SNES Game Review: Uniracers

 Uniracers was a game that sold a limited amount of copies on the SNES because a company decided to sue the game developers because the likeness of the unicycle on the game matched their from a few years back.  That company that sued? It was Pixar, and Uniracers couldn't legally sell more than 300,000 cartridges worldwide due to this.  Therefore, it's a pretty decently priced cartridge.  DMA Design, the makers of Uniracers, did decently with the game to be honestly construed here.  Here is what is below of what they did well and not well.

Positives:

1. Uniracers has a lot of variety.  Yes it is a unicycle but the differences they do with racing and then X-Games style courses/layouts (this was before the X-Games came along by the way) makes this honestly a fun game.

2. As for the racing, the course layouts are very nicely done.  The different courses, difficulties of the computers, speed boost areas, obstacles and ability to do tricks to help with speed of game as well.  DMA Design did well as well with this and made it fun to race.

3. Difficulty of the game is fun too.  It's nice in my thoughts when the game gets tougher rather than one difficulty or another just through the game.  Overall I like that it gets progressively harder and harder and that makes for quite a nice game overall.

Negatives:

1. The graphics don't seem to be as quick as they need to be for this game.  They seem a bit slow, and the color isn't anything imaginative or out there.  DMA may have had to deal with the lawsuit but in all honesty, they didn't really do much on the graphics side.

2. Music is meh at best.  Also not a major center point to it and when you are trying to do well with the game itself, it just doesn't do much overall to have meh music.

Rating: All in all, Uniracers is a solid racing game.  It isn't wow-ish like F-Zero, Super Mario Kart or even Top Gear, but it is quite alright overall.  One thing is that the fans of this game will like the different layouts and the different courses of which the X-Games style tricks need to be done.  I would give this game around a 7.3 as it isn't a wow-ish game but is solid.  An overall ranking though of around 105th in the SNES round-up.

SNES Game Review: Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers

 In the early 1990's, there was a television show that transformed kids and made kids want to wake up early to watch.  Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers lasted 3 full seasons and made a lasting impact that still resonates today.  The same television show come up with a video game.  However, despite the show being terrific in the 90's, the video game.. well isn't as resonating and isn't as good.  There are some good aspects to it, and that is below.

Positives:

1. The original Power Rangers are there.  So they got the realism there, but they also have the look of every Power Ranger at that time.  So Jason is buffed up, Billy looks the nerd as he was in the show, Kimberly as an artistic gymnast, and so on. 

2. The music.  This is actually pretty good as well.  The morphing sequence graphic and music is pretty good as well. 

Neutral, more of an opinion: Play as Billy in this game.  It is absolutely hilarious the way he fights overall.

Negatives:

1. Oh boy where to start on this. Well the game is just slow.  Its pacing is just rough overall.  All of the pacing in this game from the fighting to movements is just slow overall.

2. The graphics otherwise are meh, not great or terrible just meh.  Which isn't a great thing if your game doesn't have many positives to begin with overall.

3. This game is actually pretty easy.  Which is fine, but when it is a beat-em-up with more movement than you would with a Mortal Kombat it would be better off with the difficulty being better overall.  This game really lacks a genuine flavor of anything overall that would make it unique. 

4. The sequel to this game, Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers: The Movie, is actually better. Yeah.. that's pretty much how that seems to be overall.

Rating: Well seeing how much this struggled overall, the rating I would give for this game is likely around a 4 out of 10.  There just isn't much to this other than a below average beat-em-up game and for the SNES, there are far, far better games.  This game probably falls in around 500th overall of SNES games.

Bees are Buzzing in Burlington

 The Burlington Bees were a Class-A minor league team in the Midwest League for the Los Angeles Angels.  However with the new realignment of Minor League teams, this is a new thing for the Bees to be aligned with the Prospect League.  The Prospect League is essentially kind of like the Cape Cod League or Northwoods League, which are summer wooden bat collegiate player teams who are likely for draft prospects in the MLB.  This rearrangement happened after I visited this in 2019, which actually concluded my Iowa minor league teams at the time.  What did I think of their ballpark and place? Here we go below!

