NES #33 - Bionic Commando

Okay so I could've wrote about this game a week ago, but I've sick. Whenever I get sick my writing starts to get really dark. Yesterday I was planning out a blog post about how you never get back what you had as a kid, but you will spend your whole life trying. I was going to talk about how that's the reason I play so many old video games. So you can see how my mind goes when I'm not feeling well. For the record I'm not that interested in reliving my childhood, and I'm actually quite happy these days. I'm probably still a little too ill to be blogging, but I get really bored when I miss work. At least this gives me something do to.

So earlier I was talking about how I'm not trying to recapture my childhood by playing old games, but if I was I couldn't think of many better games to do that with than Bionic Commando. For years I said it was my favorite game ever made. While I no longer know if that's true I still think it's just as fun as when I played it all those years ago. The only thing that has changed is my appreciation for other games.

In many ways I think Bionic Commando is the perfect action platform games on NES. I think the only rivals are Mega Man 2 and Mario 3. It has so many things going for it. I mean, look at what it has going for it. First of all there's the unique gameplay. You can't jump, but you got this long arm that you have to swing around with. All the precision swinging makes this a game like no other. Then there's the compelling storyline. This was right after game developers started to see the potential for expanded stories in games, and they use it to great effect here. This game also has the most bloody and adult ending that I had seen in a game up to that point. It also has some RPG elements which greatly enhances the experience. How good can a game be with no towns to visit and no levels to gain? I don't even want to think about it. It's even got a world map which always knocks a game up a couple of places on my list.

Am I gushing a little bit? Well I really love this game. I've beat it many times over the years. Although I have an interesting story, or at least a not completely boring story, about this time through. This was actually going to be one of the first games I played when I started this blog. I knew that I could get through it easily. It was always my plan b in case another game was taking longer than expected. Well I tried playing through this one during just about every RPG I've covered on this list and never could beat it. I discovered that somehow I sucked at Bionic Commando. But this was my game! I couldn't possibly be so bad! I was missing every jump, getting hit by every soldier, and running out of lives fast. What was going on? I had remembered this game having very fluid motion. You were able to swing around like Tarzan. How did it get so sluggish? I thought that maybe it was a Tetris scenario where I had played so many newer versions that the old NES one seemed rough by comparison. The problem with that theory is that I've never really played any of the other versions of Bionic Commando. It was about that time that I realized that my controller was broken.

So all this time I've been playing these games with a broken controller. Or at the very least an unresponsive one that needs a good cleaning. I don't really know that much about the technical side of gaming. Anyway, I got out one of my other controllers and beat this game easily. I finally learned how to get continues and realized that there's still a lot I don't know about this game. I didn't know that you could use your energy recovery pills over and over again. I thought that was a one shot deal. Also, I still don't know how to get the machine gun. Not that I need it much when I've got a rocket launcher. Still, I'd like to know. I think it's great that I've spent more time playing this game than just about any other platformer and I still don't know everything about it. Some games just have staying power.

So did I mention how much I love this game? I guess there's not much more for me to say. I can't say that it's the greatest game of all time anymore, but it certainly is one of the best sequels anyway. The developers took the game Commando and expanded it beyond anyone's wildest dreams. I would like to close by saying that I hope people are impressed out there that I had been playing through all these NES games with a broken controller. But since I'm a guy who spends his free time playing twenty year old games and writing about them ten years after all the other bloggers out there I doubt you will be. Well there I go getting dark again. That's why I get for blogging when I'm sick.

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.

NES #26: Darkwing Duck

Well here's the one you've all been waiting for. After all these months of anticipation, I'm finally writing about your favorite game. You'd better sit tight because this game's got a lot of nuance and mystery attached. What's that you say? This is just a typical side scroller? It's not you're favorite game but in fact one you've never really thought about much? Actually I knew that going into this post, but since it's been almost a month since my last NES game, I thought you would cut me some slack. Well that's very kind of you.

Alright well enough talking to myself. It's time to talk about some Darkwing Duck. It's based on the cartoon series from twenty years ago. If you didn't see it you missed out, especially if you're now an adult. You can watch it if you want, but I doubt it would be the same. You can try, but can never truly recapture the joys of childhood. Am I sill not talking about the game? I'm really trying to avoid this one.

