Indie Gamer Chick

TaleSpin (NES Review)

September 17, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 1 Comment

TaleSpin
Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System
Developed by Capcom
First Released: December 11, 1991
Included in The Disney Afternoon Collection

So, I know this is a stupid way to do screenshots, but instead of having the emulator automatically take a snapshot every second, I prefer to manually do it myself. Any time I use an emulator, I map the screenshot capture to my controller and pump the capture button as I play. Usually I take several hundred screens per game. Sometimes it’s over a thousand. I use maybe ten of them, if that, and toss the rest. For TaleSpin, I was stunned by how little action is happening in most of them. The game felt pretty intense, and yet, very few of my pics are “exciting.” 8-bit games often have that problem, but few have it as bad as TaleSpin. So, rest assured, this is a very difficult and intense game.

In the interest of full disclosure, I should note that (1) I’ve never seen a single episode of TaleSpin. It only got one season that was off the air shortly after I turned two years old, and I never saw reruns of it that I assume MUST have aired on Disney Channel at some point. Then again, I barely watched DuckTales and Rescue Rangers, either. I might as well preemptively note that I’ve never seen Darkwing Duck either, even though it got three seasons. (2) It’s been a long while since a game’s epilepsy risk was high enough that the precautions I must take stood to affect a review, but in this case, they certainly did. The larger bosses flash my specific white-strobey trigger when you damage them. I had to sit very far away from the screen and wear sunglasses, limiting my visibility, which limited my excitement in what should have been the highlights of the game. But, I didn’t want to cancel the review, since there’s still plenty of stuff to talk about in this, the second of three TaleSpin titles I’m playing in this marathon. The first one? It didn’t go so well. Despite being a different genre entirely, and by a company with a proven track record with Disney, this might be an even worse disaster. Because, TaleSpin NES is a game that SHOULD be amazing, and it’s not.

Do you see what makes this different from other shmups?

TaleSpin has one big twist in the shmup formula and one big-big-big twist. The singular big twist is that your bullets that ricochet off solid objects.. or even enemy shields.. are still live and can damage enemies. Getting the hang of taking advantage of this helps speed along several boss battles, or makes a couple sections in levels more tolerable. Of course, the big-big-big twist is that, with the press of a button, you can flip and fly upside down. The scrolling also shifts direction too, so you fly left instead of right. This allows you to shoot enemies behind you or pick-up items you missed. In theory, flipping is primarily used to prevent you from being crushed by the auto-scrolling. It’s a great idea! Of course, this all hinges on the game actually registering that you’re pressing the flip button. Sometimes TaleSpin doesn’t. Actually, quite often it doesn’t. As in it constantly, throughout the entire game, just plain refuses to work.

The upside down plane does tend to look silly.

Yea, TaleSpin has a massive problem with responsiveness. I thought it might have been tied to maybe flipping while your max bullets are on the screen, but that wasn’t it. So I was afraid maybe it was tied to movement, but that didn’t seem to be the case. Or maybe flipping again too quickly after flipping once? Nope, that doesn’t seem to be it, either. After playing through the game a second time, I’m stumped as to why sometimes the flip button straight-up doesn’t work. Sometimes SEVERAL flip button presses go unnoticed, with no rhyme or reason. The one and only common denominator seemed to be how “busy” the screen was with environmental scenery. It’s a pretty damning mechanical hiccup, and one that was universal no matter which emulator I used. This is including my copy of Disney Afternoon Collection. By far my most common form of death was being crushed by the auto-scrolling when I would be hitting the flip button and the game would be like “fill out this form and we need two forms of identification. You’ll receive your flip in 7 to 10 business days.”

The shame is, there’s some damn clever design in TaleSpin that goes to waste because of the amount of frustration the flipping generates.

So consistent was TaleSpin’s inconsistent unresponsiveness that I have no choice but to declare it a deal breaker. How can I not? I, the player, was pressing the button that SHOULD have stopped the scrolling from crushing me. Sometimes it worked and I flipped. Sometimes it didn’t, and I died. It felt completely random whether it took or not. Since TaleSpin utilizes the auto-scrolling as a primary hazard, placing items and building stages around the risk of being smooshed by the screen, having it work every time is a must have. But, there was no methodology I could spot that would have allowed me to predict when the flip wouldn’t work. Sometimes it happened in the middle of the screen when I’d position myself to shoot an enemy behind me. Sometimes I could flip multiple times in a row with no issues. Sometimes it would work when I was a fraction of a second away from death via screen. Other times, the game didn’t cooperate when I needed to flip because the combat was behind me. I’m sorry, but that’s the ballgame when it comes to a shmup. And mind you, this is a game that is shockingly difficult for a Capcom Disney title, with some very tricky patterns of enemies and projectiles to deal with. Responsiveness is paramount, and not having it should be a deal breaker for any fan of the genre.

Come on, WayForward, remake this one too. Well, provided you fix the flip first and foremost. But seriously, there’s a GREAT shmup here.

The unresponsiveness isn’t my only problem. TaleSpin hides items in completely arbitrary spots on the stages. Sometimes I’d go to shoot an enemy and, instead, the bullet would reveal one of the hidden point items, essentially shielding them. If the items had been hidden in a way where you could logic-out their locations, I would have enjoyed that a lot more. Part of me also wishes the game had done a lot more of the maze-like level layouts. I suspect that had been the plan, but Capcom caught-on to the fact that the flip button didn’t always work. There’s several areas of the game where the level design reverts back to very pedestrian layouts, which makes me think they cut something more bold.

Credit to Capcom, who knows how to do set pieces, even in a shmup.

Otherwise, the combat in general is very nice. At the start of the game, you’re only allowed to have one bullet on-screen at a time. If you miss, you have to wait for this relatively slow projectile to pass the entire length of the screen before you can shoot again. Honestly, I really liked this part. I would have been fine if there had been no upgrades to your primary weapon. It added spice to what could have been an otherwise mundane shmup. But, you can upgrade your gun twice to allow more bullets, which makes some of the spongy bosses go quicker, but it also means you can be a little more spam-happy with your bullets. And also makes them significantly more likely to trigger a seizure. For what it’s worth, those non-photosensitive among us would probably really enjoy the fights. They’re typical for the genre, but with a Disney flavor that makes them feel fresh. I have no doubt if the flipping worked every single time, I would have really loved TaleSpin. But, it didn’t, and I don’t.
Verdict: NO!

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with TaleSpin, TaleSpin Capcom, TaleSpin Capcom review, TaleSpin NES, TaleSpin NES Review, TaleSpin Nintendo, TaleSpin Review

Fantasia (Sega Genesis Review)

September 15, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 3 Comments

Fantasia
Platform: Sega Genesis
Developed by Infogrames
First Released: November, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

Well, at least there’s only four levels. She said, staring off into the distance, her soul shattered into millions of pieces.

Boy, do I have a funny story for you. I nearly beat Fantasia unaware that there was a way to kill enemies by hopping on them. Now, on occasion, enemies would die from me landing on them, BUT I always took damage too. What I wasn’t aware of is that Fantasia has a butt stomp that’s activated by pressing DOWN when you jump. Now, I might be an idiot, but there’s no way I could have missed this at the start of the game. What I think happened was I tried to perform a butt stomp on the early enemies, only Fantasia’s legendarily horrible collision detection flipped a coin and awarded the victory to the enemy. I took damage and assumed there was no butt stomp. That’s on me for not reading the instruction book.

And when I say “I made it to the end of the game” I mean I was literally about to clear the final screen. This is where I accidentally discovered the butt stomp works. I think I deserve a little credit for making it this far while having to mostly avoid enemies while trying to round up enough magic to take out the ones I couldn’t manage to jump over, even after rewinding and retrying dozens of times. It’s why a game that took me around 45 minutes to beat the second time took me 8+ hours the first go around. Lots and lots of rewinding trying to avoid enemies with collision boxes the size of a galaxy.

The way I played Fantasia, where I had to spend several minutes just to be able to make it one enemy further along, was just about as unhappy a gaming experience as humanly possible. I had to start over, because otherwise my opinion on Fantasia would have been based on an incoherent series of swear words. So, I started over from the beginning, and learned that Fantasia isn’t the worst game ever made. It also meant that, technically, I played the first and third levels three times. See, the object of Fantasia isn’t to get to the end of stages. It’s to score enough points. If you don’t score enough points and reach the end of a level, you have to start over. Since I wasn’t killing very many enemies at all, I wasn’t finding hidden notes or scoring enough points.

Music notes, like the one pictured here, score the most points of anything in the game by far. AND they restore life. AND they give you temporary invincibility. AND they give you an extra life. Seriously, it does all that, all at once. Mind you, there is no extra life item OR temporary invincible item, so it’s not like the note combines four in-game items. That would be cool. The fact that this restores health AND does three other things? It’s just so random. This is like how an imbecile designs a video game.

