Jammin' (C64)

It's been a long time since the last post, hasn't it? The usual excuse applies: I was spending a lot of time playing games that do not fit this blog's remit. I still am spending a lot of time playing those games, in fact! So, in the hopes that it will stop you forgetting about me, I will write about a game I already knew about.
In Jammin', you go about the place collecting musical instruments and taking them to triangles. The world i made up of four colours, and you can only walk on either the colour you're standing on, or the multicoloured diamonds that are on the conveyor belts. If you're stood on one of those diamonds, you can step off onto any colour you like. So, each stage has four musical instruments and for triangle things. You have to go about, using the conveyor belts as transport, and fetch each instrument back to the triangle that's on the same coloured ground as you found the instrument. (What a terribly written sentence!) While you're doing this, musical notes and strange, bow-legged men wander about trying to take the instrument off you. If the musical notes touch you while you're carrying an instrument, it goes back to where you got it. If the bow-legged men touch you while you're carrying an instrument, they run off with it and you have to chase them. If either of them touch you while you're not holding an instrument, they disappear and you get points.
The game is fairly fun to play, but the real reason I like it is that it just has a really nice, friendly atmosphere. While mechanically it's a bit fiddly (though not enough that playing ever feels like a chore), it's best quality is that kind of intangible feeling. I can't say whether that's just me, or if anyone else will have similar feelings while playing it, or even if that's what the designers intended.
Try it, I guess. If you do, tell me how it went. I'm interested.

Gekitotsu Dangan Jidousha Kessen: Battle Mobile (SNES)

This is a strange game. It has the exact same plot as the awesome laserdisc arcade game Road Avenger/Road Blaster FX (Your wife was killed on your wedding day by a gang of Mad Max knock-offs, and you seek revenge in a modified, armoured sports car). It looks like (and is structured like) a shooting game, but you do very little shooting in it. The only shooting you do is firing surface-to-air missiles at helicopters. most of your enemies are motorbikes, cars and other land vehicles, and these guys you dispatch by ramming, either hitting them enough times to make them explode, or more satisfyingly, making them crash into scenery.
You can't just drive into them normally and expect to do damage, though. By pressing the B button and a direction, you charge in that direction with speed and force, in a manner not entirely dissimilar to Ecco the Dolphin's method of attack.
Your health bar constantly (but slowly) depletes, but luckily, health power-ups float down the screen fairly often and you have a limited-use force field (which is also very useful for fighting bosses), so unless you take a lot of hits, you shouldn't need to worry about it.
The stages range from post-apocalyptic-looking desert roads to motorways suspended high above futuristic cities and even a nice drive on a beach. They all look great, and the music is also excellent. In fact, the music and graphics are so good, you'd think this game was on the Mega Drive, rather than the SNES*!
The game is pretty great all-round, in fact. It's neither too hard nor too easy, it's a lot of fun to play and there's not really much else like it.
This is where I normally might say "the only problem is..", but in this case, there isn't any real problems with the game! It's great! Play it!


*Just kidding, SNES fans! Or am I...?