I'm so glad that Hamster's Arcade Archives are a thing.

[Steven]

For you guys who have been keeping up with the ACA releases, what are some of the stand out titles released so far? I’m looking to get into some non cave games and I’m primarily using a ps4 so I figured this was a good place to start.

Big Tournament Golf (AKA Neo Turf Masters, AKA The Best Game on the Neo Geo)
Kaitei Daisensou
Thunder Dragon 2
Halley's Comet
Xexex (Japanese version only)
Shock Troopers
Twinkle Star Sprites
Saigo no Nindou
Image Fight
Moon Patrol
X Multiply

Thanks man! I’ll start looking at these now

Sure. I didn't mention Darius because there is also a ShotTriggers release (Cozmic Collection), but that's there too if you want a cheaper Darius. ACA Darius II has the three screen version, unlike the ShotTriggers release, which has the two screen version, so even if you have the ShotTriggers compilation it might be worth checking out if you are interested in the three screen version.

[nogden]

Big Tournament Golf (AKA Neo Turf Masters, AKA The Best Game on the Neo Geo)
Kaitei Daisensou
Thunder Dragon 2
Halley's Comet
Xexex (Japanese version only)
Shock Troopers
Twinkle Star Sprites
Saigo no Nindou
Image Fight
Moon Patrol
X Multiply

Thanks man! I’ll start looking at these now

Sure. I didn't mention Darius because there is also a ShotTriggers release (Cozmic Collection), but that's there too if you want a cheaper Darius. ACA Darius II has the three screen version, unlike the ShotTriggers release, which has the two screen version, so even if you have the ShotTriggers compilation it might be worth checking out if you are interested in the three screen version.

Big tournament golf actually looks amazing lol. Shock troopers looks very interesting, reminds me of outzone. And yeah I have always wanted to see what the three screen Darius is like! That reminds me I still have G-Darius to dig into

[Steven]

Thanks man! I’ll start looking at these now

Sure. I didn't mention Darius because there is also a ShotTriggers release (Cozmic Collection), but that's there too if you want a cheaper Darius. ACA Darius II has the three screen version, unlike the ShotTriggers release, which has the two screen version, so even if you have the ShotTriggers compilation it might be worth checking out if you are interested in the three screen version.

Big tournament golf actually looks amazing lol.

It is! Only negative point is that the music might get a little repetitive because there is only one track for each course. Otherwise, it's amazing. 1CC is tough because you have to either play very well on the default settings, but it's a lot of fun.

Shock troopers looks very interesting, reminds me of outzone.

They're pretty different games. Shock Troopers is much slower-paced, and it has the thing where you can make a team of characters instead of just having one, and different characters have different movement speeds on different stages.

There are two revisions of this game, but only one revision is available on ACA. This revision is the one where your characters have separate life bars instead of everyone sharing the same one, but it also is the revision that doesn't tell you what each character's movement speeds on the stages are, so you will have to figure it out yourself unless you play the other revision somehow or check online. I think there is a website somewhere that has movement speeds and all of that listed, but I don't remember where I found it.

And yeah I have always wanted to see what the three screen Darius is like!

More than anything, it's... big. You lose an arguably very important part of the experience if you don't have the cabinet or don't play on PC Cozmic Collection with a subwoofer that is powerful enough to vibrate your seat and make any nearby neighbours hate you, but this is good enough.

I gotta admit that I don't really like the arcade version that much. It's visually cool because of the triple screens, and if you have the cabinet or the PC version you'll get the audio experience as intended, but otherwise, I think it's worth checking out the arcade version a little bit just to see what it's like and then actually playing the Mega Drive version instead because it plays much better.

[mycophobia]

*chanting, slowly getting louder* I-mage-Fight! I-mage-Fight! I-MAGE-FIGHT! I-MAGE-FIGHT!!

[mycophobia]

sorry it's just every once in a while im reminded that image fight exists, and is an excellent game i need to play again soon. and then i forget about it again... or maybe i just think about the second loop and decide "naah im good"

[Steven]

Image Fight is incredible, even with a horrifying second loop. I'd absolutely love to get the PCB someday, but it's out of my price range.