And sometimes slaying enemies opens up hidden platforms or reveals items, including the insanely overpowered musical notes. Except, killing them with your magic almost never does it. Only the butt stomp works. There’s no bosses and the end of stages lack any climatic feel. The closest the game comes to that is having a wave of basic enemies spawn when you reach the final fairy of the final stage. The fairies are also haphazardly done. Sometimes touching one takes you to another part of the stage. Sometimes it means the door is AROUND where you’re at. Hell, on the first stage, I even collected one of the fairies.. somehow. I don’t even think it did anything, either. So, after putting in over two play sessions since last night in Fantasia, while Fantasia isn’t the worst game I’ve ever played, I feel comfortable calling it the worst game Sega has ever published. As for Atari, formerly Infogrames, seriously, go to your room. You’re grounded. I know nobody there today probably had anything to do with Fantasia, but I don’t really care. Go to your room and think about what you’ve done.

Any game with bad collision and spongy enemies should probably avoid spamming the whole screen with enemies. That’s Fantasia’s go-to move, and they always tend to cluster-up no matter where they start on the screen.

Calling Fantasia on the Sega Genesis “historically inept” doesn’t feel like it does it justice. It’s clearly a game designed with little more in mind than looking good in advertisements and disgustingly invoking the previous year’s incredible Castle of Illusion release. That game? Very good. Fantasia? One of the worst platform games ever made. A title that does nothing right except look the part. And the “looking the part” crosses the line into being genuinely morally reprehensible because it’s trying to imply a relationship or even sequel-status to Castle of Illusion. Castle of Illusion was fine-tuned to the point that it felt scientific. A literal “fun for all ages” release that could cast the widest possible net for the Sega Genesis while it was in start-up. If you looked at it and Castle of Illusion side-by-side, it sure seems like Fantasia is trying to appear be a direct sequel, does it not?

The object of the game is NOT to reach the end of levels, but to first score X amount of points AND THEN finish the level. Each stage has a minimum scoring baseline you must reach, or you have to start over.

I reject the excuse that Fantasia’s problems came from the holiday release window time crunch. It shouldn’t take that long for one person to raise their hand and say “this isn’t fun” or “why are the collision boxes so big that Mickey takes damage from enemies over a character length away?” I just checked this with a stopwatch. It takes three seconds to raise that objection. My apologies if someone did raise their hand, only whoever was in charge rejected it. That might have happened. The project manager hasn’t done a game since 1996. Good. Fantasia is nearly unplayable. From the “score X points” premise to the level design to the shockingly massive collision boxes to the way combat is handled to the enemy placement to the movement physics.. EVERYTHING is bad. Screw it. EVEN THE GRAPHICS AREN’T GOOD! It has decent sprite work, but when visibility is often a major factor, what good is a sprite clear enough to say “yep, that sure is Mickey Mouse.”

I really don’t get the whole “at least it looks good” bit. Castle of Illusion? Now THAT looks good and there’s no visibility issues. Here, I often couldn’t tell what was a platform and what wasn’t.

Fantasia is a laundry list of bad design choices. I’m going with the collision detection as the worst part, because it’s truly shocking. I’m talking about collision boxes so large they need to be measured in the percentage of screen they cover. They’re not consistent either. Sometimes jumping over enemies or ducking under them is viable. Sometimes they can cause damage by hitting the corner of your box just by being in your general vicinity on your side of the screen. Take a look at this:

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And here it is in motion.

Since Fantasia relies on spamming the screen with enemies, this is sort of important. Even once I discovered the butt stomp, I was stunned by how the game typically programs enemies to deal with this. First off, enemies are INSANELY spongy. Some of them take several bounces to slay. Also, since most of them tend to sort of move upwards, when you butt stomp them and they keep rising up, you’re likely to take damage if you try to finish them in one motion. The only other options are limited magical projectiles, or “spells.” You can cast two tiers of spells: strong (which cost 3 magic points) and weak (which cost 1). They should really be labeled “weak” and “weaker” because even the ones that cost 3 points aren’t enough to finish the majority of enemies.

Oh god, I forgot to write about the movement. QUICK, CATHY! Six Flags is waiting!

Yea, I forgot to do a bit on the movement. Well, it’s sluggish and unresponsive. Turning around is a chore. This is further compounded by often having the platforms themselves have a little bit of give to them, like they’re unstable. You know, sort of like I am after playing this game. In a game that’s this centered around combat with enemies, many of whom move erratically, having just the act of turning around and starting to move be an exercise in patience feels like it wasn’t the wisest choice. After a certain point, I have to ask if anyone making this had even a tiny lick of fun, or were they just really angry at the world while they made Fantasia?

The magic books give you ammo, though even this seems inconsistent. Most of the time, I’d get 3 points from them, but sometimes I swear I’d only get 1. Same with the life refills.

The story goes that, after Fantasia the game was rushed out to make the 1991 holiday release, Disney apologized to Sega, saying that Fantasia’s license had been granted to Sega by accident. See, Fantasia, the 1940 motion picture, was Walt and Roy O. Disney’s baby. Roy E. Disney, son of Roy O. and gatekeeper of the Disney legacy, was dead set against Disney licensing Fantasia to anyone. Disney apparently gave Sega an extended deal as a make-good. Either way, the unsold inventory was pulled. Part of me wonders if that still would have happened if Fantasia had been a halfway decent game that got Castle of Illusion levels of critical acclaim.

I actually did finish Fantasia without cheating on NORMAL difficulty the second go around. My reward? This. That’s it. There’s not even a credit roll. It really screams of a rush job made by clowns. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to rush to this review’s conclusion so I can go ride roller coasters.

This is Disney game #18 on this marathon I’m on, and this is easily the worst. It might actually be the worst holiday release in gaming history. And, unlike some bad games, it’s not even worth fixing Fantasia. Even if they tweaked the collision boxes, the enemies are too spongy. Even if you removed the sponginess, the levels are boringly designed. After a certain point, so many things need to be fixed that you might as well tear it down and start over again. You’d think the one thing a Fantasia game would get right is the music, but these chip tune versions of the film’s famous orchestral arrangements are some of the worst in gaming history. The soundtrack sounds like a synthesizer is trying to die and it just can’t.
Verdict: NO!
I recommend Playing at the Next Level: A History of American Sega Games by Ken Horowitz. Among other things, it contains the history of this piece of crap.

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with Fantasia Genesis, Fantasia Genesis Review, Fantasia Sega, Fantasia video game

The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck (Sega Master System & Sega Game Gear Review)

September 14, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 1 Comment

The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck
Platform: Sega Game Gear & Sega Master System
Developed by Sega
First Released October, 1991 (Game Gear)
First Released December, 1991 (Master System)
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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In case you didn’t know, in Europe (and later in Brazil), the Sega Master System got hundreds of new releases after it was discontinued in favor of the Genesis in America. While almost all of these titles were adapted from the Game Gear, which uses very similar hardware, it’s a misnomer that the games are simply ports of Game Gear games. They often have several changes somewhere, be it level design or mechanics or health meters or play control or enemy behavior or whole boss battles. It’s all of the above for The Lucky Dime Caper. Although these titles share the same name, the Game Gear version of Donald Duck’s first big solo video game that wasn’t co-opted by Snoopy is significantly stripped-down from the Master System release. Also this is probably the first “big” Master System release that didn’t come out in the United States.

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I should note that I played the Game Gear version first, and that I’ve previously played the Lucky Dime Caper. After one level of the Game Gear build, I thought to myself “I distinctly remember liking this more.” Which I did.. on the Sega Master System. On the Game Gear, Lucky Dime feels slower and eliminates a lot of the elements that break-up the platforming monotony. Swinging off vines? That’s not in the Game Gear version. A trippy auto-scrolling “run down a hill that becomes increasingly steeper” segment? That’s gone on the handheld version. Even the boss fights are cut-up. On the Sega Master System, at one point you fight two gigantic statues that are possessed by a spirit. On the Game Gear, it’s just one statue, with nothing really added to make up for it except for the fact that the whole game is nerfed.

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In addition to stereotypical “jump on enemies” combat, Lucky Dime has two weapons. In both games, you start with a hammer, and you can also pick up a frisbee. On the Game Gear, from the moment you get the frisbee, Lucky Dime Caper might as well start playing the end credits over the action because you just beat the game. You can throw it the length of the screen and take out most enemies and especially the bosses (who don’t damage you when they blink) without having to time when to attack them or wait for them to position themselves to be vulnerable. And, only on the Game Gear, even if you die you’ll still have the frisbee when you respawn. On the Master System, it’s totally different. There, when you take damage, you lose your weapon. The changes they went with are so bizarre that it makes the Game Gear title feel like an unfinished prototype. Also, I have to go ahead and say the last boss, be it Game Gear or Sega Master System, is one of the worst ideas I’ve ever seen.

Just hit the crystal ball six times. It doesn’t move and Elvira Duck or whatever her name is doesn’t exactly have the most difficult to dodge attacks.

