Super Star Soldier limps onto Wii Virtual Console

24 Comments by Kyle Orland Nov 27th 2006 10:15PM
Filed under: Retro, Nintendo Wii, Action

It's time for fun with Virtual Console math. OK, so a few weeks ago Nintendo promised 30 games would be available for the classic gaming download service by the end of the year. Fourteen of those games premiered on the service at launch (or just after), leaving 16 more to be released in the remainder of 2006. With Nintendo set to premiere new VC content on Mondays and only five more Mondays in 2006 (including today) we could reasonably expect three or four virtual console games each week, right?

Apparently not. With less than two hours remaining in Monday on the East coast, the Wii Shop Channel is only showing one new game today: TurboGrafx-16 vertical shooter Super Star Soldier.

We suppose its Nintendo's prerogative to slow-play its 2006 Virtual Console hand like this, but we're a little frustrated that we still have to wait for promised classics like ToeJam and Earl and Ecco the Dolphin. It shouldn't take much work on Nintendo's part to upload these decades-old ROMs to their servers -- perhaps the slow release is a way to offer a respite to Nintendo download servers that reportedly slowed to a crawl shortly after launch.

Anyway, the game is up and available for 600 points, so go and buy if you're into the whole classic shmup thin.

[Update: Fixed some math errors in paragraph 1]

Tags: SuperStarSoldier, tg16, turbografx16, VirtualConsole, VirtualConsoleMonday, wii

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(Page 1) Reader Comments

Cronotrigger913: Nov 27th 2006; 10:29PM

Does anyone know if that's a game worth getting? It looks really good, even when judging it by those horribly small pics that Nintendo shows when browsing the games. If it's somewhat enjoyable, I'm definitely picking it up.

Eggman: Nov 27th 2006; 10:40PM

It's a very fun classic shooter. Pretty difficult. I find that it's worth the points. Good pick up and play.

funkonaut: Nov 27th 2006; 10:45PM

I never played it, but I sure did lust after a TG-16 when I was younger. I just couldn't justify the purchase since the SNES was right around the corner. I guess I should read up on if Bonk was really as good as the hype since it's now available for a measly $6...

Gill: Nov 27th 2006; 10:48PM

Damn it Nintendo... give us Link to the Past already!!! =P

skyrous: Nov 27th 2006; 10:52PM

doing a quick google search here's a web site that talks about the star soldier series. have a look and see if you like.
http://hg101.classicgaming.gamespy.com/starsoldier/starsoldier.htm

Zam: Nov 27th 2006; 11:02PM

C'mon Nintendo. You can do much better than this. Man, from what I've seen, there's only one or tewo games worth buying. I'm still waiting for all the good classics.

ErbilT: Nov 27th 2006; 11:03PM

You know, I actually have really fond memories of this game. I think I bought it on clearance about ten years ago for about $10. It wasn't half-bad.... difficult as all hell though.

Hostile: Nov 27th 2006; 11:03PM

I thought Nintendo had said these are not ROMs and they're specifically coded to for the Wii, which should take time. It also got me sulking because we won't be able to transfer them to the DS.

Tony: Nov 27th 2006; 11:13PM

This is an awesome game. Do not dismiss it because you've not heard of it. There's a lot of good TG16 titles out there.

redjack: Nov 27th 2006; 11:26PM

@3

Bonk was definitely fun. Don't know how well it's stood up against the test of time, but I always had a ball with Bonk growing up.

I'd like to see more companies release TG-16 titles.

Shadow Hog: Nov 27th 2006; 11:26PM

As interested as I am in trying TJ&E and Ecco for the first time, ever, I have to say... screw them, where's Gunstar Heroes?

Ando: Nov 27th 2006; 11:28PM

While I too want more games and faster, it's not just uploading roms... each game comes with a full digital instruction manual.

Dan: Nov 27th 2006; 11:50PM

I'm really kind of disappointed with the big N over this. There's a pretty fine line between spacing out the hits so we're not overwhelmed, and holding back the gems in the hopes that people will buy more of the crap. Unfortunately, Nintendo's nowhere near that line. So much of the current lineup feel like throwaway additions.

Voxaryx: Nov 27th 2006; 11:51PM

Well, considering that Nintendo is headquartered in Washington (US) and BC (Canada), both in the west coast, it makes sense that the Monday "deadline" would be midnight Pacific Time, which gives them 3 extra hours.

Harry: Nov 28th 2006; 12:03AM

Yeah, I'm with #13 on this one. I understand that they want to give the shitty games a chance and they want gamers to buy titles they didn't previously know about (honestly, when they drop Link to the Past or River City Ransom, who's going to care what other games are out that week?), but come on, the system launches with MAYBE two titles worth buying (Zelda 1 and Sonic 1) but those are BIG maybes. I am waiting for Sonic 2 at least, but as it stands, my Wii-Wallet is empty, and it'll stay that way until they drop something on the VC that's actually worth buying...and it's looking like that might be a while...sadly.

Knoxximus: Nov 28th 2006; 12:09AM

I used to wear this game OUT back in like '90(?)!! If you like shumps, don't sleep!

Cronotrigger913: Nov 28th 2006; 12:27AM

So yeah, I went with your guys judgment and picked this game up on VC just now. Yeah man, this game is pretty cool. Definitely worth the $6. Hard as balls, though. One hit, and back to the beginning of the level you go, even if you at the boss. Man, kids got it easy these days. If kids played games like this now, they'd be running home to momma.

Sean DL: Nov 28th 2006; 1:18AM

I'm just saying Next Monday, when the Wii launches in Japan...we'll see a whole lot of new games online...

It's when we got nothing this week....

vio: Nov 28th 2006; 6:02AM

I did a search on YouTube and found a bunch of gameplay footage. Looks pretty intense. I'm definitely going to download it.

http://youtube.com/results?search_query=super+star+soldier

TurboGrafx was such an underrated console..

tcc3: Nov 28th 2006; 8:13AM

Speaking of Ecco the Dolphin...Wheres my next get dolphin simulator Sega? Hmm?

If any title could use a 3-d, High Def revamp its Ecco the Dolphin.

webrunner: Nov 28th 2006; 9:04AM

Strangely enough, there's more titles listed here:
http://wii.nintendo.com/virtualconsole.jsp
Then got released.

Columns, Gunstar Heroes, Ecco, Ristar, and Toejam and Earl are all on that list, among others.

Maybe they're doing staggered release dates like with the TG games last week? The announcement in the Nintendo forums is that the updates for the week have "begun", not that Super Star Soldier is this week's new title.

fush: Nov 28th 2006; 9:28AM

I'm waiting for WaveRace 64 and the Wii follow-up.

Datix: Nov 28th 2006; 9:37AM

@21

If you read the last line in the blurb on that page about VC games, it reads, "The titles listed below will be available before the end of December." It's a clever way of saying buy the Wii right now, but they've given themselves till the 31st with that last line.

But yeah, so far I have:

Sonic the Hedgehog
Super Mario 64
Bonk's Adventure
Bomberman '93
Wario's Woods

Not a bad lineup, but having never owned a TG-16, and with the short amount of playtime I've had with Bonk, I have to say it's a bit of a letdown. :(

The other's are great though. Now if they'd just push Gunstar Heroes out the door...

Greg: Dec 10th 2006; 12:27PM

How well did Bonk's Adventure hold up over time?

The answer is well enough for me to purchase it and my 10 year old son to get hooked on it as if the game just came out. He never played it before but after showing him the game he continues to work through the levels. The game is as much fun now as it was back in the 80s.

Also Super Star Soldier, this is for any shmup fan. It has great power ups and fantastic level design.

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