All images on this portion of the site are courtesy of The Classic Review Archive.
Super NES Abridged
Reviews
All images on this
portion of the site are courtesy of The Classic Review
Archive.
While perusing numerous other "retro
gaming" sites recently, I realized something. Though the majority of such pages
deal primarily with the NES, many of them also detail games for its successor. I
similarly couldn't help noticing that, in certain cases, my views differed from
those already available. The articulation of my own claims quickly followed
suit.
Moreover, while the NES was haven to the finest group of games
ever made, the SNES teaches quite a lesson. Its games exude a certain psychology
-- such that one can quite acutely examinee this critical period in videogaming
history, uncovering both the ways in which it reached its heights and the many
things that did it in (translation: "I want to razz Mortal Kombat,
and I'm trying to justify it with psychobabble.")
However, this is
still, at heart, an NES site. These abridged reviews are simply a chance for me
to ponder the aforementioned "psychology," make my contribution to classic
gaming's group of SNES reviewers, and otherwise get up on a soapbox. Because
this is an NES site, there will never be full versions of these reviews -- hence
the provided "Personal Scores." Moving on...
-Battle Grand Prix-
Maybe it's just the novelty of how eminently Japanese it is (we Yanks
tend to get denied this sort of game -- no way we could understand big eyes,
after all), but no auto racing game has ever captured my imagination as has this
one. The pressure of keeping your car in top condition, along with the immense
risks involved in pitting in, make the experience scores more exciting than any
other game of this kind. Moreover, the races are set at a sane length --
preventing the boredom that so often results from stockcar racing, and letting
the music spread its peppy wings without becoming repetitive.
Personal Score: 8
-Breath of Fire-
Proof that, if
you're going to infuse an RPG with mythological elements, it's best to go whole
hog (as opposed to inexplicably plopping a dragon into a technological setting
-- ahem, BoF III.) The result of those effforts, in Breath of Fire, is a
world in which birdmen, dragons, moles, and other diverse races all interact,
each culture with its own ethos and function. There has never been a game so
sold by its environment -- an environment that, one should note, wouldn't be
quite so perfectly eclectic if the soundtrack didn't expose the regional
diversity as triumphantly BoF's does. I just wish the names of so many of the
items weren't abbreviated beyond recognition (still don't know what a "W. Ant"
is.)
Personal Score: 9
-Breath of Fire II-
Once was about ideal with this sort of idea, but a second
installment wouldn't have been pushing it had the setting been carried off as
well as it was the first time. In this one, no effort is made to give the
"animal" characters any abilities distinct to their kind, nor do any of them
belong to a larger culture or species -- they just happen to exist. Plus,
the game is so poorly translated that most of the enemies sound like lessons in
phonics ("Biruburu", "Habaruku", etc.), and the NPCs all speak like children or
people on acid trips; and who the hell came up with the bright idea of
abbreviating the FINAL ENEMY'S NAME?
Personal Score: 5.5
-Chrono Trigger-
Let me put this
as bluntly as I can: Crono, Marle, and Lucca are three of the dumbest fucking
heroes I have ever encountered. Sure, that could be symbolic of the potential
disorentation of humankind in the face of the vastness of time, but I'm still
not inclined to root for characters I can't stand. Everything that makes this
game enjoyable (with the exception of a few of the songs and scenes) is
compressed into the Kingdom of Zeal; kind of makes it poetically just that said
state gets blown to pieces not long after the player arrives
there.
Personal Score: 6.5
-Drakkhen-
The dismal setting doesn't ruin Drakkhen for me, per sé -- it just
makes me very selective about the moods in which I'm willing to play it. All the
music and artwork contributes to this often choking atmosphere of darkness (is
it my imagination, or are the nights longer than the days?) Mind you, all of
these elements are presented well and allow for a consistent tone; but having
been weaned on console RPGs (I'm almost sure this one was translated from a PC
version), I tend to prefer to games that are less caught up in their
environments -- games with a little more of a sense of humor about themselves
(this is also the reason the Quest for Glory series comprises the only PC RPGs I
like) -- games in which the outcome of a given battle is determined more by my
actions than my statistics.
