As I perused my way through the streets, I couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like to have that hot sports car stopped at the traffic light ahead. Instead of wondering, I just jacked the driver from his seat and called it my own. I know what you’re thinking,”I’ve been doing this for years in the Grand Theft Auto series.” Not like this you haven’t.
In my new automobile I passed somewhat familiar places, including a pub I’m sure I must have stopped at some point In my GTA adventures. That’s not what caught my eye: it was the glowing Jimmy and Bimmy’s sign hanging above the next bar, a nod to the poor translation of early Nintendo titles like Double Dragon. It’s the charm like this scattered throughout my experience that kept me thoroughly engaged. Whipping around the next corner, all the while carelessly trampling unsuspecting civilians, another sign glimmered in the corner of my eye: “Fabi-o’s” in the fashion of a cereal box but with the handsome hunk best known for his flowing locks. In my distracted gaze I failed to pay attention and struck another pedestrian, sandwiching him between my vehicle and a narrow brick structure. Whoops.
By this point I came to the conclusion that I didn’t like that car much anyway. Red, really? Time for some exercise I decided, and began to make my way around the city on foot. The glowing neon text on top of my screen constantly kept me in the loop, whether it was updating my score, kill streak, or acknowledging my ruthless behavior. Now I didn’t feel so bad about shooting that rocket launcher at the next guy’s face.
While I had the chance to perform a number of missions through the game’s story mode, I preferred to play the arcade style and simply run around, causing as much destruction as I possibly could, while still taking the opportunity to explore the city. The final product will offer a number of missions and locations instantly recognizable to fans of the 8-bit era, such as the swimming level from Ninja Turtles, or sneaking around as Snake in Metal Gear.
Retro City Rampage was originally titled Grand Theft Tendo and meant to be released on the original Nintendo Entertainment System, albeit much after the system’s heyday. The game wasn’t on my radar until I saw the panel for Brian Provinciano at GDC. It was then that I realized his ingenuity and dedication toward his craft. How many other developers do you think would not only hack open their NES, but the cartridges too (while soldering ln additional RAM, mind you) to recreate the entire GTA 3 experience down to the hand-drawn maps? I can’t think of any either. That was part of Brian Proviciano’s development process, as he mapped out all of GTA3, hacked apart his NES to program for it, and added RAM to allow for his creation. This was all before he decided to port it over to the PC of course.
While this title will naturally draw comparisons to Rockstar’s triple-A franchise, it should be noted that it takes the best elements from that game, and combines them with others for a new, noteworthy experience. My brief experience with Retro City Rampage left me hungry for more, and I’ll finally have the opportunity to satisfy that hunger when it lands on XBLA this summer and WiiWare later this fall.
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