Poy Poy (PSX)

Do you feel want to throw hard object to someone you hate like your annoying neighbour or irritating co-worker? Well, you know what they said about video game? You can do something what you normally can't do without any risk, including not getting serious sue. So, of course you can throw someone with log or even rocket in a videogame. I'm talking about: Konami's Poy Poy (1997).

"Press Start!" said the ducking bloke. As much as i want to relieve you from suffering that come from your own stupidity (because he doesn't run like other which is the smartest course of action), i have to analyze anything from this title screen first. For instance, why "Poy Poy"? It sounds like word that come out from Yuudachi twice. Such whimsical name for title, indeed. The lass who hold the rock seems really happy that he have stone to throw to her hapless competitor. Look at her face and you shall see the terror of sadism, reader! Bloke in green looks bit dorky while the ones in blue has expression between deep determination and carelessness. And the ones in red has massive gap for mouth and...okay! okay! I press start button immediately.

 

Here's the main menu and that's the lad in blue running but nowhere the sight of the other. Maybe he outrun them by huge distance, to the outer space even. Exhibition is your standard fast match, Poypoy cup is tournament mode, and options is setting menu to adjust cpu difficulty etc. I don't want to delay another of  my article again so i will just show you  several matches instead of a full tournament. Besides, i don't think i have skill enough, yet.

 

I'll be Mike because his cocky expression and his sharp nose, remind me of Suneo Honekawa. I'm sold! After selecting character, i have to choose Glove power which is special attack or sort like that. It seems stupid to pick "knife" into boulder/rocket fight but whatever. I trust you, Sakuya Izayoi.

 

By the way, this is practice stage so enemies do nothing at all (unless controlled by other player). Bad news for those who don't like unchangeable button configuration, because there's no that kind of setting in option. Unless you play the game via emulator. You must memorize this button settings. Quite simple, aren't they? Dive is dodging dive executed by pressing direction button besides front (of character's facing) and jump button at the same time. Kind of difficult to do successfully but it's vital to survive in this game.

 

Okay i'm ready for real match. Wait! There's another Mike besides me? Preposterous! I can't change CPU's character. So i have to accept this. You will regret to be another Mike, you sod.

 

I told you before. Catch this rock, bastard! I'm the one who wear white glove, obviously. You can see that Bubba picks up Joey. Yes, you can pick up your opponent as form of close range battle. But it's tricky to do. I suggest you to pick something and throw it to your opponent. Here's something to mind: you need to hold the throw button to throw further, leaving you vulnerable in one place.

 

Yeah! Real Mike won the round. While the fake one lie unconscious with eye open.

 

Winning a round (by being the one who still standing at the end) doesn't mean you can win the match yet. A match consists of 3 rounds. At each of round, there's 3 score: Direct Hit, Luck, and Round. Round score is determined by the order of survive. Luck score is determined by how many score up item that you can get at a round. Direct hit score is determined by how many time you can hit other with direct hit from object you throw not by explosion (special move may be counted). This score indicates how active you are in a round. Discouraging you to only run around seeking safety. That's quite fair. 

There's also flying saucer emitting tractor beam or what have you. Instead of abducting people, it creates/drops object for anyone to throw into other. Do aliens treat as for blood sport entertainment purpose just like what happen in Team Buddies?

 

Here's proper stand-off between two contestant. I have bigger rock than his so i'm quite in advantage here. You can tell that bigger object throw inflict bigger damage damage than smaller ones. There's also momentum when 2 non-explosive object collided when thrown, to mind for. Another feature: a character  takes longer time to lift bigger object than smaller ones. All become accounted for strategy.  

 

The throwing contest suddenly becomes wrestling bout! Don't try this at home, kids! Once you hoist something/someone above your head you have other option beside throw it/him/her to a distance: Slam which is throw it/him/her nearly in front of you; (German) Suplex which is throw it/him/her nearly on your back which i demonstrate here.

 

Here's "Knife" special move which is throw the object along the ground while it's covered in blue light. It can travels slightly faster and further from (uncharged) throwing. Not so spectacular.  

 

On the other hand, Joey has "Hop" special move where he drop the rock in front of him and it's bouncing in a direction. I can't confirm if it's random or not, yet. Also here some valid strategy that i tend to do: stay away from the crowd and bombard them with everything you can get.    

 

I won the match with significantly big score. Yay!

 

For the next match, i will use "Poison" special move. It throws object along the ground by not so far distance but it emits black cloud on impact that makes anyone touches it becomes "exhausted" for a duration. In this status, he/she walks slow and is not able to jump and duck (which is including pick up object). There's Arnold who we saw in title screen and Kool who's supposed to be cool guy because wearing sunglasses. I can guess he is just show-off.