Personal
Score: 6.5
-E.V.O: Search for
Eden-
So far as originality is
concerned, EVO has everything going for it -- the evolutionary backdrop,
the freedom to make your animal whatever you want it to be, and the damn cool
talking jellyfish all reinforce this reality. The problem is that, around the
fourth chapter, the game gets drunk on its own merits, and takes creative
liberties it would have been better off not taking (the bird castle, the entire
fifth chapter, and the utterly bizarre ending ensue.) The graphics and sountrack
are appropriately comical, but all the low-level creatures are way too slow and,
as I suggested, the overall enjoyability never truly recovers from the fact that
only two-fifths of the game are worth playing.
Personal Score: 6
-Earthbound-
For sake of my
already limited objectivity, I'll try to ignore the fact that this game is
chiefly responsible for my creative renaissance of this past Summer, but my
appreciation of the allegory for its own sake cannot be considered separate from
the gaming experience. Sure, the visuals are less than the technology of the day
allowed, but the music doesn't suffer for it; and in a genre dominated by
alternating futurism and medievalism (not to mention some utterly messed-up
hybrids of the two), this game's present-day setting is one of the most original
things ever to come down the pike. Quite possibly the most inspired (to say
nothing of the most whimsical) Role-Playing Game ever made.
Personal Score: 9
-Family Feud-
I should probably
take a hint from my past disappointments and stop buying game show conversions.
This is an accurate rendition of its real-life counterpart, but its pickiness
about synonyms and unforgiving computer opponents sap all possible enjoyment. If
you play it, be sure you have a human against whom to compete. The knowledge
that the computer will respond with either a correct answer or "I don't know"
keep one from getting at all wrapped up in things.
Personal Score: 5
-Final
Fantasy II-
I'll admit it. I believe
this is the best game in the series, and thinking so I can't help but feel
obligated to defend it against all those, for lack of a better label, pricks at
RPGamer who have reduced its merits and demerits to a single three-word
invective (I'm talking, or course, about "You spoony bard!", which suited the
dottering Tellah back in '91, still does, and always will.) Not only does FF2
mark the coming out of Uematsu as a composer and Sakaguchi as a producer, it
does what so many of its successors refused to do -- lets the characters go off
in pursuit of their own concerns, rather than having them cling to the player's
immediate presence while their identities get sucked into a superimposed cliché.
To my mind, this is about as close as Square ever got to doing everything right.
The only falter is that the plot and the sense of personal urgency obviously
churning within each of the characters do not always manifest themselves well in
the dialogue (and NO, "You spoony bard!" is NOT an example of
this.)
Personal Score: 9.5
-Final Fantasy III-
(So, having defended the ugly stepsisters, I've got to
justify my stance by pointing out Cinderella's flaws.) Even though the "World of
Balance" is probably the best written, designed, and accompanied gaming
environment ever, I cannot justify giving a near-perfect rating to a game whose
entire latter half is comprised of aimless, undirected searching, prevailingly
sappy interchanges, and may have begotten the current mindset that values inane,
unnecessary secrets above the primary gaming experience (tell me, did you
have a "resurrect General Leo" theory?) By the story's end, the initially
diverse and autonomous characters all seem to have become the same person, even
though the thematic direction of the game suggests that just the opposite was
supposed to happen. Much as I love the early stages (which is, trust me, A LOT),
I will seldom see a campaign as far as the Floating Continent.
Personal Score: 9
-Final Fantasy Mystic Quest-
I
don’t quite gather where Square was going with all the puzzles, and I admit that
the game is a little on the babying, generic side, but I'm still not willing to
give up on it. While the music doesn't create an atmosphere of its own, it
perfectly supplements the one that's there. Plus, the overriding way in which
FFMQ is presented gives it a sense of lightness -- as though, for a moment, the
Role-Playing genre stepped back from its inexorable forward progress and just
stared at itself in the mirror.
