Source: VideoGames: The Ultimate Gaming Magazine – June 1994

Video gaming magazine can have a complicated lineage. One of my favorites, VideoGames & Computer Entertainment morphed into VideoGames: The Ultimate Gaming Magazine but many of the editors/writers I liked went on to reboot Electronic Games instead. VideoGames spawned Tips and Tricks which, though they overlapped for a while, essentially replaced it. I followed VG&CE but not so much VideoGames and Tips and Tricks… Anyway, the June 1994 issue of VideoGames includes:

News

• Input – A discussion of the then new video games rating system.

• Press Start – More about the ratings system and the political pressure that led to it; Nintendo announces the Super Game Boy; Revolution-X featuring Aerosmith is released in the arcades; an interview with the makers of Way of the Warrior for the 3DO; NovaLogic works on helicopter sim for the Saturn; Philips announces lower priced ($299) CD-i; and more…

Previews

• Demolition Man – An action game for the Sega Genesis based on the movie of the same name featuring Sylvester Stalone, Wesley Snipes and Sandra Bulloch.

• Tennis All-Stars – A tennis game for the Genesis in the new “J-Cart” format. A J-Cart in addition to containing the game also added two additional controller ports for 4-player action. This tennis game allowed 4 players in a doubles game.

• Psycho Pinball – Another J-Cart, this one featuring video pinball with six tables.

• Kasumi Ninja – What would turn out to be a pretty decent fighting game for the Atari Jaguar.

• Doom – A pretty good translation of Doom for the Atari Jaguar (they seemed to keep porting this game to new systems for years and years) but really, no version beats the original PC version.

• Club Drive – A great example of one of the many games with a rushed development schedule for the Jaguar and it shows. While game play wasn’t terrible, the graphics and music were, especially for a supposedly “64-bit” system.

• Lawnmower Man – Another movie based game. This one is for the Sega CD and the game/movie heavily featured virtual reality.

• Mighty Morphin Power Rangers – Power Rangers was all the craze at the time so of course there would be games. This side-scrolling beat-em-up was released for the Super Nintendo and Game Boy.

Tips & Tricks

• Tempest 2000 – Tips to skip levels and to play bonus levels.

• NBA Jam – Tricks to enable the special guest players from the arcade version, enable power-ups such as speeding up game play, set your player “on fire” for the whole game, and more.

• Ground Zero Texas – A mini strategy guide to help get you through this FMV game.

• Robocop Versus The Terminator – A trick to unlock the MA-17 version of this game for the Genesis.

• MLBPA Baseball – A bunch of passwords to activate power pitching, power hitting, double throwing speed, double running speed, enable higher bouncing balls, play on ice, and more.

• Chuck Rock II – Tricks to skip levels or even entire zones.

• …and lots more!

Strategy Guides

• Daffy Duck: The Marvin Missions – General tips as well as guides to each level of this side-scrolling action game featuring Marvin the Martian and Daffy Duck for the Super Nintendo.

• Kether – Strategy guide for a weird sort of 3D shooter that nobody had ever heard of for the CD-i.

• Tempest 2000 – Make it through all 100 levels of this update to the classic arcade game on the Atari Jaguar.

Reviews

• Super Street Fighter II Turbo – This review is for the arcade version of the game which had just been released.

• Spectre – This game for the Super Nintendo is essentially a 3D battle game in which you are placed in a flying craft in an arena and must battle it out with robots. It’s an ok game but without much variety. The PC version was better for the simple reason that you could play over a network with multiple people.

• Rocko’s Modern Life – This is a platform/puzzle game for the Super Nintendo based on the Nickelodeon cartoon of he same name. It ends up being pretty good for a kids game based on a license.

• Super Loopz – A puzzle game for the Super Nintendo in which you must construct polygons. There are various modes including two-player cooperative and competitive modes. It is a pretty good game if you are a fan of puzzle games.

• Flintstones – This game based on the cartoon for the Super Nintendo mixes a variety of genres including racing, platform, and board game. However, it ends up being too short and easy to provide much value.

• Jetsons – A fairly unique platform game for the Super Nintendo based on the cartoon. It is an excellent game overall but the challenge level makes it better for older players than for younger kids.

• Asterix – An average (at best) platform game for the Sega Genesis.

• Mortal Kombat – The Sega CD version of this game offers a few relatively minor upgrades including some FMV, a soundtrack and a few more frames of animation.

• Third World War – A strategy game for the Sega CD that the reviewer compared to KOEI’s offerings. The graphics aren’t great, the interface is complicated and the voice acting is pretty awful but as a strategy game it’s not bad.

• Rise of the Dragon – A cyberpunk themed graphic adventure for the Sega CD sounds like a good idea but unfortunately, this particular implementation is average at best. It was also a conversion of a game that had been around on the PC for a few years already.

• Super Air Zonk – Overall, a great platform game for the Turbo Duo but at the end of the day it’s much to short, especially for a CD based game.

• Space Ace – A great conversion of this laser disc based arcade classic for the CD-i. I was never really a big fan though.

• The Incredible Hulk – An excellent comic book themed game for the Game Gear that this reviewer like even better than the Genesis version. The only downside was the relatively poor and monotonous sound.

• Ninja Gaiden III – This game for the Atari Lynx looks and plays much like the NES version. And that’s a good thing.

• The Horde – This game for the 3DO tries to combine, not very successfully, strategy/simulation with fantasy based action.

• Twisted – An interesting and rather unique board game/game show combo for the 3DO.

• Micro Reviews – Short reviews of several games including Spider-Man and the X-Men (Game Gear), Aladdin (Game Gear), G2 Rider (Game Gear), and more.

Other Cool Stuff

• Alien vs. Predator: Stalking the Jaguar, Burning Up the Arcades – Interview with Atari producer James Hampton about Alien vs. Predator for the Atari Jaguar. Also, a look at the arcade version of AvP which is a completely different game (fighting game vs. FPS).

• SportsWire: Sports game news, reviews, previews and more – Midway releases NBA Jam TE for the arcade; Sterling Sharpe signs with Jaleco for a Super Nintendo football game called Sterling Sharpe: End to End…but I don’t remember this one; previews include World Cup USA ’94 (Super NES), Mario Andretii Racing (Genesis), Champions World Class Soccer (Genesis), and Suzuka 8 Hours II (arcade); a review of Baseball Tonight for the Super Nintendo; a review of Double Dribble: The Playoff Edition for the Genesis; a review of Jammit for the Genesis; and a review for Soccer Shootout for the Super Nintendo.

• Hardware: Gaming accessories galore – New items include the Super Link multiplayer adapter for the SNES, the Mega Mouse for the Genesis, the Interactor Virtual Reality Vest, and more.

• Global Gaming – Featuring Sonic Drift for the Game Gear, Dragon Ball Z 2 for the Super Famicom, and Waka Taka Osumo for the Super Famicom.

…and more!