*joins Image Fight chanting*

[Marc]

Escape As is great fun, these single screen racers have always been my jam and this doesn't ramp up the AI quite as savagely as some others.

[Acid]

For you guys who have been keeping up with the ACA releases, what are some of the stand out titles released so far? I’m looking to get into some non cave games and I’m primarily using a ps4 so I figured this was a good place to start.

Big Tournament Golf's presentation is top notch. I kept watching longplays on youtube, captivated by the sound and graphics, and realized I must own this game. The gameplay is great too.

Phelios. I might be alone on this one, but I dig its vibe. And while it's a shooter, it somehow feels like taking on a 2d action game. It charmed me.

Splatter House. I like the horror theme. Good old school jank.

Metamorphic Force. A beat em up where every character is fun to play, with cool style.

Fighter&Attacker. The first time I played it, I was wondering how this game could be so difficult. But there's something unique about how it plays that when gotten used to makes for a special experience.

[Sima Tuna]

The best beat em ups currently on ACA are:

Vendetta, the pinnacle of Technos bmup game design (even though not made by Technos, it is that "style" of bmup.)
Mutation Nation, the best beat em up on the neo-geo. Which is a low bar, but still. Yes, it is better than Sengoku 3. It's solidly solid.
Zero Team, Seibu's absolutely astoundingly high-quality BMUP masterpiece.

Unfortunately, ACA lag a bit on beat em ups compared to other games in their libraries. Many of the best beat em ups are either licensed, owned by capcom or owned by Arc System Works (ArcSys owns all of the Technos stuff iirc.) So that leaves Hamster grabbing at the unlicensed Konami stuff (like Metamorphic Force, which is still good) and Taito's Growl (which is good.) But many of the best of the Konami brawlers haven't been brought to ACA yet.

Why am I talking about beat em ups? Because this is shmups forum. Everyone here already will have a thousand recommendations for the best shmups or the best general games, but beat em ups are a smaller niche. The absolute TOP TWO of Hamster ACA for HARD PUNCHING ACTION are Vendetta and Zero Team. They're so far above everything else it's not close. Vendetta is to Konami as Final Fight is to Capcom. Perhaps that is a slight exaggeration but Vendetta is better than the vast majority of Konami bmups.

I don't consider games like Rygar and Rastan to be beat em ups but they are good games you should also play.

Big Tournament Golf/Neo Turf Masters is possibly the greatest arcade sports game of all time, depending who you ask.

[velo]

For you guys who have been keeping up with the ACA releases, what are some of the stand out titles released so far? I’m looking to get into some non cave games and I’m primarily using a ps4 so I figured this was a good place to start.

Just games that I don't think were mentioned already... mostly not shmups:

Crazy Climber 1 and 2
Galaga '88 (and Galaxian, Galaga, Gaplus)
Gradius 1-3
Libble Rabble
Liquid Kids
Metal Slug (all of 'em)
Puzzle Bobble 1 and 2
Rolling Thunder 1 and 2
Rompers
Sunset Riders (and Mystic Warriors)
Tetris the Grand Master 1 and 2
The Legend of Valkyrie
Tinkle Pit

The absolute TOP TWO of Hamster ACA for HARD PUNCHING ACTION are Vendetta and Zero Team. They're so far above everything else it's not close.

I agree with that, but there's a lot of competition for the #3 spot imo. Some good ones dropped in the last year or so.

[BIL]

For you guys who have been keeping up with the ACA releases, what are some of the stand out titles released so far? I’m looking to get into some non cave games and I’m primarily using a ps4 so I figured this was a good place to start.

Ten I consider particularly notable home debuts. There are dozens more I'd recommend, some of which, like Gun Frontier, Cotton, and Kaitei Daisensou, are actually their first accurate home translations. Will leave it here for now.

(a few older rec posts, for STGs and adjacent hardcores also, for more recent releases, 2024 year in review )

EDIT: Y'know, let's make it eleven. I forgot the magnificent DAIOHHH, and can't bear to boot out Gunnail or Trigon. <3 Toa-ryuu.

