Having played I think 90% of these, I think my favourite was Gryzor, followed by Salamander and Hyper Sports.... sorry, I always preferred Way of the Exploding Fist to Yie Ar :)
I absolutely love this channel ... hats off to Kim for taking me back to the days of my youth; that Speccy 128k my folks grafted so hard for was a big part of my childhood
Been looking forward to this one!!! I worshipped 80s Konami, those silver label NES carts held such prestige for me. Your big giant list/multi-review vids are among my favorite things on TH-cam, there's no better combo than Kim + Speccy + Konami!
When I first got my 128k back in the day the 5 Konami coin op hits compilation was one of the titles bundled in . Great hit pack. Green Beret was the first game I played on the Speccy and it was a stone cold classic. Great days 👍🏻
I’m so pumped your making these compilation videos again. NO ONE does a better job that you do my friend. Honestly....I’ve spent hundreds of hours watching your videos and your research and knowledge is just amazing. You are a diamond in the rough my friend. 💪💪💪💪💪
Mikie!!!!! one of my favourite speccy games of all time! and also TMHT, loved the colorfull graphics! Pingpong was also an stable in my speccy collection. Konami will be always in the memory of many many speccy players.
Another Kim Justice classic! Thanks for continuing to provide us with such wonderfully created, Genre leading Retro gaming documentaries like this. Your care and attention to detail never fails to impress. All chapter/time stamped as well! Great piece of work.
oh dear, lol, this was meant to be for the Konami Video, but it rolled to this one behind the comment screen. Oh well, comment is the same also, thanks Kim!
If I ever go to Europe to play any of the ZX Spectrum games, I'll gravitate towards Eric & the floaties. As I am a Bomberman veteran since 64, and I'm getting the hang of the 2d Bomberman games atm
Had the same one, loved Hypersports, Green Beret and Mikie. Mikie would only load on my brothers +2 but not my +2a, the opposite happened with Yie Ar Kung Fu.
09:27 I remember I had the Atari 2600 and my cousin a Spectrum, and when hardly ever put Yie Ar KF I was like in the paradise but at the same time at the hell because it wasn't mine. 😭😭 That intro screen was like WWOOOOWWW!!
Mmmm, I watch all your videos at least twice Kim. Once to fully absorb and enjoy the video and then a second time when I go to sleep. The cadence of your voice is like honey to the ears and whisks me off to sleep in no time.
@@Bianchiboy Yes! Treasure Island was another one. I didn't remember Disco Dan but just looked it up, I do remember the cover art, but not the gameplay for some reason.
WEC Le Mans was easily my fave Konami conversion. The Speccy did arcade racers really well and WEC was one of the best on there, it still holds up now.
I was so disappointed with nemesis as I loved it in the arcades. £7.95 down the drain. I also bought jailbreak knowing nothing about the arcade. Fortunately most of the Konami ones I bought were very good and ping pong was an unexpected treat.
Great video Kim! I remember my disappointment with Salamander after first playing the arcade version in a local computer shop... but I was even more disappointed with Nemesis after playing the C64 version at a friend's house and having high hopes! Thankfully they were only £2.99 each when I bought them.
I actually enjoyed the Turtles coin op on the Spectrum. The main issue with it was that the lack of the arcade's graphics and sound exposed how shallow the gameplay was. It was still pretty playable though, plenty of action too for a Speccy beat 'em up conversion.
Thanks for another video. I appreciate AY music in the background from games. I like Hypersports, Green Beret and also Salamander was (in my opinion) great. Please do a MASTERTRONIC portfolio.
Love your voice kim. I could listen to you talk about anything lol. the recent oasis vid was cool please do more music docs. How about one on the prodigy?
Kim, the intro music to this and many other of your videos is driving my memory crazy, where in retro UK TV is it from? Many thanks for your fantastic and meticulously researched videos.
Wonder where Sinclair would be today if they used their own proprietary storage medium rather than normal tapes in order to collect a small fee from each one sold, 5p maybe. Theyd need to produce the medium for close to the price of tapes though which would be hard but there was room for an extra £1 on prices for sure. Would have also hurt bedroom piracy. Its a shame Sinclair thought like inventors rather than businessmen in some ways as we lost out on an Amstrad equivalent Spectrum 2 in 87 or 88, with Sinclair worried about back compatibility as inventors would be, rather than creating something so desirable that people will upgrade.
