Chiki Chiki Boys for Sega Genesis - A Review | hungrygoriya 

Well, look at that, we have some important visitor here. Anyhow... I'd rather Hungry Goriya play games that are usually considered trash since she has a knack for enjoying them and seeing the good in them. I'm always eager for a different perspective.

Very cool! Thanks for the suggestion... I've never heard of that one before!

I've got something cooking that might be in this very vein...

oi you cheeky cheeky boy always commenting on these, reminding us you're a regular person ;>

Elo you!

I wish I could remember exactly how I found it, but I took a chance on it not really knowing what to expect. I wasn't disappointed!

@@hungrygoriya That's good to hear.

It’s a really good game! I found this and Twinkle Tale about 5 years ago and loved both of them!

@@obthree2830 Oh Twinkle Tale! I've been trying to remember the name of that one for a while now. Thank you!!! I saw someone playing it and didn't write it down.

@@hungrygoriya ya it’s a really good game! If you’re a fan of the pocky and rocky series you’ll really dig it!

This pleases me.

I appreciate this very much. Thank you for the encouragement :)

Sounds like a wonderful game to grind all throughout childhood. It's so pretty and very fun so I can see spending a lot of time with it being an absolute joy! And thanks for the info about the other releases too. I'd love to try some 2-player action someday just to see what it's like!

Right on! I loved the challenge of Chiki Chiki Boys.

I try to shine a light on things that I enjoyed, but haven't necessarily gotten a lot of mileage online. I think folks would really enjoy this if they give it a chance! I only had around 10 games for the Genesis my entire childhood and rented the same stuff all the time, so it's nice to be able to expand outward now too.

Oh right on! It's so awesome to hear of your experiences with this one growing up. I think I would've really enjoyed it if I'd had it when I was little too, just for the replay value and the beautiful music and graphics. I love that you played with the red twin, haha... I am a perpetual saver of all things consumable so I stayed in my comfort zone. I suppose you must've been good enough with the magic to be able to save up for those sword upgrades. It's a very clever approach! If you do end up trying out some Wonder Boy, I hope you have fun. It's definitely not the same style of gameplay but I love Dragon's Trap very much. Thanks for sharing!

Oh nice! I'm so glad you remembered what it was after so long!

@@hungrygoriya Thank you, I had half convinced myself that I had imagined it.

@@jonypo928 I had a similar experience with an old DOS game I used to play when I was little. It's magical having that closure, haha

@@hungrygoriya I really can't thank you enough there. It didn't help that I thought it was on SNES so googling terms like "brothers, game, SNES, adventure" just resulted in wall-to-wall Mario games, effectively gaslighting myself 🤣

Glad the arcade game's out there at least!

My pleasure! Enjoy :)

It was a happy accident I ended up buying this but I'm glad I did! I need to try the arcade version sometime.

I'm honoured! Thanks very much for giving this little place a chance. I appreciate it :)

@@hungrygoriya thank you for making these videos keep it up !

@Ranni the witch Another great thing is the community around here. Unlike a lot of youtube channels, there isnt a bunch of toxicity in the comments - just cool people remniscing and discussing the featured game.

It's so gorgeous! I'm glad there are so many other fans of it out there. It certainly deserves all the love it gets!

Glad it wasn't just me!

There'll never be enough Wonder Boy!

Very well here, but just very busy with summer projects. Sorry for the wait!

Enjoy your replay when you get there!

Oh wow... what a fun weekend that must've been!

Enjoy! It's a great little game.

Yeah, definitely not the most accessible title. Maybe we'll see it on that Genesis Mini 2! Popful Mail is coming out on that so anything is possible!

@@hungrygoriya Fingers and toes crossed! I would love for this to be on the Mini 2

You can get the (awesome) arcade version (known as Mega Twins) for the PSP as part of the compilation Capcom Classics Collection Remixed.

I hear ya. My copy's not in the greatest shape, but even still, I think I was really lucky when I bought it. I looked it up on eBay that day and there was one available. I rarely see the North American version for sale these days :(

Sounds like a very convenient birthday gift, haha... thanks very much for stopping by!

For sure. I was just a little shocked at how hard it was to get accustomed to the gameplay at first. It was great once I got going though!

Too kind! Thanks so much!

Yeah, it was a long time since the last one. Sorry about that!

hey no rush. my dumb ass can wait

Right? It's a great looking game for sure!

Right? I couldn't help but check it out on that basis alone!

Yeah, not sure if there were limitations preventing two player action, but it's beautiful in all senses otherwise. I love the look of this game too!

Thanks so much for watching!

It's a lovely-looking game! Thanks for taking the time to watch, as usual. Much appreciated!

