PPR Presents Limelight: Analogue Pocket Adapters in Action

After what’s felt like EONS of waiting, Analogue has FINALLY sent out the remaining Analogue Pocket adapters for their FPGA-engineered portable powerhouse, and we’ve got our hands on a set of the elusive do-hickeys to dive in on with y’all.

Join George as he streams an assortment of GameBoy, GameBoy Color, GameBoy Advance, Sega GameGear, Atari Lynx, SNK Neo Geo Pocket Color, and TurboGrafx 16/PC Engine/SuperGrafx games off of the Analogue Pocket on March 29^th, 6:00 PM PST! We don’t know what edgy 90’s slogan to end off on? So maybe we should use all of them—like, To be this good, it take PPR, or WARNING: the following may cause chills, dizziness, and shortness of breath or some other goofy dumbass shit like that…

We don’t know, just show up and check it out!

You can check out the streams here or directly on our Twitch Channel, and vibe along with us as we work towards ushering in a new age of Limelight for y'all!

PPR 150

ey everyone, apologies for sitting on the production of the episode for as long as we did—a combination of schedule changes within our daily routines coupled with the rare moments of poop-socking that were granted for us to dump giant loads into new releases with near endless maws of content really fucked up our usual operational turn-around times. Nevertheless, that’s all over and done with as we’re here to catch up with 2024 and plug away at another new year of gaming (and the sad sad shit that’s unfortunately stuck on to it like childhood baggage it would seem.

Rest assured though, with the little money this outfit has ever seen in its fifteen year run so far, we’ve come nowhere NEAR the volume of corporate glut that was the Corporate budget for Milk from VICE management—holy shit is it wild y’all. Anyway, in this episode of Press Pause Radio, Ed, George, Andrew, and Sean all gather together to discuss the details of their precious screentime in another edition of “What’s in your Console “ and we get deep in our time with sharing with the class in this session of water cooler talk.

On docket for the show, you’ll hear about the Commodore 64 Mini, Lazy Jones, Scramble, The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds, Final Fantasy Pixel Remasters, Tatsujin, GameBoy mod work, Hori Fighting sticks, Helldivers II, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, Splatoon 3: Side Order, Mario VS Donkey Kong, Final Fantasy VII: Remake Intergrade, Contra: Operation Galuga, Palworld. Unicorn Overlord, the WiiU and so much more!

So be sure to get  your intake of Vitamin R and soak nearly 3 hours of ear candy from one of the oldest video game podcasts still kicking in the game—here’s episode 150 of Press Pause Radio!

Mail us at our new email Mailbag@presspauseradio.com, leave a voicemail at 469-PPR-TALK, and be sure to stop by at our Forums if you haven’t already registered and post your thoughts about the show. Finally, make sure to rate and subscribe to us on iTunes and YouTube, follow us on Twitch page and Twitter, and finally take part in our Facebook and Steam group!

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PPR Presents The Golden Zonkies: Class Of 2023

ot to get too sidetracked but did y’all know that American Dad has aired for 13 seasons now? Shit’s kind of wild when you think about it. Anyway, better late than ever, here’s our annual Golden Zonkey Podcast special for the year 2023! We were able to fit a bunch of new games into our lineup, and of course, a bunch of old-ass ones too! Like, sure I guess it isn’t all that weird that George rolled a Texas Instruments Ti99/4a and Epoch Super CassetteVision into his lineup, but can y’all believe that Ed got a PS5 AND an Xbox One?! Andrew also picked up a friggin’ PlayDate—we are certainly wildn’ right meow y’all.

Despite all of the layoffs and chaotic mergers leaving behind more Valleys than Peaks in the Games Industry last year, there were still some genuinely massive achievements that deserve their flowers. Here’s to doing what we can to give back to the medium that brings our lives so much joy.

In case y’all don’t remember the updated flow from the last couple of years, we have changed up our format and have done away with categories!  Now, bear in mind, we’re still giving our prestigious mark of excellence, a Golden Zonkey, to the games that are deserving of recognition, only, we’re not doing by a respective genre, or category. Instead, we will be giving them out in a personal list format by each of us in the podcast, and we’ll be spending time discussing why we picked the titles we did within a countdown of five (we just happened to have played more killer games in 2023 than usual.)

Also, the biggest change to the process is that we will no longer limit nominations to the titles that were released that same year but instead, games that we had the opportunity to play that year, because honestly—it gave a somewhat stressful deliberation process a much-needed shot of levity for us to play with for Golden Zonkies!

 Normally we would have done a roundtable of games that were worth a quick mention from the year, but we decided to mention them in passing instead, along with some not-so-honorable-mentions (we also chose a few more not mentioned on the show to include in the post!) We will then award the “Golden Zonkey of The Year” in a unanimous vote that was similar to the previous format, and conclude the show from there.

Thanks again for listening to us gab on about our favorite time-wasters from last year. May we do what we can to capture both your ears AND eyes this on Press Pause Radio with all the neat shit we have in store—love ya!

Mail us at our new email Mailbag@presspauseradio.com, leave a voicemail at 469-PPR-TALK, and be sure to stop by at our Forums if you haven’t already registered and post your thoughts about the show. Finally, make sure to rate and subscribe to us on iTunes and YouTube, follow us on Twitch page and Twitter, and finally take part in our Facebook and Steam group!

