Taito Legends 2

The Good
This collection is huge, 39 games from different eras are sure to fulfill your any arcade gaming needs. Some games rise above the others in both terms of fun gameplay and interesting concept. Games such as Elevator Action Returns, Don Doko Don and Cleopatra as well as Puzzle Bobble 2 and Puchi Carat certainly rise above the mass with neat graphics and good 2-player experience.

Older games such as Lunar Lander, Crazy Balloon and Alpine Ski also provide a time trip back in time. And if you prefer shoot'em ups there's a wide load of them in there. As a curiosity Growl's cheesy storyline is worth for a laugh or two when playing with a friend.

There's something for everyone. Beat 'em ups, Shoot 'em ups, fighting, action RPG, puzzle games and platformers from the last 3 decades, all in a neat package and easy to use system.

The games beginning intro has catchy tune and shows a small piece of each game included in the collection, though PS2 version doesn't have one of the games shown in the video. The graphics are high quality and if you're playing on HD TV with component cable, the image quality will be superb.

Before starting the game you usually can change button settings, review game info and even take a peek at the game info provided by the developers, such as meaning of power ups, special attacks or other interesting trivia about the game.

The Bad
Arcade games are from old times when games didn't need to be too easy. In fact they're insanely difficult and due to slightly hard controls in some games they're nearly impossible. It's good if you like challenge, but in my case I just got frustrated. Coin system helps with some games to continue the game as if nothing happened (usually resetting score to 0), but that takes away the fun from playing because you'll finish the game anyway after playing long enough.

These games mentioned earlier include Growl where tens of enemies attack you at the same time and you can't do anything to block them or avoid them. Also many of the scrolling shoot'em ups cause pain by their difficulty level.

One thing I was slightly taken down by was the 3 Space Invaders included in the package. It's not that I didn't like Space Invaders, it's just that one of them could have been easily replaced by some other game. However the wacky Space Invaders '95 and Space Invaders DX (original ones and parody + 2 player versions) earned their spots.

The Bottom Line
There would be dozens of other games to talk about but my time and will is limited.

I can still warmly recommend this game collection to any person who's into retro gaming. However be prepared for intense difficulty if you are aiming for the high score, if you haven't played these games before you'll die a lot.

Overall there are some bad games included, but most of them are very good. provides you a neat clean cut-through of some classic arcade games from last .

The Good
I'm a big fan of classic gaming from any era, and since I play primarily on my PC, it's always a joy when I can find a collection like this. With games from an era I never truly got to experience, this Taito Legends (the second game in Taito's Legends series of collections) is packed with tons of classic, and obscure, arcade treasures.

There seem to be more scrolling-shooters this time around, with graphic powerhouses like Darius Gaiden, Elevator Action Returns, and Bubble Symphony mingling with older titles like Alpine Ski and Crazy Balloon.

Each games has extras like configurable controls, scans of the original flyers sent out to arcade owners and the like. Most are also two player, and they work fine with many different controllers.

Also, some of the games weren't widely available, and getting to play games I had never heard of, like Growl and Gun Frontier, was a ton of fun.

The Bad
But, though this collection has great games, and plenty of cool bonus features, it does have some warts. Chiefly at fault is a horrible menu system that forces you to scroll through each of the games before you come to the one you want. Ideally you would only need to select a title from a drop-down list, but not here.

Also annoying is the game's habit of resetting your controls each time you load it up. I have to continually reconfigure my game controller to work with it each time I play. I also found the lengthy disc-check the game goes through to be tedious; anything that keeps me from my game is not a good thing.

And, though this obviously doesn't bother me, some people may find the going a bit tough. These are arcade games after all, and they are much harder than your average console game of the times. But with the controllable difficulty most players should be able to find a setting to suit them.

The Bottom Line
Overall, I would highly recommend this collection to anyone who has fond memories of their local arcade, and to anyone interested in classic gaming. If you're a fan of beat-'em-ups, scrolling-shooters, or puzzle games, there's sure to be something on this disc to interest you.