It’s time again.

The DangerTerrorHorrorThon lives again, but not for long if these participants have anything to say about it!

Custom Sprites
Castlevania: Death (Castlevania NES and Symphony of the Night designs)
Ghosts ‘n Goblins: Skeleton Murderer
Gauntlet: Death
Kid Icarus: Grim Reaper
Night Slashers: Boss 6

All sprites have been added to the GFX Generators

The HorrorThon continues tomorrow when things get wild!

The DangerTerrorHorrorThon is finally done, and it’s time for the wrap-up post (and a few extras):

Custom Sprites

Altered Beast: Werewolf (new pose), Neff, Aggar (flying head and whole Aggar), Chicken Stinger
Splatterhouse: Rick Taylor (new pose), Jennifer Willis, Evil Cross & Nightmare, Biggy Man, Nobu
Castlevania: Alucard, Queen Medusa, Sonia Belmont
Gauntlet: Demon
Ghosts ‘n Goblins series: Red Arremer/Firebrand
Mario Series: Boo
Zombies Ate My Neighbors: Stanley Decker
Illmosis/ScrollBoss: Ghost
the Horror gallery:
– Halloween: Michael Myers/The Shape (sheet disguise), Dr. Loomis, Jamie Lloyd, and, added today, an improved version of my 2016 Laurie Strode sprite
– Phantasm: the Tall Man (new version of blade-bearing spheres), Mike
– WNUF: Frank Stewart

Mini-logos: Sonia (Castlevania) added to Konami gallery, Carrie and Phantasm (Remastered) added to movie gallery.

All of these things were added to the GFX Generator, along with that new ominous arcade background.


The horror print (available on the shop page) made a cameo in a Destructoid article about some spooky Nintendo Switch games! Mad thanks to Jonathan Holmes for both buying a print and spreading the word! By the way, if you think the reshading job I did for the Laurie sprite looks like the horror print, well, we’ll have to save that conversation for a later date.

Hardcore Gaming 101 just released a new digest called The Guide to Retro Horror. The book includes material by Rob Strangman, creator of the legendary West Mansion Splatterhouse fan site and artwork by the always-fresh Rusty Shackles.

VGJunk has been on a roll with a wide variety of horror and monster game reviews throughout October, including Splatterhouse 3!

Arcade Quartermaster added new shrines, including Konami’s Haunted Castle, a game that’s considered scary for all the wrong reasons, and, to kick off Karnovember in the right way, the original arcade version of Karnov!

The movie became an instant favorite of mine when I saw it on Shudder long ago and I’m proud to own it on DVD (no VHS version for me… yet). There’s currently a GoFundMe campaign to get a sequel made! Consider helping out and supporting independent filmmaking if you can afford it!

Eddie in the City is having a sale on some cute, horror-themed miniatures, including a few game characters you’ll recognize if you’ve been following the HorrorThon!

This shmuplations.com translation of a 1988 interview with the Splatterhouse arcade team is right on time for the spooky season and full of interesting tidbits about the game’s creation.


The DangerTerrorHorrorThon is back!

Custom Sprites
Castlevania: Alucard, Queen Medusa, Sonia Belmont
Gauntlet: Demon
Ghosts ‘n Goblins series: Red Arremer/Firebrand
Mario Series: Boo
Zombies Ate My Neighbors: Stanley Decker
Illmosis/ScrollBoss: Ghost

All of these things were added to the GFX Generator, along with that new ominous arcade background!


The horror print made a cameo in a Destructoid article about some spooky Nintendo Switch games! Mad thanks to Jonathan Holmes for both buying a print and spreading the word!


In tomorrow’s installment of the Horrorthon, we celebrate 30 years of two gross, monster-filled arcade classics. When you rise from your grave tomorrow, put on your terror mask and come back for more gore than you bargained for. One of the new sprites is so large that it can’t fit in the GFX Generator screenshots!

This year’s DangerTerrorHorrorThon begins now with some 1989-related horror goodness, including the Mistress of the Dark ditching her Party Monsters (from the 1989 pinball game) and getting down with the Monster Party!


Yeah, I basically used a pinball game as an excuse to make pixel art of Elvira.

Custom Sprites – Along with a new design for the main Custom Sprites page, the following galleries were updated:
Atari: Ghosts from Gauntlet
Movies: Elvira
“Games (Other)” page: Monster Party’s Bert and Mark, Tom Guycot from Clash at Demonhead
Namco: a Pumpkinhead drone from Splatterhouse Wanpaku Graffiti

Mini-logos – Elvira added to the Movies section, Monster Party added to the Bandai sections.

GFX Generators – All of those new sprites and mini-logos were added to the generators along with a few Vampire Savior 2 stages for the multi-choice background styles.

The DangerTerrorHorrorThon will continue next Friday with more weirdness from video games (and beyoooooond, ooOOOooo) and conclude with one more update on Halloween, Friday the 31st. Something about that date makes it seem even more suspicious, doesn’t it? Hmmm…


The font to write the DangerTerrorHorrorThon logo comes from Hydro78, one of the most unstoppable graphic design beasts I’ve ever seen and definitely worth a look the next time you want to buy some fonts.


Other people out there doing the spooky thing right about this time:
VGJunk: Great monster game reviews have been added all month, including a fresh look at Sega’s Monster Bash.

ManyNinjas recently clocked in some Boss Rush speedruns for Maxim and Simon in Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance.

Wizzy dropped one of his patented all-around CPS2-styled BGMs for Darkstalker’s Sasquatch, and it sounds buttwhoopingly beautiful.

edit: the first update went so well that I’ve made a few improvements to Elvira, including new palettes and two more poses. Thanks for the kind words and I’ll be back with more weird stuff!

