Nintendo Wii Fanboy

Even more than the world depicted in the bizarre Street Fighter movie, or the outrageous horror-and-Zubaz presentation of the Mortal Kombat movie, we imagine this Art of Fighting 2 commercial is what a fighting game would look like in live action. Huge guys with terrible hair delivering awkward dialogue in semi-yelled monotone, standing totally still until launching into an unnatural-looking punch.

Even though they're awesome to play, fighting game-style combat in the real world would look less like an expert martial arts tournament and more like pro wrestling with less Spandex.

When The King of Fighters '94 introduced the concept of the three-person team to side-scrolling fighting games, it simultaneously introduced the idea of the joke team. While the other teams consisted of martial arts champions, mercenaries, and wielders of ancient powers, the American Sports Team was a group of three American professional athletes:

• Brian Battler, the football player in a single, giant shoulder pad, obsessed with tackling
• Lucky Glauber, a pro basketball player who spends his spare time street fighting
• Heavy D!, whose rendition of "Now That We Found Love" was a hit in 1991

Old Man, the mysterious old man who helps Link in various ways as he quests through Hyrule (except when he's shooting fireballs at Link) rarely has trouble making money. When he feels generous, sure, he'll give you something for free, or for the low, low cost of mastering its use. He often gives cryptic advice for free, as well: "Digdogger hates certain kind of sound."

But Old Man doesn't always work pro bono -- not, for example, if you'd like more bombs. He's not above extorting a door repair charge out of a hapless adventurer, and he makes enough from Money Making Game to pay for an occasional wooden sword. He's even got some kind of hold on the potion industry.

So why, then, is he so inept at robbing Link? He seems to have misinterpreted the usual meaning of the expression "Your money or your life" here, to Link's benefit.

Everyone's familiar with this sight: after burning down the right shrub or bombing the right section of a rock face in The Legend of Zelda, Link meets a Moblin hiding in a cave, who makes an offering of Rupees and warning Link that "IT'S A SECRET TO EVERYBODY." For years, we accepted the situation without thinking about it. "Of course he wants to keep it a secret," we thought. "Ganon would be totally steamed if he found out some Moblins were helping Link out."

But that assumption fails to explain all the aspects of this exchange that remain a secret to everybody.

Of the main Phantasy Star games, Phantasy Star III: Generations of Doom is the most maligned. The presentation was scaled back after Phantasy Star II, the characters walk agonizingly slowly, and the story has only a tenuous connection to previous games. But Phantasy Star III's main gimmick is interesting enough to make the game worth talking about: at two points during the game, your hero will be given the option to marry one of two different women. The next chapter then starts with that couple's grown offspring as the new hero. It's a really clever mechanic that results in an assortment of generic anime heroes. The endings are completely different for every path, and each character experiences changes in the storyline.

We may not have recommended Alex Kidd in Miracle World for everyone, but many of us are still charmed by the colorful adventures of Sega's erstwhile mascot. The boss battles are one of the most adorable aspects of the game -- they're played out in the arena of rock, paper, scissors.

In theory, this is cute and quirky, but bosses based on random chance can get frustrating quickly. Good thing, then, the opponents' throws aren't random at all. The bosses are pre-scripted! There's evidence of an element of randomness: the bosses' attacks in later games will be different depending on what you throw in earlier games. But if you adhere to the following solutions list, you'll sail through the janken games. The two moves next to each name correspond to the two rounds involved in each battle.

Stone Head: Rock, Scissors
Scissors Head: Scissors, Paper
Paper Head: Rock, Scissors
Stone Head 2: Paper, Paper
Scissors Head 2: Rock, Rock
Paper Head 2: Rock, Scissors
Janken the Great: Paper, Paper

Consider this a sort of anti-VC Advantage, because it covers cheats that don't exist. If you're reading The VC Advantage and you own (or plan to own) the new VC release of Samurai Shodown, it's probably occurred to you to head over to GameFAQs and look for additional content that can be unlocked. If you've done so, you'd be pleased to find codes to unlock three additional characters.

