If there’s one thing that will turn buyers off from the Smash Pack it’s going to be the boot sequence. While this might seem a strange way to start off a review, it will be the first thing anyone will notice. THQ, Sega, and CodeFire somehow managed to force players into sitting through thirty seconds (I timed it) of unskippable logos, copyrights and other useless information instead of getting you to the good part: the games. It’s a throwback to the PSX era on a cartridge-based system. It seems a bit shortsighted, to say the least.

As for the games themselves, they’ve been ported faithfully from the Genesis versions. Visuals and sound are spot-on with the originals. Unfortunately, this also means both are dated compared to today’s standards. One thing I must commend is the option to completely customize the controls of any game. The only problem is that since the game pak does not have a battery back-up, you will not be able to save your selections nor any high scores you might achieve. That said, it’s great to relive three good games on the GBA. Ecco the Dolphin, Golden Axe and Sonic Spinball were great on the Genesis and are just as fun now.

Ecco the Dolphin revolves around Ecco saving his home world of the Ocean and finding his pod after disaster strikes. Players swim through the oceanic world and explore areas using Sonar, along with a special Dash to defeat enemies and do all sorts of aquatic acrobatics. Players will have to travel through many stages and talk to all sorts of sea-going animals to survive this quest. Ecco has both Health and Air Meters, requiring you to take breaths, which can lead to intricate jumping and timing strategies.

Sonic Spinball is a pinball title starring SEGA’s world-famous mascot. Using the L and R shoulder buttons to move the flippers and send Sonic flying throughout the levels, you unlock secrets and collect three Chaos Emeralds per stage to defeat the evil Robotnik. The game includes both “Normal” and “Fast” modes of play, to add to the frantic fun.

The oldest game in the trio is Golden Axe. Sadly, it hasn’t stood the test of time all that well. While it is a fun beat-em-up, it unfortunately doesn’t quite stand up to the quality of games today. As one of three characters, you must defeat the evil Death Adder who has invaded your land and killed your best friend Alex. Gameplay can essentially be described as mashing the attack button as hard as you can and saving magic up until the stage boss. Further hindering the game is the fact that there is no two-player support, unlike the Genesis original. It’s still a very fun game – but most veterans of the title will agree that it was best played with a friend.

All in all, the Sega Smash Pack is definitely worth your money. You have three classic games from the Genesis-era and can take them on the go. The only issue is if you already own all three and don’t really care if they’re portable or not. It’s a nice way of reliving games of yore and allows a new generation of gamers to rediscover some of the great games of the 16-bit era.