I assume some elements from the Master System build were cut because of the smaller screen dimensions, while others were cut to avoid motion blur/ghosting problems. HOWEVER, many changes are just baffling. The Master System had the right idea about losing your weapon when taking damage. It adds incentive to not just run up to every obstacle, guns blazing. Especially at the risk of losing the frisbee, which I went long stretches of the SMS version without. However, that’s not why I disliked this. The nail in the coffin for me was the sluggish jumping physics and overly bland level design. The game just plays much cleaner on the Master System and it takes the level design in much more surprising directions. Sorry Game Gear version. Ya basic.
Verdict: NO! to the Game Gear port, but keep reading..

The SMS version has time limits to the levels. They frequently reset when you change rooms, so I never came close to timing-out. Also this thing basically drip feeds you extra lives. I’d have to be trying to play badly to game over.

Now then, the superior Sega Master System version is also too easy for different reasons. I would have never guessed the working title of this game was “DuckTales.” This was the Sega version of one of the biggest cake walks on the NES? Nope. Never a million years would I have imagined that. To this version of Lucky Dime’s credit, the item system here gives the game SOME stakes. The problem is that enemies drop items in crazy intervals, so you won’t really have to go without. The hammer isn’t that fun to use, but if you kill enough baddies, you’ll eventually get the overpowered frisbee and enough extra lives to assure Donald Duck will survive the heat death of the universe, rendering the whole experience a cinch. Okay, that’s a slight exaggeration. There’s some potentially cruel jumps near the end, and there’s one really annoying mechanic to movement/jumping. Take a look at Donald right here:

This is the typical Disney “teetering on the edge of a ledge, I’m so afraid” animation. Only, in this game, it’s got what I’ve termed a “movement tax” attached to it. If you’re not doing the “oh crap” animation, you can just press the opposite direction and start moving. But if you’re teeter-tottering on the edge, there’s a noticeable delay to turning around and starting to move. Just a half a second or so. Why does that matter? Oh, because of level design like this, where you have to shimmy left and right in the air to make sure you stick the landing.

And there’s level design like this, where you have to heel-toe your way through platforms.

You can’t see it but I was teetering on the edge before this.

And it’s not just turning around. It saps your ability to jump forward in the direction you’re already facing as well. The whole game is full of platforms and sometimes you might want to.. you know.. turn around or quickly leap from platform to platform. But quick reflexes are taken from you if you’re barely on a ledge and have to pay a movement tax. Which you’ll almost certainly have to pay if it’s a single character-length platform. Seriously, who was the brain trust who decided to add this to a platform game? I’d say that this is game breaking, but you get so many extra lives that it doesn’t really even matter all that much.

The enemies behave differently too. The top hat skeletons have to be “tempted” to expose themselves on the SMS. They’re generic baddies that are just there and easy to get rid of on the Game Gear.

What matters a lot more is that, despite this completely weird decision to have the lookie-ledge dance factor into movement, Lucky Dime is just better on the Master System. It has much more memorable set pieces, better boss fights, and even the movement.. yes, that thing I just complained so much about.. is significantly improved. Oh, another difference: the Game Gear version scatters items around, but on the SMS, everything is dropped by the enemies. And the stars aren’t your “life” like they are in the Game Gear version. Instead, if you get five of them, you become invincible. WHAT THE HELL? What, did they not want the sprites for the tiny little red diamonds that represented your hit points on Game Gear to go to waste when they did away with hit points on the Master System?

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Is it fun? Yea. Problematic as it is, and toothless as it is (seriously, I’m not exaggerating when I say enemies drop so many extra lives it’s almost patronizing), it’s one of those generic platform games that leans on the positive side. It’s nowhere near the same level as Castle of Illusion. This feels like a B tier Disney platformer. But, like, somewhere near the top of the top of the B tier. Not quite as good as Disney legends DuckTales or Rescue Rangers, but worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as them. You know when you do a run on sentence and you barely have any air in your lungs but you keep trying to talk anyway? Yea, that’s when you utter Lucky Dime.

What? I’ve done almost 20 Disney games in a row, folks. I’m running out of words over here.
Verdict: YES! to the Sega Master System port.

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck, The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck Game Gear, The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck Game Gear Review, The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck Master System Review, The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck Review, The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck Sega Master System, The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck SMS

TaleSpin (TurboGrafx-16 Review)

September 13, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 2 Comments

TaleSpin
Platform: TurboGrafx-16
Developed by Radiance Software
Published by NEC
First Released July, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

Always check to see if there’s cheat codes first, Cathy. I could have probably cut the forty-five minutes of agony I spent with TaleSpin down to a more palatable thirty. Hell, maybe even twenty.

I can say exactly three good things about TaleSpin, which is sadly the very first TurboGrafx-16 game to ever get the full Indie Gamer Chick review treatment. (1) You can throw projectiles diagonally. I hate it when games don’t let you do that. This one, you can. Kudos. (2) When you game over, it doesn’t make you restart a stage from the start. You go back to the last checkpoint. It’s basically just a point reset. Double kudos. (3) It didn’t gain sentience and murder me through my monitor. Otherwise, this is easily the worst game I’ve played during this Disney marathon yet. It’s one of the most boring and poorly made platformers I’ve ever played.

For about four minutes, it’s also one of the worst shmups I’ve ever played. It might be THE worst, in fact. All the collision box and cheap hits from the platforming sections, only this time in a shmup. Oh, and there’s no variety to it and no boss fight.

TaleSpin consists of four non-linear levels, a shmup, a level where you play as Kit (I’d never seen the show and assumed his name was “Li’l Britches”) and a final platforming stage. I played the jungle level first, and it was easily the best stage in the game. By “best” I mean it barely rose to the level of “competent but bland.” A fairly basic side-scrolling type of affair notably only for the rate some enemies fire projectiles at you. There’s also a branching path for no reason. Before the start of every level, you’re told to find X amount of some random item. In that stage, it’s feathers. In another stage, it’s pearls, and so forth. I had been under the impression that was the object of the game, but it’s not. It’s just for bonus points. I didn’t discover this until the second stage. For me, that was an underwater level where your weapon seems to be a squirt gun. Yes, really.

Too bad nobody bought this. The sequel would have seen Baloo take a flamethrower to do battle with the sun.

To the game’s credit, it paid-off the absurdity of bringing a squirt gun to an underwater level by having it be the worst weapon in the history of video games. Not only is it unresponsive, (along with movement in general in this specific stage) but it doesn’t do a whole lot of damage. This was such a bad level that I nearly had a panic attack when I realized I was barely two stages into a game so awful that it feels historic. To TaleSpin’s very limited credit, this was as bad as the game got, but it’s pretty damn bad AND I had to go back and replay it because my first session had a logistic problem: I spent a lot of time trying to avoid ALL the fishes when some of them are benign. Of the normal looking ones, only the brown ones damage you because they’re really blowfish who swell up when they approach your massive collision box. As if they weren’t bad enough, the game has these massively spongy crabs that nibble at your collision box. I suffered my first of multiple GAME OVERs here.

There’s electric eels too that you can usually duck under. The crabs? I’d be impressed if someone could avoid taking damage from them.

You’ll note that I’ve been saying that enemies attacked my collision box instead of Baloo himself. Well, that’s because TaleSpin’s collision detection is some of the worst I’ve ever seen. Your box is absolutely massive, and the boxes for enemies and their projectiles are too, which combine to make avoiding damage a living hell. Seemingly the only thing that doesn’t have huge boxes are YOUR projectiles. I was often stunned by how lazily done the collision is and how they seem to have understood this and placed enemies to target THE BOX, and not the sprite. I made a couple examples. Take a look at this.

It gets even worse when you get to Kit’s stage. Even though he’s physically smaller, he seems to have retained a collision box that matches Baloo’s. Also, in that stage, there’s no attack. TaleSpin TG-16 becomes an avoider-game for that level. Thankfully, it’s just a lazy series of ramps that seems tailor-made to avoid enemies comfortably. That is, until it climaxes with an enemy that I honestly don’t believe there’s any way to avoid taking damage from. You just can’t leap high enough, even with Kit’s ability to use a parachute, to avoid this guy. In this screenshot, I’m being hit.

Allegedly there’s health refills in the game in the form of gold bars. I finished the whole game and, to the best of my knowledge, I never found one single health refill. I scored several free lives and, in the (terrible) bonus stages I even scored a couple extra continues, but I never saw a health refill. In every stage BUT this one, I defeated literally every enemy I came across, and they never really dropped anything besides the bonus times that are only worth points. Your health doesn’t refill between stages, and if not for the fact that the game offered continues, there’s no way I’d have finished TaleSpin. This isn’t merely old-school janky. This is a mechanically broken game. There’s also no personal touch to it. When you enter a section where boxes are thrown at you by enemies, the arrangement of where the enemies are placed is repeated several times for the full hallway. No charm. No tact. This is not a game made with love. It’s a game made because Radiance was probably the lowest bidder.

Shere Khan isn’t the last boss. What the hell?

