diamonds, that will periodically appear for a short time every now and then. The moneybags freeze the cops in place for a few seconds, and the diamonds let you chase them for a short time, like the power pills in Pacman.
I should probably go into what makes Lock n Chase its own game, and not just a reskinned Pacman clone. The original gimmick in the arcade version was that there were doors place all over the stages that the player can shut behind them, cutting off any persuing cops (but also possibly creating a dead end for the careless player to be chased down). This feature survives into the Game Boy port, which also gradually adds more gimmicks as the game goes on. The first to appear is kind of the opposite of the original: doors that are closed by default and can be opened for a few seconds by the player walking into them.
I won't spoil any of the other features for you (plus i can't get very far into the game, and have only seen a couple more anyway, but shhh.).
The GB Lock n Chase is a pretty fun game, and even better than the original version. It is also, by extension, better than the PSP version, which is a download over 100MB large from the PSN store, despite just being a ROM of the arcade version packaged with an emulator. THat doesn't even automatically save high scores. Tsk.