Old School Arcade Review (terminator 2)

[Saint_Michael 3]

Well it is almost summer time which means school is almost over, seniors graduating across the world and of course blowing millions of dollars into the arcade. Well people did that even during the school season but either way we still spent millions in quarters playing every arcade including the fighting and gun games. Which brings me down memory lane for one of the biggest games to come out on the market and a great year for movies as well and to think I was just a skinny little boy collection baseball cards and playing Nintendo and sega at the time. Ahh 1991 a very big year for James Cameron, and Arnold as they scored big time in the Box office with the sequel to Terminator in 1984 with Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Never saw it in theaters but of course I was 10 at the time and god forbid I go see a Rated R movie, of course I would see on tape anyways . However, that didn't pull me from a great arcade game of the early 90s either and so today I will review if not one of the best FPS games of old school arcades in the word. So in the famous words of Arnold, "I be back, arcade style" I give you Terminator 2 Arcade Review.

 

 

Terminator 2: Judgement Day-Arcade

 

Some screen shots

 

 

 

Game Maker: Midway

 

Year: 1991

 

Levels: 10

 

Price: 50 cents

 

Sound: 9 (got to love live audio screams and explosions and getting the good job from Arnold, I would have given this a 10, but After playing it for the first time in a long I feel as though it was lacking especially in gunfire and explosion effects, of course when I used the light the kick back was realistic.)

 

Graphics: 9.5 (pixelated live actors is what lost the .5, although motion capturing was big in the arcade world and if I remember correctly Mortal Kombat started that off, background detail was good especially due to the fact most of it was dark backgrounds to begin with. Explosion graphics were good and when those terminators god up close and personal the detail was awesome as well.

 

Mini Games: I wouldn't say this would be a mini game but more like a level, in which John Conner and a truck gunner are racing towards skynet and basically you have to protect them from the HK's. But if you failed you had a chance to start over, of course after awhile your power meter goes down and game over and so I toss it up to the readers if you consider this a mini game or not.

 

Difficulty: 10 (I give this a extreme 10 because of how difficult this game was and still is, especially when you run out of missiles to blow up large groups of terminators and destroy the background up. Sad to say even after tweaking the MAME I yet to be it, but more to come on that).

 

Gameplay: It's a FPS (First Person Shooter) that uses the lightgun to blow stuff up sky high and rain destruction over the machines and later humans in the later stages.

 

Plot: Well for the first part of the game destroy skynet and send a terminator back in time and then latter half of the game is protect john conner and destroy the t-1000 simple enough I guess. AHAHAHA was I complete wrong and those who played it.

 

First Impressions DUDE!! I was blowing money left and right into this game I would say I put in at least $100 in change through solo play and tag team play. This game was hard as hell playing it solo especially since your moving that gun all over the place, but with a partner you only had to concentrate on half the screen. The farthest I got ever was the truck level, which is the third stage and that's were some of my games ended, but usually it was a toss up between first and second stage because those bosses take for eve to blow up. I been in lines and in groups playing this game, to my memory I haven't seen one person ever beat this game and I doubt I heard anyone claiming to do so either. Either way this game made millions during it's run in the early 90s. I even played the ports for this game as well and I believe I got to the third stage once but most of the time I end up dying in the second stage. Some good times playing that game especially when my brother and I would tear that game apart just to get killed off by those machines.

 

16 years later: Well once I was able to get the calibration set correctly away I went with two players, man I still sunk in fake quarters to play this game and change the game settings, but this time I got to level 9 and thats when I have been stuck ever since, because in that level you have to destroy a helicopter that comes in at different angles. However, the trick is that all the helicopter needs is one hit and the truck is destroyed. The one and only faq I found on this game gives very little detail on how to beat this level, although they give a specific coordinate on where to aim the gun of course that didn't help either way I am stuck on that level, but someone made a recommendation to use the mouse for the gun control, it does make sense since you can move the gun a bit quicker then keyboard I guess I will give it a try sometime.

 

Overall Ranking need I say 10 for this awesome game, it's difficulty and replay value is beyond what most arcade games could give especially Dance Dance Revolution and it's dancing machine....yuck. I will see if I can figure this stage out and hopefully beat it one. So who can claim that they beat this game you let me know and I give you a cookie.

 

So now for a catchy slogan.....

 

"Games don't get old, just people!"

 

--Now for some copyright info--

 

Images and of course games are copyrighted to its perspective owners blah blah blah. Roms are illegal and so do not get caught blah blah blah or else blah blah blah. Reviews and opinions are my own so don't argue with me unless you can prove otherwise why this game sucks and 100% of the time you are wrong because one your either a new school gamer and don't know a good game when you see it or two, well there is no two so HA!!. All slogans, trademarks and names excluded the games I review are copyrighted to me blah blah and blah. 2007-2009 SM Old School Legend.

Edited January 16, 2009 by Saint_Michael (see edit history)