If you were to pretend that this didn’t have overly-heavy jumping, feathery combat, and some of the worst collision detection I’ve seen in a platformer, TaleSpin would just be boring anyway. This offers NOTHING besides very rudimentary platforming high jinks. I feel sorry for those TurboGrafx-16 owners who didn’t get to play the Disney offerings on Sega or Nintendo. The shoddy play mechanics, unresponsive and sluggish controls, and the way damage is handled makes TaleSpin stink of a game that was rushed through development without a hint of polish. It’s an ugly game, too. One of the worst looking TG-16 titles I’ve seen so far, and I played through the TurboGrafx-16 Mini. Burn this one in the red flower.
Verdict: NO!
Oh god.. they did the Darkwing Duck game on the TurboGrafx-16 too.

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with TaleSpin, TaleSpin PC Engine, TaleSpin Review, TaleSpin TG16, TaleSpin TurboGrafx-16, TaleSpin TurboGrafx-16 Review

Mickey’s Dangerous Chase (Game Boy Review)

September 13, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 2 Comments

Mickey’s Dangerous Chase
aka Mickey’s Chase which is LITERALLY THE TITLE SCREEN!
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Now Production
First Released May 15, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

Mickey ‘n Minnie: Rescue Rangers

Although I couldn’t find any official documentation on this, I think there’s compelling evidence that Mickey’s Dangerous Chase began development as the Game Boy port of Rescue Rangers. It’s not just the fact that DuckTales, Darkwing Duck, Talespin, and even Little Mermaid all got Game Boy versions while only Rescue Rangers got left out in the cold. The core gameplay of picking up and throwing boxes that are littered all over the screen is identical to Rescue Rangers, minus the “ducking in the box” mechanic that baffled me so much. Otherwise, from the way you pick up boxes to the “full length of the screen” throws to the fact that enemies fly off the screen upon dying is nearly identical to Chip ‘n Dale. So are multiple enemy sprites, and you can also select whether you want to play as Mickey or Minnie.

I have no clue what happened, but this is clearly THE Rescue Rangers Game Boy game. And, when Mickey’s Dangerous Chase sticks to Rescue Rangers-style gameplay, it’s pretty dang decent. The box-throwing combat is fun. The problem is, it does different things. There’s only a single boss fight in the entire game, and it’s a horrible fight. There’s fifteen levels spread over five worlds. Every third level is some kind of “event” type stage that’s horrible. And there’s lots of last-pixel jumps and blind chance jumps that are.. well, horrible. Are you catching onto the theme here?

The event stages all offer some form of auto-scrolling mayhem and have more cheap shots than your average Danny Ainge highlight reel.

I can’t help but wonder if they realized this wasn’t going to be the close approximation to Rescue Rangers that DuckTales had sort of pulled-off and aborted the Rescue Rangers theme. Yea, I hated DuckTales on the Game Boy, but it was a no-question-about-it adaption that I could see players and critics in 1990 comparing favorably to the NES original. Meanwhile, the game that became Dangerous Chase would have probably not gotten the same “faithful adaptation” buzz. I suspect that there were other issues as well, perhaps recreating the iconic Rescue Rangers bosses and the rubber ball weapon mechanic that’s part of their battles. Or maybe it was a speed issue. Game Boy titles play slower, and Rescue Rangers is a game that cuts a blistering pace. Whatever happened, Chip & Dale were out, and Mickey & Minnie were in to star in a game that teeters between action decency and straight-up unfair gotcha bullcrap.

The “?” blocks aren’t of the Mario “bonk’em” variety. Instead, they work like the crates. They disappear upon being picked up and the item flips upwards before falling off the screen. They even incorporated this “disappearing” thing into the platforming design, which is the only clever thing Dangerous Chase does.

While the action is fine, the level design relies too heavily on blind jumps or last-pixel jumping. The deeper you get into the game, the more heavily Dangerous Chase leans into this. Consequently, it’s just not very fun. Even less fun is throwing enemies into the mix in ways where I’m nearly certain there’s no way to avoid taking damage. In fifteen levels, exactly one of them was better than average. Level 5-1 to be exact. It’s essentially a maze of crates where you have to suss out which ones to grab mid-air in order to create a viable pathway to avoid falling into the spikes below. It was actually really well done, which shocked the hell out of me. The levels had been so bland up to this point.

I hate it when mediocre games don’t get good until the very end. “Where was this cleverness all along?”

The rest of the game isn’t as miserable as many bad games I’ve played, largely based on satisfying combat. But, why end each world on the auto-scrolling stuff? One of them involves a climb up a building, and that would be fine if not for the fact that the platforms deviate into pairs of single-character-length ledges. Typically one is the right way, and one is going to lead to you dying and starting over. It’s absolute garbage design and was the final straw for me. I’d preferred a boss fight over any of these sections.

Maybe you can make the jumps regardless of which way you go. I don’t know. I’m almost certain this is a “right way/wrong way, flip a coin” situation.

What’s most frustrating of all about Mickey’s Dangerous Chase is that it does a lot right. The first couple stages made me think I might have found one of the most underrated hidden gems on the Game Boy. “Why does nobody talk about this? It’s not bad!” Then, the first auto-scrolling section happened: a speedboat chase with spotty collision, GOTCHA! enemy placement, and nothing fun or clever to make up for the jankiness. And then I understood. Then the blind jumps started. Then the last pixel jumps started. And the cheap enemy placement. Then more auto-scrolling. And an annoyingly designed final boss. And now I’m totally cool with this having not ended up being a Rescue Rangers game. It didn’t deserve it.
Verdict: NO!

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with Mickey's Chase, Mickey's Dangerous Chase, Mickey's Dangerous Chase Game Boy, Mickey's Dangerous Chase Game Boy Review, Mickey's Dangerous Chase Review

Mickey Mouse II/The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 2/Hugo (Game Boy Review)

September 12, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 1 Comment

Mickey Mouse II
aka The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 2
aka Hugo
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Kemco
First Released April 26, 1991

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I expected this to be little more than 1991 equivalent of an expansion pack to the original Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle. Well, the Game Boy one, at least. Nope. This is a whole new beast. It’s also one of the best selling Game Boy releases, which proves that sales figures are not indicative of quality. This time around, the level design is so boring. The puzzles are too.. unpuzzle-like. There’s very little room for improvisation, and the close calls that I dug so much in the first pair of Crazy Castle games are replaced here by hoping the game actually responds to your requests to activate your weapon. Yea, the input lag is much worse this go around. It’s probably more noticeable because Crazy Castle 2 utilizes having enemies camp right by doors. There’s doors this time. Get used to screens that look like this:

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It just absolutely kills the flow of the game. Later in the game, Crazy Castle II relies very heavily on doors with nothing in them. Mind you, there’s zero consequences for this. In theory, they’re red herrings that send you on a wild goose chase that adds an element of planning and strategy. In execution you’re going to pass by every door through natural gameplay progression. And it fails logically too, doesn’t it? It’s blind chance that the doors will either contain something or be empty. There’s no way to deduce it by design or by logic. That’s not a puzzle. It’s a coin flip.

There’s hammers, pick-axes, etc that you pick up in the rooms. Once you have them, you get unlimited usage of them for the rest of the stage. But, again, it doesn’t really add to the “puzzle” because the levels aren’t designed to require a whole lot of thought process. You just go to the next thing. It’s so bad.

And, since enemies remain in place inside the rooms, wherever an enemy is when you enter a door, they’re still there when you exit. So, that the whole “enter the rooms” gameplay mechanic is functionally useless and serves only to pad things out. How padded? The first NES Crazy Castle was 60 levels. The first Game Boy Crazy Castle was 80 levels. I beat both in roughly the same amount of time. This one, at 28 levels? It took me about double the time, even though this has only just-over a quarter of the amount of levels. Granted, my total playtime was broken-up because this was so boring that basically anything else would be a suitable substitute for my attention. I even went swimming at one point, and I hate swimming.

Oh god, make it stop. This game can have pipes that feel like they take FOREVER to get from point A to point B. I suppose that’s why there’s no timer.

Also keep in mind that (1) The levels are much longer. (2) I died a lot more than I did in the previous two games. Though I wouldn’t say it’s because the game is harder. It’s just jankier. Things like taking pipes that transport you several stories down into an enemy you couldn’t have known was there, or especially when you have to just walk off a ledge and fall down several stories.

Oh god, there’s a last boss. And it’s a Jank Supreme with pickles and mayo. Oh, and you know the empty rooms? There’s one of those in the boss chamber that then becomes the passage to Minnie after you beat the boss (three shots does the trick. Easy peasy). Is that supposed to pay off the empty rooms? Because it doesn’t.

