Splatterhouse coming to the virtual console

By Spencer . February 25, 2007 . 2:47pm

A couple of extra TurboGrafx-16 / PC Engine games coming to the Wii Virtual Console next month. Japan gets: Syubibin Man, Fire Pro Wrestling: Combination Tag, Double Dungeons and Galaga ’88. North America and Europe are also getting Double Dungeons and they are getting Splatterhouse. Double Dungeons isn’t exactly exciting news, it’s a basic first person RPG where you explore 22 dungeons collecting gold and fighting monsters. It might temporarily quell the desire for RPGs on the Wii Virtual Console, but not for very long. Splatterhouse is a little bit of a surprise. After three games, Namco Bandai put their ultraviolent Friday the 13th inspired beat-em up to rest. The game has Rick explore a haunted house carrying weapons like a 2×4 that slams poltergeists into the background. Galaga ’88 (aka Galaga ’90 outside of Japan) is a remake of the classic shoot ‘em up Galaga where the enemies have new attack patterns and lets players rescue two captured ships during boss fights to make one super outer space shooting machine. Since Galaga ’90 has appeared on arcade compilations it is probably going to appear on the Virtual Console in other regions sometime in the future.


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  • Veilknight

    I remember Splatterhouse being a true hallmark for the TG16 during its short life in the US, before it got completely eclipsed by the Genesis and SNES’ struggle for 16-bit supremacy. I was completely jealous as the only home port for the game in the US was simply for the TG16 (the other port being a Japanese exclusive, for the Japan-only FM Towns Marty console) as I had a Genesis and lacked the former. I used to love playing the arcade cabinet at the few arcades that actually had the game up for display and loved how it was completely different from anything else out there at the time.

    I really thought this game deserved more fame, and not just for its blood and gore either (which was naturally one of the reasons it was rare to see this game in any arcades); the gameplay holds up extremely well but being ported to such an obscure console didn’t help either.

    It goes without saying I was overjoyed to play Splatterhouse 2 and 3 on the Genesis when Namco announced and released both during 1992 and 1993, respectively. As a matter of fact, I wouldn’t mind seeing Namco bring Splatterhouse’s successors on the Genesis to the VC to compliment the TG16 port in the near future. I’d especially like to see part 3 show up, which threw out the conventions of its predecessors by being a flatout beat-em-up, while still containing the gorey charm I’ve grown to love.

    Splatterhouse 3 is actually a rare example of a beat-em-up that’s actually as fun to play by yourself as it is to play another game in the genre, say Streets of Rage 2, with a friend through co-op. No wonder many, including myself, consider it the best game in the series. I wouldn’t mind seeing the Famicom import, Splatterhouse: Wanpaku Graffiti (pretty much a parody of the series in a similar vain to Mighty Final Fight), show up either, especially if Namco decided to release this as a download overseas in the States.

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