Personal
Score: 8 (that’s right, 8 -- you wanna make something of it?)
-Gradius III-
Ordinarily, I defend shooter slowdown as a sort of
unheralded slow motion that quells the stress of what would otherwise be a
nerve-rackingly frenetic experience. But when I can’t possess the maximum number
of Options (four, in this case), shoot, and have something to shoot at without
the game reducing itself to snail pace, I suspect it’s been taken a little too
far. Gradius III still upholds the audiovisual standard of its
predecessors -- most notably the brilliant soundtrack -- and I rather enjoy
being able to vary my power-up configuration. However, a few overhead stages in
the spirit of Life Force would've made for pleasant variations, and
Konami desperately needs to come up with some new enemies (ENOUGH WITH THE
BOUNCING THINGS AND WALKING GUN TURRETS, ALREADY!)
Personal Score: 7
-Hal’s
Hole-in-One Golf-
I almost never think
about this game in my daily life, but whenever I survey my SNES games, it's
among the first I consider playing. On the whole, the logistics are easy to pick
up (and put down and pick up again), and the in-play song is as early-SNES as
anything I can think to name. The only problem is that the slope of the course
isn't handled sanely -- there are three types of surfaces: extreme uphill,
extreme downhill, and flat. That polarity can make putting an ordeal, unless
your ball is perpendicular to the slope of the green.
Personal Score: 6.5
-Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League
Baseball-
Okay, now how many of you
have ever heard Fear Factory during a seventh-inning stretch? That's what
I thought. I'm not a psycho-traditionalist or anything -- in point of fact, I've
only been to one baseball game in my life -- but still, between its obnoxious,
ill-suited music, big-name label, and big-shouldered players with ridiculous
names, this game opened the door for everything that is wrong with video gaming
today. And it's not as though Junior didn't suggest enough attitude on his own
-- did he have to endorse this game to ampplify it?
Personal Score: 2
-Lagoon-
If you can deal with
the amount of time you'll spend unknowingly checking paths you've already
checked and the fact that Nasir's sword is, for all practical purposes, a white
inchworm, you might enjoy this game. After all, some of the songs can hold their
own with the finest in all of gaming, and the visuals are detailed (albeit
repetitive.) This should be an especial favorite of those who like old-school
adventure gaming -- it's chock full of hobbits, dwarves, gnomes, elves, and
jewelry with magical properties.
Personal Score: 6.5
-The
Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past-
After the mythical traditionalism of Lagoon, this game's
Nintendoish oddities and brightly-hued world are refreshing. Plus, it is here
that the character interaction previous games in the series failed to create is
brought to its true -- and, by now, necessary -- potential. Link finally has a
tangible motive to do what he does. The game can, however, be obnoxious with all
of its cause-and-effect puzzles (knocking the book off the shelf, the door that
closes every time you face it, etc.)
Personal Score: 7.5
-Lufia & the Fortress of Doom-
The older I get, the less my personal history with this game amends how
inarticulate and otherwise like "socially active" teenagers the heroes are. They
aren't as bad as those with whom you begin Chrono Trigger, but their
constant bickering could have been more entertaining had their outlooks been a
little less (my, this is cynical of me) vapid (one day I will play an RPG
whose protagonists strike me as being able to tie their own shoes -- something,
albeit, that I couldn't do till I was nine.) Where was I?... Anyway, the game
itself isn't all that bad -- in the systematic sense, everything is done well,
and you can sympathize with the characters if you try hard enough. The
best facet of things, I'd say, is the degree to which each town is given its own
identity. That's a trade-off, though, with the fact that most of the plot
consists of chasing after things that aren't where they're supposed to
be.