So what else can I say about Mickey Mouse II, Bugs Bunny II, Hugo, or whatever else this wants to be called? It’s boring. It’s a slog. This review was a disaster for me to write. I don’t think there was a whole lot left they could do with the formula from the first game. I understand that keeping the series going meant tweaking the rules and adding more enemy sprites. Hell, it could have worked, but having the doors be glorified closets, always the same shape, that often don’t contain anything? Well, that was a stupid design choice that hurt quite a lot. But what hurts even worse is that the stages often feel too linear. There’s really no “puzzle” and instead levels feel like you’re being queued, with the only challenge being the occasional leap-of-faith. Then again, I suppose “Bugs Bunny Slow Grindy Castle of Agony” wouldn’t sell over two million copies.
Verdict: NO!

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 2, Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle II Review, Hugo Game Boy, Hugo Game Boy Review, Mickey Mouse II, Mickey Mouse II Game Boy, Mickey Mouse II Game Boy Review

Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse (Sega Master System/Sega Game Gear Review)

September 11, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 16 Comments

Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse
Platform: Sega Master System & Sega Game Gear
Developed by Sega
First Released February, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

I figured it was just going to be a journey through 8-bit versions of the Genesis game’s set pieces. Hah. Yea, some of the themes repeat, but this is a whole different mouse, folks.

Take a look at pretty much any “best of the Sega Master System” list and Castle of Illusion is bound to show up. I’m always a bit of a skeptic when it comes to such lists, and..

Wait, hold on.. I’m having a case of déjà vu over here.

Okay, it’s gone now, because thankfully, Castle of Illusion’s 8-Bit version is actually a completely different game. I don’t mean just in the level design sense, like the difference between, say, Crazy Castle on the GameBoy and the NES. No, this is not a “re-imagining” or a “demake” or anything like that. Think of it as the little brother to the Genesis game that bears only a passing “clearly they’re siblings but not twins” type of resemblance. In fact, this feels like an amalgamation of three elite Disney games: the Genesis Castle of Illusion, along with the NES classics DuckTales and Rescue Rangers. Mickey doesn’t really do anything from a mechanical point of view to stand apart from those. I figured, as great as those games are, 8-bit Castle of Illusion ran the risk of not having an identity of its own. Yet, a startling amount of my readers insisted this was the superior Castle of Illusion game. Friends I trusted seemed to agree. I thought there was no way it could be true.

It is.

I’m going to just come out and say it: sentient chocolate bars as bosses are a crime against nature. It’s just.. wrong. And this one was only slightly more tolerable than the one from Cuphead. Which I remembered after this was really supposed to be a waffle. For God’s sake, Cathy, its name is Sir Waffington III.

I think a big part of that is Castle of Illusion SMS isn’t a game you can sleepwalk through. This one has teeth, folks. I died a lot, and while the game is thankfully plentiful with extra lives, I admit, I was sweating a few sections. Whereas Castle of Illusion Genesis has its platforms fine-tuned for thrilling jumps, the 8-bit version instead focuses on fine-tuned enemy placement. While the collision detection is a little bit on the iffy side, the challenge is more about timing. Knowing when to make your moves. When to attack, and when to back off. Combat is done two ways. The butt-stomp from the Genny game makes its triumphant return here, only this time, you don’t spring-up the entire height of the screen off enemies. I think this makes it more satisfying, as it gives the world a more nuanced sense of weight and gravity that the more “advanced” Genesis version was lacking.

This has a lot more restraint than Rescue Rangers does.

Then there’s the Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers style pick-up-and-throw mechanics, only it’s done in a more methodical “lift with your knees” type of way. You can pick-up rocks, barrels, balls, occasionally keys, and various other assorted blocks to use as throwing weapons. Unlike Rescue Rangers, they don’t just fly across the screen. Perhaps the most fine-tuned aspect of the game is the range you get with them. No cowardly “one-shotting an enemy from across the screen” malarkey here. You actually have to get close enough to be at-risk. I’d say Castle of Illusion is more conservative with the ammo, but everything respawns nearly the moment you leave that part of the map. This includes all the blocks. Otherwise, I’d say conservation of ammo factors in. It still sort of does.

Sometimes they do other things. Like this “block” is a lantern that allows you to, you know, see where you’re going.

Where an enemy lurks, there’s usually only a single block, maybe two, to deal with it. That’s assuming there’s any at all and you’re instead expected to use Mickey’s legendary rear-end. You can’t just “deal” with enemies with the projectiles. The way these baddies are designed is precision-engineered to require you to actually take your time and aim. They’re a jittery bunch, but in a good way. Original too. There’s a section with R.C. cars and planes where trying to attack them is pointless. Instead, you have to get rid of their remote control. I mean, come on! That’s charming! I was so certain I would prefer the frantic, fast-paced throwing action of Rescue Rangers, and boy, was I wrong. And I didn’t even mention that the blocks aren’t just throwing weapons. While rocks and balls vanish after a single use, the barrels can be used both as weapons and as stepping stones to reach higher platforms.

Even without the dazzling visuals, there’s several memorable set pieces.

Another big change is this Castle of Illusion heavily rewards exploration. Levels 1 – 3 can be played in any order, then levels 4 and 5 as well. Seemingly taking most of its inspiration from Capcom’s DuckTales, levels are laid out in a semi-labyrinthine style. There’s two extra hit points hidden in the game. I didn’t even find one of them in my first play-through, because I didn’t take the path to it on the stage it was on. Later, the game repeated the Genesis “there’s seven gems but only five levels” thing that made me roll my eyes. “Why not just have five gems?” Except, I missed a gem on the fifth stage. Again, I just didn’t take the right path and ended up in the boss chamber without it. After winning the fight, I had to replay the level to go get it. Upon picking it up, the game tallied up my points for the stage instead of making me refight the boss. I was a very happy person at that point.

This is an auto-scrolling section, and I normally hate those. This is different. Here, you have to allow the scrolling to push you under this gap. Clever. SMS Castle of Illusion doesn’t overuse the auto-scrolling, but when it’s there, it’s some of the best usage of this style of platforming design in gaming history.

And by the way, there’s six levels this time. After gathering the seven gems, instead of just cutting straight to the last boss, you play a sixth level. So, seven gems, six levels, seven boss fights. And not a stinker in the bunch. Each of the six levels is a joy to explore. Often tough, but never unfair. When I died via timing out, it felt like I deserved it. When I missed my jumps, I knew it was on me. When an enemy got me, I knew it was my fault for not attacking it right. And those bosses? Each one killed me at least once because I tried to cheese them and paid the price for it. In fact, 8-Bit Castle of Illusion has the best boss fights of any of the Disney games I’ve reviewed so far. I’ll take it a step further and say this is easily the best game in the whole marathon. As a reminder, this is the twelfth Disney release I’ve played. Better than Rescue Rangers. Better than the other Castle of Illusion. This is the current leader. And, while I’ve got over six-dozen left to go, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if this Castle of Illusion ran the table from here.

Hey Capcom! Pay attention! I died on every single boss EXCEPT the last one, and that was sheer luck on my part. I died TWICE on this dragon. You don’t have to phone-in the finale of every level and have your bosses be total push-overs just because it’s a Disney property. Castle of Illusion has the best boss fights of any platform game on any third generation console. Yep, I went there. Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse on the Master System checks off a LOT of “best-of” boxes.

A reader on Twitter had a line that I just adored. He said the 8-bit Castle of Illusion “is a better game, but the Genesis one was a better experience.” With twelve words, he summed up the difference between the two games better than this whole review did. While Castle of Illusion on Genesis holds its own as one of the all-time greats, it also existed to provide an enchanting experience. It didn’t have time to experiment. It didn’t have time to get too creative. It had to look spectacular in those iconic GENESIS DOES WHAT NINTENDON’T ads. Remember, Sega had no Sonic The Hedgehog yet, and they had no idea if that game would turn out good. Or, even if it turned out amazing, they had no certainty people would embrace it. Great games get ignored by the public all the time, and Sonic would need a unique marketing strategy. Mickey Mouse, though? Everyone knows Mickey Mouse. Just make sure it looks great in commercials (check) and the game is really good (check) while also getting compared to Super Mario (check) and you have yourself a killer app. That’s the difference. The Genesis version needed to be great in gameplay and amazing visually. The Master System version? It needed to flip that, or it would serve as little more than a cruel tease for those kids without the upgraded system.

The Master System version of Castle of Illusion is on the left. The Game Gear version is on the right. While there WERE some changes, it’s almost entirely superficial stuff. That won’t be true of EVERY Master System/Game Gear combo. I have to review The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck twice because the two versions feature different level design, among other things.

Well, the end result was the best Sega Master System game I’ve ever played. Yea, more than even Wonder Boy III: The Dragon’s Trap. In fact, I don’t even think it’s close between the two. This is head and shoulders above that, and far above the SMS versions of Sonic. It’s one of the best 8-bit games ever. One of the best 2D platformers ever. I’d throw it on the “most underrated game ever” list too, but given how many people bring up the fact that it’s better than the Genesis game, I don’t think it counts as underrated. Y’all got it right this time. Easily the superior game. It’s a shame Sega had to wait four years for it. If Sega had Castle of Illusion in 1987, Nintendo v Sega might have been an actual fight much sooner. Off the top of my head, I can only think of maybe four or five NES games I like more than Castle of Illusion. The real crime is that only the Genesis game is getting celebrated with remakes and re-releases when a case could be made that Castle of Illusion on the Sega Master System was Sega’s finest hour.
Verdict: YES!