The Canopy at Community Field

The first thing I got when I got there was a grass parking lot.  This stadium, known as Community Field, is easily noted for one thing.  That is the big canopy (which yes I have a photo of here) that is located right behind the press box and the concourse behind that.  You can see this from a distance so you know where to go for this field.  There is one main stand for concessions and the team store but the concessions are a plenty for food.  Anywhere from nachos, pork tenderloin sandwiches, Chicago dogs, and more.  They are all a decent price so you can spend less than 50 bucks for food and drink with a family of four in a 7-9 inning game.  The team store had a good array of things and, as typical for myself, I bought a Bees hat and it worked out well overall.  All the different array of things would lead to a good on field product right?

On field action

The on-field product is good yes, but it was not with major bells and whistles.  This is noted as some teams really pile it on with the need for entertainment.  The Bees didn't have that and the focus was the team on the field.  I do like that honestly as my focus at a game is for the players on the field.  I know this isn't a sport tailored for myself and rather for kids so I think they probably will take that into effect with the Prospect League going forward.  The field lends itself to be kind of a blast from the past feel to it due to having a baseball field built long ago with many renovations.  I know the major one is the party deck in left field that was hopping at the time.  The game itself was a pitching duel with some offense a couple of innings.  Burlington ended up winning this game and it was overall a fun time.  So all in all, how would this stack up against other, at the time, Midwest League stadiums?

Honestly, this would relate at the time as middle of the road of the stadiums in the Midwest League.  It was better than Beloit, Clinton as well, but behind those of Quad Cities, Peoria, Kane County, Wisconsin and Cedar Rapids and Fort Wayne that I had been to.  With them going to the Prospect League, it's bound to be one of the better stadiums.  I would still go back to this and would encourage fans to go.  Especially if you have a family, you can spend less than 100 dollars on a good set of souvenirs and food at the park.  Do take the trip to Burlington and have fun at Community Field.   

Dock Spiders Worth Not Burning Everything Up in Fondy

 The Northwoods League is a summer collegiate baseball league that is for likely draft prospects who are still in college and it is a league that uses wooden bats rather than the aluminum in college.  These games tend to showcase some good talent and one of those teams that end up with a team is in Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin.  They are called the Dock Spiders.  Yes I know people will see Spiders and instantly be in fear, but this team is definitely worth watching.  

 The Dock Spiders play in Herr-Baker Field, which is also home to Marian University, who plays baseball here.  They also started with a joint partnership with the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers, the now High-A minor league team of the Milwaukee Brewers.  The Dock Spiders have a good space to use and they do well for it.  Now it has been a couple of years since I last went there but still do have vivid memories of this team and this field. 

Herr-Baker Field

 Right away the thing that helps when going to the game is free parking, and easy in and out access of this field.  Herr-Baker Field is a nice little walkup to the field.  You are greeted with a concourse and a nice big concession stand to start.  They have yes the standard foods at a ball park, hot dogs, brats, burgers but also different sandwiches as well to help with any and all needs.  The main concession stand is good, but down the first and third base lines they had some specialty stands as well.  All of which is affordable and a good price in my opinion.  They also down the third base line had their team store.  Also affordable for the attire and they had a good selection of gear for a newer team.  The product off the field also resembled their stadium and on-field product.

The Northwoods League is known as I mentioned as a collegiate summer League so this lends itself to that.  So the on-field product is good in terms of talent as most of these players are draft prospects in some regard whether that year or in upcoming years.  The Dock Spiders do utilize that well and put on a good on-field product.  One thing I do like is they mix their on-field promotions at times and they don't do too little or too much like some minor league teams have done in the past. So I did like the mix of everything involved.  The field itself was good and very presentable of a collegiate team during the spring or in this case a summer league team. 

All in all, Herr-Baker Field and the Fond Du Lac Dock Spiders are a good product in central-eastern Wisconsin and the Northwoods League should feel right at home on this college field.  It has a good product and it's overall aspect of providing good quality talent is something to strive for.  I liked all aspects of the stadium and it is something to look at when in the area in the summer.