Virtual Console: Vegas Stakes

Nov. 26 12:14 PM by Sardius

I once played Vegas Dream for the NES at a friend's house as a kid. The gambling aspect of it didn't grab me all that much, but every so often between rounds, your character would be approached by a stranger at the casino and be offered a choice to make. A lady might ask you out on a date, or someone might page you for a phone call, for instance. Keeping true to the gambling theme, your choices could either bring you a quick fortune (you get married and the casino gives you money for some reason! WIN $5,000) or a swift and painful defeat (on the way to the phone a chandelier falls on your head and breaks your skull open! LOSE $500).

This also meant that you could eventually build up a harem of strange women you married after your first date, half of which will later run off and steal your money. Vegas Dream was kind of weird.

To my surprise, I found out thanks to this week's Virtual Console lineup that Vegas Dream received a sequel in 1993 with Vegas Stakes for the SNES. Like its NES predecessor, Vegas Stakes offers up reasonably faithful recreations of popular casino games, including blackjack, roulette, craps, poker, and slot machines.

If you like any of these games, odds are (ha ha) that you'll like the versions presented in Vegas Stakes. Blackjack plays like blackjack. The slot machines are a waste of money. Roulette features a nice little Mode 7 rotating wheel. About the only complaints I have are that some of the games run a little slow (playing poker with five people is excruciating), and few of the rules of each game are adequately explained, so you'd better know how they're played going in. Craps has always mystified me, and Vegas Stakes did little to make it any clearer.

So, you've got some decent versions of five casino games. What makes Vegas Stakes worth the $8 that could otherwise be spent on an LCD keychain poker game? Well, like Vegas Dream, Stakes also features a story mode and chance encounters with strangers who will either rip you off or give you some fast cash.

I really, really like this approach. Whereas most casino games are content to plop you into a casino and have you gamble until you die, Vegas Stakes frames your gambling adventure in the context of a story, which sees you visiting a series of casinos with a group of friends. It's kind of a weak story, sure, and they could've done a lot more with the concept, but at least it's there. It helps define Vegas Stakes' personality, and makes it stand out among a lot of really similar competitors.

Thankfully, Vegas Stakes also retains Vegas Dreams' weird random events outside of the main games themselves. From what I've seen, none have consequences as dire as in Vegas Dream (you won't collect six or seven wives by the game's end, for one), but they're fun little diversions that often challenge your personal morals. Your character might find a wallet at one point -- do you keep the cash inside, or do you turn it in and hope for a reward? It's a neat and strangely personal choice, and Vegas Stakes is all the better for it.

So is it worth $8? Sure, what the hell. It's not like it has much competition on the Virtual Console, anyway, or even in the Wii's entire software library, for that matter.

This video illustrates every corner of Vegas Stakes in painstaking detail. Trust me, it's more fun than this makes it look.