Ported to Amstrad CPC, Apple II, Commodore 64, & ZX Spectrum in 1986
Released for Amiga in 1987
Ported to PC in March 1987
Ported to Amstrad PCW in 1987
Starglider II
Released for Amiga in October 1988
Released for Atari ST in 1988
Released for Macintosh, PC, & ZX Spectrum in 1989
Days of Thunder
Released for NES in 1990 by Beam Software
Released for Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum in 1990 by Tiertex
Released for PC in 1990 by Argonaut
Released for Amiga & Atari ST in 1990 by Creative Materials
To me it seems like C64 and ZX Spectrum are based on the NES version, which uses pre-rendered pseudo-3D graphics, while Amiga and Atari ST are based on the PC version, which uses polygonal 3D graphics. The Wikipedia description suggests to me that NES is the original design, having began internally at Mindscape before being outsourced to Beam to finish.
Bionicle
Released for PC, PS2, & XBox in October 2003
Ported to Gamecube in September 2003
Released for XBox in December 2003
Ported to Macintosh in December 2004
Interestingly, the Gamecube version has the earliest release date, but is listed as a port, credited to Coyote Developments.
I-Ninja
First released for PC in September 2003
Released for PS2 in November 2003
Released for XBox in December 2003
Ported to Gamecube in 2003
Mobygames's original PC release is listed as Finland exclusive, which seems a little unlikely.
Catwoman
Released for Gamecube, PC, PS2, & XBox in September 2004
Select chronology:
Title
Lead platform
Date
Contemporary ports
Starglider
???
1986-10
First released for Atari ST Same-year ports to Amstrad CPC, Apple II, C64, & ZX Spectrum 1987 release on Amiga 1987 ports to Amstrad PCW & PC
Starglider II
???
1988-10
Same-quarter releases on Amiga & Atari ST 1989 releases for Mac, PC, & ZX Spectrum
Having little familiarity with this British software house beyond reading its Wikipedia page, it's not clear to me if I should treat this as a continuation of Supersoft, or of Audiogenic Limited, or as its own thing entirely. The early games by those entities are of zero interest to me unless they can be considered ancestors to the games on this list.
Unknown lead platform:
Impact
First released for Amiga & Atari ST in 1987
Ported to Commodore 64 in March 1988
Ported to PC in April 1988
Ported to Amstrad CPC, BBC Micro, Electron, & ZX Spectrum in 1988
Helter Skelter
First released for Atari ST in 1989
Same-year port to PC
Released on Amiga in 1990
Ported to Amstrad CPC, BBC Micro, C64, Electron, & ZX Spectrum in 1990
Krusty's Super Fun House
First released for Genesis, NES, & SNES in 1992
Released for Amiga, Game Gear, & Sega Master System in 1993
Ported to Game Boy & PC in 1993
Krusty's Super Fun House was originally designed as Rat Trap on the Amiga. What's not clear to me is if Rat Trap ever saw a commercial release. If it did, then the question is, was it reworked as Krusty's Super Fun House on Amiga first, or was that done on other platforms first and then ported back to Amiga?
Select chronology:
Title
Lead platform
Date
Contemporary ports
Graham Gooch's Test Cricket
Commodore 64
1985-6
Same-year ports to various 8-bit computers
Impact
???
1987
Same-year releases on Amiga & Atari ST 1988 ports to various 8-bit computers
Emlyn Hughes International Soccer
Commodore 64
1988
1989 ports to Amstrad CPC & ZX Spectrum
Helter Skelter
???
1989
1989 release on Atari ST Same-year port to PC 1990 release on Amiga 1990 ports to various 8-bit computers
Loopz
Atari ST
1990
Same-year ports to Amiga, Amstrad CPC, NES, & PC 1991 ports to Game Boy and various computers
Krusty's Super Fun House
???
1992
Same-year releases on Genesis, NES, & SNES 1993 releases on Amiga, Game Gear, & Sega Master System 1993 ports to Game Boy & PC
The last Nintendo game I played has been considered one of the worst of the system's early Famicom era. This one, closing out their 1984 output, is considered one of the best, having been developed by Shigeru Miyamoto (who to be fair also developed the unplayable Tennis released at the year's start).
This is one that passed me by completely even though I had an NES during its glory years. Excitebike is an arcade-style motocross racer with an unusual sidescrolling perspective - something the NES is quite good at - rather than an overhead one like we've seen on Atari, or a pseudo-3D one as was trending in arcades and computers - something the NES isn't particularly good at (though clever programmers managed in years to come).
