My Awful Childhood Video Game: Action 52 (1993) - Sega Genesis

     On one Winter Solstice season in my childhood home, my siblings and I were gifted with the classic gaming console Sega Genesis from our parents.  It was one of the most memorable consoles of our childhoods and we would remember the games we got for it for many years to come.  We received titles Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Sonic & Knuckles, Spider-Man vs Venom and Action 52!  You heard me right, Action 52… the infamous 52-in-1 game cartridge which originally was effortlessly released on the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), now was on the Sega Genesis.  However with a small amount more effort and mostly different titles.  When I wasn't pretending to be a vampire, trying to conjure up spirits or watching horror videos, this is the crap I sometimes played!

     It all began the following summer after we received the Sega Genesis when my mother was watching the Home Shopping Channel on our television.  My mother saw the cartridge with 52 games at a relatively cheaper price than official Genesis games and said, “Ryan, I think we should get that.  That’s a great price for 52 games!”  I of course had no objection and was excited to receive the 52 games. As one of the most exciting things for children in the 90’s was when you got a new cartridge, plugged it into a gaming console and saw how it worked.  Soon after we were delivered the new games and it seemed quite a bit different than the official Genesis cartridges, which I thought was neat at the time while not understanding the difference between official and unofficial games on the classic gaming consoles.

     I plugged that sucker in as soon as I saw it and played the first game called Go Bonkers.  I enjoyed this game quite a bit as a child, however it seemed impossible to complete the entire game.  It was a puzzle game in which you were basically an upgraded Pong ball which made blocks disappear when you were the same colour as them.  It was fun for the first few levels, however the levels became so challenging that none of us were able to beat this one all the way through…

     Another memorable one for me was Ooze.  You play a leprechaun with a gun and the green ooze was very attractive to the eye.  However, it was another one that we couldn’t beat as I only remember beating one or two levels, mostly due to the overall motion control of the game.

     We sometimes played the racing game Daytona, however it wasn’t real racing.  You just had to dodge red trucks until you got to the end of each track.  After each level you had to dodge more and more trucks.  No other vehicles, just the red trucks…

     There was also one called Haunted Hill or Haunted Halls on the title screen of the NES version… This one must be good, it has two different titles!  Right?  Well, I do love my spooky games, but this one was also too hard to control unfortunately.  You have this torch which you are only able to hit the occasional bat with effectively and rarely other enemies… You also collect gems in hard to reach places... Never beat this one either...

     I played The Cheetahmen a few times because it had the most effort out of all of the games on the entire cartridge.  I didn't like it very much however and the motion control was the same as Haunted Hill...  I never beat this one either...

     Billy Bob was a slightly more fun game because it was a first person shooter in which you shot people in windows in a Texan style setting.  However you were unable to move around your handgun fast enough to shoot on the higher levels.  Needless to say I never beat this one either...

     Freeway was a lot like Frogger, however you were a dog crossing the street to get a bone.  You had to bring it back to the side you came without being hit by cars.  When you got hit by cars, the dog's body can be seen splitting from where the tires ran over it.  The levels get too challenging, but it's just a fun sort of twisted version of Frogger and is fun to see how far you can get.  Even though I never beat it...

     Slalom I played on occasion and I remember I actually beat this one... once.  It's just a skiing game in which you dodge trees at random.  Usually so random that you'll die because the trees may be impossible to get away from.

     Meteor was quite easy!  Finally a game I was able to beat more than once!  It was a space shooter game obviously and I remember thinking the animation of the huge meteors was appealing to the eye... even though the meteors were bigger than the spaceship you control.  However it was nice to play a game I could actually beat for a change.

     I remember occasionally playing other games, however less memorable than the above titles, such as Dyno Tennis, Alfredo, Sharks, Echo, Mousetrap & Spidey.  You could also play Pong although it was called First Game in the menu.  All other games were likely undesirable to play because they were either too simplistic or too hard.  All in all certain games on Action 52 are okay to play when you have some time to waste and you're getting tired of the other games you've likely played a lot more.  Just don't expect to succeed with most of the games, or you'll be disappointed.  It does have a small place in my heart because I grew up with it of course, but playing it as an adult isn't all that great.  It's a little less than mediocre, and sometimes just awful.

     The fact that  I'm willing to mention 17 games out of the full 52, tells you just not to bother with the other ones.  This cartridge is like going down the bulk food aisle at a supermarket.  There are some things that are okay and you might buy on occasion, but for the most part everything is crap.  Go Bonkers was my go to game even though it was just a puzzle game and no one ever beat it...

     This is how I'm going to rate the cartridge:

Go Bonkers - 🌟🌟1/2 (out of 5)
Daytona - 🌟🌟
Billy Bob - 🌟🌟
Freeway - 🌟🌟
Slalom - 🌟🌟
Meteor - 🌟🌟
Dyno Tennis - 🌟🌟
Ooze - 🌟
Haunted Hill - 🌟
The Cheetahmen - 🌟
Alfredo - 🌟
Sharks - 🌟
Echo - 🌟
Mousetrap - 🌟
Spidey - 🌟
All other games - 0

     This gives the entire cartridge 22.5 stars out of 52 games. equaling an average of about 1/2 of a star.

     As I stated above, there was also an NES version which I never played and according the the Angry Video Game Nerd, it is even worse than the Genesis version.  One title just shows up as a blank screen and doesn't work.  Watch his hilarious review below, he briefly goes through the Genesis one as well.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_52

Action 52 - Angry Video Game Nerd - Episode 90

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4QBeADNM34