Nostalgia is a strong purchase motivator. Now that adults who were born in the 1980s have assumed leadership roles in large production companies, we are seeing rehashed versions of all our favorite properties. Usually, these remakes are terrible and we end up wishing that these old movies and games had been left alone. Bandi Namco decided instead to let their classic properties shine in the Bandai Namco Entertainment America’s Classic Arcade Series.
The Arcade Classic Collection features four games that each retail for $3.99 USD: Galaga, Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, and Dig Dug. I will not review each of these games individually, as they have been available on every platform ever since 1981. Instead, I will look at the entire product and analyze its value in a post-Rare Replay world. For some odd reason you can buy Galaga, Pac-Man and Dig Dug as a pack while Ms. Pac-Man is a separate purchase.
Microsoft’s Rare Replay (2015) released with the tagline “30 games for 30 dollars”. The collection includes obscure classics like Lunar Jetman, as well as Xbox 360 favorites like Viva Piñata. Rare Replay offers behind-the-scenes videos, soundtracks, animated song and dance introductions, updated gameplay and controls, and more. Rare Replay set a new standard for the care and attention that should be put into a rereleased collection of games. So how does Bandai’s collection compare?
Each game has a few options in the setting menu that were not available in the original versions. One such option is the ability to start with 5 lives instead of 3. Given the difficulty level of these games, this is a much appreciated addition. Each game is oriented vertically on the screen as if you are playing on an arcade cabinet. The perimeter of each game is surrounded by classic artwork while you play in the center of the screen.
All four games test well. There is no input lag, screen tearing, or crashing to dashboard. The controls are smooth, although they will never be as silky as the cabinet joystick. The graphics hold up and the 1080p resolution looks crisp on a big screen television. The added achievements will be a draw for achievement hunters as they require near-perfection on the part of the player. Overall, these games are a worthy port of the originals.
Summary
I am all for preserving old games as a means of giving new generations of players the opportunity to try some amazing games from my past. However, these four games have been released and rereleased on every single gaming platform since their inception, and they are at no risk of being forgotten. At 4 dollars each, with no extra bells and whistles, I find this shovelware release to be lackluster. Again, I am not rating the games themselves, as they are timeless classics. I am merely suggesting that they could have been reintroduced in a much more appealing package.
Maybe completely overhauling Pac-Man with modern graphics would’ve been the way to approach this. It worked well for Q*bert on Xbox One so why not this? Everyone appreciates a shiny new coat of paint. The same would’ve made Dig Dug and Galaga even better. This package will only appeal to nostalgic gamers and members of the new generation won’t even purchase them because of the way they look. By releasing the same old product on Xbox One, Bandai Namco has limited their audience already. If you want more people to experience these classics, you have to put in the effort to make them appealing to a new demographic of gamers. This is why the collection is so disappointing. It’s a wasted opportunity.
Joshua was a regular ICXM contributor between 2016–2017, publishing 42 articles across game reviews, and Xbox news. Their work focused on hands-on reviews, platform commentary, and breaking-news reporting during the Xbox One X launch year and Microsoft’s wider Play Anywhere / UWP gaming initiative.