The biggest problem with the Road Race game is the title which suggests some relation to the other game known from Atari and C=64 - "The Great American Cross-Country Road Race" which was widely known by the shortened name "Road Race".
At different buffets, I'll sneak corndogs in with me. I carry them in my jacket pockets. I place them with the other buffet food. Then it's a great joy for me watching other patrons eat my conrdogs thinking they were from the buffet.
It's always depressing to see how side scrollers were a lot better on the ZX Spectrum than on the Amstrad (as in properly side scrolling to start with). Green Beret on the Amstrad was a shame next to this awesome port.
One thing I've been curious about with the ZX Spectrum: What did folks typically use as a monitor? I can't imagine too many UK kids having a 2nd TV in their room in the 80s. Was there an official ZX Spectrum monitor, did folks tend to also own a C64 and use that monitor, did they just hook it up to the family TV?
@@Kim_Justice ahh ok. I'd heard about (probably form your channel) the TV registration fee in the UK, so I figured that'd probably keep many folks from having multiple TVs, especially with how expensive they already we're back then. Anyways thank you for yet another fascinating look at the UK micro scene!
Again, very strange stuff from an American perspective. I have always loved this channel and this is one of the main reasons. I get that the popularity of the microcomputer carried England through the 83 disaster, which is awesome, but I'm not sure that would have worked here. Especially with this computer, I just can't see my friends and I being interested in the bizarre colors. My son found me watching one of your videos once and he thought I was watching a glitch video. He's a generation removed from this era of gaming, admittedly, but it's not a good sign when someone's immediate impression of a system's graphics is that the system is broken.
The Yie-ar KungFu II port is a curious case. It was the follow up to the MSX version of Yie Ar KungFu (which was totally different than the arcade version). Why not 'simply' port the MSX code over?
I don't know how to pronounce the names of some of these games.😂 He calls YIE AR KUNG-FU with the word YIE pronounced like TIE... I always pronounced it YEE like SEE with the double E sound. The other day I watched a video where they pronounced the WEC in WEC LE MANS as a word like PECK rather than sounding out the three letters. Have I been getting it wrong all these years 😂
Was Stop the Express based on me getting a train in Birminghaml as a teenager? Running away from yobs with Birmingham City Jerseys with knives whilst trapped on a train was my daily commute.
17:33 bit of politics. I missed the word before "protectors". "Hadn't had to change into Robot costumes and become ??????? protectors" ? I probably totally agree, but couldn't work out what you said. Great work as always Kim
@@Kim_Justice Thanks, I thought you were saying UK police officers turned into robots, and was about to agree tf out of you, but you are too smart to get involved in such politics.
that's usually the case, unless the C64 hi-res mode (320*200) is used for the sprites, as in many Ocean C64 games (and they usually overlapped two hardware sprites for added colour).
What's your favourite Konami Arcade port, then? Have a sound off! Thanks for watching :)
Having played I think 90% of these, I think my favourite was Gryzor, followed by Salamander and Hyper Sports.... sorry, I always preferred Way of the Exploding Fist to Yie Ar :)
Out of this list, i enjoyed and played Hyper Sports the most.
Hyper Sports, I remember playing that for ages.
I have a massive soft spot for Mikey, I loved Green Beret too but I am utterly rubbish at it.
When it comes to Kjonami its got to be Hypersports.
I absolutely love this channel ... hats off to Kim for taking me back to the days of my youth; that Speccy 128k my folks grafted so hard for was a big part of my childhood
Is is just me or did "Eric and the Floaters" immediately make you think of a burger time clone about unblocking particularly heinous toilets?
Joffa was an absolute legend. His arcade conversions were bloody marvels - and have held up really well.
All games coded by Joffa are technically way better than any other, better and more sound fx, smoother gameplay. What a great coder.
A master of the Speccy and coding in general.
the legend knocks it out the park again ,, Kim should do a top 20 or what ever on arcade games that were broken
Kim does some of the most interesting and informative videos on TH-cam. Great work
Been looking forward to this one!!! I worshipped 80s Konami, those silver label NES carts held such prestige for me. Your big giant list/multi-review vids are among my favorite things on TH-cam, there's no better combo than Kim + Speccy + Konami!
