NES Replay: Adventures of Lolo

Developer: HAL Laboratory
Publisher: HAL America
Released: 1989
A Joke About Lolo Jones: I can't be bothered

In NES Replay, we go through each NES game from A-Z to see if they're any good. Today: The Adventures of Lolo.

When we say a game "holds up," what do we mean? It's one of those phrases that everyone uses but we never really think about.

Here's how I view it, and you can correct me if I'm wrong: When something "holds up," it means that you don't have to throw a pile of qualifiers in front of it to people who haven't seen it before and have no context. For example:

"OK, here's Wolfenstein 3-D. Now, before you start playing, remember, this was one of the earliest first-person shooters, and sound cards weren't that great either, and secret areas were par for the course, and they still hadn't figured out how to enable you to look up yet, and the controls are a little wonky. OK, have fun!"

Now, no one denies that Wolfenstein 3-D wasn't fun or influential, but it's been superseded and rendered, basically, obsolete (although "Mein leben!" is still one of the all-time greatest death screams, and I don't care what you say).

So what does this have to do with Adventures of Lolo? Well, some games hold up better than others. The more simple the concept, the better it holds up in the long-term. Adventures of Lolo takes a really simple concept and just goes nuts with it, and it makes it a really, really good game. I don't have to sit here and throw a bunch of historical context, qualifying what time it came out and asking you to overlook its flaws in order for you to enjoy it. If you play it, you'll fall in love right away.

The concept of Lolo is: On each stage, get the little heart containers in order to open a treasure chest, then get to the treasure chest. Each of these stages requires planning and experimentation, along with some trial-and-error, in order to complete them. Some of the levels are downright diabolical and will force your brain to leak out of your ears. In some levels, you'll think you have them figured out entirely and then realize there was one little detail that you neglected, and now you're trapped and have to try again.

Don't think that Lolo is a punishing game, though. The learning curve is impressive, as they encourage you to learn new skills and then apply them in the next level, all without a tutorial. That's some fine work.

The only complaint I have about Lolo is that it still hangs on to its arcade roots by providing a strict "five lives and game over" system, which leads to less experimentation than a game like this should have. Maybe a future entry will resolve this? Stay tuned.

Final Rating:

Next Week: Adventures of Lolo II

NES Replay: Adventures of Gilligan's Island

Developer: Human Entertainment
Publisher: Bandai
Released: 1990
Is It Just Me: Or Does "Human Entertainment"
Sound Kind of Sinister

In NES Replay, we go through each NES game from A-Z to see if they're any good. Today: Adventures Of Gilligan's Island.

When I was a kid, I thought that the TV show Gilligan's Island was hilarious. I think it's already been established that I had bad taste when I was kid, but just in case there was any doubt, that should seal the deal.

Sadly, I wasn't alone in this. Gilligan's Island was really, really popular for a few years and was on syndication forever. Just writing this article has put the stupid theme song in my head, and if I write down the words, "a THREE HOUR tour", it'll be in yours too.

When Gilligan's Island was on the air, intelligent people viewed it like the death of society. After all, if a stupid show where the same thing happens every episode could be so popular, what chance did civilization have? Best for civilization as a whole to just turn off the lights and go home, frankly.

However, just because Gilligan's Island was an awful TV show doesn't mean it couldn't work somewhere else. The story of seven castaways who are trapped on a island could be fodder for a fun, silly game. I mean, really think about the show. There's barely any conflict, lots of silly machines and plotlines, and Gilligan always finds a way to screw things up. Doesn't Gilligan's Island seem like it would make for a great point-and-click adventure game in the vein of a Monkey Island?

Like, let's say that the Professor comes up with an idea to make a coconut radio to broadcast a distress signal. The Skipper and Gilligan need to go get the coconuts and end up falling into a pit and have to come up with a solution to get out that revolves around flinging Gilligan against a wall. Then they get the coconuts and bring them back to the professor, who has to rig up a machine using the coconuts and wires made out of palm fronds.

In other words, make a new Gilligan's Island
game ANYTHING OTHER THAN THIS.
Thx - MGMT

Then, when the signal goes out, they have to build a signal fire. Mary Ann and Ginger head off to do that while Gilligan goes to collect wood. He ends up being kidnapped by birds or something, and the Skipper has to go rescue him.

