Action 52
Action 52 is an unlicensed multicart video game compilation developed by Active Enterprises for the Nintendo Entertainment System, and FarSight Technologies for the Sega Genesis. The NES version was released in 1991, followed by the Genesis version in 1993. A Super NES version was advertised in magazines, but never released. Active Enterprises was legally incorporated in the Bahamas, however, offices and development were located in Miami, Florida while the company's product warehousing was located in Orlando, Florida.
Action 52 consists of 52 games in a variety of genres, mostly scrolling shooters and platformers, including The Cheetahmen, Active's attempt at creating a franchise similar to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
The NES version of Action 52 became notorious among gamers for the poor quality and functionality of its games, and is often considered to be one of the worst games of all time. The Genesis version is widely considered superior, though still of subpar quality. Many video game collectors value Action 52 for its notoriety and rarity. It initially retailed for the comparatively high price of US$199.
Gameplay
NES
The games on the NES version cover a variety of genres, the most common being vertical shooters set in outer space and platformers. The games have major glitches, some of which cause them to freeze or crash due to programming flaws; there are also incomplete or endless levels, confusing design and unresponsive controls. In the manual, each game is given a one-sentence description, with some being described as completely different games and others incorrectly described or categorized.The "featured" game of Action 52 was The Cheetahmen. There were initial plans for a line of merchandise including action figures, T-shirts, a comic book series, and a television cartoon based on the characters. However, these plans quickly fell through as word of mouth and reviews mounted after the game's release.
A Yeah! Woo! drum break that is sampled from Rob Base's song "It Takes Two" is used, only in the opening sequence of the NES version.
Active Enterprises advertised a competition in which anyone who could complete level 5 of Ooze would be entered into a prize drawing to win $104,000. The game was reported to crash on level 2, making this prize impossible to win without the use of an emulator or an in-game exploit, rendering the contest a failure.
Sega Genesis
The Sega Genesis version of Action 52 features a largely different lineup of games, some with more effort put into design and fewer technical issues than the NES version. Each game is color-coded on the main menu screen; "Beginner" games are green, "Intermediate" games are purple, "Expert" games are yellow, "Challenge" games are white, and multiplayer games are blue.Several new games were introduced in the Genesis version, a number of which share their names with games from the NES cartridge, but are different in terms of content. The Genesis Haunted Hills, for instance, has a male protagonist and is set outside a haunted house, while the NES Haunted Hills has a female protagonist and takes place inside a haunted house. A new rendition of The Cheetahmen was included, in which the Cheetahmen rescue captured cheetah cubs from Dr. Morbis and his minions.
In addition to the 52 games, the Genesis version features a Music Test mode and a "Randomizer" option. If selected from the main menu, the Randomizer will randomly choose and start one game from the 52 available on the cartridge. The fifty-second game, Challenge, is an endurance test to see how long the player lasts in a random series of the highest levels of the other games.
Development
Little is known about Vince Perri, the creator of Action 52. Perri claims to be a businessman from Miami, Florida and the owner and founder of Active Enterprises. He also explains that the breakthrough came by accident: "I happened to see my son playing an illegal product made in Taiwan that had 40 games on it. The whole neighborhood went crazy over it", Perri said. "I figured I'd do it legally. It's obvious when you see something like that, you know there's something there". In 1993, he showcased Action 52 at the International Winter Consumer Electronics Show.For the NES version, Perri claimed to have raised $5 million from private backers from Europe and Saudi Arabia. He and Raúl Gomila employed three college students to do the game design, music, graphics and programming on an Atari ST, with a three-month deadline and little playtesting or bug fixing done. Technical work was contracted out to Cronos Engineering, Inc., a Boca Raton company that had done work for IBM. According to González, the game has been misrepresented as a "scam" in the gaming press; he clarifies that Perri never intended for the game to be a scam, at least at first, and believed it was a genuinely good business venture after seeing his neighborhood become entranced by his son's Taiwanese multicart. However, it was Perri's overconfidence and lack of gaming business savvy that led to the project's downfall, by hiring inexperienced programmers and giving them such a short deadline without knowing how long games typically took to make, and thinking such a poor-quality product would be able to make him rich via the Cheetahmen franchise.