Okay so Darkwing Duck is a typical NES side scroller on the way easy side of things. It may actually be at the base of the Capcom difficulty scale. It's easier than Rescue Rangers and even shorter. If you are an adult who has been playing Nintendo for 20 years or so, and you're just picking it up for the first time than you shouldn't have too much trouble with it. I know this from experience. The only two parts that gave me trouble were Liquidator's level and the final battle with Steelbeak. Although even that turns out to be easy when you've learned the technique.

So what is there to set this game apart from other games? Well like Mega Man and Duck Tales you can select your level. Although unlike those games it make absolutely no difference in the game which order you beat the levels in. DW's got a pretty cool gas gun, but the only special gas weapon that you'll ever need to use is the arrow gas. Actually avoiding the other types of gas made the game a little bit more challenging. I sort of enjoyed it. Oh and I do like the way DW can hang off of ledges and get back on. That's probably the game's best feature. You can go up and down very easily, and I wish more games would've followed its example. So there's a negative, neutral, and positive thing about this game. I think that's pretty good.

I wish I had more to say about this one. I never got to play it as a kid and was actually a little excited when I found it recently at Savers of all places. I wish I had got to play it in 1992 when I was really into the cartoon. I would at least have some good memories about it. Of course if you read my Rescue Rangers article you know that I don't automatically love a game just because I played it as a kid. So perhaps it's just was well. You get a totally honest opinion not biased by nostalgia. I had an alright time playing this game. It's one you don't see in stores too often so if you see it cheap sometime you should probably pick it up. Just don't expect it to be Contra or anything. It's not a classic, but it gets the job done. I'm just glad there's not 400 games just like it on the NES. What's that you say? There actually are? What have I gotten myself into?

NES #17: Strider

Well here's yet another Capcom game. It seems like they made half the games I've finished so far. I'm not sure if that's because they are especially easy or that I played them so much as a kid. Either way I appreciate Capcom for making this blog a little bit easier. Many of their games are easy to get through and fun to write about.

So Strider was a game that I absolutely loved as a kid. I always loved non-linear games with deep story lines. This game also reminded me of Bionic Commando which was my absolute favorite game. Looking back on it though the two games don't seem all that similar. Maybe I thought they were alike because of the world map and menu screen. They both just seemed a little more advanced than the average Nintendo game.

Anyway, this game is about a group of Striders. Or are the bad guys the Striders? I have to be completely honest with you. The story in this game makes absolutely no sense to me. The storytelling is a little clunky, so it's hard to tell what's going on. First you're supposed to go kill Kain, then you save Kain, then he goes crazy, and your sister is in there somewhere, then there's a guy named Faceas Clay (get it!), then all your friends die and you appear to be fighting against the Striders. It's all very confusing.

The gameplay is set up in an interesting way. Some of the levels you will pass through more than once. Along the way you will get key cards and special items that help you get further into levels. It's sort of a pre-Symphony of the Night layout. It sounds like it would get a little tedious, but the levels are set up well. The new sections are usually placed in the earlier parts of the levels so you don't have to travel long distances over the same terrain. The only thing I don't like about the levels is that, like a depressingly large amount of NES games, you keep having to fight the same boss over and over. You got this big alien robot computer thing that you fight about a half dozen times. It's easy the first time and never gets any harder. Oh, and there's also a part where you are in Australia then you go through a small tunnel and are in China, but I'm gonna let them slide on that one.

I just have a couple of nitpicks with the game play itself. First of all it is way too hard to do a wall jump. You're going to need to quite a few times in this game, but the jump controls are really stiff. The first time I attempted to beat this game I must've tried wall jumping a hundred times before I ever did it successfully. It's even worse when you have to do two or three of them in a row. The other thing that bugs me is that the special moves you get are almost completely useless. I never remember using any of them except for the plasma shot and the health recovery. There's also nothing on the screen that tells you when you've got them. I guess it's not much of a problem since you'll never use them anyway. It does make for a cool looking menu screen though.

Although I've played Strider a million times, this was the first time I ever beat it. It surprises me some to say that because the game isn't very hard. It's also quite short for a password game. I doubt it took me more than a couple hours to beat it. It's probably about half the length of Super Mario Bros. 3 if you skip the warp zones. This is certainly a good weekend afternoon game for when you can't think of anything to play among your 250 NES games and you're in the mood to play through one you haven't beaten before. I'm sure that kind of thing happens to you all the time.

NES #11: Yo Noid!

At last a game that I actually have things to say about. I guess I'll come right out and say it. I think Yo Noid is a pretty good game. This game gets picked on all the time, but I'm not exactly sure why everybody hates it. I think it's one of the better licensed character games that Capcom made. I certainly like it better than Mickey Mousecapade or Adventures in the Magic Kingdom.

