#314 - James Bond Jr.

           Sometimes even the early 90s can be wrong. This is one of those times.

      Believe it or not, this is an NES game, not an original Game Boy game.

Not to be confused with Ian Fleming's masterful creation James Bond (Sr.) or the dimwitted fish knock-off James Pond, James Bond Jr. is a meaningless game adaptation (based on the cartoon show) that could only have been created in the labs of all the most boring Bond villains combined. I'm looking at you, Renard, from "The World is Not Enough"! Did you help in assembling this mediocrity? Bah, it doesn't matter. James Bond Jr. is sent out to save all the world's scientists from the evil S.C.U.M. Lord. Yes, it's as overwrought of a plot as they come, but who cares about video game plots when there's action and espionage to be had! Alas, I would not get my fill of espionage, as the game is non-linear action. Fair enough, if there was any sort of action be had. Your gun is about as worthless as shooting a Twix bar. Certain enemies literally take up to 30 hits and, as far as I got in the game, you could only hold up to 99 bullets. What really matters: James himself looks slightly better than E.T. on Atari, and the pseudo-non-linear gameplay is both boring and frustrating. What am I doing on this island? Searching for blueprints? Trying to stop a rocket from launching? What's a S.C.U.M. Lord anyway and why should I care? These questions emerged as I played the game and eventually led to not giving the slightest bit of a damn. Despite the absence of fun, humor, and the presence of pixelated young hotties looking to mack on James, James Bond Jr.is most certainly a video game that I played this evening. Not many other games can say that.

D-

#313 - Jackie Chan's Action Kung-Fu

Perhaps the game would have sold better if Jackie Chan's body possessed a neck.

         Not even Buddha will be spared in Jackie Chan's wake of destruction.

Say what you will about Jackie Chan's career post-Rush Hour, but I'll be damned if I let you bad-mouth anything that came before that. The guy's a fighting machine. So many bones broken, so many stunts performed. The guy's still going in his early 60s. Yup, Jackie Chan is awesome, and surprisingly, so is his NES game. With such a generic title as Action Kung-Fu and Hudson Soft's reputation as a solid, if not spectacular developer, I was expecting mediocre poo-doo, like "The Karate Kid" (2010). Instead, I'm treated with solid gold, like "The Legend of the Drunken Master" or "Police Story 2." Yes, the game really is as fun as his classics.

Ok, maybe Action Kung-Fu isn't as great as the old Jackie Chan films where everyone speaks Chinese and kicks insane amounts of butt, BUT it's one of the best platformers I've played in a fortnight, thanks to the variety in level design, incredible controls, and one of the best soundtracks never mentioned on a "best soundtrack" list.

• Let's start with the latter and work our way forward. Action Kung Fu's music deserves to be up there with the Castlevania and Mega Man series. Here's why:

• I couldn't write about music theory to save my life, but there are some complex rhythms and melodies being laid down in a mere two minutes. Or not. Either way, it's a thrilling composition. Sometimes I forget why I appreciate 8-bit music as much as I do. I wonder why every soundtrack can't be as fantastic as Contra's or Mega Man 2. This is why I'm grateful to have heard this. It was truly a pleasure to dismantle flying fish and angry monks to these tunes.
  
  
• As for the controls, Jackie Chan controls nearly as tightly as our friend Mario. Mario games, for the record, have the tightest controls out of any platformer, so this is a huge compliment to Hudson Soft's programmers. Any time Mr. Chan flailed about and got hit, it was almost always my fault. Another plus: when Jackie does get hit, he doesn't fly backwards a few feet like the Belmonts or Mega Man.

• There are only five levels, but each one is a fairly decent length and filled with things to do. One section in Level 2 has the screen closing in on Jackie, while he jumps from platform to platform avoiding spikes, enemies, and the like. Another has Jackie racing down a log on a river whilst killing more enemies and avoiding falling off. Others are just straightforward platforming goodness, like ascending a cave, bouncing from crumbling platform to platform while lava rushes up from below. Jackie handles it all with his trademark humor and penchant for snapping necks. Perhaps the game's one true flaw is its difficulty, as you could easily finish it in an afternoon. Still, an afternoon with Jackie Chan is one well spent or so I've been told.

A-

#312 - Jackal

                       The machine-gunner has issues with the title of the game.

                                PROTIP: Explosions easily destroy walls.