Thor the Warrior and Questor the Elf now join the other two O.G.’s (Original Gauntlet) in the site’s custom sprite gallery and GFX Generator. The Generators also have a rendered background based on Gauntlet II, Level 1, so you can add Gauntlet’s starting line-up and add a few more characters. The 16 x 16 in-game Gauntlet font, as seen in the preview screenshot, is in the Generator, too. I also improved Thyra’s palette while adding a brown outfit based on the Gauntlet II title screen.


The new Gauntlet revival game is now available through Steam. I don’t have it yet, but I’m using the game’s release as an excuse to finally make sprites from the game. Of course, the Commodore Amiga version of Gauntlet II was released in 1989, so I’m still covered.


The Beep: A Documentary History of Video Game Music & Sound has three days left to hit more stretch goals. They’ve announced that Yuzo Koshiro (Streets of Rage series, Revenge of Shinobi, Actraiser and many more games), so I’m completely hyped for that. They’ve stacked up an all-star group of OST legends to interview and I’m looking forward to the finished product!


This site will be in a slightly low activity mode until the middle of October, when the monster and horror-related updates will start once again. I’ll be breaking those 1989-only rules for content, but remember that there are enough monster and horror-related games from that year to celebrate. Expect both the unexpected and the expected, though expecting the unexpected also makes it expected, BUT STILL.

There’s no space for introductory yammering, only for the newness!

Custom Sprites
Atari: Thyra the Valkyrie, Merlin the Wizard (three versions of each) from Gauntlet
Capcom: Amazons and Kuniang M.A. Team (Strider), Metal Man (Mega Man)
Final Fight: brand new Two.P and J (fighting stances)
Konami: Bayou Billy West
Sega: Joe Musashi (new RoS fight stance), the evil amazons from Golden Axe (arcade and Genesis/Mega Drive versions)
Taito: the Priest from Cadash
Technos: Riki (Kunio-Kun series), Billy and Jimmy Lee (new scratch-made sprites)
Games (other): Gogan from the Legendary Axe
Toys & Cartoons: Captain N (!)
TMNT: Bebop and Rocksteady

Mini-logos – Believe it or not, it’s another A-to-the-mothereffin’-Z mini-logo update with the entire alphabet representing!


– Atari: Thyra, Thor, Merlin and Questor
– Capcom: Hugo (USF4 style)
– Epyx: Epyx
– Kaneko: DJ Boy
– Konami: S.P.Y. Special Project Y, Ultra Games
– Marvel: X-Men, The Uncanny X-Men
– Movies: RoboCop
– Nintendo: Captain N
– Sega: Alex Kidd (High Tech World style), Yamato (Shinobi), Zeed
– SNK: Ikari III, the rescue, Guerrilla War
– Taito: Fighter (Cadash), Mage(Cadash), Ninja(Cadash), Priest (Cadash), Violence Fight
– Tecmo: Ninja Gaiden (NES box), Wild Fang
– Technos: Billy (Lee), Jimmy (Lee)
– Victor: Legendary Axe


GFX Generators – All those new sprites, characters and logos were added to the generators.
– Groupshot Generator: box 160×192 gets four new TurboGrafx-16 set-ups
– Backgrounds: Three Ultra Street Fighter IV backgrounds, one Double Dragon Neon background and a remake of Final Fight 1-1
– Updated characters: Poison (blue palette from Mighty Final Fight)

Minus World – the “Run, Woman, Run!” article was updated.

Game Index – added: the Adventures of Bayou Billy.

I hope that made up for the poot-butt, small updates from the past few months. There won’t be any updates this gigantic for a while, but this Revenge of 1989 theme still has some surprises in store. No promises, but there might be an additional update later this week, including tune-ups of earlier content and things I didn’t have time to work into this update.


“Hey, why are there Gauntlet characters in a 1989 update?” Besides the fact that there was a good port of Gauntlet 2 for the Commodore Amiga, there’s a new Gauntlet game coming out this month!


BTW: the Boy and his Pup Kickstarter is almost done, so help out if you can!


Edit (September 20, 2014) Besides making a few fixes here and there, the following things have been added:
Mini-logos: Rolento (Ultra Street Fighter IV), Bebop and Rocksteady (TMNT Classics)
Custom sprites: Kunio-kun (Downtown Nekketsu Monogatari cover pose)
GFX Generators – All new content was added to their characters in the generators, fixes were made to a few characters (Andore/Hugo, Thyra the Valkyrie), the Lee Brothers new palettes were improved to include Double Dragon 1 sets (with the gray boots) and the “Mego: WGSH” has three new “head bubble” sets.

Okay, that’s enough for now.


Breakin’ News


Joystiq reports that there will be a Midway Arcade Origins compilation of over 30 games for $30 for PS3 and X-Box 360. Don’t forget that Midway acquired the libraries of The game list in the press release mentions Defender, Gauntlet, Joust, Marble Madness, Rampage & Spy Hunter. Multiplayer modes will be local only, but there will be trophies and online leaderboards so the rest of the planet can make you feel crappy about the scores you’d normally be okay with. Backbone Entertainment will be doing the emulation duties again, so this thing is in good hands. Honestly, the extras like artwork and developer interviews are one of my favorite things about game compilations and I’d be happy if they just re-used some of the videos they included with the Midway Arcade Treasures series. Games like Gauntlet and Rampage that allow more than two players should be much more interesting now that these comps are on machines that don’t need multitaps. Midway’s Tapper actually shows up in the upcoming Wreck-it-Ralph’s, so maybe they’ll think of including that one, too.


Just in case you hadn’t heard about Keiji Inafune’s new game with the interesting concept and premise:


Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z by All-Games-Beta

Here’s the Project X Zone video with all kinds of Capcom, Namco and Sega characters in crazy-go-nuts mode combat mode: