slateblog

I vividly remember playing the original Ghosts ‘N Goblins in the back corner of some shady restaurant ages ago. The machine had two buttons on either side of the stick, but the right side didn’t work. So there I stood, playing this filthy machine with cigarette ashes on it, with my hands swapped: right hand crossed over my left. It didn’t help that the game was notoriously difficult to begin with. Certainly the button issue only exacerbated that challenge.

As the years went on, I played the sequels and spin-offs. Ghouls ‘N Ghosts, its Super sequel on consoles, Maximo earned me some publishing cred and later, the PSP’s Ultimate Ghosts ‘N Goblins. I never completed that last title: it was far too difficult. That would’ve been over a decade ago.

I find my patience for these types of game has dwindled. I don’t care for Mega Man games like I used to and a return to the franchise seemed truly unlikely. However, something piqued my interest as I sat in my newest temporary quarters, with Vesuvius in the distance. Given my passion for using save states, the series might not seem so daunting. Of course I would be mistaken in that regard, but the real question was: which game should I go back to? After some research, it was decided! the SNES game it would be! Like many other titles on this backlog, I’d played this iteration before but didn’t think I ever beat it. Now having played it again (and twice), I can verify – there’s no way in goddamn hell I beat this game.

To begin, the start is oh-so-familiar. The graveyard, the music, the weapons. Everyone who has played any of these titles will feel right at home and the new double-jump mechanic opens things up quite a bit, especially given the unforgiving jumping controls. Each of the first few stages is broken into two uniquely-different segments. Here we have the standard cemetery followed by a watery section with waves crashing over you. While this is not a truly difficult portion (and I played on standard difficulty), it’s riddled with memorization sections that inevitably lead to death your first run through. Even with my cheating ways of save states, this game demanded a specific set of memorized jumps and perfect setups. Skull platforms roll towards you requiring rigid timing. Enemies appear just as Arthur launches himself. It was perfectly normal for the time, but damn frustrating decades later.

The second stage begins on a haunted ship before asking you to navigate the waters on rafts. Stage three descended into fiery depths while five was the standard icy world. This one came with fantastic rain effects and the best song of the above-average soundtrack. These straddled a fourth level that showed off Nintendo’s Mode 7 effects, spinning the stage around as you went along new paths. It was unique and showy and quite entertaining. However, when the sixth stage began, the stages no longer split and the endgame was present. These two levels culminated in Astaroth and Nebiroth battles which were demanding, but not impossible. The biggest issue was with controlling jumps and the commitment once you did jump. These could ruin your run quickly. However, another concern with the latter boss was time. After taking quite a while to reach the second Astaroth, I barely beat him before time ran out. Sadly, Nebiroth followed and with a scant 20 seconds remaining, the only solution was to restart the stage all over again. It felt a wee bit too bullshitty for me, so I tossed on an infinite time code and beat his ass. I have no shame.

Speaking of bosses, there were several impressive ones. The cockatrice, a 360 centipede dude, a hydra and some frozen monstrosity were all generally fair challenges. The expected animations were there in spades and for the most part, it wasn’t the hardest game ever. Unfortunately, defeating the final boss revealed that you simply couldn’t see the game’s true ending on the first run. A second was required with a specific weapon in order to fight the real final boss. This is par for the course w/ GNG games, but it was something I gladly had forgotten about. Play again? Hrmph…I don’t know if I really want to!

However, I really wanted to see the real ending and it turns out the GBA version featured an arrange mode which changed levels 2-5 and the Princess’ Bracelet could be found during the first run through. Thus, I dove back in for a second full replay. You have a choice between an easy path and a hard one which mimic two of the standard difficulties from the original. A third path altered those four middle levels completely which made the entire game a different experience. These came with new bosses and the fourth level was a revamp of the original GNG level! These were wonderful and made the slightly-downgraded GBA title a remarkable port.