You crazy for this one, Konami! Jackalis every ridiculous action movie from the 80s all rolled into one feel-good death fest. South American terrorists, explosions, Uncle Sam smoking a cigar: all the essentials are here. If you're rockin' one-player status, you play as Colonel Decker and Leiutenant Bob in a foolhardy, nothing-to-lose green Jeep. If it's a table for two (players), then your buddy will be controlling Sergeant Quint and Corporal Gray in a more introverted, but still subtly terrifying brown Jeep. These particular rag-tag group of misfits have a lot of friends in low places and said friends have happened to get kidnapped by the Nicaraguan rebels. Blow up some terrorists, their digs, their equipment, grab your buddies, and get the "sam hill" out of dodge. There are six stages for you to perform your various killing tactics and, like all NES games, the stages eventually get ridiculously hard. Your jeep is equipped with standard ammunition, and grenades or rockets, depending on your upgrades. Don't worry, if ammunition is too boring, you can always squash the enemy with your Jeep – seriously. Just mind the shots: one shot from any enemy, whether it's a shrimpy dude with a pistol or a tank looking to tango, can destroy your fun time. When your Jeep explodes, another one instantly appears in its place, but any guys you've rescued scatter to the wind so you'll have to retrieve them again. Four lives are nothing to squint at and Konami has always been gracious with their continues. But, like any war-time situation, it still behooves you to be careful.

B+

#311 - Jack Nicklaus' Greatest 18 Holes of Major Championship Golf

           Mr. Nicklaus is thinking, "If I make this shot, I can buy another house."

                   
                    You don't have a choice: you must play as Mr. Nicklaus!!!

When I was a child, my grandpa used to watch golf. I would usually glance at the screen every now and again, and I always wondered a couple things: why was Jack Nicholson playing golf? And when did he have a horrible haircut? Those two questions firmly unanswered in my mind, I'd then run off to watch Nickelodeon and think no more about the confounding world of golf. Now that I'm older, I realize Jack Nicklausis one of the greatest golf players ever, apparently, and his hairdo is probably the reason why he's so awesome. Maybe. Either way, he's earned the right to stick his name on a golf game, even one as ludicrously titled as this one. Greatest 18 holes? Well, it's all subjective. I felt like I was playing an ordinary round of golf, and as such, I completely sucked at it. That being said, for someone who has played several rounds of Major Championship Golf as Mr. Nicklaus has, perhaps these holes are something special. This being a Konami-produced game, it's no surprise the controls are solid, the menus are easy to read, and depending on how "deep" you want to get into the game, it can either hold you by the hand via a putter or kick you to the curb with a nine iron. It's really up to you. My only valid complaint from a gameplay level: every time you take a shot, the game has to load the course. It takes a solid five-to-ten seconds to load the course each time, which is an eternity in 2012. The course looks pretty crappy too; the layouts won't be winning any Pixel Art awards, that's for sure. If you have patience for the load times and the willingness to throw caution to the wind, per Mr. Nicklaus' consent, then you'll enjoy this round.

B-

#310 - Ivan Ironman Stewart's Super Off-Road

                             Four-player ACTION ACTION ACTION!

Thanks to Chronicgames.net for this riveting screenshot. This track resembles the majority of the other tracks.

Do you know how silly it feels to write out that title? You should give it a try sometime. Mr. Stewart is so vain that he has to have his nickname "Ironman" present in the title of his game. That, friends, is true narcissism and such that we will probably never get to experience, as the majority of us will never know what it feels like to make gobs of money simply for licensing our name. Anyways, thank goodness Ivan's game is a solid off-roading experience. You jot down your name (your name can only be four letters long, but is there any other choice? That's right: I-V-A-N), you pick your country (Japan, because they drive pink trucks, according to this game), and off you go. This game is essentially Danny Sullivan's Indy Heat except instead of being in heat, you're off-roading it on dirt tracks. Indy Heat's tracks are far more interesting than Super Off-Road, but Super Off-Road's difficulty is top-notch. The cars here are very aggressive and you better believe they're looking out for the Duke of New York, A#1, which is themselves. You, Mr. Ivan Ironman Stewart, in your pink Japanese truck will have to "trick" out your "ride" in order to win: new tires, more turbos (don't use them all in the first race like I did), some acceleration boost. Even with all that money spent, you may not win, but it will give you a fair shot. This isn't a "normal" off-roading experience, after all. It's Super, baby, as only Ironman himself can bring it.

