Author: thesarkologist

This site is a mirror of a blogger site that I had been writing on for the past few years, and while the blogger site is a mish-mash of everything, this site will focus mainly on art and literature, with a few political discussions thrown in (though since some are dated then I'll probably drop them when I get to them). The literature deals mostly with theatre, as well as a number of art exhibitions that I have been to, though I also explore some novels as well.

Categories
4 out of 5 Platform SNES

Donkey Kong Country

Publisher: Nintendo

Designer: Rare

Type: Platform

Platform: Super Nintendo

Release Date: 1994

Rating: undefined

This was certainly an interesting game, and a part of me suspects that it has something to do with the popularity of Super Mario Bros. The thing that that you might not realise that back in the deep dark days of computer history, Mario and Donkey Kong used to go head to head in an attempt to rescue Princess Daisy (whom Donkey Kong had kidnapped and taken to the top of a construction site). No doubt, this goes back to the grand old days of King Kong, hence the name, and hence the fact that Donkey Kong is a pretty big ape.

Well, this game takes us back to Donkey Kong’s home, and of course, there is no sign of Mario anywhere. However, what has happened is that Donkey Kong’s protege was tasked with guarding a cave full of bananas. Unfortunately, some nasties came along, tied up Diddy in a barrel, and scampered off with all the bananas. As such, it is now up to Donkey Kong, and Diddy, to get them all back.

So, the game pretty much plays like Super Mario Bros, though it does happen to be a little more detailed than the previous game. Then again, this is the SNES that we are talking about. You pretty much run, jump, and collect as many bananas as you can. You also have the benefit of having Diddy come along with you, and you can tag team with him. This also means that you get the benefit of having an extra life. Fortunately, if you do lose one of them, all you need to do is find a barrel with DK on it, and you can get them back.

The game has some interesting features, one of them being the ability to save, though to do that you have to get to a save point (though I haven’t managed to actually get that far). You can also find yourself getting some bonus rounds, such as when you collect three Emus, and thus you can then collect a heap of gold by playing the emu game (if it is an emu because this thing flies, and emus don’t).

One really cool aspect is that Donkey Kong happens to wear a tie, which was rather cute. Also, you can get power-ups, such as a rhinoceros which you can ride, and basically splatter as many enemies as you can possibly imagine while charging through the level.
Yeah, this game was pretty cool, though of course it does have the problem of getting somewhat harder as you progress through the levels, but still, I did like it.

Anyway, that’s enough from me for a change. If you want to know more, well, Wikipedia is probably the go to source for pretty much everything these days. Oh, and there is also a wiki page set aside for everything Mario Bros related, so you’ll find this game here as well.

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2 out of 5 Run & Shoot Shoot-em Up SNES

Contra III: The Alien Wars

Publisher: Konami

Designer: Nobuya Nakazato

Type: Shoot-em Up

Platform: SNES

Release Date: 1992

Rating:

Okay, I found that this game was a little hard. It’s your basic shootem-up type game (though I believe the correct term if run & shoot), though it also happens to be sideways scrolling as well. It appears that you play some sort of soldier and you have to go around killing nasties (which is basically what you have to do in pretty much all shootem-up games). The thing was that the nasties seem to come at you thick and fast, which meant that before I knew it, I had run into a nasty and it was back to the beginning.

Oh, the controls were a little confusing (though I probably could have solved that by actually looking at the instructions, but then again I do happen to be a guy, and we all know what guys tend to think of instructions). One of the things that seemed to be happening, when I was randomly pressing buttons on my controller (I would call it a joystick, but since it is a Nintendo controller, there doesn’t happen to be any stick to give me any joy) I would set of a nuclear bomb or something, but since there were no nasties around, it pretty much didn’t do all that much.

The other thing is that you can rotate your gun to fire upwards, which was also awkward because I would try to turn around to shoot a nasty coming at me from behind, only to discover that my gun was pointing upwards and not at the nasty coming at me. That meant that the nasty would basically take me out.

Yeah, I wasn’t all that impressed. It was cool Nintendo stuff, however, yeah, I’ll give this one a miss as well.

