Description of game

Well, where do I begin? Now, Spin master is a product made of pure recyclate. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not bashing on the game. 1990’s were an era of rapid development, a technical and engineering boom. New technologies were emerging at warp speeds, springing like mushroms after the rain. And for a computer software company to survive in such a fluid environment, it had to constantly produce something new an innovative, or—at least—try to keep up the pace with the commercial rivals.

Well, Data East tried. They have produced at least something for virtually everything: arcades, Neo-Geo, NES, Playstation, you name it. But… there is always a a catch... Be it the DataEast Cassette System, the first attempt at the standardized arcade hardware ever, or the 1988’s controversy of Chelnov, the miner who survived nuclear meltdown, it was all either prone to malfunctions, controversial (hey, Chernobyl 1986, anyone?), or just weird.

Now, in the case of Spin master, Data East grabbed a few sprites from their previous games (namely those two cowboys from Dashin’ Desperadoes), upgraded them a bit to roughly match the graphics standards of the time, and used them in a weird platformer with a poor excuse plot and a most ridiculous signature ever: a yoyo.

Yes, you heard me right: a fricking YOYO, ladies and gentlemen! A drowning man will catch at a straw, I guess. And a drowning company will catch even at this kind of recycled… *cough* mass…

You see, again, don’t get me wrong. Gameplay-wise it’s not that bad at all. Actually, I kind of liked it. But the rest? Oh man... Why? Why do you rob your own game for its characters, only to stamp new names on them and present them as something new, for Christ’s sake? And most of all, why do you rob US an European players of your poor excuse plot, and give it only to those who were lucky enough to play the Asian release? Well, I know. US and European version came a year earlier than the Asian one. So I think its safe to assume that by the time the former two were released, the plot yet wasn’t written at all, and was only later added a year later to the Asian release.

I get it. By 1994 (the year Spin master came out), Data East was standing onboard a sunking ship and they pretty much knew it. Shortly before the 2000, the American division was closed and in 1999 the parent company ceased to produce videogames at all, focusing only on its fringe engineering products, namely video-transfer devices, EKG and fax machines.

As to the game and the excuse plot itself, it is a review after all. Two cowboys/treasure hunter, whatever, go after a treasre hidden on a secret island. The map to the Island was scattered all around the world. They have the first fragment, but before they get to aquire another one, an evil scientist kidnaps the Blonde’s girlfriend and so he enbarks on an adventure journey to get her and the treasure back.

Controls consist of any 8-way joystick and three buttons A,B and C (note: in MAME they correspond to the buttons 1,2 and 3, thank me later). What each of the buttons does is presented at the beginning of the game, so I won’t be wasting my time writing it here, you have your own eyes, in the end, don’t ya?

Well, and that’s pretty much it. Should you find yourself in a state of mind where you’d want to do it, try it yourself. Because as I’ve said: if it’s made by Data East, it’s either prone to malfunctions, controversial or just weird. And weird this game is. Believe me.