Ah! Do you smell that? That’s the smell of retro gaming there, people… smells old. Wonder why.
The PSP, another system companies can use to recycle their old stuff… I mean bring us back to the glory days of old… yeah. There’s a ton of glory days stuff I’d like to see that nobody is publishing (so stop sitting on that Ultima license EAGames and gimme a classic Ultima collection on PSP already!)!
But you don’t want to hear me complain about the good old days nobody wants to remind me of (even if I do want them to remind me of it… games like Ultima I-V, the original Dragon Warrior games, or a ton of other retro RPGs nobody is bringing out), you want to hear about the Remixed Edition of CAPCOM Classics… don’t you.

When it comes to retro gaming you have a fistful of choices. Midway, Temco, Atari, they’re all doing the retro gaming thing. But maybe for your buck you’ll find that this collection might be your cup

of retro Coke (before it was Coke Classic before the advent of the failed Coke II). Of course if you happen to be a fan of certain retro genres then there is a better chance of you loving this game.

First off if you happen to be a fan of the old style scrolling shooters (from the classic 1941 to games like Last Duel, Forgotten Worlds, SideArms, Varth, Section Z, driving shooter Speed Rumbler and a rarity like Legendary Wings (featuring a female lead in the days before the first sex symbol video game goddess arrived in the well endowed form of one Lara Croft) might be for you. In fact this game might be for you as a large fistful of the games in this collection are, yes, shooters!

Beat em ups? How about classic side scrollers Final Fight or the lesser known Captain Commando?
Maybe you’d like an overhead Gauntlet style beat-em-up in Avenger, or side scrolling action button mashers like Black Tiger or the curiously fun Mega Twins.

Golden

Axe clone? How about Magic Sword.

Cult classic gaming? Maybe Street Fighter (original), Bionic Commando or the action cult classic Strider might be up your alleyway.

Add in innovative gameplay in the three-games-in-one offering of Three Wonders (one part Ghost & Goblins faux side scrolling action yarn, one part shooter and one part overhead block pushing puzzler) or the quiz meets RPG stylings of Quiz & Dragons.

A lot of these games, if you’re the kind of person to enjoy them, might fit your retro bill.

A few flaws though.

1-Too many shooters! I would have liked maybe the classic Ghosts & Goblins (since I bought it up), or some other classic CAPCOM games to round out the collection with a more solid set of games.

2-No, really, I didn’t need that many shooters.

3-They could have updated Quiz & Dragons with a more modern set of questions for this re-release. As it stands, however, the game is burdened with questions that are over a decade old.

4-Is it me or does this game seem to

eat up PSP power far faster than any other game I have ever reviewed on the PSP?!? How the heck is that happening!! Obviously you shouldn’t play this game on the road unless you’re actually going out to meet people who are playing this game… and really, what are the odds of THAT happening! This is a fireside retro game to sit by the soft glow of a roaring fire (or a favorite reading lamp in the absence of a roaring fire in a invention called a “fireplace“) and play away (with your PSP plugged into your wall to keep the thing from tapping out of energy too fast).

Overall while the game could have used more variety in games (too many shooters), and could have given Quiz & Dragons a fresh coat of quizzicals (not to mention fixed the problem that seems to make my PSP an energy guzzler every time I play this game) it’s still fun to play.

4 fond memories of retro gaming out of 5