What Video Game Did I Play Yesterday?

Cotton (Astro City Mini)

March 27th, 2025

Last night, I was playing my Astro City Mini in a very specific way. I turned in on like I'd gone to the arcade with 5 dollars and allowed myself 20 credits to play whatever. Space Harrier was my first victim, and I played it very badly. You should not ram into trees and pillars in Space Harrier, but I did it anyway, many times, until I felt bad for my shooty guy and switched games.

After that, I went on to play Virtua Fighter for a few minutes, and got really fixated on Pai's hat flying off when she gets hit. I didn't clear an arcade ladder because it was 1am and the tiny joystick was making my hand cramp up, but I was delighted!

I was less delighted by Cotton because if she dies within the level, she can respawn where she was, but if she dies during a boss battle, she gets kicked back to the start of the level. I will play this again, but I have friendlier Cotton games to get used to the series with. I don't know if now is my time to focus in on this version.

Last, I tried Dark Edge, which was a weird sprite based 3D fighter. Your character can move kind of around a 3D circle with their sprite turning and scaling as they travel, and the look of it is amazing! Play-wise, it does take some getting used to, but I'm very interested in returning to this. It's strange and cool!