I'm so happy to hear that it fits the bill for those that loved the arcade game. Console ports can be so hit or miss and it seems like this one's definitely a hit. Thanks so much for the kind words too! I don't have any intention of stopping here any time soon, and it helps knowing people are enjoying what I'm doing. I appreciate you taking a moment to tell me :)

Oh no! Gluey controls are the worst. I'm sorry you struggled with that game in a similar way. And yeah, Rocket Knight Adventures is similar in style as well! That's another deceptive game where you think it's going to be easy and then it hurts your feelings. I've never even come close to finishing it!

I had a hard time finding info on this one when I was trying to figure out if I wanted to buy a copy, so hopefully the review helps others decide!

What an amazing gesture from your grandfather! I'm glad you might still have that copy of Chiki Chiki Boys hanging around. I have all of my childhood games, and it seems like your relatives had better taste in games than mine did... Pesterminator is something I'm not familiar with, but I can see the box art for Phalanx in my mind.

@@hungrygoriya Pretty sure Pesterminator was more of an impulse buy on his part; he would occasionally have people come to his auto parts shop trying to sell him stuff, so that was probably that. It's shovelware of a sort. I don't even remember the developers. I can still see the box art in my mind though. I might still have that around too. My grandparents (most of my family, really) weren't really all that knowledgeable of what games I played, but knew that I'd play anything new at least for a little while. 99% of the time, they deferred to me to choose what I wanted, either by taking me to the game shop/flea market and letting me pick, or by asking for a small list of games I'd like and then ticking them off between birthday and Christmas gifts. Only my mother really knew what I liked, because she was there to watch me play the original Legend of Zelda and see how much more I loved that over, say, Super Mario Bros. She was the one to get me Final Fantasy 1 as a birthday gift (and probably Ultima: Exodus and/or Dragon Warrior, but I have no recollection of how I got those). My father got me Final Fantasy 2 (4) on SNES, but I'm pretty sure I asked for it. :) Unfortunately, the majority of my old collections have gone missing (especially my NES games) as during my childhood and teen years, there was a lot of lending/borrowing/trading that went on between myself and school friends/acquaintances. And even with my grandmother's attempt to categorize all my games (little sticky labels to "number" each game, then I made a written catalog of games based on number), a lot of it vanished. Hell, I only have a handful of games with those labels still on them (I think I had over 100 NES games at the time that she labeled them, and more got added later even as others disappeared, so.... yeah).

@@LordSephleon Awwww well it's so nice that your family at least tried to play to your tastes, even if they weren't always successful. And I'm sorry about your collection thinning out so much over the years. It's nice to hear your still have a few of them hanging around. 100 NES games is an awesome collection! I'm glad you got to experience that!

Where are you from? I have some NES games I bought used about 15-25 yrs ago with small sticky labels containing handwritten numbers in them. I always found the sticky labels weird and obviously someones private collection numbering system. Its a longshot admittedly, unless you happen to be a cascadian too. In which case I think I got your games 😆

@@childofcascadia NYC, in the Washington Heights area (around the 180s/190s streets). I doubt my grandmother was the only one ever to put little numbers on NES cartridges, but yeah, some of those games could easily have travelled far. I think she used blue ink (if memory serves), and she had very clean and consistent handwriting - very much a facet of her personality, really.

Oh yeah? It's a great game for sure. Did you manage to finish it back then?

@@hungrygoriya Yes! I'm just a little ashamed I got the clue for how to get the good ending the first time I got all the way to the end. But I didn't think to use it.

@@starofjustice1 Awwww well, better late than never at least! I somehow managed the good ending my first go, but it honestly surprised me. I was expecting another playthrough or two at least!

Enjoy it if you do!

This game's a lot more structured with different levels and no backtracking, but there are some definite similarities in the combat!

I think it's pretty excellent. The name's definitely a strange one, but better than Mega Twins in my mind at least!

Unfortunate that it wasn't more popular! It's definitely one of the more fun games I've played on the system.

I was really impressed with it! I'm sure the arcade version's prettier but this was really delightful to play.

@@hungrygoriya I’ll have to check that out! missed that there is an arcade version. That explains the difficulty level but not the lack of continues. Odd design choice!

@@Spark010 Totally odd... limited continues games are the bane of my existence. The arcade version's called Mega Twins if you're going on a hunt for it.

It was surprisingly fun. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I'm glad I took a chance on it. And thanks!

I hope to! I've had such a large review backlog these days that I keep working on those first, but I should really make another Manual Gaming sometime.

I like Manual Gaming. Its such a unique idea. Other retro reviewers sometimes have a brief bit about the manual, but none of them go into detail about the contents and how useful they are.

It could've drawn inspiration from there, totally! And yeah, there's some fantastical stuff that happens in this game that kept me grinning the entire time. If you knew what was at the top of that tower, you'd be even happier. One of my favourite characters in the whole game because of their adorableness.

There are quite a few great soundtracks on the Genesis when they're done right! There are a few I can't help but raise my eyebrows at. Growing up with The Lion King, Bubsy, and Sonic 2 really raised the bar for me!