 

The match takes place in Moai Land. I know that Konami is quite obsessed with Moai statue but these stone bastards are annoying. They will either charge at you with open mouth or puke exploding ball. To make things more interesting, you can pick one of them and throw it to your enemy location. But you have to grab them from behind. You don't want to face directly toward that horrid gaping maw, do you?

 

This is interesting. Bubba and i got the highest score for this match. Although Moai Land isn't my favorite battlefield as i remember that i lose often there.

 

Thing get more hectic in (amusement) park arena. That monster over there is used to be a peaceful boulder. When it get bothered by one of them, it runs amok and start biting anyone. Just reminder that i wear white glove. Yes, i'm the one who is knocked out cold over there besides another "me".   

 

Meanwhile in Robot arena, things turns well in my favor. The robot in middle will spins around and fires paralyzing beam. You can either duck or jump to avoid it. Beside firing laser, it will punchs anyone or anything around him. So stay away from it is sensible strategy.  

 

This is me unleash "Thunder" special move. It's almost like "Knife" but it's still different. First, i jump first instead of crouch a bit when i do "Knife" special move. Second, the object is covered in green light. Third, the object travels much further. In fact, it will go beyond the field, making it vanish for good. By the way, Joey is in the middle of side diving there. In case you curious about him here.

I have to say that the combat is tricky. Everything that contestants do can be nullified or denied. For instance, direct hit from thrown object can be dodged by either jumping or side/back diving. While explosion can be dodged by ducking. You can crawl by pressing direction button while holding crouch/duck button. If you're crawling, you move slower but you're invincible to any explosion damage.

 

Next arena is desert. There's no creature or robot that act as hazard but once in a while there's whirlwind spawns in random spot and moves in random direction. Touching said whirlwind will makes you spin inside of it and your health will be drained. I have noticeably great luck in desert as cpu opponents seems don't care about it thus get sucked by it immediately. In this moment whirlwind give finishing blow to my opponent. I'm such a lucky git.     

 

While in Iceberg arena, i have bad luck. Quite often penguins come up from sea nearby and loitering around, damaging anyone that get contact with them. And quite often they work in my enemy's favor instead of mine. Let's see what gameplay feature that i yet to tell. That "Danger!" crate contains items if it's destroyed. The items: red heart which restores health; creamy white heart that boost Luck Bonus; exploding black ball; and blue ball that makes you "exhausted". There's thin green bar that located on every character's HUD which is energy bar. If you use special move, the green bar will be depleted and it's restored over time. There's also specialty among the character. Small characters (like Joey) move faster. While large character (like Arnold or Kool) perhaps have bigger health. Each character has special affinity to certain special move indicated by number 2 besides the name instead of 1 (for example: Mike has Thunder2). If you use said specific special move, you will unleash stronger version from the original but costs energy more. You can use defeated enemies as makeshift projectile (except for special move). I don't think there's anything else for me to say about the gameplay.

 

I thought Poy Poy (1997) takes inspiration from Crash Bash. But looking the release dates it proves the otherwise. It's certainly experimental project (Konami got lots of money from Metal Gear Solid, you see), looking by how shallow the game is. Nevertheless, it's fun short game. The throwing stuffs feature works quite well. Maybe, if there's throwing strength bar everytime you hold the throwing button, the gameplay will be better. Health can be cheap but hitting someone can be dodgy, which makes the gameplay more complex than you imagined before. Special moves provide good variable on gameplay but you have to memorize it through trial and error as there's no further explanation about them in-game. There are 13 of them and each of them are quite distinctive in form and reliability. The character differences are barely deep and significant in function term. The scoring is pretty fair. The musics are quite good and playfull. The arena hazard aren't well designed but functional enough.  

I always think Poy Poy (1997) as complex and dodgy version of Crate Bash in Crash Bash. It can't be helped. So if you get tired of Crate Bash match and eager for challenge, i can recommend you to play Poy Poy. There's UFO that provides your throwing needs, wrestling move,  walking Moai statue, special moves with cool yet vague name, boxing stationary robot that can shoot stunning laser, mini nukes that you can throw around, and romp musics. It's very charming, i must say.

Dyna Gear (Arcade)

Today i review another arcade game. But this time it's fast-paced platformer game. It's Sammy's Dyna Gear (1993)!