This all made a second playthrough truly worth it and allowed me to fight Sardius (Samael in Japan). An intense challenge, he unlocked the true ending which was worth the wait. A bit of detail about the Princess’ Bracelet is followed by short details about a number of enemies and then a full credits scene, with Arthur and Princess Prin Prin riding off before the sunrise. The full replay really gave me a full feeling for the game and while I’ll never return to play it all again, I fully appreciate the difficulty the game and the series sets. I might consider the PSP game again, but not without save states! Judge me if you will, but that game was friggin’ hard!!!

Konami’s 1991 side-scrolling western has always been fondly remembered in the annals of gaming, though it never received a follow-up. The title’s impressive animation and lighthearted theme made for a game that stood out in a time of ever-increasing machisimo – an trend that never seems to have faded. Despite playing this back in the day and not really fitting the backlog category, it’s a game I have wanted to revisit for some time. Thus, while the packers jam virtually every possession of mine into boxes and I’m required to be in the house while it happens, today was the day to hit up nostalgia alley. There was only one small hiccup; I played the wrong game.

With a laptop and an external drive available, I booted up RetroArch and synched up my trusty 8BitDo SN30 Pro. The thing is awesome. A quick search on mamedb.org told me the file name to search (as I don’t have a full MAME frontend on the laptop) and away I went! The game, while good, seemed to be a bit lacking. It was reasonable but the animation seemed substantially off and it really lacked some of the punch my memory told me it should have. Upon beating it, with no real story or level transitions, I inspected to see that I was in fact playing the Genesis/Mega Drive port and not the arcade original. Well, that explained a lot!

Still, it was a fun game despite its reused assets and lack of diversity. There were fewer stages and animations but the final stage had a bit more than the arcade game as your hero ran through the city streets. Each world was split in two: the first half to save the lady and the second to face a boss. The simple mechanic effectively doubled the level count, though it was far from transparent. On one level, however, rain started falling, a pretty cool effect on the 16-bit system! I took some snapshots and have no real urge to play the SNES game to compare a third time. I went straight into the arcade game after and chose my favorite: Cormano!

Moving on to the far superior and technically impressive, the arcade version came in two flavors: a two-player model and a four-player one. The latter actually assigned a character to a controller and since Cormano was the fourth such choice, I opted for the two-player game where you could choose who you played as. The experience was familiar, both from my prior Genesis run-through and from my near-three-decade-old memories. This game is fantastic. Animations are over the top. Explosions are enormous. Action sequences are thrilling and colors are tremendously vibrant. From the first stage where you step on a rake and hit yourself in the balls to flames engulfing enemies, the entire run-through was just a pleasure.

Music is the clear weak link, sounding much like an arcade might in 1991. But songs aren’t memorable and they feel repetitive and bland. Sound effects are better and the voice samples, which were changed to speech bubbles in the home versions, are pretty cool.

Of particular note is how un-PC it is. Native Americans run at you with every stereotype known to man and the boss, Chief Scalpem (changed to WigWam on home consoles) begins by saying, “Me ready for Pow-Wow.” Women fare no better. While they are present with dynamite throughout, they are often relegated to the usual sex symbols. You can enter saloons and emerge, babe in hand, with a power up of some kind and a kiss on the cheek. Damsels in distress can be found and they even dance for you in one stage. It’s all nonsense and the absurd nature of it all may be enough to offend nowadays. Perhaps this is why Konami never re-issued it on newer consoles.

But as ridiculous as the entire game may be, it’s a tremendous amount of fun. Horseback-riding sections, bonus levels and characters with different animations and weapons keep the action fast and entertaining and worth revisiting. While the other titles in this retro-game backlog may be console experiences or one-and-done efforts, I would gladly come back to Sunset Riders and very well may do so one day. Maybe get a few controllers and play through with the kids. Politically incorrect or not, it was a genuinely-fun game that looks great even now, 28 years later.

Irem’s 1988 title Ninja Spirit is reportedly the first TurboGrafx-16 title to receive a perfect 10 from EGM upon its release in 1988. My memories of this game are fond: the high-leaping ninja, his mirror clones and, of course, that first boss. Returning to this game was a mostly-positive experience marred, once again, by the inordinate difficulty spike common for games of the time.

