Arcade Archives Aqua Jet

Genre: Watercraft Racing

Players: 1, Online Leaderboards

The Nintendo Switch 2 Difference

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Review:

Aqua Jet is an Arcade-style Watercraft Racing game originally released in arcades in 1996. In this game, players ride a Jetski-style watercraft in a race to try to finish first.

The gameplay here is like a simpler take on the same sort of gameplay we see in Nintendo’s Wave Race 64, with players racing through a course to try to get to a finish line first. Only… well, it lacks that game’s dynamic wave conditions, and the subtle way you could shift your weight to affect your landings. It also features only one race course with one variation for more difficult play settings, and no multiplayer in this release.

This release of the game includes a new “Hi-Score Mode” that challenges players to score as much as they can in one run before seeing a game over screen. There is also a new “Caravan Mode” that does much the same, but with the limit being five minutes. In addition, this release of the game includes both Japanese and English versions of the game. In addition, there are various display options, sound options, button mapping, online leaderboards, and save states.

Finally, I should note that this release supports gyroscopic motion control, which is nice… but when I tried it I found it wasn’t to my liking, and is even on in the game’s menus, which is irritating. Also, I did not see any option to adjust the gyroscopic controls in the game’s menus, and even finding the option to just shut it off was difficult.

Overall, I think Aqua Jet is an enjoyable Racing Game, but with only one race course and no multiplayer, you’ll be done with it very quickly. It certainly doesn’t feel like it justifies its bloated $15 price tag, especially for a game that’s nearly 30 years old. Unless you’re a huge fan of the original release or are dying to play a retro Watercraft Racing game, I don’t think this will be worth your while.

tl;dr – Aqua Jet is an Arcade-style Watercraft Racing game that’s enjoyable to play, but sorely lacking in content and with no multiplayer mode, which makes it even harder to justify this nearly 30 year-old game’s bloated $15 price tag. Unless you’re starving for this sort of game or have nostalgia for its original release, skip this one.

Grade: C-

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The Nintendo Switch 2 Difference

Arcade Archives 2 Aqua Jet

Genre: Arcade Racing

Players: 1, Online Leaderboards

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Review:

When the Arcade Archives series jumped to Nintendo Switch 2, it did so with a “2” added to the title, and an extra $2 added to the price tag over the cost of the Nintendo Switch release. An while these games don’t have a “Nintendo Switch 2 Edition” upgrade, players who purchased the Nintendo Switch release of the game first will be able to buy the Arcade Archives 2 release on Nintendo Switch 2 discounted to only $3, making this effectively a $3 upgrade. So the question is, what do you get for that $3?

As far as I can tell, not much. I didn’t notice any difference in resolution or framerates, and the only extra feature I saw was a new Time Attack mode where players try to complete the entire game in as short a time as possible.

Beyond this, the only difference I noticed was slightly-improved loading times. On Nintendo Switch, the game takes 8 seconds to load to the main menu and 3 seconds to start the game, while on Nintendo Switch 2, those times are cut to 7 seconds and 2 seconds.

Better? Sure. But $2-$3 better? Nuh-uh. If you’re trying to decide whether to get the original Arcade Archives release or the Arcade Archives 2 release, I’d honestly say to save yourself a few bucks and get the original Arcade Archives version… and that’s if you think this overpriced game is even worth it at that price.

tl;dr – Aqua Jet is an Arcade-style Watercraft Racing game that’s enjoyable to play, but sorely lacking in content and with no multiplayer mode, which makes it even harder to justify this nearly 30 year-old game’s bloated $15 price tag. Unless you’re starving for this sort of game or have nostalgia for its original release, skip this one.

Grade: C-

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