You'd then be disappointed after trying them, because they're in error. The Shiki and Zankuro unlock codes originate from Samurai Spirits! on the Neo Geo Pocket Color, and the code to unlock the Kuroko judge character is from the Neo Geo Samurai Shodown II. It's easy to understand how the NGPC codes got mixed in: search engines and other automated systems wouldn't be able to tell between Samurai Spirits! and Samurai Spirits (the Japanese title for Shodown), making mixups easy.

You're free to use those saved five minutes however you please!

By the time the Turbografx-16/CD combo system, the Turbo Duo launched, NEC's American branch had bailed on the Turbo platform and the new Turbo Technologies Inc. was desperate. Their advertising got increasingly ridiculous and antagonistic, as evidenced by the "Johnny Turbo" series of comic book-style ads in which a pudgy superhero saved kids from the horror of having to purchase a CD add-on for their "Feka" systems (another column for another time!)

The best of TTI's amateurish, juvenile ads, however, was this promotional video for Lords of Thunder, which was mailed out through a coupon program. It consists alternately of overenthusiastic teens swearing their allegiance to Lords of Thunder and confused strangers wondering why they're being bothered. Ironically, this kind of advertising may have served to turn people away from the Duo platform. Lords of Thunder certainly can't take any of the blame for low sales. It's amazing.

The hardcore Lords of Thunder (promo tape) audience must not have been what TTI anticipated, because I purchased a copy of this video from a Hastings Video Store in 2000 for .99. It was one of many copies in a clearance video bin. How did they even get there?

We don't expect Bonk's Adventure to be historically or biologically accurate. The very coexistence of cavemen and dinosaurs (and malevolent, animate flowers) comes to mind as a significant departure from reality, as do the talking dinosaurs who promise to be "YOUR NEW FRIEND ARF ARF ARF!!" Early man didn't live on floating, airborne fruit, nor did meat enable him to transform into an invincible, volcano-headed monster. Probably. But all those odd, fanciful uses of creative licenses are done in the name of gameplay or to create a cute setting or narrative.

But we don't know why developer Red decided that the dinosaur who comprises level 1-4 needed several uvulas. How do you even get that idea? Using the dinosaur's uvula as an obstacle is clever, but multiplying it is vaguely psychotic. Also, they have little smiley faces -- why not? Maybe someone at Red knows a lot more about dinosaur anatomy than anyone else -- or a lot less.

Here's something I didn't know until I went Wikipedializing: the comically squatty car that serves as the player avatar in City Connection isn't just a broad caricature of small cars. It's actually based on a real automobile, the Honda City. The City, went on to be known as the Jazz in Europe, as did its future models, but it was renamed in Japan in 2002 to the Fit. Which means that I have just discovered that I'm in the process of purchasing an updated version of the car from City Connection. Retro games are in my blood.

Personal anecdote aside, I wonder how Honda felt about the City's portrayal in City Connection. On the one hand, it is being used to destroy cop cars, and it crashes irreparably on contact with any cat. On the other hand, it handles really well in the game, and can jump.

Pretty much any time City Connection comes up, it's as an excuse to talk about the music. In that vein, enjoy the guitar version of the level one theme! I'm pretty sure you will enjoy it. And after the break, a vintage Japanese City Connection commercial!

The R stands for Revolution, and it's doubly appropriate in this case. We're using it both to refer to Star Soldier R and to allude to our temporary branching-out into WiiWare for this week's column. We figure that it's a classic-style game even if it's not a real classic. Plus, it's a downloadable Wii game, just like all the VC games we've talked about. Plus, uh, we found this thing we wanted to link to.

Star Soldier R is unique among Wii shooters in that it's completely score-focused. While most shmups are, at least for normal players, completion-focused, SSR's time limits and leaderboards make it clear that getting more points than other players is the only true goal. The short play sessions mean that you can not only memorize the stage layouts, but you can plan your route for maximum score achievement. This brings a level of play normally reserved for the best shmuppers to the rest of us. The fact that you can share scores online means that you may have motivation to take part in that level of play as well.