When I first got my 128k back in the day the 5 Konami coin op hits compilation was one of the titles bundled in . Great hit pack. Green Beret was the first game I played on the Speccy and it was a stone cold classic. Great days 👍🏻
I’m so pumped your making these compilation videos again. NO ONE does a better job that you do my friend. Honestly....I’ve spent hundreds of hours watching your videos and your research and knowledge is just amazing. You are a diamond in the rough my friend. 💪💪💪💪💪
Thanks Kim, the two hour Ocean retrospective was amazing and now this! I'm loving the Speccy coverage!
Dayum, Kim, you're on fire! How are you pushing these out so fast!
Mikie!!!!! one of my favourite speccy games of all time! and also TMHT, loved the colorfull graphics! Pingpong was also an stable in my speccy collection. Konami will be always in the memory of many many speccy players.
It’s is the second time I watched the video; very entertaining and informative, despite not owning and playing the games.
That's tonights bedtime viewing sorted. Kim your content is always brilliant.
Another Kim Justice classic! Thanks for continuing to provide us with such wonderfully created, Genre leading Retro gaming documentaries like this. Your care and attention to detail never fails to impress. All chapter/time stamped as well! Great piece of work.
oh dear, lol, this was meant to be for the Konami Video, but it rolled to this one behind the comment screen. Oh well, comment is the same also, thanks Kim!
Thank you very much!
Loved the Ocean Licensed games video! This will be great, I remember Gryzor when i was young and had no idea it was better known as Contra!
If I ever go to Europe to play any of the ZX Spectrum games, I'll gravitate towards Eric & the floaties. As I am a Bomberman veteran since 64, and I'm getting the hang of the 2d Bomberman games atm
Green Beret the reason i bought a speccy . great game and one of my faves i have the original jamma pcb now :)
No way, Bomberman and Pang were basically speccy games from 1983?!! How did I never know that!
I thought I’d played pretty much every ZX Spectrum game but somehow I’d never seen Stop the Express.
Yie Ar Kung Fu and Green Beret on the Spectrum are such classics. This is a great video series.
I love these videos, it's like watching a proper retro TV show. Brilliant work!
More lovely work on the beloved Spectrum , pure gold your incredible work is !
Still got the Konami coin-op hits compilation at my parents. Played loads of Yie ar Kung Fu and Hypersports. Could never get Mikie to load!
Had the same one, loved Hypersports, Green Beret and Mikie. Mikie would only load on my brothers +2 but not my +2a, the opposite happened with Yie Ar Kung Fu.
Another awesome video Kim!!
Cheers for that
I have so many fond memories of most of these games.
09:27 I remember I had the Atari 2600 and my cousin a Spectrum, and when hardly ever put Yie Ar KF I was like in the paradise but at the same time at the hell because it wasn't mine. 😭😭 That intro screen was like WWOOOOWWW!!
I had no idea “Pang” was a clone of - OK, “took a LOT of inspiration from” - another game.
Well unlike most other ripoffs/clones Mitchell actually did get the okay from the original publisher to make it
Mmmm, I watch all your videos at least twice Kim. Once to fully absorb and enjoy the video and then a second time when I go to sleep. The cadence of your voice is like honey to the ears and whisks me off to sleep in no time.
You do god's work 🙏 Kim. Well done again.
Awesome. Hope you're well Kim.
I loved Oh Mummy! It came with the Speccy +2 in a bundle if I remember correctly.
That and Treasure Island... and Disco Dan!!
I never saw that game for the speccy, it was an stable in every Amstrand owner collection, never played it but everybody has it.
@@Bianchiboy Yes! Treasure Island was another one. I didn't remember Disco Dan but just looked it up, I do remember the cover art, but not the gameplay for some reason.
WEC Le Mans was easily my fave Konami conversion. The Speccy did arcade racers really well and WEC was one of the best on there, it still holds up now.
Always love these video Kim! So well researched and put together. Thanks!
Loving these long videos showing all the games
TMNT was the first game I ever completed and it was excellent. I could easily play it again.
I really liked Hyper Rally on MSX at the time. Day/night cycles, weather effects, tunnel sections all in 16k. Spectrum version looks like an LCD game
I love the MSX and would love to collect more original hardware and software but the prices are horrific. I can only afford Casio games lol.
@@parallaxview2143 its certainly a problem especially with Japanese sellers on Ebay
I was so disappointed with nemesis as I loved it in the arcades. £7.95 down the drain. I also bought jailbreak knowing nothing about the arcade. Fortunately most of the Konami ones I bought were very good and ping pong was an unexpected treat.