Action 52 has eight extra game templates, since the distributor had the carts come with 60 games by default, as well as many unused tiles; this has been confirmed in an interview with González. Also, according to González, the development team was flown to Sculptured Software to develop the game. While Mario does not remember the name of the game company, he recalls them both being based in Salt Lake City, Utah, and the company was developing an NES adaptation of Star Wars V: The Empire Strikes Back. This, along with the game using Sculptured Software's sound engine, proves that the game was developed at Sculptured Software, but not by Sculptured Software staff.
Several of the songs from the NES version of Action 52 were plagiarized from example tunes included in Activision's The Music Studio for the Atari ST. The games with plagiarized music include Fuzz Power, Silver Sword, French Baker, Streemerz, Time Warp Tickers and Ninja Assault. Those songs were composed by Ed Bogas. Additionally, programmer Kevin Horton analyzed the music code of Action 52 and found that it matched a music engine programmed by Sculptured Software, featured in all of their NES games.
The Sega Genesis version, released two years later, was developed by FarSight Technologies on a Macintosh LC over the course of a year, under the direction of Jay Obernolte. This version contained far fewer glitches than the NES version, due to FarSight having experienced programmers and pressuring Active into playtesting the game before release. Pérez and Hernández were again involved in the development of this version but González had departed from the team at this point to spend more time with his girlfriend, who he eventually married. Music for this version was contracted out to Mark Steven Miller and Jason Scher of Nu Romantic Productions, which was composed within 48 hours. FarSight was also set to develop a version of Action 52 for the Super NES, as well as another multicart titled Sports 5, but Active Enterprises withdrew from the video game industry shortly thereafter, and no copies of either game are known to exist.
Prototypes
There are two known variations of "Action 52" prototypes known to have been produced. Prototype I featured a blue colored circuit board in a clear cartridge with a sold blue colored label and did not have the "Active Enterprises" embossed on the rear. The second, prototype II, featured a black circuit board and clear, transparent, label; and did include the "Active Enterprises" embossing. It is unknown how many units of prototype II were made or still exit but is believed to be more than prototype I. The final, released, version of Action 52 for the NES featured a clear cartridge with a green circuit board and transparent label with the "Active Enterprises" embossing. In 2010, a prototype I cartridge of Action 52 surfaced, owned by movie and video games distributor Greg Pabich. Originally, Vince Perri had proposed a deal with Pabich asking him if he would be interested in working for Active Enterprises as a business partner. At this time, Perri only had a few prototype cartridges and not the final product. For various reasons, Pabich turned down the offer, but not before leaving with one of the prototype I's in his possession, which was stored in his warehouse for over twenty years before it was "rediscovered".The prototypes contain numerous differences from the final Action 52 cartridges. They contain minor text differences for the game titles as well as different color backgrounds for the game selection menus. The final version contains the words "Action 52" in its header and copyright information in its footer. The prototypes simply contain section numbers in each menu screen's header. The code for Action 52 appears to be heavily based upon the pirate multicart 52 in 1. This is evident from the menu template in the Action 52 prototypes being identical to that of 52 in 1. However, the biggest difference between the prototypes and the final game is that the final version contains the game Cheetahmen, whereas the prototypes do not. In its place is a completely different Cheetahmen game titled "Action Gamer". Action Gamer features only two levels, one of which is incomplete.
After Vince Perri insisted on the inclusion of his "Cheetahmen" in the final version of the game the "Action Gamer" levels were re-worked and renamed to ultimately become the 5th game on the cartridge titled "Ooze", the same title which, as was promoted, that if an individual player were to beat that title they would be entered to win a prize of US$104,000.
On November 11, 2011, Greg Pabich publicly released reproductions of Action Gamer, calling it "Cheetahmen: The Creation". This was achieved by stripping the ROM data from one of the original prototype I cartridges and completing the game coding. This special package contains a sealed version of the game for collectors, an unsealed copy, a reproduction of the original Cheetahmen comic book, a Cheetahmen music CD, special edition T-shirts, and a poster.
In August 2012, one of the four original Action 52 developers surfaced, presenting their original boxed Action 52 NES prototype I cartridge, one of only two prototype I's known to exist. They have since created a blog documenting their part in the development of the Action 52 NES cartridge.