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Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse (Sega Genesis Review)

September 10, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 13 Comments

Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse
Platform: Sega Genesis
Developed by Sega
First Released: November 21, 1990
Remade in 2013
Included in the Sega Genesis Mini

As far as I can tell, Castle of Illusion is the innovator of that most graceful of gaming staples: the butt stomp. To count as a “butt stomp” it can’t just be gravity doing the work for you. It requires you to manually call for the butt stomp to occur. I’ve put way too much thought into buttocks-based gaming attacks.

Take a look at pretty much any “best of the Sega Genesis” list and Castle of Illusion is bound to show up. I’m always a bit of a skeptic when it comes to such lists, and halfway through the first level, my skepticism was blasting my senses with sirens. It’s one of the slower-paced platformers I’ve ever encountered. There’s no run button, and Mickey’s walking speed.. on a quest to rescue his main squeeze, mind you.. could best be described as “lacking in urgency.” Come on, Mickster! Put a little pep in your step, buddy! Do you want Minnie to die? I get that being with the same partner for 95 years now is probably exhausting, but can you at least pretend to care?

Yes, yes, the visuals are fantastic. I imagine this game convinced many children of the early 90s that maybe it was time to move on from their NES. Was that you? Leave a comment! I’d love to hear your story!

I remember specifically thinking “well, kudos to Sega for figuring out how to differentiate themselves from Mario, I guess.” This was the first tent-pole platformer on the Genesis, and it feels NOTHING like Mario. Realistically, every first party Sega platformer was going to be compared, fairly or not, to Nintendo’s mascot. A year later, Sonic went the other direction with speed and managed to pull off the same “nothing like Mario” feat based largely around the game’s movement and physics. It’s kind of funny that Sega’s two best and brightest “Mario Killers” feel nothing alike each-other. But, while Sonic gets all the credit these days, Mickey was first. And I wasn’t sure that charmingly deliberate pace would work.

By the time I finished that first level, I was whistling a different tune, because Castle of Illusion is pretty dang good. Not by the standards of 1990. By today’s standards. Oh yea, this passes the test of time.

Having memorable set pieces right off the bat helps. Mario games always take their time getting to the exotic stuff. Castle of Illusion starts with a forest, so you think “well, that’s mundane” but, before that level is up, you’re hopping across leaves with gigantic spiderwebs behind you, which somehow still feels fresh over thirty years later. Nice!

I quickly came to realize the slower pace was actually the product of genius game design. Let me use the worst level in the game as an example. In it, you enter a room where the exit is right there, but the door is locked. The key is several stories above you, and to reach it, you must climb a seemingly endless and somewhat repetitive series of stairs. I would normally find this type of design to be mind-numbing. But, the action kept-up the entire time. The enemies were spaced just right so that I couldn’t coast, and the path would occasionally have pathways that led to items or health refills. Then, just when it felt like I was about to run out of patience, I grab the key and.. the stairs become a giant, multi-storied slide that you run down, grabbing points along the way. It wasn’t enough to just end this sequence. Castle of Illusion, at its most risky of venturing into blandness, instead paid off the worst part of the game (which isn’t awful by any stretch) with an exhilarating reward. And it was awesome! That’s how you cross over from quality title to unforgettable legend.

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I’m a hyperactive kind of chick, and I like my platformers fast-paced. So, imagine my surprise when I discovered Castle of Illusion is basically non-stop action. Huh? Wha? How? It’s the level design. The layouts are so fine-tuned to perfection that it almost feels scientific. From leaps that have you holding your breath to enemies swooping in at the exact right moment to spring off them to a just-out-of-reach platform, Mickey’s first of several adventures with Sega never lets up. While the movement is slow, the gameplay’s tempo is as energetic as any of Mario or Sonic’s best 2D games. Just replace surreal visuals with jaw-dropping backdrops that look like pixelated oil paintings. I can’t stress enough: the set pieces carry the day here. You want to keep going in Castle of Illusion just to see what the next stage’s theme will be.

The jumping is bizarre because it SEEMS like it’s going to be floaty and annoying at first. But once again, it’s precision-engineered to be exciting and satisfying. Each platform is measured so that you brace yourself when you take-off. Yet, it does this without the dreaded “edge of the ledge” design that I always despise.

Make no mistake: this is a hop and plop type of game. While you can pick-up projectiles, I mostly used them to take out enemies that I didn’t trust my butt-crushing skills with. While the sprite for the weapon changes from stage to stage, weapons all behave the same way. You can only throw them straight ahead of you, and they’re a limited resource. I figured this would be one of those games where they’re littered all over the playfield, but actually, the later stages are pretty stingy with them. They become candles in the final stage, which set off some déjà vu, and by time I had accumulated a few, the places I would have used them were well into my rear view mirror. Thankfully, the act of using Mickey’s rear end to slay baddies never stops being satisfying.

Rotating rooms always tickle my fancy.

Castle of Illusion is a short game at only five levels long, but it also never gets a chance to become boring. However, I do wish it did more than it does. While the levels are beautiful and well laid-out, it’s a one-and-done experience. Despite the fact that there’s no timer, there’s really not a whole lot of reasons to explore the stages. I played through the game twice and only discovered two hidden rooms, and all they had was a couple diamonds (points) or maybe some health and ammo. There’s no DuckTales-like hidden treasures. There’s no alternate ending, regardless of whether or not you finish the game on hard mode or not. I can’t stress enough: I enjoyed my time with Castle of Illusion. Very much. But, I’m also not exactly running out to play the 2013 remake either. I’m much more excited to play the Genesis and Master System/Game Gear sequels.

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My only major knock against Castle of Illusion is the whole “easy mode” fiasco. If you select this, not only does the game end after three levels, but all the bosses are removed. Okay, so.. what is the point of it? I played Castle of Illusion on Normal difficulty. It wasn’t “hard” at all. It was a cinch for me, but I’ve got over a quarter century of gaming experience wired into me. Thankfully, my Disney-loving niece Sasha doesn’t. I had her play Castle of Illusion on the normal, and she died twice. That’s PERFECT for a child learning how to play video games, right? This is how you get better. You don’t get better by punishing them for selecting an option you provided. I hate it when games do that, but the fact that a MICKEY MOUSE game does that really irked me. Remember: difficulty options are an accessibility feature. Don’t use them to gatekeep. Ever.

The last boss reminded me of Dracula’s sprite from Simon’s Quest, which is VERY fitting because the fifth level feels like it’s straight out of Castlevania.

While that whole “easy mode” thing frustrates me, I’m not remotely annoyed by a game with limited replay value. I have literally thousands of other titles I can play once I finish Castle of Illusion. Few retro games are made better by modern gaming, but this is one of them, since it’s no longer an expensive investment that’s expected to hold your attention, let alone a child’s attention, for weeks. Castle of Illusion is a nearly perfect game for two hours, and when it’s done, this is one of those rare amazing games where that’s totally fine. You’ll sink an hour or two into your play session with it, and have a good time crushing enemies with Mickey’s buns of steel. You’ll shake your head at how visuals that were state of the art in 1990 could somehow still look so gorgeous so many years later. You’ll have boss fights that are surprisingly deeper than you would expect, if a bit too spongy (except the last boss, who oddly died faster than I expected). You’ll marvel at fine-tuned level design. And, when it’s over, you’ll walk away happy and content. Worth checking out in 2023? Hell, I think Castle of Illusion will hold up for centuries.
Verdict: YES!

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with Castle of Illusion, Castle of Illusion Genesis, Castle of Illusion Genesis Review, Castle of Illusion Review, Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse, Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse Review

DuckTales (Game Boy Review)

September 9, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 2 Comments

DuckTales
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Capcom
First Released September 21, 1990
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

It’s DuckTales from the NES, only with reworked levels, no color, arthritis, and jank. So much jank.

In researching this Disney marathon I’m on, I became somewhat confused as to whether or not the Game Boy builds of Capcom’s legendary Disney-based games are straight NES ports or not. They’re not. Even if they attempt to retain the core mechanics and basic structure, they’ll still feel different and the levels won’t be designed the same as their NES counterparts. It makes more sense to drop the term “port” and call DuckTales on the Game Boy an interpretation of the NES game I just reviewed. And hey, I enjoyed the level design of one of the stages better, so it has that going for it. It’s also an unwieldy nightmare with major control issues and some spotty collision detection. And it’s slow, too. I’d never play this again without having a gun held to my head. I know DuckTales on the Game Boy is the source of warm memories for many of my older readers, but folks, this is neither a good port nor a good game.

The big moments feel less big. There’s nothing guarding Gizmo Duck’s remote control. Well, except two spikes. Hey, in this version of DuckTales, that’s a lot scarier than enemies because you have to use the pogo stick, and it gets pissy when you need it to work.