Personal Score: 7
-Lufia II: Rise of the
Sinistrals-
Natsume can hide it behind
however many random-sound town names and inane problems they like, but anyone
who plays this game is going catch on to the fact that, even more than its
predecessor, it consists of only one repeating task. Everything other than the
audiovisuals has declined from the first, reducing the game's novelty to some
"Capsule Monsters" that aren't worth rearing anyway (the ironic humor of feeding
knives to Mr. Bubble notwithstanding.) A few brownie points for setting the
sequel in a time before the original, but to this day I have no idea how Selan
falls in love with Maxim.
Personal
Score: 6
-Madden NFL
‘94-
Will someone please explain to me
the logic behind anually releasing marginal updates of the same game? I don't
care if rosters do change; none of the Madden games have any personality
whatsoever. ... Well, at least here we have a glimpse of the series before it
got wrapped up in cameras and motion capping and all that
flapdoodle.
Personal Score: 4
-MechWarrior-
So far as Battletech (and, admittedly, everything else) is
concerned, I consider myself a purist -- we're talking "Inception" and "Revenge"
here, people. So of course my feelings about this game are as mixed as a
three-egg omelette with little pieces of my brain sprinkled throughout to mimic
ham -- more than anything, it seems like a bridge between the 16-color PC
trendsetters and the much less original MechWarrior II. On one hand, the
plot still has all the intrigue that made me love its harbingers, but the 'mechs
all look top-heavy and the atmosphere is so overcast that it truly does seem
like here that the series starts replacing desperation with
darkness.
Personal Score: 6
-Mega Man Soccer-
Having edited my stance, I condemn this game less for its
blatantly commercial pretext than for the fact that it is the foul ball of the
series. With X and Zero reinventing Megaland as a weird-ass technocracy with
smoky purple skies around the time "Soccer" hit the shelves, the gaming
environment fails to be faithful to either established image of the Blue Bomber
precisely because it tries to be faithful to both. The result is a game with a
terminal identity crisis that saves itself only with some funky "Power
Shots."
Personal Score: 4.5
-Monopoly-
I love Monopoly, but hate sorting the money -- which is why I view this
game as a gift from the skies. From the authentic interface to the little cinema
clips (which, it bears mentioning, may have laid the foundation for the CD-ROM
version), this game takes the dusty corner of my imagination that's devoted to
money and plays it so many hoppin' Rags that it gets up and dances with all my
other mixed metaphors. I do not, however, see what is so unprogrammable about
"No, I don't want to buy this property right now" -- nor do I feel inclined to
give the computer as much time to make decisions as Jeeves and his pals are wont
to take.
Personal Score: 6.5
The
accelerant...
-Mortal
Kombat-
I could point out that it was
the success of Terminator II (which had at least a little something to
it, unlike my current topic) that sowed the notion that the public would respond
to this kinda stuff, but why do that when I can pin the whole malarial mess on
Ed Boon and John Tobias? I've won about every match I've fought by using the
spear over and over; the music is nothing more than foreboding sounds; and the
tone is in all ways excessive. Non-thematic blood, breasts, and general
artlessness all got the green light here -- I'm amazed I haven't yet turned into
a pillar of salt for looking back.
(Author's Notes: A) This is the
only game I have ever sold. B) Having never played it, I can't be sure of this;
but I would hope that the "revelation" in Tomb Raider: The Last
Revelation is something to the tune of "those aren't real." That
would be good game design -- and wouldn't it be nice if it came to light that
this malaise has all been an elaborate joke at our expense?)
Personal Score: The number past negative
infinity
-Mystical
Ninja-
I've played this game all the
way through, and it has led me to a revelation just short in depth of the one
conveyed to me by EarthBound. (Shuffles some papers until he finds the
one he wants.) My fellow Americans, our country sucks. Not only do we spit in
the faces of all our great artists and eschew sailor shanties for fear of
getting syphilis or something, WE HAVE NO SENSE OF HUMOR ABOUT OUR CULTURE*.
