Hanna Barbera's Turbo Toons

Also known as:  N/A

Developer: Empire Interactive

At first glance, Hanna Barbera's Turbo Toons, a European exclusive game, looks like Super Off-Road, but with beloved Hanna Barbera characters instead of vehicles. If the idea of controlling Huckleberry Hound in a foot race against other favorites like Yogi Bear or Quick Draw McGraw sounds fun to you, unfortunately, Empire Interactive made sure that it wouldn't be. The races tend to be boring and bland. On top of that, the controls seem broken at first…not necessarily because they are, but because since this looks like Super Off-Road, you would expect that it would control like Super Off-Road. It does not at all. Instead, to control the cartoon characters in this game, you need to move the buttons in the actual direction that you want them to go…this seems like it would be obvious to figure out, but again, games like Super Off-Road, RC Pro-Am, and even Rock N Roll Racing all have a distinct control style, and with this visually looking like it's trying to clone those games, it's easy to imagine the controls would be the same, then think that something's broken while you struggle to get Hong Kong Phooey to turn a corner properly. Once you get the controls down, the game is pretty dull, as I mentioned earlier. By the time that this game came out, there were already a bunch of really good racing games (including Super Mario Kart, if you wanted a more cartoony style of racing) so unless you're obsessed with Hanna Barbera cartoons and want to control Top Cat in a foot race, I'd recommend following the words of Snagglepuss – “Exit, stage left.”

Review added: 07/09/2022

Harvest Moon

Also known as:  Bokujou Monogatari (Japan)

Developer: Amccus

Released at the very end of the Super Nintendo’s life cycle, the original Harvest Moon seemingly fell under the radar of most gamers who had already moved on to the next generation of gaming consoles. Aside from the timing of its release, the other handicap that Harvest Moon had was its content. You didn’t play as a solider, or a racecar driver, or a martial arts expert…you played as a farmer, who raised crops, took care of farm animals, and made efforts to get married to one of the local girls in town. Rather than be a game that would get your adrenaline going, Harvest Moon was a game where you could sit back and relax – there weren’t many games out there like it at the time. Fast forward to present day, and Harvest Moon kind of laid the groundwork for more modern games like Stardew Valley and Graveyard Keeper, and it spawned a franchise that still gets games released to this day, with a loyal fan following keeping the Harvest Moon series alive and well. One of my best friends loves this series, and whenever I take some time to play any of them, I can always understand why. This 16-bit original may be my favorite of the bunch, though.

Review added: 06/23/2020

Hebereke no Popuun 

Also known as:  Hebereke's Popoon (Europe)

Developer: Sunsoft

If you live in North America, then unless you're a weirdo like me that searches for games never released on these shores, you may have never heard of/played Ufouria on the NES. If that's the case, then you will not recognize the playable characters here. However, whether you're familiar with them or not should have zero effect on your enjoyment level here. In Hebereke no Popoon, this is a match-three puzzle game, that kind of looks like Puyo Puyo in appearance, but is a bit difference in gameplay. Some of the gameplay reminds me of Columns - you want to match three faces of the same color either vertically, horizontally, or diagonally. Doing so allows you to drop faces of whatever character that you're playing as on your opponent's screen. Unlike other puzzle games where blocks like this drop and you simply need to match three near them to make them disappear, the only way to eliminate these fancy faces is to put a specific colored face next to it - no need to match three. This aspect of the gameplay adds so much more strategy to the game and introduces interesting ways to pile on combos, which can be very, very fun. I found myself playing this way, way more than I thought that I would have. If you're looking for a very good match-three puzzle game that's a little bit different than any other games in the genre that have been released in North America, then do yourself a favor and hunt Hebereke no Popoon down. I bet that you'll be glad that you did.

Review added: 03/09/2025

Home Improvement: Power Tool Pursuit!

Also known as:  N/A

Developer: Imagineering Inc.

Wanna play a video game where caveman-grunting comedian Tim Allen shoots at dinosaurs with a nail gun? Yeah, with a sales pitch like that, I do too. Unfortunately, as cool as that sounds, when you start to play Home Improvement: Power Tool Pursuit!, you quickly realize that shooting dinosaurs with nail guns isn't nearly as fun as one would imagine that it would be. The clunky controls here heavily bog down the overall experience, which is unfortunate since the absurdity of everything found in this game had potential for this to become a cult classic. Instead, it’s just a mess of a game based off of a popular television show for its time. If you want more fun involving Home Improvement, just walk around your house narrating everything that you do with Tim Allen’s caveman grunts…maybe ask your neighbor to stand by the fence with his face half-covered while you ask them for advice…or have a co-worker tell you, “I don’t think so,” every time you come up with a hairbrained idea. Those scenarios lack dinosaurs, but it’s still Home Improvement-themed and quite a bit more enjoyable than playing this. Shortly into playing this, you’ll feel like those power tools aren’t worth pursuing.

Review added: 07/13/2020