Three play modes populate the main menu as was Nintendo's custom of the day, though only one of them, Selection B, is the true Excitebike experience. Selection A is good for practicing the five courses without interference from your opponents, but it's a bit boring. Selection B adds three competing bikers, though they don't so race you so much as they just get in your way - your placing (and whether you get to continue to the next course or not) is determined entirely by time. Design mode, which I didn't really mess around with, lets you create your own course, but you're limited to a handful of prefabricated obstacles from the official tracks to place around the track at predetermined points. The options to save and load custom tracks, intended to interface with a Famicom Data Recorder tape deck, don't work on a U.S. NES console, but are still available, which must have been very confusing to players who didn't read the manual.
Controls in this race are simple and intuitive while also allowing skill, strategy, and a sense of risk and reward, well befitting a console game with arcade-style sensibilities. Up and down change lanes, 'A' accelerates, and 'B' engages a turbo boost which provides a bit more oomph but can overheat your engine with prolonged use, making it more useful for catching extra air on the ramps than it is for general speed. Forward/backward leans, which is the most demanding test of your finesse as this orients the bike while airborne, and your wheels generally has to be more or less level with the ground when you land on or else you bail.
Below is my best attempt to clear the five courses in 'B' mode. I don't quite make it.
The first course is really easy, and you can easily recover from several accidents and still qualify for first place by several seconds. But there's a big difficulty spike by the third course, as the qualifying time is now shorter than the previous course's record time and the track is longer and more difficult to boot.
Luck feels like it plays a part too, especially in 'B' mode, where obstacles can funnel you and your opponents into the same lane, forcing someone to yield or crash. Crashes can be pretty capricious too; sometimes costing your biker less than a second as he just gets up again onto his bike, sometimes hurtling him and his bike down a good stretch of the track before launching him halfway to the bleachers.
You are not recovering from that.
I never quite got good enough at Course 4 to beat it reliably, failing a few times for each success, and never managed to beat Course 5 at all, except in practice mode 'A'. But each attempt was fun, even exciting.
GAB rating: Good. This is the first original NES game that I can praise and recommend without any reservations. The racing mechanics are novel, accessible, and surprisingly deep. Excitebike doesn't always play fair, but for a game by a studio still coming out of the school of arcade design, that's to be expected, and even at its most punishing, I felt compelled to keep trying and improve.
Worth mentioning is a 1988 Japanese-exclusive release of "Vs. Excitebike" for the Famicom Disk System. Three modes are once again included, and all of them offer something worthwhile.
There's the confusingly named "Original Excite," which isn't actually the original Excitebike, but rather a port of the arcade version "Vs. Excitebike" which despite the title does not feature any two-player vs. mode. Rather, it is a remixed and expanded version of the original game, with seven new courses to race on, and a more logically structured system of progression where, upon reaching a new course, you must complete a single lap trial and make a qualifying time before entering the race in earnest.
New features include a truck-jumping bonus round, and a powerup system where sabotaging enough of your opponents turns your bike black and gains you unlimited turbo juice until you yourself crash.
"VS Excite" mode, not to be confused with the identically named arcade game, introduces a two-player race.
Finally, "VS Edit" corresponds to the original's design mode, only this time you may save and load your custom tracks to the game's disk card.
All in all, this is a late but worthy upgrade to Excitebike, though I do prefer the original's colors and sound design; the music here is particularly horrible.
The next whale, Epyx's Pitstop II, is a sequel to the less famous non-whale Pitstop from 1983. So I played both.
The Pitstops are arcade-style racing games closely modeled after Pole Position (and to a lesser extent Turbo), with the gimmick that in extended races, you'll need to enter the pits and complete a minigame to quickly refuel and replace your worn tires, and you risk running out of fuel or a disqualifying blowout by putting this off.
These came out around the time that Epyx was transitioning their focus from Atari to Commodore, and so "B" and I played Pitstop's Atari version, and Pitstop II's C64 version, which I believe reflects their respective development priorities, though both were available on either computer.
Game 347: Pitstop
Pitstop's title screen offers a few options prior to gameplay:
Number of drivers (1-4). Drivers race sequentially, and are ranked by finishing time once all have completed their laps (or been disqualified).
Number of laps (3, 6, 9).
Difficulty (Rookie, Semi-Pro, Pro). Harder difficulties make it more difficult to pass your opponents (who drive slower than you in any difficulty), and also cause collisions to wear out your tires quicker.
Race type (Single, Mini-Circuit, Grand Circuit). Single lets you select one of the six circuits for one race, mini-circuit plays through three of them, and grand circuit tours all six of them in order, displaying the drivers' cumulative scores and overall standings between races.
"B" and I decided that six laps was best, as with three laps you don't need
to enter the pits at all, circumventing the game's very namesake, and with
nine the race just goes on far too long. We played a few single races at each of the difficulties, and the below video showcases a six-lap race in semi-pro, and a three-lap race in pro.
