Somehow, in the midst of 2023 madness, you may hear about a little kiwi over the next few weeks.

Forget your Starfields, Baldur’s Gates and Paydays, this game is a classic and another we grew up loving. This is what this week is really all about. Maybe.

Taito are releasing a brand new Milestones Collection with ININ, and it’s fair to say Tiki is the star of that particular show. But did you know you can also check out his cute little adventure on Antstream.

Introducing a new weekly column where we select a retro game of the week from Antstream Arcade and take a closer look at it. Played on an Xbox Series X.

What is this and when did it release?

Originally finding life in the Arcades during 1988, this game would later become something of a phenomenon on home based entertainment systems, including the Spectrum, Amiga and NES.

It had this eye-catching box art that leapt off the page and the cutest little hero you ever did see. Published by Ocean, you play as a little Kiwi who goes off to help his friends after they’ve been kidnapped by an oversized Walrus. You’re armed with a bow and arrow, but also a cute set of little trainers. For some reason.

It’s basically a platformer, but rather than just relying on jumps, you can also float upwards on little hovercrafts as the levels are as much about the vertical as they are horizontal.

Why this game?

Two-fold. The aforementioned Taito Collection releases this week, so it all feels sort of timely to be celebrating this game all over again. But also this is another of my childhood games. I still vividly remember ripping open Christmas paper one morning, seeing this beautiful sea blue cover box, squealing and placing it straight into my Amiga because I’d seen this game all over the shops at the time. It did not disappoint.

To this day, it remains one of my fondest, most favourite games from the system and makes up a huge part of my childhood. It also still holds up pretty darn well and looks absolutely fantastic.

So tell me about it.

The aim is to reach a caged Kiwi at the exit – in any direction – but you’re always guided by a pointer. You have to ‘Goal In’ and do so by shooting at all sorts of random enemies with your bow and arrow, watching from all sides, while keeping an eye out for any spikes and hazardous traps. Then you can free the Kiwi and move onto the next level.

Enemies drop fruit which add to your score and you’ll find yourself travelling all over New Zealand, passing famous landmarks along the way. The game was apparently inspired by a developer’s trip to the beautiful country and the ideas just snowballed from there.

Not every game on Antstream has aged well, but this one still looks great, plays great and does a good job of balancing the kinds of games people used to play while still feeling quite relevant and interesting to a modern audience. Give it a look, you might just love it. There’s also a native version on Switch if you’d rather play handheld. And don’t forget the Taito Milestone Collection 2 coming out…

What should we spotlight next on Antstream Arcade? Anything you’d like to hear more about? Let us know…