I guess it really just comes down to the main character. The Noid was a claymation character created by Oscar winner Will Vinton for Dominoes Pizza commercials. In other words he was created to sell a product. For some reason this really upsets gamers out there as if video games were a legitimate art that wasn't created to make money. I hate to break it to you guys, but every video game character was created to sell a product. For most of them that product is video games, but they are sill marketing tools. I honestly don't see how The Noid is any less entitled to star in a game than Mario. I mean, his face is on about a thousand awful shirts with stupid sayings on them. So seeing some college kid born in 1991 wearing a Mario shirt, perhaps with a picture of a mushroom with the phrase "the original magic mushroom" on it doesn't offend anybody, but having a pizza spokes character appear in a video game does? Some people really need to get some perspective on things.

So anyway, while I was thinking up this rant I was actually playing the game. As I said, it is pretty good. I was surprised by how hard it was, especially since I just went through it a couple of years ago. This was actually going to be the third game I wrote about, but because I was having such a hard time with it I put it aside for a while. There are really only a couple of things that annoy me about this game. They are the skateboarding and flying levels. For the most part I like how they tried to do different things with the levels, but they really could've worked a little bit harder on the collision detection. On the skateboard you can only kill things if you hit them with the back of your board while jumping. It can be hard to judge sometimes. This is only the third level, and I imagine it's where many people give up. The flying levels are tricky because you and your vehicle take up so much room on the screen. You fly the thing by tapping A, and this makes it really easy to run into things. The other levels are decent side scrolling platform levels with a pretty good amount of challenge. I enjoy the pizza contests in lieu of regular boss fights because they make you think a little bit. However, this does cause you to constantly use your yo-yo in the levels to find hidden powerups, but it doesn't get in the way that much. I really can't think of anything else to criticize in this game actually.

So what we have here is kind of an underrated game. Not exactly a masterpiece, but an enjoyable platformer. Most people stumbling upon this game today will probably have no idea who The Noid is, so the criticisms of old don't really apply. I'm surprised that this game was marketed to kids though, because it is really difficult. Although looking at the booklet it also describes Mega Man as a kids game and that one's damn near impossible without that pause cheat. Anyway, when I was a kid I did love this game, so maybe they know what they were talking about. And don't accuse me of being too sentimental about this one. There are plenty of games I played as a kid that I don't like now. I know Monser Party kinda sucks, and Rescue Rangers leaves a lot to be desired, but Yo Noid actually holds up pretty well, and I wish the people out there would give it a better chance. I just wish that pizza crusher showed up more than once. It sure looks cool on the box.

NES #5: Adventures in the Magic Kingdom

The next game in my series of Capcom published kids games is kind of an odd one. There were many games based on commercial mascots and other outside characters, but I'm not sure if any of them seemed more like an advertisement than this one. You get to wander around Disney's Magic Kingdom and check out many of the attractions. Of course the game doesn't tell you that at the real park you're mostly sitting down and watching things. At times the game seems more interactive than the actual park does.

The way this game is set up is also a little strange. Although Mickey, Donald, and Goofy all make appearances you don't get to play as them. Instead you get to play as a very sad looking little kid. You can tell just by the look on his face that he doesn't want to do this, and I can't say that I blame him. He was probably expecting to go on a nice relaxing vacation, but instead he has to put his life in danger just because Goofy lost the keys for the parade. Why can't Goofy go? Why do they have to send some little kid? On top of that his mom dressed him up like a cowboy, and because his name is fill in the blank he is probably being called something like Asshat right now. I know that one never gets old, but I feel too sorry for this sad looking kid. I'm going to call him Dignity.

So as I said earlier, Dignity gets put into a lot of danger just so Disney can have it's precious parade. His objective is to find keys hidden in the different attractions around the Magic Kingdom. One of them is a trivia quiz which he should be able to survive alright, but in the other ones he has to survive being blasted into space, chased by ghosts, attacked by pirate skeletons, dodging boulders on a runaway train going down a mountain, and jumping over large hazards in a car. Give this kid a break! Mickey even warns him when going into the Haunted Mansion that the ghosts are out to kill him. Why would you let him do it? Couldn't you just cut the gate open so that no kids have to die? It just doesn't make a lot of sense.