B-

#309 - Isolated Warrior

Pink was really the warrior's choice back then. Perhaps the color warded off such disturbing creatures as that skull/brain entity in the background.

I'm stymied as to what to make fun of on this screen cap. Color choice? When I think of shooters and explosions, I don't think of Lisa Frank.

Isn't every video game protagonist an isolated warrior? Unless you're playing some sort of squad-based or co-op game, I'm going to hand you a big fat YES to that question. The followup question then would be, is Max Maverick, the isolated warrior of Isolated Warrior, the ultimate video game protagonist? For crying out loud, the government of his planet recruited him and him alone to save them from over 40 alien creatures. I'm guessing Mr. Maverick has done this before, perhaps on the same planet in some unrecorded adventure, or perhaps on a different planet. Regardless, he is trustworthy. His credentials are in order, then, but what to make of the term "isolated"? According to thefreedictionary.com, "isolated" means "separated from others; solitary, singular." Indeed Max is a highly accomplished man to be able to save planets within a moment's notice, but this very distinction means that there are very few people who can understand the weight of his situation. His is a lonely existence, lived predominantly in and around a governmet-built villa on the outskirts of his planet. Do not envy this man or any other isolated warrior in video gaming. Their lives may seem exciting, living as they do on the brink of death at all times. But who are they fighting for? Themselves? Your everyday person who can not properly thank or understand what they go through? These are examples of questions that sprint through their heads while they are spattered with alien entrails and unknown goo. Isolated Warrior may look cool and fun, with its crazy weapon upgrades and non-stop vertically-scrolling action/shooter mischief, but for Max Maverick it's some serious business. Even if he doesn't know why.

B-

#308 - Ironsword: Wizards & Warriors II

Yes, that's Fabio, holding a decidedly faux-iron sword. He really did take this picture near an erupting volcano, though.

Birds dropping dookies on your head... believe it or not, that really does penetrate through steel. Acid dooks.

Having not played the original Wizards & Warriors, I can not, in good conscience, compare the two (people who have played the original – thoughts?). I can, however, say that this game is aptly named: your bug-eyed, Monty Python-esque knight lives or dies by his sword, that may or may not be made of iron. It is not theIronsword that you initially wield, though. In Ironsword, the whole goal is actually to reconstruct the Ironsword and defeat the Wizard, all in five thrown together stages. Every stage I played forced you to ascend upward while having to fend off enemies from every angle. Worse yet, the enemies thrust themselves into you, kamikaze-style. I'm not too sure how your knight feels about living either. He can't swing a sword to save his life. What you hope happens is that the enemies run into your sword as they're attacking you. Let me rephrase this: the only way you can fight enemies is by not fighting them at all. Position your sword so that they run into it. It sounds clever, but the execution is poor, especially when you have several enemies from every direction coming at you. Even if you kill a couple, it's nearly impossible not to get hit.

Aside from the cheap hits, Ironsword isn't completely terrible. The quest itself may be overly dramatic and your knight looks stupid until you get a helmet to cover his bulging eyes. If you can stand repeatedly dying, it's a decent early NES platformer with solid exploration elements. Just don't expect to always enjoy bouncing on clouds while tornados swarm you.

C+

#307 - Iron Tank: The Invasion of Normandy

                            James Woods as the Foul-Mouthed Tank Operator

You think those cannons are going to let your iron butt through?! TAKE 'EM OUT!

There's nothing wrong with invading Normandy every now and again, especially if your mode of invasion lies solely within an Iron Tank. But for crying out loud, would it kill the tank manufacturers to increase said Iron Tank's manueverability? I appreciate that it has a large life bar, can hold up to four types of ammunition, including regular bombs and fire bombs, and is an all-around awesome piece of machinery. This is Normandy, though, and to win this war singlehandedly, as the tank operator is prepared to do, it would be nice if you could control the turret manually, like you can the machine gun. By turning the tank, you turn the machine gun, but in order to maneuver the turret, you must press 'B' and hold the directional pad in the direction you wish to inflict the most damage. It sounds simple enough, but while you're operating the tank, it can feel like the turret has a mind of its own at the worst possible time (like being surrounded by the enemy's tanks). Frankly, the machine gun is a waste of time. It can shoot enemy soldiers, but it does little to no damage to other tanks. If you're using the tank properly, you're only going to be shooting from the turret. Thankfully, there is a plethora of ammo on the battlefield, so plunder to your heart's content. Don't worry about shooting every soldier that comes into your line of sight, either. Focus on the tanks. After all, France built Normandy on rock and roll and, according to SNK's version of history, a buttload of tanks. It's your job, as the One and Only Iron Tank, to destroy them all. Then Normandy. Then the world.