Dave was totally right in his VC Monday Madness video: I enjoy Double Dragon glitches. The best-known glitch -- and the most useful -- is the experience factory found in the second level. It's easy to completely fill up your heart gauge and unlock every move simply by walking over to the pile of girders after the climbing fence, then going back across the fence, and back again. This will cause the Williams enemy who was standing in front of the girders to disappear, and you can punch the crap out of his ghost for as long as your timer allows. Later in the same level you can defeat the boss by running away from him. He disappears and the game counts it as victory. I'm also a fan of the glitch-bat, which occurs when you swing a weapon just as it's supposed to disappear, leaving a weird bar made up of other graphical elements from the game.

But my favorite glitch in Double Dragon on the NES is at best useless and actually pretty likely to hurt you. At the end of the first area, you can climb up these -- gutters? Pipes? I don't know what they are. Really, they're just wall decoration. But you can walk straight up that wall. Walk up high enough and you'll come back up to the bottom of the screen. Walk downward and you'll die. Move left and you'll warp back to the ground. Try to jump or attack and you'll fall over. Sometimes one of the Linda enemies will try to follow you up the wall and will just end up in some flickery jiggle maneuver just off the ground.

I pretty much can't get to this part of the game without messing with the wall for a while. I can't even explain why it's so amusing. I could only find one video of this glitch in action (at around 2:50), but be warned -- it's one of those YouTube videos with audio of some guy mocking the game as he plays -- the scourge of the retrogaming blogger.

This week, during his VC Monday Madness video, Dave alluded to the fact that he had to enter a code to get past the first screen of Renegade. He was not exaggerating. Renegade is freaking impossible. Here's how Renegade works: three guys beat the crap out of you. Then you manage to get enough punches in between beatings to kill one of the guys, and another one walks out and beats the crap out of you.

Should you want to see the old ladies beating the crap out of you, or guys on motorcycles beating the crap out of you, you'll need to skip levels. Luckily, Technos included that functionality, presumably so people could experience the rest of their game. To skip levels, hold the down button on controller 2 and enter one of the following codes:

• Stage 2: down, up, right, up, left, up, start
• Stage 3: up, down, left, down, right, down, start
• Stage 4: down, down, up, up, right, left, start

Now that you can see all of Renegade's content, the only thing left is figuring out why you would want to!

The VC Advantage is usually geared toward nostalgia -- specifically, evoking the memories of a time gone by, when we were denied resources such as GameFAQs, we had to look up codes in magazines, and we had to walk two miles uphill to school (both ways!). Help was available in other places besides magazines back then. Needed to know what to play and how to advance? You could turn to a book ... and we're not talking about glitzy Prima strategy guides packed with glossy photos, either.

Growing up, I didn't have much access to gaming magazines, and I'm not even sure why. I'm sure I was aware that Nintendo Power existed, and I know I read a few issues, but I wasn't a subscriber and rarely bought it (blasphemy!). I did, however, read many of Jeff Rovin's How to Win books cover to cover.

In River City, the streets, parks, and even high schools are populated by gangs of identical-looking, identically dressed teens who spend the day protecting their turf from any interlopers by beating them savagely with chains and throwing garbage cans at them. And yet, despite their efforts, turf can change hands from gang to gang in a fraction of a second -- leave the Frat Boys' area, turn right back around, and it's now the Generic Dudes' property.

Yet, to these violent, truant (except for the ones who inhabit River City High, but even they aren't in class or anything) teens, malls are sacred. A shopping center can stand between two gang warzones, and yet no Jock or Squid dares step foot into the Flatirons Mall. Shoppers walk through the center with impunity, unaware that the Internationals are just a few yards away, being kicked in the face by a guy who is standing on top of a fence and thus invincible.

Chances are those stumpy thugs would be even more reverent of River City's shopping options if they knew about Merlin's Mystery Shop. Conveniently located in the middle of the wall in the Armstrong Thru-Way Tunnel, Merlin's Mystery Shop offers rare items that provide pretty great stat boosts. We've got those items and their effects listed after the break, so you'll know just which items you'll have to beat up Benny and Clyde repeatedly to save up for.