Retro City Rampage

Retro City Rampage (also known as Retro City Rampage: DX in later releases, and Retro City Rampage: 486 on MS-DOS) is an open world action-adventure video game developed and published by Vblank Entertainment, a company formed by Brian Provinciano. It was originally released on October 9, 2012 for PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, but has since seen numerous ports for various consoles in later years.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) Very addictive gameplay.
 * 2) Lots of various pop-culture references to old movies, video games and TV shows, like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Bill & Ted, Mega Man 2, Sonic the Hedgehog, Back to the Future, Earthworm Jim, Ghostbusters and Duck Hunt, just to name a few.
 * 3) Great music courtesy of Freaky DNA, Norrin Radd and Virt, who composed the music in 8-bit style.
 * 4) Good 8-bit graphics, and it looks like if a Grand Theft Auto game was made for the Nintendo Entertainment System.
 * 5) * Speaking of graphics, they can be changed in the options to resemble various systems, like the Game Boy, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum and even the mh:crappygames:Virtual Boy!
 * 6) * The game's border graphics can also be changed to resemble an old TV or an arcade machine.
 * 7) Tons of missions and side-quests, ranging from optional jobs to Second-Rate Sprees, which are the game's equivalent to Rampage missions in the GTA games.
 * 8) Lots of collectables spread throughout Theftropolis, including hidden packages, known as Loot Bags, and phone numbers, known as Good Times.
 * 9) There are some fun mini-games, like the card games and slot machines based on Super Mario Bros. 3, as well as arcade games based on various video games, like Bit.Trip Video and Super Meat Boy.
 * 10) In addition to Player, there are various unlockable guest characters that can be used in Free Roaming mode, like Mr. Destructoid, Meat Boy, and Steve from Minecraft.
 * 11) Over 20 weapons to use, ranging from the pistol, shotgun and flamethrower, to the Bioclaw and the NES Zapper.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Some of the missions can get really hard.
 * 2) Unlocking Commander Video as a playable character is incredibly difficult and annoying, as it requires the player to collect all of the gold in every level of the Bit.Trip Runner minigame, which is easier said than done.
 * 3) The MS-DOS version lacks proper music and only has PC Speaker noises for sound.
 * 4) Player cannot be customized in Free Roaming mode.

Trivia

 * Retro City Rampage was originally envisioned as an 8-bit demake of Grand Theft Auto III, and was known as Grand Theftendo during development.
 * A prototype of the game, known as ROM City Rampage, was included as a playable arcade game in the Wii version and later releases of the game, which closely resembles the Grand Theftendo prototype.