The game itself isn't too bad once you get past the story. I had never played it as a kid so I don't have any fond memories attached to this one, but I still enjoyed it alright. You have infinite continues so beating the game is just a matter of time. Each level is a different type of game so it does have some variety. None of the different levels are really standouts, but they are all decent. The whole experience took me about 45 minutes. If you like old Capcom games then you'll probably like this one. I just wish that they would've came up with a better story so that I wouldn't have to feel so guilty each time my character gets killed by a drunken pirate.

NES #4: Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers

Here we have another game based on a cartoon from my youth. The game is alright, but it always bugs me when a games uses an 'n instead of the word and. Is that really necessary? I guess it does make it seem a little more hip, but I sure wish it was consistent. Sometimes we see that floating n with an apostrophe on both sides and sometimes there's no apostrophe at all.

So that's the kind of thought that was going through my head as I played this one. I guess from that you can tell how easy it is. Now I know that it's a game made for kids, but some of the Capcom kids games have a good level of difficulty. I'm sure even the youngest players wouldn't have too much trouble with it. I was a big fan of this one when I was younger and was a little surprised to find out that it's just an alright game. Probably the reason I loved it so much was because of the world map. There was just something about a game that showed all the levels on a screen. I just thought that they were somehow more advanced during a time when I craved more complex games. It might also be that it reminded me of my two favorite games at the time, Bionic Command and Mario 3. Either way, when I saw that blimp flying on that skinny path with a bunch of square letters to chose from I was hooked.

Of course twenty years is a long time and although I still love world maps, both in video games and real life, I only found this game to be mildly amusing. It's often the case that a game will be harder than I remember. This one, however, I was able to get through in about thirty minutes. I did get a game over once, but that was only because I forgot the controls and kept falling off the edge. One problem is that the world map allows you to skip almost half the levels. I guess the concept does have a dark side.

The one player mode allows you to chose between Chip or Dale, but since Chip is a pompous ass you'll probably want to use Dale. Gadget gives you some advice between levels, but it is not very useful and is quickly forgotten. It made me happy as a kid that if you saved Gadget as Dale you got to bring her flowers. I always wanted Gadget to end up with Dale instead of that jerk Chip, and I wonder if anyone else out there was taking the show so seriously. I also thought that Gonzo should end up with Miss Piggy on Muppet Babies, but he was probably better off without her.

It looks like I'm losing focus again. There's not really much to this game so it's easy for my mind to wander. It's a decent Capcom NES game that many of us have fond memories of, so I don't have any problems recommending it. Just be warned that it's super easy and not quite as good as you remember. If you're just now getting into NES than this isn't a bad starter title. However if you're like me and you've basically been playing video games every day for twenty years than it's not too impressive. It was easy enough to help me get past my NES fatigue though, so it did have an upside.

NES #3: Duck Tales

It's a little hard for me to be objective about Duck Tales. This is a game that I've basically been playing for 20 years, and it's connected to many of my fondest childhood memories. Because of this I'm not sure if it's really a great game or not. It sure seems like it is. It has great level design and very memorable music. At the same time though it is very short, and it has an odd attack, but that doesn't hurt its score much in my book.

I have no idea why Capcom was able to make good games out of licensed characters while every other company failed. It makes me wonder why people kept licensing to companies like LJN and TH*Q who always put out horrible games. Capcom has some real licensed gems, and Duck Tales might be my favorite one. If you've never played this one before it's nothing particularly revolutionary. You start out with five levels to choose from at typical NES locations. There is an ice level, a space level and so on. All the major Duck Tales characters make appearances except for poor ol' Duckworth, but the only playable character is Uncle Scrooge. He attacks by hopping around on his cane. You also go around collecting treasures and ice cream cones. If you're a good gamer you can probably start from scratch and have the whole game beat in an hour or two.

So why do I love this game so much if it all sounds so unremarkable? Maybe that's because when I think of NES one particular type of game stands out in my mind. Thanks to Super Mario Brothers the NES was largely defined by it's side scrolling platform games. No system did them better or more often. Duck Tales is a great example of a platform game done well. It is well designed and colorful with many hidden treasures to find and a decent level of challenge. There is just something satisfying about a game that excels when it is supposed to. Duck Tales is just that type of game, and I really enjoyed completing it again.


So for my next game I'm not 100% sure what it's going to be. I'm already starting to feel a little fatigued and it's only been two days. Duck Tales almost froze on me again, but I think I got it just in time. I might try to go through a game I haven't already beat a dozen times just so that I don't feel like I'm repeating myself. I'll get back to you on that one.