NES #29: Chip 'N Dale Rescue Rangers 2

Most of you who are interested in games enough to read this blog have probably played the first Rescue Rangers game. However, I'm sure hardly any of you have played the sequel. There's a good reason for that. This is a very late, 3rd party release for the NES. By the time it came out everybody had already moved on to SNES and Genesis. If you want to play this one today you've got to hunt down a copy and pay good money for it. I never see it on ebay for less that 50 dollars anymore. Actually, it's one of the most expensive licensed games on the whole system. So good luck on finding that one anywhere. Too bad you missed it the first time around.

Of course you could always get lucky and find it at your local used video game store for 15 bucks. That's what I did anyway. You never know what you're going to find out there. That's why I love this hobby so much. Of course, that's also what makes me put off buying certain things for years and years. I should've bought Action 50 about 80 dollars ago, but I wanted to wait and find one that was ridiculously cheap. But enough about me, let's talk about the game.

Rescue Rangers is a lot like the first game in the series except shorter and possibly even easier. The world map that I loved so much from the first game is gone and replaced by cutscenes that make the game feel like an episode of the show. The gameplay from the first one is still in tact. There's lots of running and throwing boxes. It's actually pretty fun. Also, you collect tokens all throughout the game which add to your health bar. It's sort of a level gaining system that almost makes the game seem deeper.

The bosses are extremely cute in this one. You sorta feel bad killing them, but I guess they attack first. I haven't seen the cartoon show in about 15 years so I have no idea if they are characters from the tv show or not. Was there a bunny that squirted water at you in the show? Maybe they were all made up for the game. Anyway, I have no idea why they turned over to the dark side. I'm sure all those kitties could've found nice homes, so that they wouldn't have to fly around on bat wings or dress up like magicians and throw playing cards at hat wearing chipmunks. That may be the best sentence I've ever typed.

I guess the thing that was really supposed to set this game apart was the dialogue between levels. As I stated earlier, the game plays like an episode of the tv show. It's actually a pretty good idea. The only problem is that the story is quite flimsy. The story goes that Fat Cat escaped from prison and wanted to steal something important from Egypt. You'd think that since I played this game three days ago that I'd remember what it was. I guess that tells you something right there. I figured that this would be a trek across the world leading to a big show down in a pyramid. I was dead wrong though. It's just the same ol' generic levels like in the first game. There's always some excuse why you're in a factory or pier instead of Egypt, but I don't buy it for a minute. Would it really have been so hard to put some sand and pyramids in the background? I wanted to fight some sphinxes with lasers shooting out of their eyes, not just the same old robot dogs!

The worst part is probably the ending. I was expecting something a little more involved since the whole game was set up like a tv show, but you never even get to fight Fat Cat. You just find his factory or evil headquarters on the end of town and fight the robot Fat Cat. No problem with that battle. Then the building collapses and Monterey Jack compliments you on making Fat Cat's life slightly more difficult. That's it? Mild irritation!? That's how the heroes save the day? What about that thing that he was going to take over the world with? What about getting him back into prison? It left me feeling pretty empty inside.

The ending implies that they wanted to make more games in the series, which is odd to me on a few different levels. This game came out in 1993 which was three years after the first game and the original run of the series. It was also at the very end of the system's life when nobody was playing the system anymore except for me, and I wasn't that interested in another Rescue Rangers game. I know that there were still little kids playing the NES, but if you really wanted to continue the series on why put it on a dead system? SNES and Genesis both made excellent side scrollers that plenty of little kids played. It just doesn't make any sense to me.

So in my collecting I've always been interested in the last games for consoles. What goes into making a game for a system on its last legs? Every year after 1991 saw less and less NES games up until its final year in 1994. What surprises me most about the 93s and 94s out there is that they really seem like the people involved were trying to make good games. You can see a lot of time and effort in them. This game is pretty good, but I just don't see the love in it. There isn't one from the era that seems more phoned in that I have played. It was just a game made for kids who were all playing Kirby's Adventure instead. At least its rarity makes it a conversation piece. After all I did spend more time writing this blog entry than I did playing through it.