rdrunner

Just in case it helps, make sure that whenever you reach a dash/zipper, you let go of the gas while holding the weapon button. Your vehicle should have a blue fireball instead of red or green for the biggest speed boost.

Skipped ahead through all the bickering. This really shouldn't be the "Sonic 2 does/doesn't deserve to win" thread. It's likely going to win and that's fine. Majority vote wins out. It's been a fun bracket. Thanks for setting it up!

I like the Gradius intermission in Blades of Steel. Thought it was really clever at the time.

I'll second the Catherine soundtrack. The classical music is remixed with a nice combination of old and new sounds. The original music is good as well.

Just updated the main post when I logged in tonight and saw the new mirror tracks. Guess someone out there heard me! Pity my trial subscription is running out. Not planning on paying to play this, but it does look nice for anyone still interested.

Are people still playing F-Zero 99? I tried a few games with my NSO trial subscription and noticed that the waiting screens were nearly empty (10-30 users) until the timer ran out and a bunch of what looked like bots showed up to bring the race count up to 99. Worried that this game is dead or dying, which would be a shame. EDIT: Almost because I said something, the game was just updated tonight with new tracks (sort of). They made mirrors of all 15 original tracks, but they're NOT straight up mirror mode. All the mirrored tracks have new stuff added to them (boosts, jumps, rough patches, mines).

Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" is all over video games, especially Peggle...

@T-Pac The inverted volcano stage comes after the Moai level. You probably triggered the warp to stage 5 by destroying at least 10 Moais during the level. You're not missing a lot. It's mostly just stage 1, but upside down with more enemies. The volcano at the end also has reverse gravity, so all the rocks "fall" up. There are other warps in the game for other conditions, each of which skips one stage. You know you hit one when a bunch of indestructible green Moai fly across the screen after beating the boss.

Elevator Action. Tons of improvements over the arcade game (forget NES, which is garbage). There are attack dogs and sentry robots to go along with the standard enemies, new weapons doors that give you machine guns, shotguns, or grenades, plus every 6 stages, you get a rescue mission where you climb up through a maze.

Yeah, though I do like the two portable versions.

I still prefer 1. Every Wily boss is a winner (except maybe #3). Final boss gauntlet with no E tanks FTW.

Can't vouch for arcade, but yes Bombjack is in NES Solomon's Key. He's super-hidden though. You need to bump a specific block with your head a bunch of times to make him appear. Catching him turns all the enemies into fairies. Works in two rooms, I believe. Oh, and don't forget he's also the star of the final halftime show in Tecmo Super Bowl!

I saw a review for this. Really high on my wishlist!

Original 10/10 - So many memories of this game. Never owned it until later in life, but I rented it a ton. Started out by getting confused about the stage numbering and skipped the neutral areas in favor of doing area 2 just after 1 (should have read the manual). Took turns with friends trying to do the hardest swing combos and together we slowly reached the final 3 stages, though I ended up beating the game myself from there. The final stage is one of the best on the NES! I also loved this game enough to speedrun it. I wasn't the best at it, but I could still reach the ending in under 19 minutes. Rearmed 9/10 - I have this on X360 and really enjoyed it. As people have said, it's a nice remaster that does a lot of things well. I also beat all of the challenge rooms, which while they were not the highlight, they are definitely great extra content for people who like that sort of thing. Haven't played Rearmed 2 yet, but based on what I've heard, I'm not in a hurry.

Lamenting how Powerball is getting killed by Snow Bros, a game I thought nobody actually likes, but is just rare and expensive. Really enjoying the thread. Thanks for doing this!