Taito Legends

Taito is a gaming company that has been around for years. You might be scratching your heads wondering who they are, well let me tell you the one game that made this company famous: Space Invaders. This company has made plenty of great games that spans from the beginning of gaming. The popular trend it seems lately is to release a “collection” of classic games and release it on current generation systems, and they wanted to cash in on this trend as well and thus Taito Legends was born. Read on to find out more about this collection of classic Taito games.

Here are the games that are included in this collection: Space Invaders, Battle Shark, Bubble Bobble, Colony 7, Continental Circus, Electric Yo-Yo, Elevator Action, Exzisus, Gladiator, Great Swordsman, Jungle Hunt, The New Zealand Story, The Ninja Kids, Operation Thunderbolt, Operation Wolf, Phoenix, Plotting, Plump Pop, Rainbow Islands, Rastan, Return of the Invaders, Space Invaders Part 2, Super Qix, Thunderfox, Tokio, Tube It, Volfied, and last but not least is Zoo Keeper.

Many of these games are classics such as Space Invaders, Bubble Bobble, Jungle Hung, Phoenix, and Zoo Keeper. This means that if you have never gotten the chance to play the originals, which might include many of you, then here is your chance to play some of the games that kept players at the arcades for hours on end. Most of the other games in here are lesser known then the big boys mentioned above but you will have a great time trying out all of these games and see what gaming was like in the early 80’s.

The games that are included in here range from a variety of different genres. First you will have the platforming games, shooters, puzzle games, action, and light gun. All of these games play perfectly and are emulated really well with the exception of the light gun games. This game does not support a light gun so in exchange for that players will use an analog stick to move around the cursor on the screen to shoot the various enemies. To be honest this is not very fun and these games got old really quickly.

Graphically this game is has a very shallow look to it, and I am not talking about the actual games themselves. Of course it is understood that the games are going to have their classic look and feel to them. What I am referring to is the lack of presentation in the game. The selection menu is very bare-bones. Players can look at various arcade machines and you will get a brief description of the game. After that you just go to the next one. The developers should have done something to make the games stand out more; instead we are left with just a hack job for each game's presentation. The sound and music are faithfully recreated as well which gives the game a very nostalgic sound to it.

Taito Legends is rated Teen for mild violence. It will take up 64kb on your memory card for game saves.

Gameplay: 7.9
With the exception of the light gun games, everything else played just like the originals.

Graphics: 7.2
All of the games look just like the originals. What gets major points taken off is the bare-bones presentation of each game.

Sound: 8.0
Most of the games are ones that I have played in the past, and these sound just like the originals

Difficulty: Easy
Some of these games will prove to be a challenge just like it was back when they were first released.

Concept: 7.0
It is nice to see some of these older games making a comeback so younger players can see some of the origins of gaming.

Multiplayer: 8.2
A few of these games offer multiplayer support, and it is just as fun as it was back in the day.

Overall: 7.9
Taito Legends is a really nice complication of many classic gaming hits that were released on the arcade many years ago. If you were a fan of these games when they were first released then this collection is for you.