As usual with these reviews, let's be clear on a couple of things about my background that may impact how I feel about this cart. I'm not British. And - though I was alive in the '90s - I didn't become a teenager until the year 2000, and I never really went full edgelord.

But I don't want to spoil the review right in the first paragraph, so let's leave it at that for now.

Oh, you know what, one more thing. When I first got into Evercade and decided I wanted to go for a full set, Gremlin Collection 1 is the very last cart I picked up. And it stayed sealed for while. And when I finally opened it (maybe when Zool was Cadey's Challenge?), I didn't come away with much love for the cart.

So I was a little skeptical when they announced Gremlin Collection 2, but it seemed like these were well-remembered and well-regarded games among their audience so I kept an open mind. Let's see how that went for me.

Loaded

Loaded is a top-down run-and-gun for the PS1. Broadly speaking, think Gauntlet but...well let's leave the rest of that thought for after the rest of the description.

Loaded has you (and an optional second player) choosing from one of six "psychos" who were maybe framed(?) for crimes and then tortured at a maximum security prison planet before being allowed(?) to escape to hunt down the warden and take revenge. But the warden wants that to happen(?) in order to test his strength as a supervillain(?). I dunno, there are mission briefings and some cut scenes but my brain didn't take any of it in.

Gameplay-wise, yeah, as I mentioned above it plays a lot like a Gauntlet. Run around the levels, kill anything that moves, collect keys to unlock new parts of the level. Keep going until the level is done.

This game is fine. It's got some 90s edgelord stuff if you couldn't tell with the "psychos" and over the top gore and stuff, but that's whatever. It's a little cringey, but it doesn't bother me too much personally. My main issue is that each level - and the game as a whole - is just too big. The environments and the enemies change regularly, but the gameplay itself doesn't really. Which is fine - Gauntlet is hardly a model of depth and evolving complexity - but cut it up into slightly more bite-sized pieces for me. I don't want to be trucking back and forth across big levels trying to remember where the blue door is after picking up the blue key. Just not really enough here to keep me engaged.

It might be fun blasting away at things in multiplayer, but playing single-player didn't really do much for me so I'm not likely to find out. Especially with a shelf of Evercade carts behind me, there is no reason for me to reach for this instead of Chaos Engine or an Alien Breed.

Good soundtrack, though.

Re-Loaded

Believe it or not, this is a sequel to Loaded. And, to its credit, it tries to shake things up a bit.

The basic gameplay remains the same, but the levels and objectives change up. Rather than collecting keys, you'll be variously navigating labyrinths, collecting items-that-aren't-keys, blowing up a certain number of specific scenery elements, that kinda stuff. While mindless blasting is still the core of what you're doing, there's a little more to it for most levels.

Well this is a good lesson for me to be careful what I wish for. More varied objectives, less mindless blasting. It's just what I wanted. Unfortunately the execution leaves something to be desired.

Many of the levels are larger and more elaborate than those of the first game, which makes searching and backtracking even more annoying. Especially since it's no longer just a matter of looking for a color-coded door. So once you've blown away all of the enemies, backtracking through the level to find the right elevator to take on your path across the rooftops isn't especially thrilling gameplay.

I dunno. When I started this game and saw we were getting different objectives in the level I was excited for something a little different. But it just doesn't quite come together to make any fun.

Hogs of War

Hogs of War was the game I was most intrigued by when this cart was announced. I love a turn-based strategy and the comparisons to a 3D Worms had me excited.

And those comparisons are pretty accurate. Hogs of War has you choosing from one of six teams of hogs themed after countries from World War I then you can take on the campaign or play skirmish battles against the CPU or another player. Gameplay proceeds like a 3D Worms (disclaimer: I have not played any of the actual 3D Worms games), with a few interesting twists.

As you progress through the campaign, you collect promotion points you can use to promote your team members through one of four career paths. These classes determine which weapons your pig has access to during the missions. So you may find yourself with a bazooka, a sniper rifle, or a poison grenade depending on what class you have chosen. This adds a bit of strategy around how you build your team and how you use each team member on missions.

The levels themselves are typically pretty sparse - hills and valleys, bridges and rivers. But some missions will also have buildings, bunkers, turrets, or even vehicles. These can offer a fun change of pace, but often just make things a little bit more boring when the last CPU player goes to cower in a bunker.

Hogs of War does its best to capture the charm and comedy of the Worms series but, despite Rik Mayall's best efforts, it never quite nails it. The art style and presentation doesn't lend itself slapstick humor in the same way as Worms, even though the game seems to assume that it's a given. And the attempted comedy in the voice acting works against the game more often than not. Your mileage is going to vary here, but I feel like I need to have a discussion with everyone in earshot before I play this game with the sound on. As I mentioned before, the teams are based on World War I countries such as Germany, Russia, and Japan. And the "Asian music" sting followed by a white guy doing his shrillest and thickest-tongued "pwepare to meetu you ancestahs" is going to have people nearby raising eyebrows at least.

Which is too bad because there's a fun game here. And a good bit of humor in the pun-laced mission briefings and such, but the rest of the humor just falls completely flat for me.

There's a good time to be had here, I'll just maybe play on mute or focus on skirmishes where you can choose the less embarrassing teams.

Buggy

We got a taste of Gremlin's PS1 racing games back on Collection 1 with Hardcore 4x4. And you can say a lot of things about how HARDCORE that game is, but I wouldn't call it fun. So I had pretty low expectations with Buggy.

Buggy is a racing game themed around remote-control cars. There are a bunch of cars to unlock and a bunch of different tracks to race on (connected by little hub areas). The tracks are littered with colored gates and you can get yourself various power-ups such as speed boosts and time stops by going through them in the right order.

This game is a lot of fun with one important caveat: it's only fun if you use the analogue controls. Steering with the d-pad and accelerating with the face buttons suffers the same over-steering issues as you'll find in Hardcore 4x4. But in analogue mode, the two sticks mimic a (reversed) RC controller where one steers and one accelerates. The game gets a lot more controllable and a ton more fun. So handheld users or VS/Alpha users without a third-party controller may have a different experience here.

Even with the improved controls, this game still suffers from the same "PS1ness" of Hardcore 4x4. That is, it looks perfect on an Alpha or on the VS with a little portable monitor, but when I get it up on the big screen my eyes unfocus and the game just becomes a big smear. And sometimes when I get going fast I end up feeling a little bit motion sick when I can't quite parse what's happening on the screen.

So there is a lot of fun to be had here, but only under ideal circumstances.

Wrap Up

What, already? Yeah, there's only four games here. Four PS1 games, to be sure, so there's a fair bit of content here. But is it content you're going to want to engage with?

For me, Loaded and Re-loaded are complete write-offs. There's some fun to be had with them, but the long stretches of boredom just aren't worth it. Hogs of War is a pretty good strategy game that, uh, misses the mark with its humor. And Buggy is a really fun racing game under the right conditions.

I dunno, I'm right on the line here, folks. I had a lot of fun with Buggy once I tried the analogue controls, and Hogs of War is alright but I'd almost always rather a real Worms experience.

Truth be told, I had this review written in my head weeks ago, but I couldn't bring myself to sit down and write it. It doesn't have any games I love that I want to gush about, any games I think are interesting and want to dissect, or any games that I don't like and actively feel compelled to complain about. I mostly just need to clear the queue so I can write about Roguecraft DX. So I think if I weren't a full-setter I would probably just be Avoiding this one.