Anyway, you can find out more about this game from Wikipedia, and I’ve also noticed that there is an entire Wiki dedicated to it as well.

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1 out of 5 C64 Platform

Finders Keepers

Publisher: Mastertronic

Designer: David Jones

Type: Platform

Platform: C64

Release Date: 1985

Rating:

This game was actually rather annoying. You basically play knight and are given a mission by the king to, well, do something, and the next thing you know you are in a dungeon full of nasties. Now, don’t get me wrong, this is not some role-playing game or anything, but rather a platform game, that in part also transforms into a maze game in sections.

Well, the story is that you have to go and get a present for the princess, and if you succeed, well, you can be admitted to the royal order of the knights of the polygon table. Yeah, it sounds pretty silly, and honestly, it really did seem to be pretty silly as far as I was concerned. Okay, it was pretty popular in its time, but that probably was because it happened to be an el-cheapo game. However, when I played it, well, I wasn’t all that impressed.

Apparently one of the ideas was that you had to manipulate objects (though I couldn’t figure out how to do that) and of course avoid nasties (which I also couldn’t figure out how to do either). You could also sell the items to collect gold, which no doubt you needed to do to be able to get that present for the princess.

Yeah, with all the other quality games out there, this one is definitely missable.

Though, if you really want to know more about it, well, you can always go to Wikipedia, or just jump over to Lemon 64, which seems to have the heads up on pretty much all of the Commodore 64 games.

Categories
2 out of 5 Miscellaneous Arcade SNES

Super Adventure Island

Publisher: Produce!

Designer: Yuzo Koshiro

Type: Miscellaneous Arcade

Platform: SNES

Release Date: 1992

Rating:

This game reminded me a lot of the old arcade game Wonderboy. I guess that was the intention of it, especially if Nintendo didn’t have, or didn’t want to pay for, the rights for the original game. Anyway, the game starts off with you sitting on top of a palm tree with your girlfriend when some nasty appears and takes her away. So, you decide to go an rescue her (because, well, why not?).

Yeah, pretty much right from the get-go I could see Wonderboy written all over this game, from the skateboard that you pick up, to the weapons that you collect to deal with the nasties. However, the catch is that this game is pretty hard. No, let me rephrase that, this game is really hard. Sure, getting past the first level was all well and good, but then I came to that part of games that I really, really detest, namely the parts where you have to jump onto moving platforms, and if you happen to miss these platforms, then, well its game over (not quite – you do have three lives, and an option to continue afterwards).

Yeah, I managed to get to that part, and then it was just a huge flurry of deaths that meant that I threw my controller down in disgust and went off to do something else with my time (such as writing this pointless reviews). Sure, some people are probably really good at these types of games, it just happens that I’m not one of them.

Anyway, as I tend to do, you can find out more about this game on the Wikipedia page, and here is another review you may want to consider as well.

Categories
2 out of 5 Beatem Up SNES

Sonic Blast Man

Publisher: Taito

Designer: Taito

Type: Beat-em Up

Platform: SNES

Release: 1992

Rating:

Personally, I’m not a particularly big fan of the game genre I call ‘beat-em-ups’. This is basically where you play a character that simply punches and kicks their opponents into submission. This is what this game happens to be, though I should point out that it is probably a little more entertaining than some of the others, where you are simply a fighter in an arena and churn through opponents one by one. No, this one is somewhat different in that you are going on an adventure.

I found that the game was quite easy though. In fact, I found that it was a little too easy, namely because I had completed two levels before I actually died, and when I died I discovered that I had only lost one life. This, in my mind, suggests that the game really isn’t all that challenging. Okay, I’m certainly not one of those people that are going to be playing this game for hours on end because, as I mentioned, I’m not a particularly big fan of beat-em-ups. While it wasn’t boring by any sense of the word, still isn’t a game that I’ll be returning too.

C64Anyway, you can find out more about it on Wikipedia, which tells me that it used to be an arcade game, not that I would have ever played it mind you. It seems that it also made an entry onto TV Tropes, which I must admit surprised me, but it must have been popular.

