The Adventures of Captain Comic (1988)

Platform: NES

Genre: Exploration based sidescrolling platformer

I remember this game from when I was a child and playing on my old DOS PC. It was the beginning of the 90s and there wasn't many games worthwile to choose from, and Captain Comic stood out as maybe the first scrolling platformer I have seen on DOS. It was always intriguing with graphics that managed to depict varied environments, and while strictly scrolling on a horizontal plane only, this game was by no means linear. There were multiple paths to choose. I never managed to get through the whole game as a child, so finding out about this unlicensed NES port I thought let's give it another go and see how much the game has to offer.

First off the NES port has completely different graphics, so much so that I was party wondering if it's the same level design. Well it does away with the varous level-section transitions that the PC version has, but otherwise the leveldesign seems to be the same. The new graphical design is very nice, all the graphics, while different, convey a similar feel to the original. What's different, however, is the speed of the game. It scrolls much smoother, which is welcome, but on the other hand everything moves much faster. Captain Comic still controls ok, even if landing on platforms is slightly slippery, it feels very responsive and controls well.

The biggest issue I have with the higher speed is the enemies. The game is structured so an endless array of enemies spawns from a pool of 3-4 different monsters. There are never more than 4 monsters present at any given moment, but still they are relentless. The monsters were similar in the original, but you had some moments to breathe and they just didn't move that fast. Here the monsters are relentless, there is some monsters homing into you in a way that you can't avoid or outrun them at all. I managed to get through the game with the use of quicksaves here and there, but I really felt that the fun was majorly hampered by the unbalanced difficulty. It's sad because otherwise this is a really well-designed game, with a unique sense of exploration and beautiful environments. I wish companies would playtest their products without using godmode cheats before releasing them.

Conclusion: If you can stomach relentless difficulty and cheap hits, give this one a go because underneath lies a great game. But probably this is enjoyed more on an emulator with quicksaves and maybe a means to influence the game's pace.