Retro Re-release Roundup, week of June 11, 2026

Why should I care? You’ve lost hope in Hamster ever bringing Side Pocket to ACA.

Useless fact: This game’s aesthetic — and its entire raison d’etre, one would presume — owes itself to the 1986 Tom Cruise/Paul Newman billiards movie The Color of Money, to the extent that whatever character art is present in the game is very transparently derived from shots and press images from the movie; certain versions of the game received slight edits to make the character’s faces a little more indistinct, but it seems the ACA version might be without those revisions…

CONSOLE ARCHIVES

L’Empereur (NES/Famicom)

• Platform: Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5 (worldwide)
• Price: $7.99 / €6.99 / £6.29
• Publisher: Hamster / Koei-Tecmo

What’s this? A turn-based strategy game themed around the exploits of Napoleon Bonaparte, originally developed by Koei for PC-88 and successive Japanese computers in 1990, with this conversion produced for Famicom and NES in 1991; players are tasked with taking over France and attempting to “unify” Europe, a feat achieved via hex-based military battles, the allocation of resources to militaries and townships, international diplomacy and direct and indirect military commands.

Why should I care? Icouldn’t tell ya first-hand, but I have been told that of the Koei strategy games of this era, this one is notoriously difficult, so I’d like to think this game might scratch a particular deranged itch possessed by a few of y’all.

Helpful tip: Just to reiterate, as opposed to the last several Console Archives releases, this one actually includes an English version.

EGG CONSOLE

Mirai (MSX2)

• Platform: Nintendo Switch (worldwide)
• Price: $6.49 / ¥770
• Publisher: D4 Enterprise / Xain Soft

What’s this? A sidescrolling sci-fi action-RPG, originally developed by Creative Brain and published by Xain Soft for various Japanese microcomputers including MSX2 from 1985 to 1987; players embark on a mission to secure planets across a nebula in order for global relocation, which manifests in mazelike sidescrolling action that are divided between above-ground sections, traversible by jetpack, and underground sections that limit the player-character to on-foot traversal and hand-to-hand combat.

Why should I care? Xain Soft’s modus operandi of the time could be said to have amounted to putting a veneer on games that are otherwise imitating other, more popular titles… and, to be sure, Mirai is very much in the Xanadu-but-it’s-space mould, but the slightly shootier nature and more explicit and therefore more surmountable progression-blockers do give it a feel of its own.

Language barrier? Not unless you’re put off by broken English.

OTHER

Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration

• Platform: Nintendo Switch 2 (worldwide)
• Price: $29.99 or equivalent
• Publisher: Aspyr

What’s this? A surprise Switch 2 port of the second game in the Crystal Dynamics/Square-Enix Tomb Raider reboot trilogy, originally released exclusively for Xbox One and Xbox 360 in 2015 and ultimately followed by PC and PlayStation 4 ports the following year; 

Why should I care? Without vouching for the port itself (which, given Aspyr’s track record, is probably mediocre at best and non-functional otherwise), I can say that Rise represents the sweet spot of this particular trilogy of games: it’s far from perfect and very much a gumbo of AAA design trends of its day, but it offers the least dissonant story and a more sensible blend of diet-Uncharted and, y’know, tombs.

Helpful tip: “The “20 Year Celebration” subtitle is a holdover from the title given to the PS4 version, which has been unhelpfully retained for this port —Tomb Raider as a series is actually 30 years old, and this game’s coming up on eleven years old itself. Hmmm.

UPDATES UPDATES UPDATES

Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition Switch 2 upgrade pack ($9.99 / £4.99)

Ahead of the newly-announced Xenoblade Genesis for Switch 2, Nintendo’s announced plans to roll out paid Switch 2 upgrades for each game in the original trilogy, starting with the just-released update for the remaster of the original Xenoblade Chronicles — in addition to visual and performance bumps, this update adds voice acting for the Heart-to-Heart conversations, new equipment designs and some very goofy-looking fast-travel vehicles.

TRY THE DEMO

DoDonPachi Resurrection Reignite (PC) pre-repease demo

After a long hiatus from non-mobile game development, legendary shooting game studio Cave is returning to the home market with the recently-announced DoDonPachi Resurrection Reignite, a new revision of their heavily-ported 2008 arcade shooting game DoDonPachi Daifukkatsu that promises new modes,stages, characters, music and more — and not outsourced or licensed content, either, but content designed and produced directly by Cave themselves, whatever that might mean in 2026. As of right now, the demo doesn’t offer much that isn’t present in the existing decade-old PC port beyond touched-up menus and a new assist mode, but if nothing else, playing it might go a ways towards helping them avoid the typically issue-prone PC launch that befalls most every small Japanese PC port.