Categories
5 out of 5 RPG SNES

The Legend of Zelda

A Link to the Past

Publisher: Nintendo

Designer/Director: Takashi Tezuka

Type: Roleplaying Game

Platform: Super Nintendo

Release: 1991

Rating:

I played this game years ago, right through to the end. It surprised me somewhat because I never expected to find a full-blown roleplaying game on a console machine, namely because from my experience (at least back when I was playing it) there was no way to save the game, especially after you turned the machine off. Well, it turned out that you can, and it also turns out that this game is pretty massive.

As I mentioned, it has been ages since I played this game, and played it right through to the end, but I can say that I thought it was amazing. The game uses a top-down perspective, and it is also pretty cool the number of things you can do in the game with that simple SNES controller. In fact, one of the fun things to do was to pick up the bushes and throw them (though that generally just annoyed people).

You start off in a hut, and your hut mate (brother, uncle, I don’t know) runs off in a hurry and tells you not to leave. Well, being the obedient person that you happen to be, you just hang around the hut and leave it at that. No, not quite, you ignore the command and run out to see what is going on, especially since you have this person screaming for help, through some psychic connection or something like this (yes, it is a fantasy Roleplaying Game as well).

I thoroughly enjoyed this game when I played it, though I should point out that it is pretty huge, and it will no doubt keep you occupied for hours. However, as a game, it is pretty awesome.

Not surprising, for such a popular and well known game, there is a Wikipedia article on it. Actually, there is a wiki page completely dedicated to the Zelda legacy (whom I discovered is the name of the princess). Oh, and if you happen to get stuck, like with a lot of these types of games, there are plenty of walkthroughs.

Categories
4 out of 5 Shoot-em Up SNES

Super R-Type

Publisher: Nintendo

Designer: Irem

Type: Shoot-em Up

Platform: SNES

Release: 1991

Rating: undefined

How can I describe this game other than as one of your typical shootem-ups. Well, I guess you could call it a typical shoot-em-up.

However, it wasn’t too bad, though, like a lot of similar games, this one can sort of grab your attention and drag you into a quagmire of simply spending heaps of time trying to see how far you can get. Well, I didn’t get caught up in that quagmire, not that I didn’t want to, but rather that I ended up getting bored rather quickly. Also, I kept on dying, but then again, that is sort of what you should expect to happen in such games.

I ended up getting bored rather quickly. Also, I kept on dying, but then again, that is sort of what you should expect to happen in such games.
I’m not sure if there is a story behind the game, but I suspect there is, not that you really pay all that much attention to it. It seems that you are basically a fighter pilot who flies their spacecraft towards a multitude of enemies and then have to face off against the big bad guy at the end of each level. Since I didn’t really get past the first big bad guy (as I said, it is challenging), I can say whether this is one of those ‘infinite loop’ type of games, though a part of me suspects that it just well maybe.

One interesting thing though is that you do have a power-up button, where you can charge your weapon to be extra strong simply by holding it down. Actually, I should also mention that I didn’t realise that you have two guns – one normal gun, and one that you can power up – though since these guns are pretty much, how do you say it, similar, I’m not sure why you have two.

In the end, though, this game was rather fun, though you may want to try to avoid getting sucked into a quagmire.

Anyway, you can find more information about this game on Wikipedia, of course, but there are also some reviews of this game as well, such as this site.

Categories
4 out of 5 C64 Shoot-em Up

Attack of the Mutant Camels

Publisher: Llamasoft

Designer: Jeff Minter

Type: Shoot-em Up

Platform: C64

Rating:

This is one of the classic games of the Commodore 64 and I have to admit that it is absolutely awesome. Oh, and it is pretty hard as well, not impossible, just pretty hard. Basically, you are flying a space ship (and honestly, what else would you be flying in a shoot-em-up) and there are these massively gigantic camels heading towards you that shoot bombs out of their eyes. Oh, and occasionally they also fire smart bombs, which means that they home in on you.

You have energy levels, which does actually make it somewhat easier (otherwise it would be massively impossible because avoiding those bombs, and those smart-bombs, is a challenge in and of itself). You also have three lives, which really helps as well, but the problem is that first of all, these camels aren’t easy to kill – by no means. You simply have to bombard them with bullets, and as they get weaker they change colours until you finally kill one. Yet, there is more than just one.