The racing model here is simplistic and not very satisfying. Taking turns is trivial - this is the Pole Position model where steering means lateral movement, turns simply push your vehicle toward the curb, and here you can easily counteract this no matter how fast your vehicle is going. Turns are so barely consequential that it hardly matters what track you race on! The challenge is passing other cars, who spawn at random and as in Turbo/Pole Position serve more as obstacles than actual opponents.
Collisions aren't disastrous - they just cost you speed and some wear, which is represented by the color of your tires. Pulling into the pit lane at the start of each lap lets you replace them and refuel through a straightforward point & click interface.
The sound of passing cars reminds you of precious time spent here.
GAB rating: Below average. Pitstop is inoffensive, but too simple to be worth spending much time on. I am not surprised that it has been virtually forgotten in favor of its sequel.
Pitstop was ported to ColecoVision, where it can be played with a steering wheel and throttle pedal.
Game 348: Pitstop II
Pitstop II's big new feature, which the box and manual remind you of no fewer than four times (auto racing is not a solo sport), is the simultaneous split-screen multiplayer option, providing active competition and not just slow-moving drones to get in your way. Racing solo? The computer will take the second screen.
"B" and I once again raced multiple times, trying each of the difficulty settings on a different track. The below video shows six laps in rookie, and three apiece in semi-pro and pro.
On paper, Pitstop II looks like a big improvement over the original. Not only is there two-player racing, but the
graphics and physics have been overhauled, now better resembling Pole
Position both from its smooth pseudo-3D projection and its simulation of centrifugal forces that wear out your tires while pushing you laterally. The other cars on the road, aside from player 2's, are still more obstacles to surpass than real opponents, but they come into view on the horizon as blips, giving you plenty of time to swerve and avoid slamming into them at 250mph, and generally behave just like your actual opponent, just slower and ephemeral. Turns are now a challenge to navigate, and on the harder settings you'll need to properly manage your throttle to get through them or else take excessive damage.
So why did I say on paper? Because despite the more advanced physics model, Pitstop II just doesn't feel good to play. "B" and I constantly oversteered, then understeered, then oversteered again, causing our cars to slide back and forth across the lanes, which is hardly ideal for passing the slow-moving traffic. On rookie mode, you can get away with riding the curb, but on semi-pro this will shred your tires, and on pro even a few bumps is devastating. The C64's lack of analog control options is lamentable here, and I can't imagine trying to play this on a stiff authentic joystick.
Taking the turns slowly makes controlling things a bit easier, but throttle control is janky too, with pushing up and down on the joystick directly raising or lowering your velocity like one adjusts a thermostat, and the sense of speed conveyed by the pseudo-3D view doesn't feel quite aligned with the speedometer display. The fire button activates a turbo boost, but would have been better served as a harder brake option. You don't see turns until you're already in them, you don't really know when you're about to come out of a turn either, and the minimap isn't precise enough to really show you when you're close enough to a turn to need to start decelerating. I'd often brake while already in the turn, grinding my wheels against the side until speed dropped just enough that I could instantly overcome all of the centrifugal forces and instantly zip over to the other side of the road and grind my other wheels against the other curb.
And then there's the pits.
Your F1 team must have had a budget cut, because you've only got one tire guy now, and he controls like he's been hitting the bottle. Actions like walking around the vehicle and getting into the precise pixel needed to change a tire are just frustrating! And on a personal note, the color-coded damage stripes on the tires are less meaningful to my cone-deficient eyes than they were in the original.
"B" and I both enjoyed this less than the original Pitstop, despite the surface improvements. I did spend some time replaying alone, and I did improve a bit, but never to the point where I felt differently about its flaws on my initial impression.
GAB rating: Below average. Pitstop II is the more complete package, but it trades the flaws of the original for different flaws.
As a side-note, it's interesting to me that splitscreen multiplayer was more or less simultaneously implemented by both Spy vs. Spy and Pitstop II, and both on the C64. Is there an earlier example of this that both games might have followed?
This list excludes the majority of games that LucasArts outsourced to third party studios (e.g. Star Wars: Battlefront, LEGO Star Wars, etc.). Other Ports of Entry posts will cover them later.
Unknown lead platform:
Star Wars: Rebel Assault
First released for PC & Macintosh in 1993
Released for 3DO and Sega CD in 1994
Star Wars: Rebel Assault II - The Hidden Empire
First released for DOS/Windows and Macintosh in 1995
Ported to PlayStation in 1996
Afterlife
Released for DOS/Windows and Macintosh in 1996
Gladius
Released for Gamecube, PS2, & Xbox on October 2003
Star Wars: Republic Commando
Released for PC & Xbox on March 2005
The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition
Released for PC, Xbox 360, & iPhone on July 2009
Monkey Island 2: Special Edition
Released for PC, PS3, Xbox 360, iPad, & iPhone on July 2010
Select chronology:
Atari 8-bit era
Title
Date
Contemporary ports
Ballblazer
1985-4
Same-year ports to Apple II & C64 1986 ports to Amstrad CPC, Atari 5200, & ZX Spectrum
Rescue on Fractalus!