With the subtitle "An Action Adventure on The Era of Dinosaur" which is located above the main title which is uncommon position for subtitle. Anyway, it's another game with dinosaurs. Hooray! Don't you like the giant prehistoric reptile? But before we jump into the action. We have to know the backstory of the game, right?

 

Two starships from 2993 A.D. travel to 65 million years ago. A (time) criminal: ruthless Gustaf aboard the red starship. While a time patrol named Roger pursuits Gustaf, is in another starship. Thus they shoot each other with their starship laser cannons which ends up they fall together into a nearby planet which you may guess is inhabited by Dinosaurs.  

 

And apparently by Wolf man race too. Roger meets one of them named Wolf (Sic!). He has score to settle with Gustaf too. He said that he have brainwashed Dinosaurs to become evil. How come Gustaf have done so big evil accomplishment while he's still new to the planet as early as Roger? Forced scenario climax Gustaf's charm over Dinosaurs, is my guess.

 

Not long after i choose either as Roger or Wolf. I enter this fast-paced zany action. The control is simple: joystick to move/aim/crouch, one button to attack, and another button to jump. Right now, i attack by throwing swords and those dinosaurs become premature fossils in a jiff!

 

Then i found hammer weapon (that actually is spiked iron ball with chain) and Wolf's friend. He's not so helpful as he can only punches enemy within small distance. On the other hand, the hammer that i found is quite great. With each pressing attack button, a hammer/mace/spiked ball surround Roger. Pressing more when there's 4 of it, will activate a special rapid attack: many spiked ball will orbit him. In fact, all of the weapon in the game have that special attack by pressing attack button rapidly. So, i hope you have durable fingers if you play this game. C:

 

Wolf's fellow stop followed me and warned me about flying dragon. Here's the flying dragon. It doesn't look intimidating, dumb even. But can spit fireball, mind you.

 

This time, another Wolf’s fellow comes to help me fight the boss battle: a Triceratops. His usefulness is only to take damage from Dinosaur while I keep chucking axe at it. He’s not so tanky so no wonder he goes down quickly. God bless him. You notice that there’s giant coin with symbol that quite similar to Mortal Kombat’s ones! I can’t reach it. I can do double jump. But instead of jumping again like what i expect, i’m rolling in mid-air with close to none boost on height. Tough luck.

After i finish that Triceratops, i visit Wolf’s village. One of his friend tell me to shoot something behind him which reveal secret coins for score-up and extra life. You see coin indicator in bottom screen that has writing 31/200? If i make the upper number into 200 i will be granted with extra life. The bigger the coin, the bigger score that i can net. Do mind about the quota number! It will be increased if you have fulfilled the previous ones.

 

Next stage called The Field, even though there’s dozens of tree in the background. Take him away? Yes, i reckon i can deal with this flying “dragon” like before.

 

Turns out, it help me destroy any enemy that i encounter. Sweet!

 

I don’t have it, mate. Can’t you see I’m busy cling into this dead tree? Go away! I can cling into any solid wall or ceiling and climb along. So the platformer part in this game is not only jump around! And i'm just Time Patrol, not ninja. Eat your heart out, Ryu Hayabusa!

 

This bouncing Ankylosaurus is the sub-boss here. So i have to round back and forth to evade it. Luckily i have homing arrow as my weapon to make my job here easier.  

 

I thought i had it. Then it goes inflated so its attack become much wider. Even though the process to defeat it is remain the same only faster, I got cocky and there goes my first credit. At least, the gameover screen is fantastic: Nova blast suddenly appear in the center of screen. Michael Bay most likely will love this.  

 

After i beat that Ankylosaurus, i climb this cliffside and there's chest! i wonder what prize i can found there? Coins? Or other weapon probably?

 

Darn! At least, some narrator feels sorry to me.

 

A wolf man is being harassed by dino man, the primitive version of Reptile's (from Mortal Kombat) kin. Luckily, i'm here to safe his tail just in time. In fact he does nothing sensible like run away or fight back. He just stand there accept his cruel treatment. The lazy sod.

 

I found Gustaf's ship wreck. But he isn't here. Perhaps he's not far from here.

 

Here's Gustaf. Judging by how well his wording (which is simple yet stupid), he's man with primitive mind. No wonder, he's able to persuade Dinosaurs here to work for him.   

 

He leaves me with Barney here. He can bite and jump around. But surprisingly for boss stage, he's much easier than Ankylosaurus the sub-boss. I feel that he has less health and speed. Also he can be stunlocked.

 

Next stage named: Dino Village. But i start at this cavern that has prehistoric age version of thwomp and this mushroom. From the looks of it, you can tell that it's poisonous. But beyond my knowledge, it's also explosive! So i have to mine mushroom sweep it with my axe.