I beg your pardon... I've always been this way.

@@hungrygoriya well then you did a good job hiding it =P

Good question! I have a few things I'd like to work on but I'm not sure which yet.

@@hungrygoriya Ooooh... whats on the table? Also, I never catch you streaming, but do you have any games you want to play but feel they are too daunting to get into? (La Mulana 2 is mine. I went in blind in the first one and it took me like 100 hours. Im not sure Im ready for the sequel aha)

Right? The graphics are wonderful!

So many people love the title of this game. Me too, actually! I'd love to see what differences there are in Mega Twins (the arcade version) sometime. I haven't played any of the Shantae games yet, but I did recently order the GBC one from Limited Run so I could finally start the series. I have a few of them but haven't gotten around to them yet. Good to know they'll be up my alley! And thanks for the other titles too. I hope to get around to some of them sooner than later, though I have tried Demon's Crest before. I loved it!

Lucky! The boys on the cartridge look so happy. I would've probably picked it up if I'd seen it in a store somewhere back then as well!

I bet after a while, a game like this is totally second nature. I feel like that with certain games I played when I was a kid as well. I would love to try this game with turbo to see how much easier it would be on the hands. I bet it'd increase the fun factor to be able to focus on other things other than how fast I'm mashing! I'm curious to see what's different in the Japanese version, but I can almost fathom a guess by the wink, haha

@@hungrygoriya I'm not as good at this game as I used to be back then, but yeah, there are certain games that we've played so much that are like "comfort food" to us. Games that we know so well, we can't play all the way through them, but are still really fun. The turbo option is a big plus yes, you can't ever stop firing in this game! :D And the Japanese version is exactly the same as far as I know (besides the texts being in Japanese). What I meant is the presentation is so beautiful: the cover, full-colour manual, etc.

That level I showed the clip from with the sticking was definitely a case of both I think. Not being able to disengage and very tight paths to take that made it really tough to have somewhere to go even if I'd manage to let go. It's interesting to think about for sure, as someone who is not in tune with the fine details of game development!

​@@hungrygoriya There's a tight relationship in platformers between the controls and level design. For example, it would hardly make sense to use the level designs of Super Mario, so fluid and capable of accelerating and jumping low or high depending on how long we hold the jump button (I often want to conflate controlling Mario to a vehicle), to Simon in Simon's Quest (or the main character/wanderer in Faxanadu) which is deliberately stiff or vice versa. From the admittedly narrow view of my own field, I'm interested in what seems to feel good despite any possible level design. But should I accomplish it, the level design must necessarily work with that design. The ideal level design is dependent on the nature of the controls. If we change the controls, then we might as well toss out all the level design and start over again.

Bikini ladies! I'd be curious to see the differences for myself and play the Japanese or arcade version one of these days. It's definitely on my list of things to track down. I hear it's available on a Capcom Collection of sorts.

@@hungrygoriya Game Sack has put out a video (Arcade vs Console 3) since my comment that shows some of the arcade differences if you wanna see em.

@@cryomancer199X Oh a new video? How convenient! That's great :) I will check it out!

I can totally see what you mean about Forgotten Worlds! Definitely! And thanks for the info about the arcade stick! I think it'd be a worthwhile purchase for the console since so many games are arcade-like and may wreck my hands playing them.

Turbo fire can be helpful in RPGs, too. Lose to a boss fight and don't want to sit through all that talking before trying again? Turbo fire saves the day.

@@japanimationman4442 Haha unskippable text is such a drag. Noted!

It sounds like it to me!

Right? I had no idea what to expect from this one, haha

Thank you! It took me an afternoon of practicing to get through this game but the build up to victory was great! I actually own Heroes of the Lance on the Master System but I haven't played it through yet. One of these days!

Thank you very much :) I'm sorry that RU-vid didn't tell you about this sooner, but better late than never. I hope you enjoy the game!

Three Wonders eh? I'll check that out! It looks like the Capcom Collection's still relatively cheap so I should probably nab it. Thanks for the suggestion!

@@hungrygoriya It is, and vol. 1 and 2 will give you years of material to work with.

Seems to be the case eh? It's a pretty unique title!

You stop feeling sorry for the monsters pretty soon after you die for the one millionth time!

I haven't played Black Tiger, but I'll take your word for it!

@@hungrygoriya oh lol, its an old arcade game, I believe its on MAME emulator. Its old tho Goriya, like late 80's.

I wonder if it could've handled a second player with so much else going on with enemies/projectiles. There was barely any slowdown with one player. I believe the arcade game does have two players, just not this version.

I really enjoyed this one!

Ive never heard a genesis referred to as a jenny before and for some reason i find calling it that very amusing.

It's cool that you have the box for this! I only have the cartridge and I was barely able to find a manual scan online.

