This week’s Yay or Nay? takes a look at the first 3 of the second hundred Virtual Console games to hit North America. We’ve got three selections this week in the form of Lode Runner (NES), Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Genesis), and Golden Axe II (Genesis). Which ones are worth your Wii Points? Click on to find out!

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Lode Runner

Know what this reminds me of? A cross between the Donkey Kong arcade game and Super Mario Bros. 2. Lode Runner has you, “Runner,” going around many different levels trying to obtain piles of gold nuggets in good ol’ Mario 2 platforming fashion. In the meantime, you have to avoid a bunch of robots that just happen to be patrolling each level. If one of them is coming your way, it’s up to you to burrow into the ground to try and avoid them.

Lode Runner is a decent game, and under any other circumstances I’d probably say it’s worth trying out. It’s legitimately fun and quite challenging. In this case, however, we already have the TG-16 game, Battle Lode Runner, available on the Virtual Console. It’s a newer version, much better in several aspects, and only a dollar more. If you really want to try this game out (in case you haven’t before), get the TG-16 version.

Final Opinion: Nay

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Sonic the Hedgehog 2

Sonic’s back and this time his new buddy Tails tags along for the ride! In arguably one of the best Sonic games in history, Sonic set out once again to stop Dr. Eggman (Robotnik) and his plans to collect the Chaos Emeralds. Fans will remember this game as taking the original and refining it to perfection all while introducing fresh new zones, acts, and enemy battles. In addition, it introduced some recurring features in Sonic games such as the pseudo-3D bonus stage (Sonic Heroes/Rush/etc.) and spin dash attack (pretty much every Sonic game since).

While the game was designed without Sonic designer Naoto Ohshima and a Japanese team from Sega (Ohshima and Sega Japan decided to follow up Sonic the Hedgehog with the contrasting Sonic CD game), Yuji Naka himself and a team from the United States forged what is now known as Sonic 2. The game sold 400,000 copies within 5 days of release and is still loved by fans today - for good reason.

Final Opinion: Yay

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Golden Axe II

Yet another “beat ‘em up” game comes to Virtual Console. Golden Axe II follows in the footsteps of its predecessor (also available on the VC) in almost every way. It’s a pretty good entry to the side-scrolling genre, though not necessarily worthy as a sequel.

Golden Axe II, while fun, doesn’t really improve over the original game. You’ll go through six different levels in total enjoying familiar gameplay, the same old characters, and updated graphics before realizing that’s pretty much it. While often described as clearer and more refined, the overall experience doesn’t quite match the difficulty on the original game.

You can pick it up if you think you can stomach pretty much a clone of the original game - it’s still a decent game. However, if haven’t played any Golden Axe game and are looking for one of them to play, download the first one.

Final Opinion: Nay

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That wraps up our Yay or Nay? feature for this week. Can’t wait to relive some of those great moments with Sonic and Tails. Join us next week when we cover… well, whatever hits next week. See ya!

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