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PPR 149

here’s one thing to lose a job (it still sucks, there’s no denying that) but it’s a whole other level of despair when you lose a dream job—something you’re proud to call a career. In the year 2023 alone, there has been a reported 6,000 layoffs in the Games Industry since October of this year, and that’s not even accounting for some of the new figures that were announced the last two weeks either.

Mind you, this is also happening in a year where profits are supposedly reaching record-breaking highs, but what kind of success can that really account for when it’s done at the expense of disposed talent—this shit straight sucks.

So join Andrew and George as they discuss the harsh reality of the industry and the growing instability for job security across multiples professions in the industry, and what measures, steps, and activism we can accomplish from both the outside, and the inside of the industry (take a shot every time we say “unionize” it’ll be a hoot!)

Prior to that, we also talk about some of the games we’ve been playing like Bluey: The Video Game, Robocop, Void Stranger, and more—lots to unpack before we head into the Holiday! Enjoy the episode everyone.

Mail us at our new email Mailbag@presspauseradio.com, leave a voicemail at 469-PPR-TALK, and be sure to stop by at our Forums if you haven’t already registered and post your thoughts about the show. Finally, make sure to rate and subscribe to us on iTunes and YouTube, follow us on Twitch page and Twitter, and finally take part in our Facebook and Steam group!

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PPR Presents Super Play: A Plumber for All Seasons-Part 1: Spring

here are a ton of Super Mario World hacks out there, sure, but none of them are anything like A Plumber for All Seasons. Hacker Alias White Yoshi Egg delivers a spin on the SNES classic that’s so radical that it plays like a long-lost entry to what could have been a bonafide Super Mario World Trilogy!

Join George and Andrew as they go through the entirety of the adventure, season by season, and show off all the neat shit that’s been packed into this, dare we say, Wonder-esque experience on the Super Nintendo!

QCF: Air Twister

magine if Space Harrier was revamped into an absurdly stylized Rock Opera that cranked the dial on the Surrealistic fantasy themes to psychedelic levels of absurdity over its Sci-Fi roots for current gaming platforms. Well, don't strain yourself too hard because YS Net, the studio started by legendary developer Yu Suzuki, has taken all the guesswork out of the matter with their latest release, Air Twister. Where Team Reptile's Bomb Rush Cyberfunk was a modernized Love Letter to an iconic SEGA property, Air Twister is being presented as the quintessential sequel to the Arcade Classic in nearly everything but name, and the next big release from Yu Suzuki following the studio's crowdfunded debut with Shenmue III. Originally released as an Apple Arcade exclusive in the summer of 2022, the mobile exclusive has now been greenlit as a multiplatform release for digital storefronts on both Console and PC.

The twists (shitty pun intended) don't stop there, as Air Twister offers various flourishes on the shooter's foundation that set it apart from its source material—honestly, to a degree where it more often resembles a Hidden Caravan Level Mode from Panzer Dragoon than anything related to Space Harrier. Despite the inconsistent traces of Harrier DNA though, Air Twister still manages to deliver that trademark Popcorn Shooting frenzy that Suzuki had earned his pedigree on, albeit in a somewhat stunted execution that just manages to breathe a scant new gasp of life into the Arcade classic.

Air Twister is…well, intriguing, to say the very least.

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PPR Presents Limelight: Har-Fest 2023

ey all, with the incoming flood of “October 31^st Vs November 1^st” memes hitting the timeline, we are vastly approaching the Holidays, and with that, I think it’s time we usher in the first Limelight block in years—aptly titled, Har-Fest Month!

During this month, George will be streaming 6 games to ring in the change of seasons, and will be doing so on the following schedule!

Super Mario Bros. Wonder/Sonic Superstars                                   Friday, November 10^th 9:00 PM PST

Umihara Kuwase/Astal                                                                    Saturday, November 18^th  6:00 PM PST

Super Magnetic Neo/Castlevania: Rondo of Blood                          Friday, November 24^th 9:00 PM PST

You can check out the streams here or directly on our Twitch Channel, and vibe along with us as we work towards ushering in a new age of Limelight for y'all!

QCF: Bomb Rush Cyberfunk

 find it pretty funny that I’m writing this review mere weeks after the Dreamcast’s 24th Anniversary; I mean, not just that in that granular humor from a well-timed coincidence sort of way, but in that I’m still seeing one of my favorite consoles live on through a legacy that dwarfs its flash-in-the-pan lifespan. Even though it was released two years into the 128-Bit Machine’s reign, Jet Grind Radio left quite the impact in 2000, as it quickly became a must-have exclusive for the platform and yet another reason to attract anyone over to SEGA hardware instead of Nintendo’s or Sony’s offering.

After an underwhelming sequel and years of Fan-service cameos, SEGA’s frenetic Graffiti-racer has mostly lived on as a garnish for the repeated servings of nostalgia surrounding the Japanese brands’ peak years. Given that the property has undoubtedly had more of an impact than SEGA had accounted for, it was only inevitable that one studio would set out to tag the spot Jet Grind Radio had left untouched for twenty years.

Netherlands studio, Team Reptile, answered the call, & endeavored to produce a spiritual successor to the Dreamcast Cult favorite with Bomb Rush Cyber Funk, an improved open-world take over the middling attempt we saw out of Jet Set Radio Future, with a freestyle approach to progression. The end result isn’t just a fresh approach to a familiar classic but a practical reinvention that improves upon its source material in nearly every single way.

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