B-

#306 - Infiltrator

                                             Helicopter's coming for you, son!

You've interrupted the guard's calisthenics. You shall now pay the ultimate price.

I'm not sure whether I should take this helicopter simulator/spy game seriously. For starters, the lead character's name is Jimbo-Baby McGibbits. Hilarious, yes, but can I trust the man? I may have an issue or two with Infiltrator's intentions, but what really drops this game (like a bad habit) for me is the learning curve. There are two types of missions you can select from the outset: helicopter flying missions and action espionage missions. The former feels more tedious than it need be. Once you get the helicopter in the air, there is no radar to guide you to wherever you need to go. From what I understand, all of the different dials and buttons are meant to tell you something, but, much like the origin of our friend McGibbits, it's all very vague and obscure. What did us poor gamers do before tutorials? Oh that's right, instruction manuals. I checked an FAQ to help my confused self, but all it did was verify what I had already assumed: flying the helicopter properly takes a lot of work and you have to be willing to fail. I was willing to do neither so I moved on to the espionage missions. You're equipped with a few different items, like false papers, gas grenades, explosions, etc. Once you Infiltrate the enemy base, it's all a matter of searching through desks to find random items. This section was the more interesting of the two and held my interest for a longer time. I still had no idea what I was doing, but unlike the helicopter scenario, I didn't really care. Gassing guards is fun. Sometimes, in life, that's all you need.

C

#159/305 - Danny Sullivan's Indy Heat

     Looking at this cover makes me want to mow down on some Red Vines.

This small situation could spell a disaster. Luckily, all those cars spinning around the track is cause for hurrah!

(Let's just ignore that I unintentionally forgot to review this all the way back in 'D,' shall we?)

What if you woke up today and decided, out of the blue, that you wanted to be a NASCAR/F1 champion? Race fast cars, make lots of money, and get kissed by fake women once you win trophies, affectionately referred to as "the life." You could do worse than to subscribe to Danny Sullivan's Danny Sullivan's Indy Heat. Instead of racing down a vertically-scrolling highway, as in most NES racers, Indy Heat gives you a top-down view of the race. By incorporating this view, your cars look like Micro Machines that you can easily lose because they're just so darn micro. Fear not: said smallness actually enhances the game. It's a joy to see six tiny cars travel around a tiny track, all battling for the position of glory, albeit in a tinier way. The controls are spot-on, as they should be for a game that rewards good driving skills; making tight turns feels relatively effortless. Before each race (there are nine races), you have the option of spending money to make your car go faster, brake better, have a quicker pit crew, etc. I recommend lots of turbos and upgrading your speed and pit crew. You don't want to have to hire and train a bunch of new guys, do ya?! Better still: this game has four-player compatibility. Indy Heat needs to be experienced with three other people by your side. Even if you don't make many upgrades to your car, your only real challenge in one-player is the yellow car a.k.a. Danny "The Iron Giant" Sullivan himself. So bust out some brews, a bunch of controllers, and some bountiful bundt cake, and you'll have an amazing alliterative party even your future NASCAR champion self would be proud of.

B

#304 - Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

The only way Spielberg could shut Kate Capshaw up after filming "Temple of Doom" was to marry her. Poor soul.

A lot of effort went into making those children look as soulless as possible.

The film "Temple of Doom" is generally considered the weakest of the original Indiana Jones trilogy, but as a game adaptation, I'm happy to report that Temple of Doom is, hands down, the best of the three Indy NES games. It has a ramshackle, devil-may-care spirit to it that is far superior to the sludgy, murky qualities of the two Last Crusade games. I wouldn't call it a good game necessarily, but it is a game that does whatever the hell it wants and, surprisingly, succeeds on its own terms.