1985-4
Same-year ports to Apple II & C64 1986 ports to Amstrad CPC, Atari 5200, & ZX Spectrum
Koronis Rift
1985-10
Same-year ports to Apple II & C64
The Eidolon
1985-10
Same-quarter ports to Apple II & C64 1986 ports to Amstrad CPC, MSX, & ZX Spectrum
Commodore 64 era
Title
Date
Contemporary ports
Labyrinth
1986-11
Simultaneous port to Apple II 1987 ports to MSX & PC-88
Habitat
1987-1
PHM Pegasus
1987-2
Simultaneous port to Apple II 1988 ports to Amstrad CPC, PC, & ZX Spectrum
Maniac Mansion
1987-9
Simultaneous port to Apple II 1988 ports to Famicom & PC
Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders
1988-8
Same-year ports to Amiga & PC 1989 port to Atari ST
Early DOS era
Title
Date
Contemporary ports
Battlehawks 1942
1988-10
1989 ports to Amiga & Atari ST
Their Finest Hour: The Battle of Britain
1989-10
1990 ports to Amiga & Atari ST
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure
1989-12
Simultaneous ports to Amiga & Atari ST 1990 ports to FM Towns & Macintosh
The Secret of Monkey Island
1990-9
Same-year port to Amiga 1991 port to Atari ST
Loom
1990
Same-year ports to Amiga, Atari ST, & Macintosh 1991 port to FM Towns
Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe
1991-8
Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge
1991-12
1992 ports to Amiga & Macintosh
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis
1992
Same-year ports to Amiga & Macintosh 1993 port to FM Towns
Star Wars: X-Wing
2/15/1993
Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle
1993
Sam & Max: Hit the Road
1993
Multimedia era
Title
Lead platform
Date
Contemporary ports
Zombies Ate My Neighbors
SNES
1993
Same-year port to Genesis
Star Wars: Rebel Assault
???
1993
Same-year releases on PC & Macintosh 1994 releases on 3DO & Sega CD
Star Wars: TIE Fighter
DOS
1994-7
Star Wars: X-Wing - Collector's CD-ROM
DOS
1994
Full Throttle
DOS
5/2/1995
1996 port to Macintosh
Star Wars: Dark Forces
DOS
1995-3
Same-year port to Macintosh 1996 port to PlayStation
The Dig
DOS
1995-12
1996 port to Macintosh
Star Wars: TIE Fighter - Collector's CD-ROM
DOS
1995
Star Wars: Rebel Assault II - The Hidden Empire
???
1995
Same-year releases on DOS, Windows, & Macintosh 1996 port to PlayStation
Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire
Nintendo 64
1996-12
1997 port to PC
Afterlife
???
1996
Same-year releases on DOS, Windows, & Macintosh
Indiana Jones and his Desktop Adventures
Windows 3.x
1996
Same-year port to Macintosh
Windows era
Title
Date
Contemporary ports
Outlaws
3/31/1997
Star Wars: Jedi Knight - Dark Forces II
10/9/1997
The Curse of Monkey Island
11/1/1997
Star Wars: Yoda Stories
1997
Star Wars: Jedi Knight - Mysteries of the Sith
2/17/1998
Grim Fandango
1998-10
Star Wars: Rebellion
1998
Star Wars: Episode I - Racer
1999-5
Simultaneous port to N64 2000 ports to Dreamcast & Macintosh
Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine
10/1/1999
2000 port to N64
The Curse of Monkey Island: LucasArts Archive Series
1999
Late era
Title
Lead platform
Date
Contemporary ports
Star Wars: Episode I - Jedi Power Battles
PlayStation
4/4/2000
Same-year port to Dreamcast
Escape from Monkey Island
Windows
11/7/2000
2001 ports to PS2 & Macintosh
Star Wars: Starfighter
PlayStation 2
2/21/2001
Same-year port to Xbox 2002 port to PC
Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds
Windows
11/9/2001
2002 port to Macintosh
Gladius
???
10/29/2003
Simultaneous releases on Gamecube, PS2, & Xbox
Star Wars: Republic Commando
???
3/1/2005
Simultaneous releases on PC & Xbox
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
Xbox 360
9/16/2008
Simultaneous port to PS3
The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition
???
7/15/2009
Same-month releases on PC, Xbox 360, & iPhone
Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge - Special Edition
???
7/6/2010
Simultanous releases on PC, PS3, Xbox 360, iPad, & iPhone
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