A pair of games that share more in common than they might appear to at first glance. Power Racer traces its history back more than a decade: It's a portable conversion of an arcade dot-gobbler that predates Pac-Man by a year. That might not seem to have much to do with the Japan-only Painter Momopie, a game about a witch with a paint roller, but ultimately both these Game Boy releases belong to the same genre and do a great job of demonstrating the difference a decade made in how a specific type of game concept could be interpreted. These aren't the most beloved or best-known games on the system, but they're worth a look regardless.

Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! And be sure to check out the Retronauts podcast (http://www.retronauts.com), where I (and many others!) tackle a much wider array of classic gaming topics each week.

At last, the "metroidvania" concept begins to live up to its name. Metroid was on-point from the start, but Castlevania was slower to come around to the exploratory action-RPG concept. After the baby steps of the original Castlevania (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nealF8LlXxs) and Vampire Killer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoXEk_vegkc), Castlevania II felt like the first meaningful effort to turn the quest to stop Count Dracula into a proper adventure. It was also kind of a mess, but hey, like I said—baby steps.

Also in this episode, Compile gives us another interesting twist on the action-RPG with Golvellius. It's not really a metroidvania, but that's OK.

Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! And be sure to check out the Retronauts podcast (http://www.retronauts.com), where I (and many others!) tackle a much wider array of classic gaming topics each week.

Halloween season is here once again, and you know what that means: Time for more Castlevania-themed NES Works videos. It's the Pumpkin Spice of retrogaming YouTube videos. This year, we're looking at the OTHER Castlevanias—that is, the other games that relay the exact same story as the original Castlevania (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nealF8LlXxs), tracking Simon Belmon's trek through Dracula's castle. All of these games cover the same narrative and gameplay beats.

Vampire Killer for MSX is in some ways the game most like Castlevania—it was produced in tandem with the NES game, using many of the same gameplay assets—yet also the least like it. So contradictory! Haunted Castle feels like the mutant version of the NES game. Not the kind of mutation that leads to super powers like the X-Men. The kind like when that guy falls in the toxic sludge in RoboCop. Super Castlevania IV—well, no need to belabor the point (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eXtQVjv3uE). And finally, Castlevania Chronicles, the final (and arguably) greatest exploration of Simon's journey. Mercilessly difficult, but so artfully crafted and filled with inventive moments that you can't help but want to keep dashing yourself helplessly against its proverbial rocks.

Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! And be sure to check out the Retronauts podcast (http://www.retronauts.com), where I (and many others!) tackle a much wider array of classic gaming topics each week.

While this isn't the end of our side excursions into the Atari 7800 chronology, it's the last for the time being. These four releases bring the console's lineup in line with the current state of NES Works (January 1988), and it would be a while before more games followed. Thankfully for the Atari faithful, the console's lineup with fatten up significantly in 1988 and ’89, but there's no getting around the fact that its slow start really hurt the system.

Also of note this episode: The final classic Namco conversion for 7800, and the first batch of (highly faithful) classic computer game adaptations.

Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! And be sure to check out the Retronauts podcast (http://www.retronauts.com), where I (and many others!) tackle a much wider array of classic gaming topics each week.

Our second look at the Atari 7800's release chronology takes us through the initial launch lineup and to its first post-launch title. On the whole, though, this set of games shares a lot in common with the previous episodes: Very good renditions of pre-crash arcade classics, dropped upon the world a little after their sell-by date.

Don't let the unfortunate circumstances of the 7800's birth distract you, though; these are some excellent arcade conversions. A couple of them, most notably Food Fight, are arguably best-in-class caliber adaptations. You may notice some changes in how this video is edited and presented compared to other videos. I've steadily been tweaking my approach over the past few months, and I was fortunate enough to have a free weekend to burn through tinkering with a few different concepts. It's coming along nicely, though as always, it could still use a bit more fine-tuning.

Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! And be sure to check out the Retronauts podcast (http://www.retronauts.com), where I (and many others!) tackle a much wider array of classic gaming topics each week.