Here's the thing: I'm not exactly sure what I was supposed to be doing in Temple of Doom. The majority of the game has you collecting kids (dozens, if not hundreds of Short Rounds???) peering out of dark, cavernous holes. Once you collect the children, swords, guns, keys, and any other random item you can think of will pop up in the child's hole for you to collect; the kids have an arsenal with them, in other words. What's confusing is that the pause screen states how many kids you need to collect for the level, but even if you don't collect that number, you can still progress. As far as I could tell, aside from the keys, these items – especially the weapons – are pointless. When you press 'pause' on the menu screen, it will show your arsenal of acquired goods. I tried to equip a sword or a gun to no avail, so I'm not sure what the point of collecting them is other than to get you points. The majority of the levels or "waves" (hearkening back to the arcade games of the early 80s with that term!) involve going between mine cart sections (where you jump from mine cart to platform and back again) and caves surrounded by lava. These environments can grow boring to look at, but they certainly fit in with the movie's theme. As I hinted at earlier, keys are about the only item worth a bullplop. Use them to unlock the wooden doors and move on to the next level. What's the point of collecting kids, if all you need is a key to advance? What's the point of collecting items if they don't do anything other than look pretty and add to your cool factor? Does it matter? It's a Temple of Doom, not a Temple of Personal Accomodation.

C-

#303 - Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (Ubisoft)

Why be creative when you can re-use the exact same background that Taito used for their equally toxic take on "The Last Crusade"?

               Put your mind at ease: Indy can, and does, punch air in this game.

A theory: Ubisoft played Taito's incarnation of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and they declared it "bad, but not bad enough." A mere three years later, near the end of the NES, Ubisoft decided that, yes, what the gaming world wanted – nay, needed– was yet another abominable Last Crusade game. How else to explain this nonsensical dreck? And yes, I would love an explanation, Ubisoft. You should have let sleeping dung lie. SLEEPING DUNG!

Simply put, The Last Crusade (1993 Remix) is nigh unplayable. It's not that the controls are bad. In fact, the controls are a marked improvement over the original Last Crusade. No, what ravages this particular game are the monochromatic, bleached graphics; the cheap shots the enemies take; the lunging backwards every time Indy gets hit; the "there for no reason" uber-short time limit; the too-low life bar; the boring, meandering levels; the overblown character model for Indy himself; the way life depletes as you're falling through the air. These are all defining characteristics of the first level, which thanks to those attributes, was also the last level I played.

Perhaps there is no way to explain this game's existence properly. Certainly Ubisoft has moved on to greener pastures, lined with Rayman corpses. Allow me to summarize, then: Last Crusade is a whirlwind of poor developmental choices, undoubtedly rushed to a dying market to satisfy absolutely no one.

F

#302 - Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (Taito)

                                                  Don't think he won't shoot.

Ah yes, the boat level. Beat fifteen guys, pick up a key, and move on. Seriously.

Like an unearthed piece of dinosaur dung that still retains its pungent scent, so too does this twenty-year-old Indiana Jones game maintain the crappiness bestowed upon it by Software Creations. Is it really that hard for action games based on Spielberg movies to be good? I suppose you could brand The Last Crusade an "action-puzzler," but that would imply that the game contains any true action besides overly repetitive beatdowns on regenerating thugs; or that the puzzles presented here indeed have solutions. Just try the level where you have to rescue Indy Sr. from a castle divided into five different, obnoxious sections, and you'll be re-thinking the idea that "The Crystal Skull" was the worst Indiana Jones outing. Tedium and frustration might be endurable if the control scheme didn't feel like it was shoved under a cement mixer. It's been a long time since I've had to rant about the assignment of 'A' as the ever-eternal jump button, but I'll gladly do it again. You shouldn't have to press both 'A' and 'B' to jump in a game. Ever. Nor should a nimble protagonist, like Indy, feel like he's trudging through mud whilst dealing with a painful hemorrhoid problem. If you're smart, you'll whip your enemies instead of beating them with punches or kicks, but the enemies have to be lined up correctly with the whip in order for them to get killed. Actually, if you want to be reallysmart, you could drive out to the New Mexico desert with a shovel, and bury this game in a landfill next to all of the Atari E.T. cartridges. Spielberg would want it that way.

F

#301 - The Incredible Crash Test Dummies

Don't be fooled: the game is actually composed of incredibly serious car crash tests. Fail any of them once, and the cartridge will send a signal to your NES, causing it to explode. Buckle up.

              Or it's your standard platformer, with bouncing tires for enemies.

The 90s was a strange time to be a child. It was a time when any commercial character, whether it be Chester Cheetah, Yo Noid!, or even the innocuous Crash Test Dummies ("Don't be a dummy! Buckle your seatbelt!") could be turned into an action figure line and given their own cartoon show or even video game. Very little time and effort was given to these characters' extracurricular activities. No surprise: a lot of these soulless products are the worst kind of terrible. I mean, a Yo Noid! video game? Could Nostradamus have predicted such a travesty? Strangely, The Incredible Crash Test Dummies, made by LJN out of all companies, is not the expected carwreck it should have been. It can be needlessly frustrating, but it is more than playable.