I’d never played the Game Boy version of DuckTales before. I decided to play it straight. No cheating. No maps. Come what may. Had my emulator not crashed on the fourth stage, there is a good chance I would have Game Overed at some point in either the fourth or fifth stages. So, technically I’ve played this 1.5 times. This is trying to be the NES game to a certain extent. Everything you can do on the NES you can do on the Game Boy. The iconic pogo sticking? It’s there.. or trying to be. It’s really badly done on the Game Boy and incredibly unresponsive. I brought two controllers with me on my trip. Tested both of them on this. Tested it on different emulators. Every time, the act of pogoing was much less responsive than on the NES. Unlike that version, I never was able to adapt to the Game Boy’s pogo issues. Plus, because the playfield is more cramped, you often don’t have the clearance to use it on baddies without taking damage. That would be fine if the whole point was to avoid the enemy entirely, but based on the level layout and enemy behavior, it often seems like it’s just not possible.

You will come to hate the ropes.

It’s not just the pogo stick. Movement in general is sluggish as hell. The ropes are noticeably harder to grab, as if the collision box with them is smaller. This chest here? I tried for quite a while to figure out how to fall off the rope and get to it, even trying to fall from the previous screen. I never got it. DuckTales GB is FULL of moments like that. It’s so bizarre, because they specifically altered the level layouts to accommodate the limitations of the Game Boy, so moments like this shouldn’t happen. But even with brand spanking new levels, it feels like the levels are laid out for the NES physics and responsiveness that isn’t present anymore. And by the way, they kept all the baffling quirks from the NES game. The two hidden treasures and the two extra hit-points are in the same levels they were before. Having to play the Transylvania level three times? The weak bosses? The race after being Dracula Duck? They’re all here, only they’re (mostly) worse. Bubba Duck was improved. They added a tiny little challenge to activating him and it took me a couple of attempts to get it right. So, hey, that’s not nothing.

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I don’t want to exactly say that the level layouts are “stripped down.” They’re just different, really. In fact, I think the level layout for Transylvania is superior on the Game Boy. It’s a better maze, period. Everything IN that maze is worse, but the structure of it feels much more labyrinthine. And.. yea, that’s the only real positive thing I have to say about DuckTales on the Game Boy, because everything else is like a ruined version of the original game. Name an aspect of DuckTales on the NES and it’s here and worse and really only serves to make you long for the TV version. The mine carts are back, and they killed me twice because trying to jump out of them onto the next platform just plain didn’t happen. The controls were like “we’ve received your request to hop out of the cart, and we’re taking it under advisement.”

Remember the “go to Transylvania to get the mine key?” bit from the NES game? Remember how it takes maybe 20 seconds to reach it, rendering the whole thing pointless? Yea, it takes under 10 seconds on the Game Boy. It’s in literally the first mirror one screen over from where you start on the Game Boy.

The bosses were even easier than before. They blink longer and you don’t take damage while they blink, UNTIL Dracula Duck, where I was stunned by how sloppy the whole battle was. I won, but I had to take a lot of damage myself just to score normal hits on him. It was baffling. Curiosity got the better of me and decided to rematch with him after I beat the game, and even after fifteen minutes of trying, I couldn’t damage him without taking damage myself most of the time. It’s the same boss, where you have to pogo off the bats to hit him, only you have A LOT less time because he teleports away so fast. You also have A LOT less space between you, the ceiling, and his head to hit him Also, he starts blinking to teleport away, but you can still hit him while he’s blinking, which is kind of confusing. Then, the final race between me and Glomgold wasn’t even close. He goes so slow they might as well not have bothered.

The “spring off the bad guy to not pay the toll” trick on the Amazon stage no longer works. However, there’s a hidden passage leading to a shortcut where you drop down into the boss’s chamber.

I could go on and on about little annoyances.. and I think I will. The man-eating plants at times seem like they’re impossible to leap over. There’s also too many instances of playing a treasure chest with only a single character length of clearance between it and a platform, only the golf club move can’t be activated, either. The Moon level is completely ruined, with a layout that isn’t fun to explore at all. Hell, even the base logic of hidden areas and what’s inside them are often just plain dumb. For example, the mines have an invisible passage that leads to a hidden room that contains a gem and a cake. The cake restores your full health. Oh, and where is this hidden wall at? Right behind Mrs. Beakley, the character who drops food that restores your health. Why have that cake in the hidden room instead of a second gem? It was at that point where I wondered if the words “does any of this make sense?” were even once uttered during the development of DuckTales on the Game Boy.

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I get that the Game Boy had limitations to it, so some jank should always be expected. Like, I enjoyed Link’s Awakening and Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins just fine, but they’re pretty rough games. But, they also don’t try to be copies of console games. I’ve now played probably in the ballpark of two hundred Game Boy games, and I’ve never really enjoyed any that attempt to be “the Game Boy version.” They’re never as good. I’ll never understand why developers stubbornly kept trying to do it, either. It makes more sense to do an entirely new game that plays to the strengths of the Game Boy hardware instead of trying (and usually failing) to make the same game while working around its weaknesses. This was an early Game Boy release, so I’d normally chalk this up to the development learning curve. Except this kept happening again and again for the entire record-breaking lifecycle of the handheld. And do you know who I blame? YOU, the children of the 1980s! For buying them despite them being awful. Were you THAT desperate to play a terrible version of a great game at school? Couldn’t you just go into the bathroom and smoke like any self-respecting delinquent?
Verdict: NO!

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with DuckTales, DuckTales Game Boy, DuckTales Game Boy Review, DuckTales GB

Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers (NES Review)

September 9, 2023 by Indie Gamer Chick 12 Comments

Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers
Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System
Developed by Capcom
First Released June 8, 1990
Included in The Disney Afternoon Collection

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Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers is one of the four best platformers on the NES. Yep, I went there. I rank it up there with Super Mario 2 & 3 and Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse as the holy quadrilogy of NES platforming. It’s astonishing to me that DuckTales is held in this incredible prestige when Chip & Dale is the superior game. Not a perfect game, mind you, but it’s so close that I think a ROM hacker could make the necessary changes to create what would be a genuinely flawless 2D platformer. So, what does Rescue Rangers do that puts it so far above the insanely crowded mascot platforming field on the NES?

One major thing the game gets wrong is allowing you to circumvent as many as three levels. Rescue Rangers has one of the most nonsensical maps in video game history. Hell, look at where Level E is situated. It’s so weird. Really, the reason to play it is to bank more extra lives. That would be fine if Rescue Rangers were a hard game, but it’s actually pretty easy. I could get it if Capcom had a meeting and were like “man, some of these levels suck.” But, folks, all eleven stages in Rescue Rangers are fantastic. Don’t skip any of them. All-in, you’re looking at a little over an hour to beat the whole shebang even if you play every stage, and it’s worth it.

First off, that object-throwing combat is just delightful. Like a hyperactive version of Mario 2’s vegetable-yanking-carrying-throwing mechanic, and it’s so fun. Most of the enemies take only one shot to kill with normal-sized boxes. The act of picking them up and throwing them never gets boring. Then, there’s the non-throwing boxes that never get used up, and the gigantic fruits that weigh-down your jumping but fly through every enemy. When you defeat an enemy, it makes one of the most satisfying death noises on the NES. It sounds almost like a sloppy-wet death fart. And yet, the turd in Rescue Rangers’ punch bowl is tied to these boxes. It’s this:

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Yea, this is a head-scratching game design decision. I can’t justify it. I’ve tried to figure out the logic, and the best I could come up with was they had other plans for how this whole “ducking in the boxes” thing would work and what’s left in Rescue Rangers is a game-wrecking relic of those initial plans. So, in case you didn’t know, in Rescue Rangers, Chip & Dale can duck inside every box they pick up, including the multi-use steel boxes. Your eyes poke out comically, and it’s adorable. So, it’s a stealth thing, right? Actually, no. If an enemy walks into you while you’re hiding in a box like this, it dies. Instantly. Well, assuming it’s a one-hit-point enemy, which most of the baddies are. If you’re holding a wooden box, all you lose is the box. If it’s a steel box, you can reuse it again and again as a no-effort-needed shield of death. It nerfs Rescue Rangers to such an absurd degree that I ended up having an extended discussion with my friends trying to justify it. It’s “wacky” and “cartoonish” but it also absolutely murders the tension in the game. It makes you wonder if Rescue Rangers originally had a stealth element that was removed early in development. Why would you ever have something like this in a combat-focused side scroller?

Most of the set pieces are fun. The hammer, found in one of the optional levels, is a bit janky. It feeds into my theory that Capcom wasn’t proud of ALL the levels, and thus was born the map. For the record, the rest of this level slaps.

