In his latest video, Just Jamie rounds up a brutal list of Amiga arcade ports that really should’ve stayed at the arcade. The spotlight is on Amiga arcade ports that completely missed the mark—visually, mechanically, and sometimes even audibly. Over 20 ports are reviewed, and none are spared. If you thought your childhood memories were safe, Jamie’s about to stomp on them with an ST-colored boot.
Right from the start, games like Final Fight and Street Fighter II get ripped to shreds for clunky controls, choppy frame rates, and visuals that look like they were drawn with a dry marker. These Amiga arcade ports often suffer from awful hit detection, sluggish response times, and muted color palettes—sometimes literally, thanks to bugs like the infamous default-dark color setting in one game. And remember Flying Shark? You might want to forget it again. The bullets are giant, the screen is cramped, and it plays more like “Crawling Mosquito.”
Jamie doesn’t just criticize. He surgically breaks down how each of these Amiga arcade ports fails. Whether it’s the oddly washed-out look of Turbo Outrun, the dead-eyed expression of Billy in Double Dragon, or the curious lack of sound effects in what should be adrenaline-pumping action, each entry gets a fair but unforgiving spotlight. There’s even some cross-platform roast beef served—many of these disasters are straight ST ports in disguise.
And while one or two titles almost scrape by with “acceptable” visuals or “not-terrible” scrolling, the majority land somewhere between “why did I buy this?” and “who let this happen?” It’s a painful, hilarious, and weirdly cathartic watch for anyone who once paid full price for these 16-bit letdowns.