 

I don't think that flying limbless creature there is a dinosaur. This monster is more fitting to horizontal shmup game rather than platformer game like this.

 

A wolf man appears next to checkpoint flag and tells me to take this T-Rex with me. Sure, why not?     

 

I guess the wolf man tribe hold really big grudge toward dino man tribe as one of them happily sent T-Rex to assist me raze this village. The dino man had installed some primitive turrets but they're useless to stop crazy man that throws any weapon he has and this 3 tons carnivore reptile.

 

But then there's dead end for this T-Rex so only i can move further. So disappointing. :C

 

On the top of the cliffside, i encounter dino man chieftain. He’s tough to defeat thanks to his slim size and ferocity. In this screenshot, i know that he can perform flying uppercut. It’s dragon dino punch move! I lost another credit in sub-boss battle, again. 

 

I switch to Wolf. Beside sprite, he’s not much different from Roger except he jump slightly higher but run slightly slower. The boss here doesn’t move as aggressive as that Dino man chieftain. I can defeat it with no problem.

 

Or not. In case you don’t believe me about nova explosion that mark gameover, here’s the solid proof. You like it? The problem with this boss battle is can’t dodge his claw while i’m cornered. But soon i found the solution. Pressing jump button while crouching will makes me rolling. While doing so, i can bounce harmlessly on some of enemy’s attack including that claw attack. With that knowledge i can proceed to next stage.

 

Next stage is The Labyrinth. Hey! That background is the same with one in title screen. Also there's ancient robot and a chest.

 

The Labyrinth or to be more precise The Temple, is closed space stage. So you're often to climb ceiling or wall here. One of the benefit of climbing: you can disarm this falling boulder trap instead of triggering it by walking beneath it. By disarm, i mean destroy it.

 

Then a sub-boss fight happen. Did i mention that the every stage is short or can be finished relatively fast? Because it is. This time, there's 2 skeleton pterodactyl. If you can roll on their head so you can bounce harmlessly, you won't get boxed by them.

 

Only few steps from previous sub-boss fight, there's another one! It's armless Armadillosaur! Actually if you look it really closely you can see its arm hidden near chest region. He only attack you by walking toward or rolling around. You will take damage if you try to rolling jump on it. Luckily his move is quite predictable and slow so you can jump over it relatively easy.

 

Then i rolling pass spiked traps and check point flag! This reminds me of Sonic The Hedgehog game. In fact beside the rolling in ground or air, Roger or Wolf moves slow at the beginning and gradually faster like that Sega's Mascot. Thus Sammy learns a lot from 2 platformer game: Ninja Gaiden and Sonic The Hedgehog.

 

The boss stage this time: giant totem pole that come from above. Each segment can shoot rock or other things at you. But you all need to do is just hammer the attack button in front of it. The boss fight will be over soon. I still wonder why the sub-bosses are much harder than the bosses in this game.

 

I believe i never go to this bonus stage before. Maybe there's score quota for each bonus stage but i'm not sure myself. In this bonus stage, you have to collect floating items by using springy mushroom and/or climbing. Imagine Sonic's bonus stage where you can climb ceiling and wall. You got the idea here.   

 

In the Ruins stage, Roger got brutally slashed by this buffed dino man. For what he did to that village, i say he deserve this. Roger's blood spurt out! To lessen the violence intensity, there's cute flying seahorse on the left side. Nice, huh?

 

You know the scene in Lost World: Jurassic Park where dozens of Compsognathus surround humans? But imagine they got aerial support from Pteranodon kids. That's 100% worse, right? That's what happen here. Arrows have longest range and homing to enemies. But they don't homing to small enemies here. Luckily there's hammer weapon there. I can sweep them all easily with that weapon.

 

Here's the proud mother of those swarm as boss stage. At first, it takes form of bipedal dinosaurs but then it change to this mini Pteranodon. Beside flying, it can emit fireball. Overall, it's quite easy to beat.

 

Next stage is Dessert where there's dinosaurs and sand worm here. The green dino over there is helping me. As it can do nothing but rolling and biting. It's not so helpful in my quest.

 

The sub-boss this time: this ant lion. You already knew that every sub-boss is challenging. This insect is the same. Especially, it can catches me off guard by making its pincer spin like helicopter so it's able to reach highest place.

 

Then there's this dessert turtle. It's nothing compare to me and my triceratops buddy here. I like to call this specimen "Pushoversaur"

 

The boss stage: Ultrasaur. He can either spits fireball [so cliché isn't?] or drop its neck if you keep take shelter below it. It's slightly easier than that ant lion.