This game, folks, is not only a fun-house self-portrait of Japan, but a satire
and microcosm of video gaming itself (never mind how I know that.) A cavalcade
of immensely fun settings and mini-game hysteria, Mystical Ninja is
arguably the coolest video game ever made. If we are to be as great as it is, we
must begin to rebuild ourselves in its image -- I myself have started braiding
my nose hair.
* 98% of surveyed sociologists attribute this to the fact
that, on the national scale, we tend not to have any culture until its
progenitors die.
Personal Score:
8
-NCAA
Basketball-
I waited my entire early
gaming existence for someone to wise up to the fact that people like college
sports too, and this is what I got for it -- a lame excuse to cash in on
the marketability of the Final Four and experiment with the mode-7 animation
that would eventually eat gaming whole (or rather, share it with hemophilia and
the infinite mystery of the nipple.) This game leaves out quite a few of the
more recognized conferences, and, for chrissake, it doesn't even have sixty-four
teams! Combine that with the pixelly graphics and the excessively long games
(which look like they take place in some sort of void), and you'll end up with
a... not particularly encouraging sign for the future of college athletics in
gaming. The only part that really grips me is the short history of basketball at
the end.
Personal Score: 3.5
-NCAA Football-
Forty teams chosen on the basis of reputation and where the
dart hit the map, no conferences, no season option, (I just got the strangest
sensation that this review was writing me -- not that it has anything to do with
anything), no bowls, no goals, and no kaiser rolls. Sounds like college football
to me. Sure, every technical aspect of the game is average and no better, and it
plays like a clumsy Tecmo Super Bowl, but who among us has not laughed
seeing Dick Van Dyke trip over the ottoman? That's the beauty of NCAA
Football -- you can play a few placid exhibition games at low stakes, and
watch with pinwheel delight as your linemen fall flat on their faces. Hee
hee.
Personal Score: 6.5
-PilotWings-
Aside from the blow that will be dealt to your self-respect
by actually having to learn something from a person named "Big Al", this game is
an exercise in euphoria. Maybe it's just man's love of flight talking, or maybe
it's all the subliminal messages in the situationally perfect music (Ed.
Note: Must.. buy.. rocket.. belt..) Either way, this game will feed your
adventurous spirit while you sit and wonder both why the pixels are so huge when
your plane lands and why the U.S. Government believes hang gliding lessons are
sufficient training for a search-and-rescue operation.
Personal Score: 7.5
-Robotrek-
Six
words: Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, crap. It isn't, you see, just that this
game is crap; it's that it is crap crap crap crap crap crap (and I've never come
close to saying that about an RPG before.) The music is all hackneyed; the
characters are totally flat; and the translation reduces what might otherwise
have been a decent plot to such vignettes as "This is an Invention Machine.
Inventors use it to invent things." The programmable attacks do a little to help
this, but I deeply resent having, after every move, to sit and get whomped while
I wait for my robot's energy to refill. I expected Short Circuit II; I
got a blithering game with a clunky battle system, only reasonably cute robots
(which, in fairness, scan be maintenaned), and an utter cliché for a backdrop
(not in the endearing way of Mystic Quest either.) So in closing, a kiss on the
hand may be quite continental, but Robotrek is crap, crap, crap (not the
original lyrics.)
Personal Score:
3
-Secret of
Mana-
This game was the Froot Loop of
my eye (being a child of the '80s, I've never seen any of those "apples") for
about three months, and then I realized that I had spent about two of those
months doubling back and summarily getting myself killed because the ghosts of
my cohorts got stuck behind a tree (wokking throo iz harrd, aftur oll). As in
Breath of Fire, Som's plot is held up less by what happens than by where
the heroes go; but in this case the problem isn't as defensible (mainly because
the music is nothing but calypso and orchestra hits, the composer's mastery of
those concepts aside.) Don't get the idea that I hate this game; that's not it
at all. I just don't have the patience necessary to enjoy the general idea
(especially the distinctive, if inconsequential, decomposition of the Mana
Beast) without being plucked by all the things that get in the
way.