It was great on the MSX. Never noticed the jerky scrolling at the time
Who is old enough to remember when it was Kjonami?
Imagine that.
@@AcornElectronHappy times!
Great video as always Kim, thanks :)
I spent my holiday money on Jail Break because of a glowing with praise Sinclair User review. I'm still cross about it to this day.
Great video Kim! I remember my disappointment with Salamander after first playing the arcade version in a local computer shop... but I was even more disappointed with Nemesis after playing the C64 version at a friend's house and having high hopes! Thankfully they were only £2.99 each when I bought them.
I actually enjoyed the Turtles coin op on the Spectrum. The main issue with it was that the lack of the arcade's graphics and sound exposed how shallow the gameplay was. It was still pretty playable though, plenty of action too for a Speccy beat 'em up conversion.
Thanks for another video. I appreciate AY music in the background from games. I like Hypersports, Green Beret and also Salamander was (in my opinion) great. Please do a MASTERTRONIC portfolio.
Nice to see you back 😊
I thought the contra theme was just stuck in my head, but you did have it continue to play for a bit afterward lol
Outstanding job, man! 👏👏👏
Fantastic review as usual Kim. Despite the large amount of dross on show here, we still love Konami 😂
Great video - thanks Kim!
Ic ould watch videos on spectrum ports all day
great video as always
Thanks Kim. Just what i needed.
Another brilliant video Kim..... 🤩
Kim smashes it every time! Must be a ton of research and planning goes into these documentaries!
Love your voice kim. I could listen to you talk about anything lol. the recent oasis vid was cool please do more music docs. How about one on the prodigy?
Very good vid, hope we get a Taito spectrum ports vid + Konami Arcade ports on Amiga/C64
Kim, the intro music to this and many other of your videos is driving my memory crazy, where in retro UK TV is it from? Many thanks for your fantastic and meticulously researched videos.
Wonder where Sinclair would be today if they used their own proprietary storage medium rather than normal tapes in order to collect a small fee from each one sold, 5p maybe. Theyd need to produce the medium for close to the price of tapes though which would be hard but there was room for an extra £1 on prices for sure. Would have also hurt bedroom piracy. Its a shame Sinclair thought like inventors rather than businessmen in some ways as we lost out on an Amstrad equivalent Spectrum 2 in 87 or 88, with Sinclair worried about back compatibility as inventors would be, rather than creating something so desirable that people will upgrade.
CONGRATURATION! YOU SUCSESS!
I Know you've done Ocean when is the Hit Squad (specific) series due to land ;) ... Appreciating the trips down memory lane!
Today I learned: Liverpool are the red men. Amazing how much British culture I’ve picked up from these videos.
Kim I'm a big fan and I love your videos, but you know that by definition there's only one thing that can be "the almighty" by definition, right?
Worst thing about Jail Break was not being able to move/shoot diagonally.
Green Beret was amazing, I played it to death bitd
David Ward, a great business mind, too bad that his company weren't the ones porting Jackal.
The biggest problem with the Road Race game is the title which suggests some relation to the other game known from Atari and C=64 - "The Great American Cross-Country Road Race" which was widely known by the shortened name "Road Race".
At different buffets, I'll sneak corndogs in with me. I carry them in my jacket pockets. I place them with the other buffet food. Then it's a great joy for me watching other patrons eat my conrdogs thinking they were from the buffet.
I'm surprised that the coders of the Konami published ports actually pit their names on it instead of "Alan Smithee".
The Yie Ar King-Fu music has aged soooooo well! 😝
Stop the Express looks pretty awesome!
It's always depressing to see how side scrollers were a lot better on the ZX Spectrum than on the Amstrad (as in properly side scrolling to start with). Green Beret on the Amstrad was a shame next to this awesome port.
One thing I've been curious about with the ZX Spectrum: What did folks typically use as a monitor? I can't imagine too many UK kids having a 2nd TV in their room in the 80s. Was there an official ZX Spectrum monitor, did folks tend to also own a C64 and use that monitor, did they just hook it up to the family TV?
There wasn't an official monitor as such so you'd just hook it to a telly. A portable Black and White one, perhaps!
@@Kim_Justice ahh ok. I'd heard about (probably form your channel) the TV registration fee in the UK, so I figured that'd probably keep many folks from having multiple TVs, especially with how expensive they already we're back then.
Anyways thank you for yet another fascinating look at the UK micro scene!