Cybattler (Jaleco, 1993) Immensely cool mecha STG, with 8-way locking strafe and furied slashing. Like a hybrid of Hyper Duel and Shock Troopers, with the kinematic largesse of Assault Suits Valken. Fixes the janky Hi Score name entry cursor.

Daioh (Athena, 1993) Pitch-perfectly leavened Tatsujinesque. Rad ship vs rugged stages. Adds an optional counter-stop fix, plus a director-requested Rank Gauge.

F/A (Namco, 1992) Absolute hardcore, pt1. Deliberately no-frills Xeviousesque with ultra-polished stage designs and pulse-pounding techno BGM. Endgame onslaught sees the apotheosis of precision ground-shotting. ACA release features some very useful custom autofire. Currently Japan-only, unfortunately.

Gunnail (NMK, 1993) Ruggedly tough yet attractively generous Toaplanesque starring a Homing Flamethrower, featuring a notoriously fiendish scoring mechanic. Less lives = more multiplier. ACA lets you toggle off the equally notorious Last Life / Alarm Clock SFX.

Metal Hawk (Namco, 1988) Disciplined nonlinear Time Attack STG, via stunning graphics tech. Beefy hardware is no joke to emulate even now! Offers a range of control options; great on DS4, arcade stick, and flightstick alike.



Omega Fighter (UPL, 1989) A game from the future, sporting Shikigami's buzz scoring, ESPGaluda's time manipulation, and rip-roaring firepower ala Batsugun, all in a super-cool package. There are Huge Battleship Stages - this is the Huge Battleship Game Includes the original game, the scoreplay-boosted Special rev, and a deceptively cool Developer board, effectively a new Arrange mode.

Thunder Dragon 2 (NMK, 1993) Formally near-perfect waveshredder/speedkiller, that unfortunately extreme stage 3 boss milk aside. (in these cases, I think a soft time limit is plenty) Even in casual survival play, tearing through each increasingly intense stage is bubblewrap-addictive. Strongest two-song OST ever from Manabu Namiki. Adds a very handy 1P/2P toggle for easy ship select.

Trigon (Konami, 1990) Personal favourite, a bitterly nails-hard Toaplanesque with hyper-metallic style and bloodening BGM. Decidedly not for everyone, though the ACA's optional hitbox reduce may help that. Give it a spin in MAME first, you'll know if it's for you. Includes the overseas Lightning Fighters rev for completism.

Viper Phase 1 (Seibu Kaihatsu, 1995) Absolute hardcore, pt2. Seibu's customary Toaplanesque, expertly leavened by kinder ship speed. Scoring is fiendishly high-performance. Masterpiece pixel art and destruction aesthetic. Includes Old & New ver, very much two games in one. PSN launch was bungled - use this! - and it still needs the AWOL st5 BG layer fixed, but it's already an admirable first attempt at the notoriously difficult SPI hardware.

War Of Aero (Allumer, 1993) Its legendary blueprint, Image Fight, is on ACA in fine form, and should be your first port of call for puzzlebox vert diabolique. Don't overlook this one however, it's an unmistakable passion project that does IREM proud. ACA ver adds some very nice control options.

XEXEX (Konami, 1991) Sublimely accessible IREMesque hori, cleverly poaching from R-Type and X-Multiply, with a winningly original Force Pod concept all its own. Outstandingly tuneful Kukeiha Club OST! Includes the oddball Orius revision; as usual with Konami, more of a curio next to the JP board, but always welcome.

[NightBeast]

Those Cybattler pics you share are what motivated me to turn on scan lines for the first time.

[BIL]

All credit to trap15 for the pointer.

[nogden]

For you guys who have been keeping up with the ACA releases, what are some of the stand out titles released so far? I’m looking to get into some non cave games and I’m primarily using a ps4 so I figured this was a good place to start.

Ten I consider particularly notable home debuts. There are dozens more I'd recommend, some of which, like Gun Frontier, Cotton, and Kaitei Daisensou, are actually their first accurate home translations. Will leave it here for now.

(a few older rec posts, for STGs and adjacent hardcores also, for more recent releases, 2024 year in review )

EDIT: Y'know, let's make it eleven. I forgot the magnificent DAIOHHH, and can't bear to boot out Gunnail or Trigon. <3 Toa-ryuu.

