Review scoopings 4/5 · Oct 19, 2024
Amazing Music Bolsters The Repetitive & Unimaginative Gameplay
Preliminary: Ooo based on my preliminary viewing, the music is good and it looks like tight controls for an NES! I just hope there isn't too much NES sprite flicker and usual brutally hard NES level design.
Sure enough the music is great and I love the Overworld map. For the most part the controls are pretty good, and collision …
Preliminary: Ooo based on my preliminary viewing, the music is good and it looks like tight controls for an NES! I just hope there isn't too much NES sprite flicker and usual brutally hard NES level design.
Sure enough the music is great and I love the Overworld map. For the most part the controls are pretty good, and collision masks are tight, but the turn around aspect is a bit clunky and delayed, but good for an NES game and still on par with most 91 platformers (well, that I've played so far). The first level was almost too easy? I will probly regret saying that later. But also I see this was an North America-only release, and like I've mentioned before, as the NES got more popular in late 90 and 91 in the U.S., it was quite clear that the NA-specific games were intentionally made much easier than Japanese releases. Not complaining--I didn't find most Nintendohard enjoyable
Lame that the second level boss was the same, but seems it's really "miles" upon one "level" (Paradise Island, which I loved the font for, but didn't get a screenshot). Wow another great tune. The music and Look honestly remind me of a Commodore 64 game.
Oh wow there is more to this than I thought. Now I can buy spells in these huts? Let me read the manual
Day 1
Wow some of the tunes are really really really good. It's bossing night with my buddies on OSRS, but these tunes keep me going and the innocuous gameplay is just nice so far. Turns out it's not that complex and the manual was a quick read :-p (tbh it was basically useless lol, but super cute and included a word search so I love it nonetheless)
Wow! And another amazing tunnnnne! Wowwww. The game is quite redundant, tho enjoyable, but the Sound is just amazing! I took a screenshot of the font at last cuz it's time for bossing, but I hope not to go too late tonight so I can play this some more! 
Nice. On to the next area I go 
I see where the Nintendohard/computer game-hard comes in: that one hit death (well, one hit lose projectile, then one hit death). And the difficulty is definitely amping up. Sad to read there aren't checkpoints or a password system. Really quite basic features for a 91 game so that's lame. But with modern savestates and whatnot, this is doable (so far) and enjoyable. I read there are 4 islands. Seems doable enough! I didn't get to play much tonight cuz surprise surprise, I wound up bossing most the night :-p
I really like the inclusion of power-ups and spells tho I've barely used them. And it's cute that the shopkeepers get irritated if you take a long time to pick what you want :-p One negative is, I was just about to say that I like that sprite flicker/lag isn't frequent, and then it started happening more ha.
Day 2
Always a sign of good game design that many of my gameplay complaints can be solved with the buyable powerups. The music continues to be absolutely amazing. The gameplay itself is fun and that classic "just keep moving ahead and quickly kill things or jump out of the way" platformer gameplay I so love. However, it still has that innocuous feeling to it: it's simultaneously "easy" in the sense of how straightforward the enemy mechanics and even boss mechanics continue to be, instead the difficulty comes from the brutal death mechanic without a proper continue feature, which I fortunately don't have to fret about. However, I have to acknowledge that flaw. Also the sprite lag/flicker flaw, not very acceptable in 91 imo. Oh and not in love with these uh shmup? segments. Not really shmup but whatever these are lol where you use your club like a helicopter. Like, you should be able to turn your character around during the boss segments...
There is a lot to criticize about this game. The momentum mechanic is odd, and you jump like you have full momentum while just standing still (which mostly was a negative). It's got a lot of "gotcha" pop out enemies later in the game, with your character still being quite clunky even with spells and power-ups. And the level and enemy design continue to be quite redundant and monotonous later in game. But there is just something very enduring about it.
I'm on the last island! I think I'd sum this one up with a review title of "Largely Unimaginative Gameplay Forgiven For Its Amazing Music And Speedrunny Design" Or something like that lol. This just seems so ripe for speedruns. And the multiple paths for most levels is a nice touch.
I think that Pterodactyl was the final boss? I am down to one life and had to use my club cuz got hit (and died and luckily started back at the boss, so at least it has some checkpoint concept within levels). Kinda lame final boss if so, tho it did have the most complex mechanics/pattern so far. Super super cute having both the Pterodactyl and Big Nose in wheelchairs after their scuffle :-p And now on this screen which is what makes me think it was final boss? 
Yep that's all I got for the ending lol. Lame. But still overall great game, right up my alley.
Look: 8.5/10 Great for an NES game
Sound: 9/10 Yes!
Play: 8/10 Classic platformer vibe, just speedrun it with savestates and have fun. But definitely had its flaws.
Feel: 8/10 Fun game. Games like this are what are keeping the NES relevant in 91 imo (obviously, in the "true timeline" the NES was very much still relevant and SNES was not coming to NA till much later in 91)
Attachment: 8/10 A bit too long to regularly replay, but likely one I will return to. One of the better NES platformers.
Overall: 8.3/10
Completion: Main Story
Playtime: 1h 20m