@@MrTableDesk You dont pay more for multiple tvs and infact if all you used the tv for was as a monitor, you wouldn't have to pay
We had a small black and white, and then when the parents were out, the computer would be hooked up to the main colour tv for a few hours :D
yup, a lil black and white number with a clunky wheel tuner :D
then when I got an ST for christmas, my parents bought a little colour set for me
Thank you for another excellent video! Have you completed a Elite Games Arcade Port?
It's always good to see how bad things were on the spectrum. Put's those playground arguments vs the C64 into a hilarious perspective.
Again, very strange stuff from an American perspective. I have always loved this channel and this is one of the main reasons. I get that the popularity of the microcomputer carried England through the 83 disaster, which is awesome, but I'm not sure that would have worked here. Especially with this computer, I just can't see my friends and I being interested in the bizarre colors. My son found me watching one of your videos once and he thought I was watching a glitch video. He's a generation removed from this era of gaming, admittedly, but it's not a good sign when someone's immediate impression of a system's graphics is that the system is broken.
83 disaster?
@@MephProduction I assume he is referring to that "video game crash" which we didn't experience in Europe.
@@HansHackfress maybe, we never even knew it was a thing in the uk at the time.
Can we have a Taito video please Kim? Including the Technos stuff 👍
Non related but I'm just wondering if you have ever covered One Man and his Droid on the spectrum. One of my favourites.
I suppose Konami had more Z80-based arcade games than Sega and Capcom's popular games, making them easier ports to the Speccy.
I can't find your Oasis one anymore:(
Hmm? It should still be around - it's not taken down or anything like that th-cam.com/video/N369Y4EeHzE/w-d-xo.html
The Yie-ar KungFu II port is a curious case. It was the follow up to the MSX version of Yie Ar KungFu (which was totally different than the arcade version). Why not 'simply' port the MSX code over?
Can you do one on The Hit Squad?? Loved thier games back in the day
Take a drink every time Kim says "the almighty" 😜
I don't know how to pronounce the names of some of these games.😂
He calls YIE AR KUNG-FU with the word YIE pronounced like TIE... I always pronounced it YEE like SEE with the double E sound.
The other day I watched a video where they pronounced the WEC in WEC LE MANS as a word like PECK rather than sounding out the three letters.
Have I been getting it wrong all these years 😂
Was Stop the Express based on me getting a train in Birminghaml as a teenager? Running away from yobs with Birmingham City Jerseys with knives whilst trapped on a train was my daily commute.
Don't Birmingham City wear blue, though?
@@martincann5052 Yeah they do but that's the only inaccuracy
12.02 - FAILURE TEACHES SUCCESS - Churchill said that, right? [Bit of an obscure reference, that one].
4:07 It's good to see that the endless runner gameplay loop is technically a boomer. If it's not broken, don't fix it.
Never realised that Imagine was Ocean
17:33 bit of politics. I missed the word before "protectors". "Hadn't had to change into Robot costumes and become ??????? protectors" ? I probably totally agree, but couldn't work out what you said. Great work as always Kim
Probotectors -- when the Contra games were released in Europe on consoles the heroes were changed into Robots and the games were called "Probotector".
@@Kim_Justice Thanks, I thought you were saying UK police officers turned into robots, and was about to agree tf out of you, but you are too smart to get involved in such politics.
I always thought sprites looked more detailed on spectrum over c64.
That is because generally speaking the speccy always use a higher resolution for the graphics, the C64 has much better color but blockier graphics.
that's usually the case, unless the C64 hi-res mode (320*200) is used for the sprites, as in many Ocean C64 games (and they usually overlapped two hardware sprites for added colour).
"Congraturation! You Sucsess!"
Flipping heck that turtles game has remarkable graphics
Long live to the ZXSpectrum! long live to the 8bits!
F.I.R.E. is actually 48K title, not 128K even though it supports AY-3-8912. It works on 48K with external AY module.
I LOVE these videos. Just saying
Top dawg baby
44:06 amazing
Its quite wierd that I watch this video (very good) then take my dog out for her late night pee and see Kym sat in the pub I walk past! 👌
Lmao!
Eric and the Floaters...
Pffffft! xD
The Specy(Kim close it) looks awful and sounds annoying AF but play pretty good. What is ZX's best game?
Sigh, no c64 love( great video, thank you!
Fuxoft is the greatest name