A multi-cart for the people.
PLAYERS: 1-2 simultaneous/alternating
PUBLISHER: Camerica
DEVELOPER: Codemasters
GENRE: Arcade
RELEASE DATE: 1992
Quattro Arcade is another unlicensed four-in-one game cartridge brought to you by Codemasters. Thankfully, it’s leagues better than its hit-and-miss predecessor, Quattro Adventure. Here’s a thought, though: why not devote development resources to one great game instead of four decent ones? Wouldn’t that be easier and less stress-inducing for all concerned?
C.J.’S ELEPHANT ANTICS
Elephants can do a lot more than trudge through Africa and spray water on themselves, you know! Case in point: C.J. the Elephant has some antics he’d like to perform for you. Said antics involve avoiding French police guards, skiddily bopping through the Arctic, sweatin’ to the oldies in Egypt, and trying to stay alive in the Jungle. These platforming shenanigans aren’t anything new, but at least Cornelius Joseph. Elephant isn’t slow and lumbering. His nose can spray what I’m assuming is water onto enemies, and he also wields bombs that, once unleashed, roam of their own accord. Levels are fairly well-designed and the mood is whimsical throughout. Good show, C.J.!
B-
STUNT BUGGIES
It’s a buggie-eat-buggie world in Stunt Buggies. There are sixteen carefully crafted levels, perfectly designed for buggies to destroy each other. And destroy they will. Throughout each level, there are between three and five buggies that want to stop your bomb-collecting (what’s with all the bombs, Codemasters?). Collect all the bombs, then return to the portal from whence you came. It’s simple , easy, and fun for about five minutes. Warning: actual stunts may not exist.
C+
F-16 RENEGADE
I enjoy shmups, even crappy ones like F-16 Renegade. The game is a complete ripoff of Capcom’s far-superior 19XX series. It has floaty controls, drab graphics, slow progression, and the enemies’ bullets (more like pellets) are barely visible. But so help me, I still enjoyed myself. It’s cathartic to mow down enemy fighters with waves of bullets. The resulting explosions are just as nourishing, if not slightly more dangerous.
B-
GO! DIZZY, GO!
First, say the title aloud as it’s written, punctuation and all. Sounds strange, eh? “Go!” Obnoxious pause. “Dizzy Go!” Thankfully, game titles don’t have to make sense, as long as the game is worth playing (sorry Infinite Undiscovery – you fail completely). Go! Dizzy Go! bears a strange, sedated charm. Instead of Dizzy’s typical exploring, Go! has you collecting fruit and avoiding enemies in each of the twenty-five themed levels. The enemies are never really a bother. They’re slow, and unless you go out of your way to get killed by them, you should be fine. Leisurely collect fruit and enjoy Dizzy‘s slow and steady pace.
B-
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3 replies on “#500 – Quattro Arcade”
I got this game as a kid, and I was stoked because I was getting FOUR GAMES IN ONE! Thankfully, unlike whatever poor schmuck’s overpaid for a brand new copy of Action 52, these four games were all pretty good. CJ especially had a nice catchy tune, bright graphics, and while the controls could have been tighter, it was still fun. And two player Co-Op to boot, not too shabby.
Stunt Buggies isn’t GREAT on it’s own, but as part of the package it’s fun to play from time to time. I got pretty far, but I never did beat it, it gets damn hard after awhile. Go, Dizzy Go! is a fun little Pac-Man game that I’ve always enjoyed, and being co-op again was a nice plus. As for F-16, it isn’t the best shmup in town, but I think it’s better than most people probably give it credit for. It has something like 20 or more stages, which is pretty big even for a stand alone shooter, and I liked that it alternated between top-down levels and forward view, Space Harrier style stages.
All in all, it’s a good cart, easily the best of the Quattro series (of which there was apparently a fourth entry, just not on NES).
I still play my old cartridge from time to time.
In my opinion, the only bad egg is F-16 because controls are terrible. CJ is something like a NewZealand Story clone and is OK, Stunt Buggies quenched my need for Rally-X for a long time and Go! Dizzy Go! is great.
My parents refused to buy or allow me to rent the unlicensed games. I think maybe they thought they would break the NES, so I never got to play any of these games as a kid.