Personal Score: 6.5
-SimCity-
Tra la la to the branded Nintendo peace tunes. Buildings keep on
appearing up from the dirt where I plant my radiant square seeds. Planes,
trains, but no automobiles (build a square of road and my citizens bitch
ass-first about traffic.) Disasters kept at bay by the push-button force field.
A million dollars for a useless code. I AM THE DEMON KING OF
FREDVILLE!
Personal Score:
8.5
-Space
Megaforce-
Okay, maybe bigger is better
one time in a thousand. The levels are all either innovative or so embellished
that they pass for it and.......... (In sudden desperation he tears open a file
drawer marked "intellectual bullshit", realizing that it's empty because he's
turned over a new leaf and resolved to be completely and entirely truth-plotted.
This revelation makes him either cry or destroy things -- he can't figure out
which.) Oh the hell with it! I LIKE BLOWING THINGS UP (if it doesn't come at the
expense of dignity itself), AND I LIKE THAT THE BOSSES WELCOME ME TO THE
UNDERWORLD. This game is a masterpiece in the way only achievable by liars and
other damned geniuses; and I have to go play it now.
Personal Score: 8.5
-StarFox-
More
explosive psychedelia and experimental geometry -- and this time I get to be an
animal. I'm the luckiest boy in the whole wide William walrus Washington world.
This is the last true game Nintendo ever made; and though "truth" isn't a
measurable value, it is the stuff that molds the measurable values or something
very much like that I'm sure. Fox McCloud says I shouldn't say "truth" anymore
because redundancy is bad because redundancy is bad because redundancy is bad
because redundancy is bad. The military forces prudence on foxes, but a
gallanter fellow never did I know and backwards talk to fun is it. Oh yeah, this
game has music and graphics and a plot and some play control
too.
Personal Score: 8
-Street Fighter II-
A lesson in multiculturalism, I think. I did not know that
Indian Elephans stand completely still when burly Soviet warriors maul yogis
(ELEPHANTS ARE COMMUNISTS!!!!!), nor did I realize that the US Army routinely
issues miniskirts. That's not what the game is about, though. No, friends, this
game is about karate and the quest for world peace -- all orchestrated through
six well-converted buttons and a bunch of rather global tunes. So what if Bison
always defeats me when I set the difficulty above three -- you think
overthrowing a hostile dictator who can control fire is easy? If only George
Bush had been a hidden character -- then I could have utilized his Ultra
No-Broccoli Kyaku Punch-Kick-Whine Combo and guaranteed global harmony for the
children the children we've gotta help the children.
I'm supposed to have
an opinion or something, aren't I? Well then... SF2's animated sparring ages
much faster than wine and Vitamin A is better for colds than Vitamin C.
(Disclaimer: I stole the latter opinion from William S. Burroughs, being
unable to grow a daisy in the Sahara.)
Personal Score: 5.5
-Super Baseball Simulator 1.000-
I'm marching, a dejected one-man band, outside Culture Brain's corporate
headquarters, and I'm brandishing a sign that reads "BRING BACK THE BIG HEADS!"
This confuses people, since the game I'm protesting -- Super Baseball
Simulator 1.000 -- was made several years ago, but my message is still
there. You see, gentle stranger, they took my cartoon and they made it real;
they betrayed the trust I placed in them, and now I can't trust anyone. My
marriage broke up because of this game; my life has been ruined and spat
upon by all these fat cats and iguanas and other such indefensible creatures.
When you take the dreamy quality out of entertainment, you take the dream with
it. That live-action How the Grinch Stole Christmas is gonna suck
too.
Personal Score: 4.5
-Super Mario Kart-
Mario and cart racing -- dull. Mario, cart racing, and a
bunch of glitzy "weapons" with eyes -- still commercial, but not dull. Imagery
fails me at the moment, so I'll put it more succinctly. Graphics: Average.