You (obviously) play as one of the Crash Test Dummies and your quest, your goal, your very being depends on you trudging your way through a series of side-scrolling levels, filled to the brim with platforming, action, and many needless deaths. You alternate between the two dummies, Slick and Spin (whatever happened to Vince and Larry from the commercials?). Slick gets around via his unicycle body, while Spin has two legs, like a normal, er, crash test dummy. The real challenge typically comes from Slick's levels. His unicycle can be hard to navigate around obstacles, and if he gets hit, he can go flying backwards, causing you to repeat a large portion of the level again. There's nothing here that you haven't seen in any other platformer (save for the bloodless limb-severing that comes with your character's death), but it's still, dare I say it, fun. The levels are well-crafted, the controls are solid enough, and because the game isn't based on a beloved franchise or film, there's no real way for LJN to have pissed off a lot of "die-hard" Crash Test Dummy fans. Honestly, the game controls and plays so decently, that I'd be hard-pressed to call it an LJN game, if not for one thing: when you die, sometimes you start near an enemy that can and will attack you. Yes, it wouldn't be LJN without some sort of cheap method that lowers your lifebar. Still, considering the silly source material and the company's track record, I'm surprised that The Incredible Crash Test Dummies doesn't explode more often than it does.

B-

#300 - Impossible Mission II

Contrary to the ridiculous box-art, you are not playing through a Japanese monster movie.

Yes, those are goofy Einstein/Wily/Mad Scientist heads in the background. IS THAT WHAT YOU WANTED???

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to navigate a dim-witted gymnast through eight towers of destruction. For whatever reason, a maniacal man named Doctor Atombender (he bends them – who knew?!) is determined to kill you and you alone. To do this, he employs robots, surveillance cameras, and an overall inflated sense of self-esteem (his towers aren't that dangerous). Each room contains items you can search – paintings, safes, chairs - that will give you other items you use – bombs, mines, lights – to progress further up the towers. There is a general map you will be given, but it won't explain much. This is a non-linear quest, old man, andy ou should treat it as such! Find what you need in each room and get out of there before time runs out. You have "eight hours" of Atombender time - which in real time, equals around one hour or so – to stop Atombender from... blowing you up? Yeah, sure, whatever.

Should you choose not to accept this game, in truth, you won't be missing much. Impossible Mission II is too tedious to be of any merit. Every room is the same thing: search for items, either use said items in that room, or move on to the next room. Watch your time. Repeat endlessly. That's it. If your main character didn't always move like he was in slow-motion, this game would be a breeze. His unwieldiness is the only reason for the game's difficulty, but don't worry, you have unlimited lives. I think dying lowers your time a little bit, so watch out for that. Or don't. I'd go with the latter.

D-

#299 - The Immortal

                                Will Har-vey! YOU... SHALL NOT... PASS!!!!

                                   The Mines of Moria never looked so blue

The Immortal is an old-school dungeon crawler of devious proportions. You play a wizard who must walk cautiously through a series of rooms. The occasional fight transports you to a "battle screen," which gives you the options to fight or dodge your opponents attacks. The latter is a fantastic respite from what is otherwise an unforgiving game. Progression in The Immortalis slow and, ultimately, meaningless unless you have the patience (and underlying masochistic tendencies) of someone who relishes dying repeatedly in video games. The game isn't really hard, per say. It just desires to kill you and ensure that you stay dead. Each room conjures up new ways for the Main Wizard to die, whether it be trap floors (never marked), skulls spitting arrows, or bats you can hardly see because the pixelated rendering is borderline abominable.

To tell you the truth, I'm not sure how to feel about this game. I certainly admire the gleeful enthusiasm that went into making it. Each room's deathtraps were labors of obvious love. Still, call me old-fashioned (or new-fashioned, I suppose) but I like to progressthrough my video games and get to the end without dying a thousand times. Unless you have passwords, which come from beating each level, you start over at the beginning of the level every time you die. This is pretty standard stuff for most games, but most games also reward the player for trying to progress. The Immortal– incredibly ironic title aside – hopes the player will take part in the murderous madness contained within its cavernous walls. I couldn't, but for the right person, it could be worth it.

