Update 6/11 - Wonder Boy, interview with Westone founder Ryuichi Nishizawa, Game Club 199X Ep. 7, The Lost Vikings, Neo Turf Masters, Excelsior, Rocky Horror Show

Wonder Boy was one of the first articles on this site from back in 2004, and while it did an okay job parsing the series' rather confusing naming conventions, it was still kind of lacking compared to the articles we feature in 2012. I've rectified that now, having almost completely rewritten it to double its length, and conducted an interview with Ryuichi Nishizawa, one of the founding members of Westone, and one of the main developers behind nearly the entire series. It's always been one of my favorites, particularly Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap for the SMS, and this chat elucidates some of the more intriguing aspects of the series. For example, in most of the non-Sega ports of the games, the name "Wonder Boy" was removed from the title and the characters were changed. We long thought that this was due to licensing issues with Sega, but nope - most of these versions were actually developed by Hudson, who refused to comment on their alterations. Close one mystery door, open another.

Three of the games were recently released on the Wii, XBLA and PSN as part of the Sega Vintage Collection, which is absolutely imperative that you purchase - while it's unfortunately missing the The Dragon's Trap, it does contain the previously unreleased English version of the Monster Land arcade game, as well as a brand new translation of the also previously unreleased Mega Drive game, Monster World IV, which is one of the most gorgeous titles on the system. Coincidentally, Game Club 199X was playing the Monster Land titles this past month, and the seventh episode has been posted, featuring special guest Ray Barnholt, of Retronauts and Scroll Magazine, which is publishing its sixth issue very shortly. All of this taken together makes a rather brilliant Week of Wonder Boy.

Also featured this update is The Lost Vikings, an rather classic puzzle-platformer released by the folks who would eventually become Blizzard; Neo Turf Masters, an arcade golf game from the makers of Metal Slug; and Excelsior, a duo of 90s shareware titles heavily influenced by the classic Ultima series. Your Weekly Kusoge is The Rocky Horror Show, just a bad idea in general, for a number of British computers.