One more thing that I noticed during the review and didn't mention here. Apparently the character only reacts if you steer the joystick strictly in the respective direction. But if use both directions (top right, bottom left, etc.) as usual, it doesn't work.
When moving the joystick diagonally, the priority direction is horizontal, so if you are moving vertically and move the joystick diagonally, the character will move horizontally, but vice versa it doesn't work. However, consider that the original arcade version uses a 4-way joystick and therefore the diagonal is not foreseen.