 

Next stage is: Sky Palace. Thanks for the obvious advice, buddy! But truth be told. I don't encounter any insta-kill pit/abyss in this game. Not even here. You only die if you lost all of your hearts and every harm mean only deplete one of them. That's sounds fair. But keep in mind that harmful things in this game are many and fast.

 

It seems he implies to keep cling on this insect that looks like the enemy. There's difference between transport bug and enemy bug. The former is in blue while the latter is in red. Both of them can be destroyed, of course. The transport bug leads me to this area where there's lots of chest. Very good!     

 

Unrelated to anything sky-ish: Lion man is the boss stage. He's moves fast and aggressively but thanks to my flying buddy here he can be beaten well.

 

The final stage: Castle. You can guess that it's home to boss and sub-boss rush. How dull. Maybe i should talk about the weaponry. There 4: swords, hammers, axes, and arrows. Swords cover short area in front of player's aim with hefty damage. Hammers surround player has quite small damage per hit but has superb rate/speed. Axes deal big damage has longest range with wide hitbox but fairly slow. Arrows have same range with axe, travel slightly faster and has homing capability but inflict the least damage. Everytime you get new weapon, you will get Auto Shot bar. If you have it, you can hold the attack button to attack rapidly and perform special rapid attack more frequently. Auto Shot bar will be decreased if you execute it. Speaking of it, it depends on weapon you carry. If you carry sword, you will execute thousand stabs. If you carry hammer, many spiked balls will orbit you very fast. If you carry either axe or arrow, you will launch which one you carry in eight directions.  

 

Naturally i meet the lion man again. But this time, he joins my side. How delightful.

 

He's less fast than before. But he's tank-y enough to take damage from enemies which is great. Also, there's these cobramen that appear for the first time. But that's quite ignorable, right?

 

Then there's red mermen here. This remind me of early section in Castlevania. Do you feel the same thing?

 

Finally, i meet Gustaf. But he soon dive into red water below (where those mermen come from). I thought we will have fierce battle.

 

So you turn into electric Arowana. He bursts out from below, immediately spits 2 exploding ball and back into the water. You have to stay away from him then approach him fast otherwise you can't hurt him efficiently.

 

Then he has second form: Carnotaurus with more horn in the back of the head. He's like other boss with aggressive move (like jump around occasionally then stop for attack with fast pace) but he's the tallest of all.

 

The real problem is his 3rd and also final form: Wyvern. He flies very fast to everywhere and sometime stop to blow firebreath. Did i mention that any skinship with enemy is lethal to our hero? Because it is. And this bastard exploits this with absolute obnoxiousness. Once you run out life here, you have to fight him from the first form. It seems sword weapon can make this final battle easier. So i suggest you do that too.  

 

Like in 101 villain's rule: your castle will crumble if you die, Gustaf is destroyed along with his prehistoric castle. It also happen in Metamorphic Force, now that i think about it. Later Roger is surprised that his starship has been repaired by Wolf's friends, homemade style.  

 

Would you look at that! Despite how primitive the repair is, the starship can go well, i hope. Roger's departure to home accompanied by Wolf's howl and my feeling of satisfaction and relieved. Dyna Gear (1993) is your typical platformer arcade game that has fast pace. As fast as horse wearing roller skate instead of horse shoe. The game feels really fast thanks to narrow screen. It also allow every action to be so explosive. The music feels ignorable thank to exciting action and fantastic sound effect. Seriously, i can't remember about the music at all. I'm sorry. The visual effect superb. The weapons are all interesting and distinctive. The special attack are what makes the game special than other generic platformer. Roger and Wolf are versatile platformer hero but not so good at jumping. Checkpoints can be harsh especially in final boss fight. The enemy's designs are good even though 40% of the enemies aren't either belong to prehistoric age or dinosaurs. The difficulty can be either challenging and fun or bit unfair but never to the point of nigh impossible. Keep in mind that there's "Sub-bosses are more difficult than bosses" phenomena. Healing items can be scarce. 8 levels sounds long for arcade game but thankfully each of them are quite short and quite well designed.

The conclusion: i can suggest you to play Dyna Gear (1993). It's one of interesting platformer arcade game beside GanryukiMusashi but with more blasting action and narrow screen. Also there's dinosaurs there. Though most of them are hostile and only some of them are willing to help you. Or maybe i can interest you with the existence of wolf men in the game? Though i'm not wolf (or werewolf) liker, i can say they're well designed. That's quite something, right?