The game’s familiar intro begins with our hero’s father being killed by an unspecified green glob attack. Moonlight, the protagonist who strangely is a wolf, begins his quest for vengeance. The game’s presentation is highly stylized and entirely over-the-top. Equipped with several possible weapons, my playthroughs often stuck with the standard sword, despite its weakness in several cases. Having up to two mirror images of yourself plus shadowy sword trails make for a memorable introduction. Ninja enemies spawn from everywhere, throwing daggers and filling the screen with impressive sprites. As you get accustomed to the incredibly-floaty physics, the first stage’s boss appears, an utterly-massive, six-armed demon. He is by no means difficult, but virtually anyone who has played this game recalls his striking appearance. I’d imagine this was the biggest boss for any game at the time, 30 years ago.

The relative simplicity of the first stage is forgiving, particularly on the TurboGrafx mode which allows several hits from minor characters before death. The arcade original did not have this and as the game progresses, most non-croney enemies will still result in a one-hit death. Using your clones to block and attack while you remain safe at a distance is a great method, but certain foes take an awful lot of hits. As stages progress, memorization is your ally – these guys get difficult! The vertical stage is reminiscent of Contra and the bosses never get as surprising as stage 1, at least until the end. More on that in a minute.

The music isn’t far from what you’d expect from a 1988 title. It is dark and mysterious, entirely fitting for a shadowy ninja game. The tracks aren’t entirely memorable, but they suit the title perfectly. I suppose, in retrospect, I never quite found a better ninja title in my gaming days. I never got into Ninja Gaiden (outside the original and brutal trilogy in the ’80s) and need to return to Nioh, which was rather good. We’ll see if Sekiro can trump this upon its release next spring. I digress.

Running along the ceilings in later stages and battling baton-wielding toads all gets very rigorous. The screen is littered with enemies and flying attacks making survival without powered-up weapons a chore. Though enemies carrying those perks are numerous, sometimes getting to them is suicide – perhaps a good risk-versus-reward balance.

But then after you’ve survived the last levels of memorization and mania, you’re ready to descend the pit towards the final boss. As difficulty goes in games, this is just stupid. The aforementioned pit is literred with flying ninjas, swords held high. You jump into said chasm blindly and one hit from any of these hundreds of foes will end you. Descending through these guys is quite literally the definition of memorization because after a few lost lives, you’re forced to repeat the entirety of the fifth stage. And by that, you’re just running as fast as you can to avoid ninjas that take multiple hits but who can kill you in one and these deadly puffs of gas that don’t seem to affect aforementioned super-powered ninjas. Yes, memorize this pattern because after the run-away technique and the memorize this one-hit-death pit of stupidity, you reach the boss. This guy’s green snaky attacks are what killed your father – though we never really learn why. My method here was to throw shurikens and run away like my own life depended on it. The unnamed boss doesn’t move, fortunately, but after all these sequences of precision and stress, that’s good. It’s OK if you die to him, you can redo that ‘falling in a pit of flying fucking ninjas’ all over again!

The credits sequence has cool half-screen images of all seven bosses with their chapter names written in elegant Chinese. You’re then presented with some semblance of a story, about you having saved the day, but it doesn’t matter, evil will just return. Inspirational! Now go back and play it on arcade mode!

Final Verdict
I’d play Ninja Spirit again. But I don’t know if I would care to try beating it again. To be fair, the hour-long experience fit right in for the time. Had you purchased a $50 game and beat it in one sitting, you would be disappointed. The 25-hour experiences of today were virtually unheard of back then and this was an arcade port, remember! However, while the setting, ambience and feel are familiar and wonderful, the rigor of the end-game makes it difficult to appreciate nowadays. I’m wholeheartedly glad to have returned if only for the sheer glee of revisiting that first stage. There’s a nice sound test where you can listen to all the music and there are also curious messages unlocked by a code – good for a laugh, I suppose. Much like the prior entries into this retro-gaming list, the first levels of this game are a lot of fun and worth a try. I’m glad I’m embarking on this journey. I’m thinking Gunstar Heroes next.

