In celebration of its 30th year, Blizzard announced today that it is relaunching three of its oldest games: Rock N Roll Racing, The Lost Vikings and Blackthorne. They are getting a little sophisticated at the Blizzard Arcade Collection, with varied features, including setbacks and extra levels, as well as a ‘museum’ of old development resources and interviews. It is now available for PC, although currently only if you buy Blizzard’s big pack of goodies from Blizzard.
The collection has the three games in their original versions, as well as more sophisticated new definitive editions. The Lost Vikings and Blackthrone allow you to save anywhere, as well as an ‘observation mode’ that allows players to watch the moves and then come in and take control whenever they want. And all are complemented with collections of “game art, development resources, unused content, tradition, interviews and more.”
The Lost Vikings of 1992 is a platform puzzle starring three big boys who need to combine their different skills. Your Def Ed is a mix of different console versions, says Blizzard, “combining the superior audio and visual experience of the first release with the extra stages and scenes, and support for up to three players in local co-op, which have been added in a subsequent version. “/ p>
Rock N ‘Roll Racing is a top-down murdercar game, first released in 1993. Def Ed has 16: 9 resolutions, increases the split-screen multiplayer count from two to four, adds snow and rain, it appears on extra tracks, slips on “real recordings” of songs on the soundtrack and on new songs and narration clips as well.
And Blackthorne from 1994 is a flashback platform game. I can’t say that I know this one. Your Def Ed adds an area seen only in the 32-bit version and a map that is filled in as you explore.
Honestly, I don’t have many memories of any of this – are you looking forward to a return visit, gang?
The Blizzard Arcade Collection is “currently” available exclusively for PC as part of the Blizzard’s Celebration Collection, a bunch of trinkets for many of its games, which start at £ 16.79. Would you like them to sell separately too? They are already selling separately on Switch, PlayStation and Xbox.