Cybattler (Jaleco, 1993) Immensely cool mecha STG, with 8-way locking strafe and furied slashing. Like a hybrid of Hyper Duel and Shock Troopers, with the kinematic largesse of Assault Suits Valken.

Daioh (Athena, 1993) Pitch-perfectly leavened Tatsujinesque. Rad ship vs rugged stages. Adds a Rank Gauge by director request.

F/A (Namco, 1992) Absolute hardcore, pt1. Deliberately no-frills Xeviousesque with ultra-polished stage designs and pulse-pounding techno BGM. Endgame onslaught sees the apotheosis of precision ground-shotting. Currently Japan-only, unfortunately.

Gunnail (NMK, 1993) Ruggedly tough yet attractively generous Toaplanesque starring a Homing Flamethrower, featuring a notoriously fiendish scoring mechanic. Less lives = more multiplier. Lets you toggle off the equally notorious Last Life / Alarm Clock SFX.

Metal Hawk (Namco, 1988) Disciplined nonlinear Time Attack STG, via stunning graphics tech. Beefy hardware is no joke to emulate even now! Range of control options, great on flightstick and DS4 alike.



Omega Fighter (UPL, 1989) A game from the future, sporting Shikigami's buzz scoring, ESPGaluda's time manipulation, and rip-roaring firepower ala Batsugun, all in a super-cool package. There are Huge Battleship Stages - this is the Huge Battleship Game

Thunder Dragon 2 (NMK, 1993) Formally near-perfect waveshredder/speedkiller, that unfortunately extreme stage 3 boss milk aside. (in these cases, I think a soft time limit is plenty) Even in casual survival play, tearing through each increasingly intense stage is bubblewrap-addictive. Strongest two-song OST ever from Manabu Namiki.

Trigon (Konami, 1990) Personal favourite, a bitterly nails-hard Toaplanesque with hyper-metallic style and bloodening BGM. Decidedly not for everyone, though the ACA's hitbox reduce may help that. Give it a spin in MAME first, you'll know if it's for you.

Viper Phase 1 (Seibu Kaihatsu, 1995) Absolute hardcore, pt2. Seibu's customary Toaplanesque, expertly leavened by kinder ship speed. Scoring is fiendishly high-performance. Masterpiece pixel art and destruction aesthetic. Includes Old & New ver, very much two games in one. PSN launch was bungled - use this! - and it still needs the AWOL st5 BG layer fixed, but it's already an admirable first attempt at the notoriously difficult SPI hardware.

War Of Aero (Allumer, 1993) Its legendary blueprint, Image Fight, is on ACA in fine form, and should be your first port of call for puzzlebox vert diabolique. Don't overlook this one however, it's an unmistakable passion project that does IREM proud.

XEXEX (Konami, 1991) Sublimely accessible IREMesque hori, cleverly poaching from R-Type and X-Multiply, with a winningly original Force Pod concept all its own. Outstandingly tuneful Kukeiha Club OST!

Thanks for the list BIL! So ACA reduced the hit box? It must’ve been absurd before lol, but Trigon looks right up my alley! Viper phase 1 looks awesome as well.

Admittedly I’ve been playing Diaoh since I posted the other day as that’s the first game I bought. It made me realize these older games are no joke! I’ve only been playing newer/bullethell style games as of yet, except for a couple psikyo games here and there, so I have a learning curve ahead of me. Looks like you mentioned some bangers though, so that shouldn’t be a problem. Thanks again!

[BIL]

Thanks for the list BIL! So ACA reduced the hit box? It must’ve been absurd before lol, but Trigon looks right up my alley! Viper phase 1 looks awesome as well.

Always a pleasure! Have to admit, I've never actually tried the hitbox reduce. (it's in "Game Settings" then "Preference Options," just like Daioh's Rank display, and many other ACA goodies) I got a very sketchy 1ALL a few years back, thought it played reasonably. It's one of those harder Toaplanesques with bullets quick enough, you need to pre-emptively strafe even at midrange to avoid being nicked.