Music: Average. Control: Average: Challenge: Good. Plot: Present, ma'am.
Cool-Stuff Factor: A bazillion big number thingies that
mioahgoihifusagfoaghuiodag. Mario wear no shoe shine.
Personal Score: 7.5
-Super Mario RPG-
Do my eyes fail me, or is Nintendo capable of mocking itself?
High-jumping, Bowzer's obstinacy, and all the ludicrous mushrooms add complement
to therapy, but throwing them all into a (presumably) serious situation was a
brilliant bit of spotlight operation (verily, Kevin Arnold couldn't have done it
better.) As a result, we have the romance of Mario at its finest, and a lot of
other such book-reviewer mish-mosh.
Personal Score: 8.5
-Super Mario World-
Hmmm... The
first game to come out for the SNES, and it has Mario in it. Couldn't guess why
this game was made, could we? You see, according to some poll taken by
whoever, at some point in the last ten years more children recognized Mario than
recognized Mickey Mouse; so of COURSE, it was necessary for Mario, as a
popular-guy rite of passage, to become a complete sellout. Yoshi might have done
a little more to distract me from this reality, but after the introduction of
Rush, the "give him a pet" ideology got a little predictable -- much in the same
way that this game's soundtrack consists of one melody presented in about four
different ways.
Personal Score:
5
-Super Play Action
Football-
I have a runner's build. I
haven't run anywhere since I got my driver's license, but I have the look, and
that's enough to qualify me as a critic of this game. See, if I were making a
beeline for the endzone, and I suddenly found myself getting painfully tired, I
would NOT slow down and hobble forward in a way that looks like I'm still
running. I would run full-force until I died like all good athlete-knights in
search of the Vince Lombardi Holy Grail. But I'm willing to pardon these Tuesday
efforts, for lo and there were a great many come to see the gate drawn open; and
when he threw back his hand and asked "Art thou my video game?" the doors fell
aback and lo he saw that there were COLLEGE TEAMS IN THIS GAME. And lo some of
them are renamed but lo that's okay because lo the play mechanics are spot on
once you get used to them and lo this is a friggin' long sentence I write no
other kind.
Personal Score: 7
-Super Punch-Out!!-
I left Culture Brain for a more lucrative bitching locale.
Now I picket Nintendo's staff courtyard, where programmers fly kites and get so
excited about Mario's divine winking face in the sky ("The Sun" to you
laypeople) that they slam into the side of the building and need stitches that
their health plans won't cover. I am here because injustice is here. Where
Culture Brain took the cartoon away, Nintendo took the cartoon too far. What in
the name of Mario (perhaps I should leave this place before I get further
indoctrinated) do getting hit by someone's hair and having rubber balls thrown
at me have to do with boxing? Common decency was so outraged that it tried to
take its own life. I eventually managed to talk it down, but then I realized
what an inadvertent dent I had made in the asshole's movement to which I am so
devoted.
Personal Score: 4.5
-Super Soccer-
OH WOW, IT'S 3-D -- just like the popping corn in The
Muppets Take Manhattan. Unlike the popping corn, however, this game is not
fun -- not fun in a box or with a fox or eating lox or any of those -ox things.
You see, this strain of 3-D is known as "Fixed 3-D" -- true 3-D's even uglier
brother. What this means is that the camera holds one perspective -- that it
follows the action, but never swirls around it. And what that means is
that, for half of the game, you can't see your goalkeeper until the opposition
gets close enough -- which is usually too late to stop anything. And what
that means is that Mr. Goalie is a good peek-a-boo player half of the
time. And what that means is want the yummy Spaghetti O's? Here comes the
airplane -- vrrrrrrrrrrmmmmmmm
Personal
Score: 3.5
-Super
Tennis-
I'm a tennis fan for two weeks
out of every year, so I know I speak with some expertise when I say that THIS
GAME IS A MUST HAVE. FOUR DIFFERENT SHOTS, SPOT-ON MECHANICS, AND REALISTIC
SOUNDS, PEOPLE! Why are you still sitting here reading this? RUN OUT AND BUY
SUPER TENNIS TODAY! THEN COME HOME AND JOIN THE NINTENDO FUN CLUB! THEN
SHOVEL THE SNOW OUT OF MY DRIVEWAY!