That’s literally my only major complaint about Rescue Rangers. Oh, plenty of little ones. Ones so nit-picky that I feel bad for even bringing them up, but screw it, here we go. Enemies flying off the screen when you kill them is nice, but I wish they had “damage sprites” so that I knew they suffered. Also I might be unhinged. The bosses are even worse about this. The bosses that utilize NES trickery to look massive just vanish from the screen, and not in a satisfying “Thanos snapped them into ash” type of way but rather in a “poof, existence ended” type of way. Since the bosses only blink when you damage them, it leaves what should be historically amazing combat a little lacking in impact. And yea, the co-op isn’t all that, but since both myself and my sister’s first instinct was to murder each-other, we might not be the best judges of it.

I appreciate how out of f*cks to give Capcom was about symmetry with some of the levels. In the first battle with Fat Cat, they said “screw it: TWO spikes on the ground in a spot that’s designed to create maximum annoyance. Does it look pretty? Does it look sophisticated? No? WHO CARES because it adds challenge.”

Admittedly, all of my annoyances with Rescue Rangers are exceptionally petty. Hell, I’m expecting a lot of push-back on my “hiding in the crates could have ruined the game” argument. But, I’m also calling Rescue Rangers a top four platform game on a console defined by platforming games. Clearly I love it, so those complaints are out of a desire to see it rise above Mario and claim the throne. The roughly one hour of gameplay Rescue Rangers gives you is breathtaking. Each of the eleven levels feels completely different from each-other. They each throw in at least one novel set piece as well, so as to not simply feel like it’s the same gameplay over and over and it’s just the background facade changing. That’s harder to pull off than you think, especially with the limitations of the NES.

It goes without saying that the sprite work is gorgeous. While I think Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse is the best looking overall NES game, Capcom wins the “consistently great looking” contest, hands-down.

Modern games have it a lot easier making levels feel different. File sizes are basically unlimited, so you can easily create a new setting. Retro games? They struggle with making stages feel distinguishable from one-another. Not only are you limited by fewer buttons and actions, but there’s only so much you can do with an engine that takes up less memory than any title screen from a game today. Rescue Rangers is the rare NES game that has over ten levels that all feel completely different while retaining the core gameplay. Part of the reason for this is there’s gags unique to each stage. Exposed live wires. Faucets you turn off. Machines dropping steel balls on you. A hammer that only appears once in the entire game. Rabbits who whip a carpet at you. It’s not enough they changed the backgrounds or the enemies. They gave each stage’s design logic its own personality. That’s what sets this apart from so many other quality games.

Huge variety of enemies too. I hated these ones. There’s a spot at the end of Fat Cat’s factory (the final stage) where you’re on a conveyor and I’m absolutely convinced it’s impossible to squeeze past one of these guys without taking damage.

There’s eight bosses, because three of the stages end without one. That’s disappointing, because the bosses feel like events. They have a unique combat mechanic: there’s a red rubber ball in the boss chamber that, when thrown, ricochets back and forth in a straight line off the wall, damaging the boss if it passes through it. Sometimes, you can even score two hits in a single throw. Just think: if Fat Cat hadn’t left a ball in the room with them, he would have taken over the world. Admittedly, the bosses all feel samey. This is the one area of the game where you sort of see the sausage get made and realize that it’s just the same boss with the same collision boxes, only with tiny changes to how their projectiles behave or how the collision box moves around. However, the settings and sprites do a pretty dang good job of hiding the fact that you’re fighting slight variations of the same thing over and over. The rubber ball being unique to their chambers helps with this too. If you want an example of how many alterations you can do to one style of 8-bit platformer boss, Rescue Rangers ranks right up there with Mega Man games.

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I get why DuckTales is more revered. It’s based on a more popular, more endearing cartoon (with a much catchier theme song) and the pogo stick mechanic is probably slightly more satisfying than throwing the boxes. But, in terms of gameplay, Rescue Rangers slays DuckTales. It’s got a lot more content and never makes you replay one level three times. It’s a bigger game. It’s got better boss fights. It’s got more gags and gimmicks than DuckTales. It’s even got co-op, if you’re into that sort of thing. I wish WayForward had also remade this one. Given how they took the six ultra bland bosses of DuckTales and made them delightfully wonderful, I can’t imagine what they could do with the eight boss fights in Rescue Rangers. The fact that Rescue Rangers sits in DuckTales’ shadow leaves it feeling a bit underrated. THIS is Capcom’s one true NES masterpiece. Not Mega Man 2. Not Bionic Commando. Certainly not DuckTales. Rescue Rangers, flawed as it is, is the best 8-Bit Capcom release I’ve played. Even if they kinda hosed Monterey Jack.
Verdict: YES!

OH! OH! I have another valid complaint! The bonus round that ends every stage SUCKS! There’s eight boxes on the screen, and you have roughly enough time to pick up four or five of them. One of them has an extra life. That sounds great! Exciting! Except, the order of the items is the same all ten times you can play it. The 1up is always in the top center box. Would it REALLY have been that hard to create a randomized pattern? Oh well. YES! Next!

Filed under Retro Reviews Tagged with Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers, Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers NES, Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers NES review, Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers Nintendo, Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers Review

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TaleSpin (NES Review)

TaleSpin
Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System
Developed by Capcom
First Released: December 11, 1991
Included in The Disney Afternoon Collection

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Fantasia (Sega Genesis Review)

Fantasia
Platform: Sega Genesis
Developed by Infogrames
First Released: November, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck (Sega Master System & Sega Game Gear Review)

The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck
Platform: Sega Game Gear & Sega Master System
Developed by Sega
First Released October, 1991 (Game Gear)
First Released December, 1991 (Master System)
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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TaleSpin (TurboGrafx-16 Review)

TaleSpin
Platform: TurboGrafx-16
Developed by Radiance Software
Published by NEC
First Released July, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Mickey’s Dangerous Chase (Game Boy Review)

Mickey’s Dangerous Chase
aka Mickey’s Chase which is LITERALLY THE TITLE SCREEN!
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Now Production
First Released May 15, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Mickey Mouse II/The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 2/Hugo (Game Boy Review)

Mickey Mouse II
aka The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 2
aka Hugo
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Kemco
First Released April 26, 1991

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Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse (Sega Master System/Sega Game Gear Review)

Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse
Platform: Sega Master System & Sega Game Gear
Developed by Sega
First Released February, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse (Sega Genesis Review)

Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse
Platform: Sega Genesis
Developed by Sega
First Released: November 21, 1990
Remade in 2013
Included in the Sega Genesis Mini

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DuckTales (Game Boy Review)

DuckTales
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Capcom
First Released September 21, 1990
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers (NES Review)

Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers
Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System
Developed by Capcom
First Released June 8, 1990
Included in The Disney Afternoon Collection

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TaleSpin Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System Developed by Capcom First Released: December 11, 1991 Included in The Disney Afternoon Collection

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Fantasia Platform: Sega Genesis Developed by Infogrames First Released: November, 1991 NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck Platform: Sega Game Gear & Sega Master System Developed by Sega First Released October, 1991 (Game Gear) First Released December, 1991 (Master System) NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Like this:

TaleSpin Platform: TurboGrafx-16 Developed by Radiance Software Published by NEC First Released July, 1991 NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Like this:

Mickey’s Dangerous Chase aka Mickey’s Chase which is LITERALLY THE TITLE SCREEN! Platform: Game Boy Developed by Now Production First Released May 15, 1991 NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Like this:

Mickey Mouse II aka The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 2 aka Hugo Platform: Game Boy Developed by Kemco First Released April 26, 1991

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Like this:

Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse Platform: Sega Master System & Sega Game Gear Developed by Sega First Released February, 1991 NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse Platform: Sega Genesis Developed by Sega First Released: November 21, 1990 Remade in 2013 Included in the Sega Genesis Mini

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DuckTales Platform: Game Boy Developed by Capcom First Released September 21, 1990 NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

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Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System Developed by Capcom First Released June 8, 1990 Included in The Disney Afternoon Collection

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TaleSpin
Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System
Developed by Capcom
First Released: December 11, 1991
Included in The Disney Afternoon Collection

Fantasia
Platform: Sega Genesis
Developed by Infogrames
First Released: November, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck
Platform: Sega Game Gear & Sega Master System
Developed by Sega
First Released October, 1991 (Game Gear)
First Released December, 1991 (Master System)
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

TaleSpin
Platform: TurboGrafx-16
Developed by Radiance Software
Published by NEC
First Released July, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

Mickey’s Dangerous Chase
aka Mickey’s Chase which is LITERALLY THE TITLE SCREEN!
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Now Production
First Released May 15, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

Mickey Mouse II
aka The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 2
aka Hugo
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Kemco
First Released April 26, 1991

Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse
Platform: Sega Master System & Sega Game Gear
Developed by Sega
First Released February, 1991
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse
Platform: Sega Genesis
Developed by Sega
First Released: November 21, 1990
Remade in 2013
Included in the Sega Genesis Mini

DuckTales
Platform: Game Boy
Developed by Capcom
First Released September 21, 1990
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers
Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System
Developed by Capcom
First Released June 8, 1990
Included in The Disney Afternoon Collection