I'm not sure if the reduce is an easier Arrange mode, or a patch that trims a busted hitbox back to the visible sprite. There might be some truly unfair scenarios I just didn't encounter, or notice. I've seen a few JP veterans describe the original hitbox uncharitably.

EDIT: In particular, I've seen some cite a nasty bug with the Lightning Sword bomb... I wonder if that's what stole this 2ALLers life here, and if the reduce fixes it. There are quite a few 2ALLs out there (like many of Hideyuki "Falco" Tsujimoto's games, it's a set two loops), so I'm sure it's doable even on PCB spec, just ruthless. (or maybe the midboss's laser hitboxes lingered a bit... wouldn't be the first time I've seen that, cough cough Gun.Smoke )

Gunnail and especially Daioh are the stronger recs; ala its fellow Konami superunknown, A-JAX, I'm just happy it made it home in safe hands, especially after blasting its tunes for 20+ years. (obligatory nod to that Microsoft Game Room series from a few gens back, which I think had A-JAX... the series wasn't very well-regarded, but it actually had a few I still want on ACA, like the uber-macho Devastators )

[Sturmvogel Prime]

Tecmo's Final Star Force is this week's release!
https://www.famitsu.com/article/202501/31280

[BIL]

Wanted this one forever.

[DenimDemon]

Damn!

[Shmups4ever]

The best beat em ups currently on ACA are:

Mutation Nation, the best beat em up on the neo-geo. Which is a low bar, but still. Yes, it is better than Sengoku 3. It's solidly solid.

I love this game too.... I have good memories of it !

[Sima Tuna]

Final Star Force is one I've wanted to play but haven't yet.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

Was Tecmo's Final Star Force jamma pcb conversion kits distributed in the USA back in 1992? I don't recall seeing it at any of my local arcade hangouts during the 1992-1993 timeline.

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[BIL]

This is rad. I was hoping Hamster would come through with another elusive Tecmo STG, as a mirror to last year's Silkworm, and the previous's Raiga. While it feels more conventional than Raiga, and especially the willfully batshit SW, it's exactly the rock-solid quality and well-judged generosity I expect from Tecmo's 80s arcade staff. (the early 90s feeling like their swan song; Raiga, Riot, and now Final Star Force)

Seems less blisteringly-paced than OG Star Force's bitesized protoCarnival raids. More of a feelgood big guns blockbuster ala early 90s. I'm fine with it, tbh; FSF keeps a good clip ala Raiga, and the original is perfect as-is. (a very sensible early ACA arrival; speaking of elemental early 80s fury, roll on Pleiades and Phoenix pls ) That's a bonafide Huge Fuckin Battleship in stage 4.

I could easily be wrong about FSF's score attack potential. Got the classic ground targets nestled under much bigger exchanges of firepower. I'm kinda wondering if letting those monster tanks trundle along in st2 does anything.



Blap blap! Blap blap blam! The survival time = weapon level up mechanic is kinda startling tbh. Not something I'd think would work as well as it does, hella comfy groove.

Some great tunes, left the attract booming a good while between credits. Where Metal Yuhki handled Raiga, I see More Yamasan from the classic Famicom Ninja Gaiden OSTs featured here. I wonder if Riot (Wild Fang / Ninja Gaiden) art staff worked on this... the perspective tricks in stage 3's tower climb are straight out of their masterful playbook.

(seriously, as Jeneki pointed out back at ACA release, Riot's fourth stage has one of the most masterful BG perspective sweeps ever; just look at this, no hardware tricks, just balls-out bravura.

Spoiler

^ so easy to miss in-game, with the furious pace! reminds me of the deluxe painterly backdrops Capcom and SNK mastered in their respective mid/late 90s FTGs. everything as it should be, blastin' now and 'mirin later. )

Was Tecmo's Final Star Force jamma pcb conversion kits distributed in the USA back in 1992? I don't recall seeing it at any of my local arcade hangouts during the 1992-1993 timeline.

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

I saw a few Japanese fans asking similar questions of Hamster, re: FSF's hardware distribution, PCEFX! It's such an intriguing little epoch, this, especially with Riot's near-fabled scarcity... feels like a pocket 80s dimension that snuck into the early 90s, y'know?