Personal Score: 7.5
-Tecmo Super NBA Basketball-
Even though basketball on a court the size of a Triscuit box really did
sound promising to me, I can't help but be a little disappointed by the fact
that I get whistled for a foul every time my players sneeze. Remember all the
great reinterpretations of the game that were employed in Tecmo Super
Bowl? I do too, so I think I'll talk about them now: Football with an
"arcade" twist and a pinch of lime to boot.
Personal Score: 5
-Vegas
Stakes-
This game, in essence, combines
all the fun of losing money with the nearly equal fun of not losing it -- and of
losing and not losing it in THEME CASINOS. THEMES ARE GOOD!!!!!!!!! Food is
good. Themes are food? VS also incorporates the joy of talking to people......
wait, I don't like talking to people. Uh......... See, this game is good in sort
of a not good way that isn't as good as it would be if it were really good. Got
it?
Personal Score: 7.5
-Waialae Country Club-
My man's legs are stuck together, but I guess that doesn't
make much of a difference. Like Hawaii? This is your game. Like golf? This is
your game. Like golf in Hawaii? This is your game. Like really slow golf in
Hawaii? This is definitely the game for you. (Please note that "really slow" is
not meant as a pejorative label, since it takes me about 45 minutes to read five
pages.) Like gray, hard plastic boxes with pictures of men in sand traps on
them? This is your game too.
Personal
Score: 6
-Wanderers from Ys
III-
I'm covinced this game has been
cut from its original length, but shortness is not a bad thing because if I said
it was I'd be a bigot and bigots are bad people who pollute the water and throw
nuclear warheads at each other. Adol's short (damn, I slipped again), but he's a
worthy hero who, unlike so many throughout gaming, has an actual presence and is
more concerned with following his own individual path than with "knowing what
love is." (Everyone knows love is vulcanized, inedible candy anyway.) Whether
running through quarries flailing his sword around or freeing imprisoned people
from dungeons, he is the living paradox of altruistic isolationism. His game's
pretty good too.
Personal Score:
9
-Winter Olympic
Games-
oa;irhjtoaiehgiuoLUGEhwuia34980452u9BOBSLED8ath9uhjiSKATINGgopaigfa=SKIINGa-8w3ira[0SUPER
Gi]a08r309wua90tu[MOGULSa]a]09u09u90BIATHALONua89e8a[gah9gya9837y489123542[q53\[\]{|\\
\90e5890w359090*EWRU&09U98f???09fU()e8fu90E_*7()Ef09eUWOPIEOIPUOPieijiofdJSFIO(âäàåçêëèïîìÄÅÉæÆôöòûùÿÖÜ¢£¥PƒáíóúñѪº¿_¬½¼¡»___¦¦¦¦++¦¦++++893-05ikpoÇaikopgTOOjiopbmdkl;agklja;jewopa/9a8we57HARD948aujiojmgoir()&T(*REWJ*(UJ(%JOI%TJ#W(*:VSP(*u98sYU()dyh(*gyhosIDJ(G*sD)g89fdHOIS&^5fd67stf87sDTf87sy&*Y#&U$(*@ioTu89U8935u(*TU5983e(THGU(*YS&*^EYyiufhjSIOJGOI*&(#YJOIG:RSJoifMS?Mjl/gdsj:gJOIERU*&$89&UIfdshIUHR*(%*(u5U50938u093euPOJFIOjidjIOJf9803e98UJOIFJOIDJOISYp98eyOIjoifBLECH
Personal Score: 3
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