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This is an oldie, but uh... well, it's an oldie where I come from.

The game isn't heavy on text, with only a few cutscenes between levels where story beats from its movie counterpart play out, but for what little there is, it's superbly done. The original dialog in the Japanese version was adapted from the movie, so it truly shines when translated back to its native English. Characterizations come through loud and clear, and I can hear Christopher Lloyd and Michael J. Fox in my head as I read their lines. The thick Chicago-esque typeface, with good word and letter spacing, renders clean and easy to read as well. Everything looks grammatically clean, with every last bit of Japanese translated, right down to the title cards between stages. The level of polish is here is so high that it's nothing short of professional.

Overall, this is a timeless translation with little room for further improvement. Granted, it's the only English translation that's widely available, but it's still stands strong as the closest thing to an official stateside release. Many thanks to mteam for a spectacular job.

Let's get the straightforward part out of the way first: mteam's translation of Super Back to the Future II is absolutely excellent. No technical issues, no sloppy moments, just a game that looks and plays as though it had been localized for us to enjoy back in 1993 - as it should have been.

Now, that said: "What in the name of Sir Isaac H. Newton happened here?"

That is, how on earth did this game get such an outsized reputation? Super Back to the Future II is no lost classic, but a very, very average licensed platformer that's absolutely plagued with slowdown. It looks and sounds nice, sure, but those things lose their charm quickly when the game eats your inputs because it can't keep up with the action onscreen.

It's one of those games that's frustrating and yet too easy, if you know what I mean: the boss fights are a simplistic joke, but elsewhere the game has some annoying bottlenecks. Still, I beat it in just a couple of hours (on real hardware).

I've marked this as "recommended" because of the quality of the fan-translation work, and because I think just about every game is worth experiencing. But please don't believe the hype about Super Back to the Future II: it only stands out because the other games made from this franchise are so terrible, while this one is just mediocre.