The other catch is that these camels are moving slowly across the screen, and when they reach the edge of the screen it is basically ‘game over man, game over’. Yeah, when that happens, it does not matter how many lives you have left, your base has been destroyed and you might as well start over again.

This game is full-on fast-paced and is honestly one of those amazing games that I remember from my youth. Oh, it also has a two-player mode, though I don’t believe you attack them at the same time (which would have been much, much easier mind you). Yeah, this game rocks.

Oh, it also appears that this game has made it into the Smithsonian as a museum piece, at least according to the games Wikipedia article. Another thing I discovered from this same article is that you can find the source code for the game up on Github, which is also pretty awesome (though it was written in assembly). In fact, the popularity of the game has warranted it an article all of its own in the Old School Gamer Magazine. Oh, and in case I forget, you call also find out more about it on Lemon 64.

Categories
2 out of 5 Shoot-em Up

Alley Oops

Publisher: Artworx

Type: Shoot-em Up

Platform: C64

Rating:

It seems that people will turn anything into a shoot-em-up, and this game is a case in point. Well, it could also be an attempt to make a bowling simulator by somebody who, halfway through, decided to give up and make a shoot-em-up instead because, well, they are just so much easier to write (and you can see my Java version of Space Invaders as a case in point).

The game itself starts during World War I where you guide your futuristic plane across the skies shooting down, and attempting to avoid, Anyway, yeah, it is basically a bowling game, but instead of doing what you would normally do in a bowling game, you instead have to shoot pins as they come flying at you. There are a number of lanes which you can move across, and the pins come down these lanes randomly, so you need to move across the lanes to hit the pins. Oh, your weapon is a bowling ball, but you probably guess that already. There are otherways of scoring points as well, but I guess that is enough.

So, what did I think about this game? I guess my comments have basically told you everything you need to know, and that is basically that I wasn’t all that impressed. Okay, it is fun for a while, but it is just one of those simplistic games that you pretty much get sick of pretty quickly. Mind you, my initial reaction was ‘seriously! You have got to be kidding me!’.

Mind you, I have had a lot of difficulty actually finding any information about this game because, well, there certainly isn’t a Wikipedia entry, not a C64 Wiki entry either. However, I did find some vague information on Lemon 64, and of course somebody has posted a video of it up on Youtube.

Categories
3 out of 5 C64 RPG

Sword of Fargoal

Publisher: Epyx

Designer: Jeff McCord

Type: RPG – Rogue Like

Platform: C64

Rating: undefined

This is what is termed as a ‘rogue-like’ game, namely it is a rather simply constructed roleplaying game that involves you exploring a dungeon, killing monsters, and collecting treasure. This is one of those games that I played quite often back in the day, namely because it was quite simple, which compared to a lot of other rogue-like games, is certainly saying something. You basically start off on the first level of the dungeon, and make your way down as far as you can go before you happen to be killed off by one of the many monsters (or traps) that happen to populate the labyrinth.

It was fun, and as I mentioned, rather simple. The fact that you could play the game with a joystick (or controller) made it quite playable, and if you were lucky, you could certainly go quite far. Mind you, you only had a limited amount of space for gold, but you could also deposit gold into one of the temples, which happened to be on each of the levels, and it would be converted into experience. There were also magical items, such as potions and spells, that you could use, though there weren’t too many which meant that the keyboard interaction was limited.

The thing I don’t like about the game is that when you advance a level your hit points basically stay the same, and healing does take quite a while, unless of course you manage to find either a regeneration spell, or a healing potion. The other thing is that the game ends up being pretty repetitive, which meant that after a while I would end up losing interest in it.

One thing that I do remember though is that the game was written in BASIC, and my brother managed to not only discover that, but also hack into it so that the number of special squares that appeared per level increased by something like four. Mind you, these days, if I were to be able to break into the code, it might be possible to rewrite the code to make it even more beneficial, though once again, that sort of defeats the whole purpose.

If you are interesting in finding out more about this game, there is always Wikipedia, though you can also go to the C64-Wiki, or even Lemon 64. If worse comes to worse, well, you could simply type ‘Sword of Fargoal’ into your favourite search engine.

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