Midway Arcade Treasures 2 review

I used to love amusement parks because due to the arcade machines. Home computers couldn’t compete with the power of a machine designed to simply play one game, and the first time I saw the new Mortal Kombat, or enjoyed destroying buildings in Rampage: World Tour, they really blew me away. If I had been playing these games at the arcade, within the first couple of hours of enjoying Midway Arcade Treasures 2 I would have spent over £20.

The first compendium contained a good variety of games that were from the much earlier days of Midway’s games. These new entries contain more modern titles that more gamers will likely remember, and it seems to me that having played them in the past will make the product much more appealing for the novelty value.

Presented in a clean and efficient menu, each game loads quickly and almost all of them play identically to the arcade originals. (At least the ones I’d played before.) Free-play seems to be a consistent theme throughout the games, so provided you have the patience, you’ll be able to complete most of the games without having a monetary heart attack.

Reviewing 20 games at once?

Let’s be honest, if you’ve never played any classic arcade machines, are new to video games and have been spoilt by the likes of San Andreas and Final Fantasy X then you may not find much more than the equivalent of a cartoon’s worth of entertainment here. Enough to pick up and play for 20 minutes when there’s nothing else to do, but hardly an immersive product with integral storyline and snappy plotlines.

That said, there’s nothing to say it isn’t addictive. When I introduced one of my flatmates to Rampage World Tour we sat and played for an hour on the same repetitive gameplay because it was just fun.

Other favourites that I welcomed revisiting were Mortal Kombat II and 3. While they remain pretty much arcade perfect, the PS1 version of MK3 (still in my collection) released in 1995 was a superior version. If it weren’t for the fact that purists will want an arcade version I might complain, however the lack of the original Mortal Kombat to complete the series is a small disappointment.

New discoveries

Unless you spent all your pocket money in the arcade, there’s very little chance that you won’t find something new here that you won’t have played before.

And while I was less interested in playing games other than those I’d known and enjoyed (for example Primal Rage; hardly the world’s best beat-em-up, but it has a certain charm) I’d never tried Wizard of Wor or Kozmik Krooz’r before. Admittedly, neither have become my newest favourite, but have already warranted a good while of play.

Certainly there is the odd bad apple included, but out of 20 games in a single package, if they were all stunningly revolutionary I wouldn’t have any free time left. Reliving arcade classics is certainly the point of the collection, and while the standard PS2 controller can’t compete with a large joystick and massive buttons, you never lose too much from the arcade feeling, aside from a sweaty fat man breathing down your neck to challenge you and your buddy at Pit-Fighter.

It is after all on a DVD

In addition to the gameplay fun, each game has a series of bonus features from teaser movies for the games to making of videos. While the quality can hardly be compared to the most recent Return of the King documentaries, they make a welcome addition, despite having likely been created back when the games were first released. While they do vary in terms of quality, it certainly adds another layer of value to the package.

Now that we’re talking about value, there can be nothing bad said about the price of the game(s). With an RRP of a mere £14.99, and I’ve found it for under a tenner, it means that you could theoretically have one credit on each game and pay for the same experience of walking into an arcade with the same amount of money.

Add the almost endless fun of adding your friends into the multiplayer mix and for any fan of the originals, it practically pays for itself. Quite literally if you charge each of your mates 50p a game. Go on, we dare you.

Full game List:

• Mortal Kombat II
• Mortal Kombat 3
• Gauntlet II
• SpyHunter II
• Xybots
• NARC
• APB
• Cyberball 2072
• Timber
• Total Carnage
• Pit Fighter
• Wizard of Wor
• Xenophobe
• Primal Rage
• Arch Rivals
• Rampage World Tour
• Kozmik Krooz’r
• Championship Sprint
• Hard Drivin’
• Wacko