B-

#298 - Image Fight

The space craft is placed just below the man's crotch, where he can make sure it stays out of trouble.

                                                Will the thrills never cease?!

I was going to start off this review with a "this game's title makes no sense" anecdote, but realized how inane that would be, considering a good portion of the NES' game library have inscrutable title names. But really, Irem? Image Fight? There's nothing in this mediocre shooter that would leave the player to contemplate the meaning of fighting one's own image a la Dark Link in Zelda II. You are but a simple fighting vessel that can acquire typical upgrades – seeking missiles/lasers, v-cannon, shooting pods that attach to your ship – in order to stop the Boondoggle Galaxy (a most hilarious name for such a terrible menace). Shoot... shoot... shoot, con sarn it, shoot! Shooting is all there is to do. I can get down with shooters, but there's something about Image Fight'sconstruction that feels so... half-hearted. Upgrades are plentiful, enemies come slowly (by shmup standards) and are easily destroyed. Assuming you don't die halfway through the level, boss battles are a cinch. There's very little strategy involved in the entire game, besides getting from point A to point B. The backgrounds are boring and the music is your typical space-battle tripe. I'd say there's nothing here to recommend, but the game plays as well any other competent shooter on the NES. If you've exhausted all other NES shmup possibilties, Image Fight is available. Just don't expect to look into one's own soul and pontificate on the darkness within. Hitting 'A' repeatedly is all that's required.

C-

#297 - Ikari III: The Rescue

Punk rockers try to take down a steel mill in the "questionable" part of town. Not on Paul and Vince's watch!

Four guys?! Paul can spin kick them in his sleep. Bring out fifteen guys, then maybe he'll sweat a little.

After acquiring diabetes and cancer from playing Ikari Warriors 1+ II respectively, I wondered if I should even touch the third one. What kind of death-bringing illness would Ikari IIIbestow upon my already weakened vessel? Surprisingly, the third installment of Paul and Vince's Shirtless Adventures is the best entry in the beleaguered franchise. While it doesn't quite hit the highs of Guerilla War or Double Dragon II, it's a solid beat-em-up that "rescues" the reputation of the Ikari Warriors series on the NES.

After two despicable adventures with all guns blazing, Paul and Vince decide that the best way to prove their manhood is to ditch the pea-shooters and bring out the big guns a.k.a. their fists. Yup, Ikari III makes the honorable transition from vertically-scrolling shooter to vertically-scrolling beat-em-up and it's all the better for it*. No longer will you have to worry about constantly missing your target because the D-pad won't fire diagonally. Just beat up the communistas and let Castro sort 'em out. 'A' is punch, 'B' is kick, and pressing both at once will make you jump and kick, so yeah, Ikari III rips off Double Dragon's control scheme, but at least it feels right. Thankfully, the one-life-and-it's-game-over BS is over: SNK gives you a generous three and unlimited continues. I'm not sure how I feel about the latter, but I completed the game with them, so there's that. Were it not for the continues, the game would be quite challenging, as the waves of soldiers certainly like to gang up on you. Once you figure out some of their standing patterns though, they're not so tough.

Consider my crippling diseases cured. Certainly there are better beat-em-ups for your NES, but I can't remember a series that started out so crappy, became even crappier, before improving dramatically for the final installment. Paul and Vince should be proud. Not only is their Florida nightclub flourishing, but they completed their trilogy of adventures by saving the President's daughter and destroying a third-world nation – all without a shirt. You guys have earned the adjective "ikari."

B-

* I should specify: you occasionally use guns, like during certain boss battles, or on Act IV where Paul is underwater shooting scuba divers for whatever reason. The game is about 95% brawler, though.

#296 - Ikari Warriors II: Victory Road

             Sorry Paul, the mere power of your pecs will not repel the creatures.

Shoot, blow things up, die, game over, take out cartridge, ponder it, shake head, walk away.

Paul and Vince, the Ikari Warriors (not to be confused with Paul and Vince, the gay nightclub owners), liked destroying creation so much in the first game, they decided to thunder down Victory Road and take on the entire galaxy or something. Story is not why you jam an Ikari Warriors cartridge into your aging NES console (or sprightly legal knockoff, whatever the case may be). Here's a solid question: why would you jam an Ikari Warriors cartridge into your NES? The original Ikari Warriors was a sorry excuse for an arcade port that nobody liked. Apparently, everyone's distaste for the first game was music to SNK's ears, thus Victory Road's quick release only eleven months after the first Ikari Warriors.