[mycophobia]

(seriously, as Jeneki pointed out back at ACA release, Riot's fourth stage has one of the most masterful BG perspective sweeps ever; just look at this, no hardware tricks, just balls-out bravura.

Spoiler

^ so easy to miss in-game, with the furious pace! reminds me of the deluxe painterly backdrops Capcom and SNK mastered in their respective mid/late 90s FTGs. everything as it should be, blastin' now and 'mirin later. )

whoa that's sick

[BIL]

ikr

EDIT: oh shit son! #preferenceteam of Daioh counter-stop fix fame strikes again!

[Skyknight]

Is that for Daiou, Riot, Final Star Force, or other?

EDIT: Didn’t notice the logo at first. So FSF. But what’s this about endless loops?

[BIL]

Hm, NM, I can dodge them just fine. :/ Maybe Hamster needs to crank 'em up a bit more. Still seems an utter tedious bastard waiting for the duplicate powerups, though. I wonder if this is even the infinite that got the game excluded from Gamest back in the day. I know it's a rule that no matter how batshit the exploit, someone will use it, but the thought of counterstopping the game like this is some serious Sperg Force.

EDIT: Oh, your question! This is for the boss milk timeout enemies; apparently "Fast" makes 'em more aggressive. Not quite aggressive enough though, it seems. Still, good that Hamster are aware of the issue and might tweak it further. Daioh didn't launch with its Rank meter, after all.

Looking at the HS mode rankings, I don't see any infinites yet. Not particularly bothered either way tbh. This works great as a characteristically forgiving Tecmo take on the big steamrolling blasters of latter-day Toaplan.

[OldSkoolShmuper]

Whoa, this is a good one.

[BEAMLORD]

Final Star Force, eh? Seems a crowd-pleasingly bare-bones blast-em up, I'm my brief lunchtime sortie.

Hamster with the Preference Setting magic touch, once again. The option to reduce the OG "sluggishness" is most welcome in this case. I don't mind a bit of slowdown in most cases, but was quite taken aback at just how slow you can go in this one! With this toggled on, makes for a much smoother experience.

The toggle for the bomb/rapid fire quirk is a nice bit of mod-con implementation, too. Whilst the wording is a little confusing, I believe this allows you to be able to use a bomb whilst also holding down rapid shot (un-toggled, you will have to stop firing in order to use a bomb). Would ordinarily take it as a given that you'd be able to do this as standard, so it's nice that they've ironed this out.

[BIL]

Hamster with the Preference Setting magic touch, once again. The option to reduce the OG "sluggishness" is most welcome in this case. I don't mind a bit of slowdown in most cases, but was quite taken aback at just how slow you can go in this one! With this toggled on, makes for a much smoother experience.

Yeah I'd seen JP players mention the PCB's slowdown, but even then I was shocked. Stage 2 boss staggers like Metal Slug 2. While it seems to be 30hz autofire that really puts it over the edge, it's pretty gnarly even limited to 15hz.

Definitely a good call on Hamster's part! Still chugs a bit even with it on, but at entirely more reasonable rate.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

The Switch ACA port of Final Star Force is a mere 81.6mb d/l with a MSRP of $7.99 usd on the USA region Switch eShop site. I get the impression that Tecmo's FSF stg was a "Japan only" arcade pcb kit after glossing over the arcade paperworks associated with it despite it's grand debut in the Japanese game centers back in 1992 (I never saw FSF at my local arcade joints during the 1992-1993 years). It's nice to set autofire for your "Shot" button with Type 15 as that's the best one (however, you have to disable it to properly enter your high score initials assuming you score high enough).

----------
With slowdown issues in certain parts of each stage, I can see why Tecmo didn't release FSF for the American arcades. As it is with FSF, the Tecmo arcade dev staff would've had to go back and fix the slowdown issues before releasing it internationally, especially for the arcade market stateside (as independent arcade operators and owners + street location routes want an arcade stg that's running at an arcade-spec 60fps framerate without any slowdown issues that would affect their bottom-line/potential profits down the road, otherwise they'd looking elsewhere for the "latest & greatest" arcade game "quarter-muncher" titles to "bring in the dough" -- it's business as usual).
----------

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~