While my memory of the two Air Zonk games is hazy, I had high hopes for the CD-based sequel. Issued in 1993, it turns out I likely never played this one and that’s a good thing. While there are a few improvements in the Super follow-up, it’s not not quite as good or as fun as the original. Had this been my introduction, I might not look back so fondly on the game series.

On the plus side, the ludicrous difficulty of the first game is not at all matched here. The game’s music, now Red Book, of course sounds a lot better but that does not make it more memorable. I found myself irritated by most of the music in the first four selectable stages. After choosing those four, you’re presented with three more that you must go through sequentially. Those levels had much better music, worth turning the volume up for. Unfortunately, some of the game’s tinnier sound effects, like when your weapons are powered up, cut through everything making you reduce that volume rather quickly. It turns out the Japanese version featured lyrics with certain songs, something I don’t feel I missed out on. Though, I still find the Japanese name for the game/series hilarious (PC Genjin or CD Denjin in this case).

While the audio quality itself is superior, it’s hard to say much else is. Controls and the buddy system have changed a bit, but the most underwhelming thing must be the visuals. Landing a year later than the original Air Zonk, it was fair to expect bigger and better and more of everything good. But the visuals first and foremost disappoint. Those glorious 16-Bit (*cough*) graphics with the multi-layered parallax scrolling feel watered down and the stages just didn’t have the same vibrancy. In fact, Super Air Zonk doesn’t feature that same parallax which is surprising and disappointing. Stages end up looking flat despite the colorful palette. This is certainly attributed to a different developer taking the helm: the typically-consistent Hudson Soft in this case.

As for the gameplay itself, the developers clearly took inspiration from R-Type. The third level has you moving around a pre-set path which sometimes leaves you stuck at certain points or paused waiting for the stage to progress. Other portions of levels are just entirely barren, an inexplicable issue in a game like this. Initial stages also have hidden sections which are rewarding for replays, but most of the design choices felt like a step backwards. Instead of that ‘bigger and better‘ sensation you want, a lot was ‘as good or worse‘. The power-ups changed this time around, they too take inspiration from R-Type, but the result was by no means better. You could separate from your mid-stage buddy, assuming you managed to collect and save him, or have the buddy attach to you. Each had a different firing configuration, much like in Irem’s legendary shooter. However, the diversity of weapons wasn’t as interesting or as useful. A few are entirely overpowered and you better not lose them if you get them. The game is quite tough with standard weapons and these huge screen-filling attacks were perfect for when enemies surrounded you from all sides.

The eased-up difficulty of the final stages was a positive change, though some felt it was too easy. The final boss, for instance, was a
straightforward sequence of repetition, requiring no real skill outside the standard dodge-and-weave of the four forms of Emperor Sandrovich . It was, therefore, asubstantial improvement from the bullshit demands of the first entry. However, the boss rush on stage 6 was right up there with the bullshittiest moments in gaming. The ending baddie summons the bosses from the first levels of the title, one at a time. However, if you can’t beat that boss fast enough, the next arrives, and the next (presumably – you’d likely be dead by then). But don’t rest up yet…after defeating the 1-2-3-4 punch, the boss summons those assholes two more times. It’s nonsense, the bullet sponges just returning dishing out incessant attacks and you have to restart the entire stage if you falter. Oh yes, this was a save-state game and I feel no remorse for playing it as such. Now, perhaps if I shelled out hundreds or thousands of dollars I’d care. But I fortunately did not.

Final Verdict
I was disappointed by Super Air Zonk. Outside of improved audio, which couldn’t always be appreciated, it offered very few benefits that could stand toe-to-toe with its superior predecessor. It was a fun romp for the most part, with the first two stages being entertaining and the last few having memorable tunes. However, those perks felt few and far between and were I to revisit the series, it would most certainly be to play the first game, not the second. Weaker visuals, no parallax scrolling and level design curiosities make this an unmemorable sequel. If curious, try the Japanese game, at least it has piles of poop when you launch a super attack. That and a second-hand copy sells for 1/30th of the price. I’m serious. Look it up.