I recently bought the two Capcom Classics Collection disks for fairly cheap and Chiki Chiki Boys was one of the first games I tried. It's cute enough but I don't think it has the depth of the Wonder Boy in Monster World series. I'm definitely glad that it's one of those games that lets you continue exactly where you died instead of making you go back to the last checkpoint like Ghouls N' Ghosts and I made gratuitous use of the unlimited continues available in the Capcom Classics Collection because I don't think it's a game I'm likely ever to put in enough time to "git gud" in. You're right about the ending, I'm not epileptic but the flashing did trigger some migraines.

@@SteveBrandon Yeah, definitely not as much there as a proper adventure game. This is definitely more of an arcade experience than anything else, which I was also slightly disappointed in.

MapleStory eh? I need to look into that because if this is similar in some way, I'd love to know more about it. There was very rarely some slowdown, maybe once or twice throughout the entire game. I found that really impressive too! And I wonder if the game could handle another person on the screen. Maybe that would be the slowdown tipping point.

Hm, unless theres another one - the only maplestory Ive ever heard of is a relatively recent mobile MMORPG from South Korea. That afaik has been shut down. I hate F2P "endless" mobile games and microtransactions with a passion that is pretty intense (I actually have a pin on my PAX lanyard I wear every year that says FUCK MICROTRANSACTIONS AND LOOTBOXES) so Ive never played it, but I asked my husband who is more into mobile games (but doesnt spend money on them, thank god) than I am and he said its a sidescrolling pay or grind mobile MMORPG with a cutesy cartoony art style. So maybe thats what OP saw because just glancing at it online, I cant really see any other similarities besides art. It does kind of have a vaguely similar art style.

@@childofcascadia Fair points on F2P mobile games. I just remember seeing the artwork and being reminded of it.

@Glitch Hunting Gamer You are totally right on the artstyle being similar. The actual drawn art reminds me of dragonball, too. Wonder if its just a certain common style in asia or if the maple story devs have fond memories of wonderboy and this game that influenced their art direction?

Right? When I think of Genesis arcade ports, I think of stuff that's a lot grittier/bloodier and not something like this. Now that you know a little more, do you think you'll try it out?

@@hungrygoriya Perhaps. Right now I'm on a Turbografx 16 kick. Partly why Turbografx was the first thing that came to mind. Started playing Neutopia the T16 Zelda clone and I'm greatly enjoying it. When I come back around to Genesis games I'll keep this one in mind.

I've got it on the Switch! I haven't had time to sit down with it yet, but I think it looks awesome!

Right? They were so adorable, it's hard to imagine them plunging their shovels into the hearts of their enemies.

Nice! I haven't played that version.

@@hungrygoriya I heard the genesis version was a butchered port of that version apparently. I didn't know about it myself for a long time and I haven't played it either. I just happened to have stumbled across it at random and surprised no one mentions it more often.

@@John-nb6ep Game Sack has a great video comparing all the versions. Truly, after seeing a little bit of the others, this one looks pretty good and keeps a lot of quality for music/sound and visuals and trades off the 2-player co-op for it. That's a good video to watch if you want to see for yourself.

@@hungrygoriya I'll check it out thanks. I rather they kept the 2 player mode though to be honest. The pc engine cd game appears expensive these days.

Yeah! I didn't have one for my Genesis.

Yep, it's a beautiful game.

I'm glad you found some solace in video games. That must've been tough to deal with.

@@hungrygoriya what? I was just asking if you found games like dragon trap, action platformers with puzzles to solve and rpg elements?

@@christurner4878 That was meant as a reply to someone else... no idea why it replied to you instead. Sorry about that! Recommendations though: Adventure Island IV, Super Adventure Island, Ufouria. Those are some favourites!

Super Chibi Boys would've been a better name!

How is the name terrible? It's in Japanese.

It's truly a beautiful game, agreed! I hope you'll try it out sometime... it's a good challenge for sure!

@@hungrygoriya I def might slide it in next to the Wonder/Monster Boy games if I ever do a playthrough of all of them

@@Maverynthia I can't wait to hear what you think!

The Genesis version doesn't have two players. Other versions do though!

🫠 I swear it's some type of Mandela effect lol

Agreed! I think my favourite part of the Wing Fortress Zone tune is all the drums they have going on in it, but yeah... it took some effort to make that console sound good.

I feel the same way about the snes. The Genesis sounds amazing when its fm chip is used properly. Listen to the soundtrack of any Technosoft game. The snes however just sounds like tons of low quality samples draped in reverb. Even the Final Fantasy games sound so low quality. The composition is amazing but it just sounds so low quality. The Genesis fm chip fidelity is so much higher because it's producing the original sound itself. No low bitrate samples and obnoxious reverb.

I hated getting stuck to walls but enjoyed the controls otherwise though!