What's changed: Paul (or Vince) must have been hittin' the protein powder pretty hard because his sprite is incredibly large. The alien enemies are larger and faster than previous enemies as well, which means the chances for you to get hit are much greater. Despite your increased girth, your life bar is as puny as it is every was, and you still only have one life. The controls are not your friend either. While the slowdown is thankfully missing here, the controls account for your larger size and so you move slower. Also, the D-pad still feels clumsy, compared to the arcade's original rotary controls. To summarize: because you are large (but slow and weak) and your enemies are large (and strong and fast), you will die often and you will have to start over from the very beginning every time. This will insure that you turn this installment of Ikari Warriors off more quickly than the previous one. Paul and Vince may have aspirations of turning the galaxy's denizens into furious mulch, but in order to do that, they need to figure out how to move and aim accurately. Godspeed, boys.

F

#295 - Ikari Warriors

Tom Selleck and Corey Feldman are Mr and Mrs. Ikari in "National Lampoon's Vietnam Vacation!"

Is that a pink machine gun he's wielding? I'll give him this: he's committed to that color.

SNK, those noble purveyors of fighting games, Metal Slug and the occasional oddball sports affair, brought Ikari Warriorsto the arcade in 1986. It was a huge success, thus paving the way for ports for every system known to man (Ikari Warriors on DOS?). Out of all the systems in the late Eighties, the NES should have been the system that got a close-to-perfect arcade translation. True, 1987 was still early in the NES' lifespan and the developers (in this case, Micronics – SNK only published the port) were still getting used to what the system could do. Nevertheless, this port of Ikari Warriors is big, dumb, and the opposite of fun.

Why does Ikari Warriors work in the arcade but not on the NES? Some would argue that it's the lack of rotary controls. In the arcade, the rotary control system provided solid twelve-way (!) directional shooting. On the NES, you had to contend with the stiff four-way directional D-pad. While I agree that the controls are an issue, for my money, it's the slowdown that makes Ikari Warriors nigh unplayable. Every bit of the game chugs along, as if the NES were being powered by a crank or something. Sometimes this can be used to your advantage if the enemy fire gets too heavy. Mostly, it's just annoying and really takes one out of the supposedly "furious" experience ("ikari" means "fury" in Japanese). Lastly, the bullets resemble white pellets and with all the shenanigans and goings on, it's easy to get killed and not see the bullet that hit you. If you really want to wrassle with this game, look for those white pellets coming from every direction. If nothing else, your eye sight will be much improved after you beat the game.

SNK would later refine this style of gameplay with Guerilla Warand, of course, the Metal Slug series. Both are excellent and come highly recommended. Ikari Warriors, however, fails to achieve even the modest task of performing as a competent Rambo-style shoot-em-up. Perhaps the sequels will make me feel better about donning a pink headband.

D-

#294 - Ice Hockey

                                               Chuck Norris, Hockey Ranger.

Every single one of those bobble-heads in the audience is cruisin' for a bruisin'. You heard it here first!

There's really no reason why hockey players and fans alike should get so riled up over a stupid puck. And yet, blood (and teeth) on the ice are a common occurence during hockey games. Unchecked anger must be a prerequisite for enjoying such a sport as this. Case in point: Ice Hockey. I'm almost a hundred percent certain that this game plays as well as an early hockey game can, and yet the more I played, the more enraged I became. It's true that the computer was much better than me, so perhaps that could account for part of it. Still, this feels different than the typical sports game I play, where I could honestly care less if the other team wins or loses. Any country I played against in Ice Hockeywas better than mine (I think it goes without saying that the Canadians were the greatest), despite the much appreciated tight controls; passing was a cinch, as was blocking. I could say that I'm just not very good at sports games (true) or that I set the speed too fast for the games I played (you can set the speed from 1 to 5 – 3 was too fast for me), but I think that overwhelming rage – which oozes forth from the sport of hockey, like a festering wound – prohibited me from doing well. Some fans and players feed off of the anger that comes from the game. Others, like myself, who are typically mellow individuals, don't know what to do with this sudden influx of overwhelming emotions and panic. For those who can withstand the speed and ferocity coming from the micro men's hockey sticks, you will be well-rewarded. The rest of us will get by with a warm bath, a cup of tea and a lie down.

B-