The fire is built, and they just have to wait for help. Gilligan is told to wait by the fire and keep it lit. If you do nothing, the fire goes out and everyone comes just this close to murdering him. If you put wood on the fire, it creates a raincloud above the mountain that starts a rainstorm and puts out the signal fire while also destroying the radio, and everyone comes just this close to murdering Gilligan again. With a little bit of self-awareness, it would be surprisingly fun to play.

I mean, imagine if a company like Telltale Games got the opportunity to make a Gilligan's Island game. That would be the perfect fit. Their graphical style would mesh almost perfectly with the already-cartoonish show, and their episodic skill would work well with it too.

Oh, I suppose I have to review this game, not some nebulous game that I just made up in my head. Anyway, The Adventures of Gilligan's Island for the NES sucks. The controls suck, the music sucks, the lame attempts at humor suck, and why is the Skipper punching gorillas now? There's a time limit running in the background too, if all of that wasn't enough. Gilligan falls down wells and you have to rescue him all the time. It's just bad and I hate it.

Either way, it doesn't pay to get all nostalgic about something like Gilligan's Island. It was really lame and kind of dumb. Making a game based on it in the NES years was the definition of "cynical cash-in" and I hope the developers are all ashamed of themselves.

Final Rating:

Next Week: The Adventures of Lolo

Review: The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX

Developer: Nintendo
Publisher: Nintendo

Most games in the Legend of Zelda series follow a similar pattern: You're Link, you rescue Zelda, beat Ganon, and somehow the Triforce is involved. It's a pretty basic setup.

And yet, every once in a while, the series goes gloriously off the rails. Link's Awakening is one of those games. It's a weird, weird game, but a great entry in the series.

In Link's Awakening, you're Link, waking up on Koholint Island after a shipwreck. You can't leave the island unless you wake up something called the Wind Fish, and to do so you have to find eight musical instruments. There's no Zelda, no Ganon, no Triforce, a visit from a guy who looks like Mario, another one who looks like Wart, an enemy that looks like Kirby, and even Goombas and Piranha Plants in brief side-scrolling stages.

Obviously, Link's Awakening was a little different than other games in the series, but there was also another big reason: It marked the first time there were so many named NPCs running around Link's world. In Zelda II, there were lots of people running around in the cities, but only a few of them had names. In Link to the Past, there was a small town, but the people there were more window dressing than anything else.

In Link's Awakening, there are two towns, and each one has people with specific personalities. There's a fashion-loving Chain Chomp, a shy old man who only talks on the phone, a girl named Tarin who likes you, a man named Mr. Write who has a penpal on the other side of the island, and all sorts of other characters running around. That imbues the game with a lot more personality, which makes the final denouement that much more powerful.

The only flaw with Link's Awakening is that there are a few pieces of text that repeat themselves constantly. For example, whenever you walk up to a rock without the Power Bracelet equipped, you get a notice that "This rock looks too heavy to lift with your bare hands!" Every time you get a key, you get a notice that "This is a Small Key! You can use it to open a locked door in this dungeon!" The worst offender is the compass, which gives you screen after screen of text every single time you pick it up.

You also will have to switch out weapons frequently, which means you'll have to go to the pause menu, look at your weapons, switch them out, and then go back to the screen. It's not the end of the world, but considering how frequently you'll have to switch out weapons by the end of the game, it is a little annoying.

Link's Awakening is still great, and the Virtual Console version includes an extra dungeon and a person who takes pictures of Link during his adventures. It's a lot of fun and it's inexpensive. There's also a dungeon where you collapse one floor on top of another. That should convince you.

Final Rating: A

NES Replay: The Adventures of Dino Riki

Developer: Hudson Soft
Publisher: Hudson Soft
Released: 1989
Possible Slogan: Bite The Curb

In NES Replay, we go through each NES game from A-Z to see if they're any good. Today: The Adventures of Dino Riki.

I want to make something clear: I'm not automatically against hard games on principle.

Some may get that impression from the way I talk about them, but I'm not. I like a little bit of challenge in a game as long as the game is fair.

For example, I'm playing Torchlight II on a higher difficulty than normal. It's going really poorly, but I can tell what I did wrong. I can clearly see that if I restart the game over, I'll do much better on the next playthrough. It's fair.

I would like to think that most people feel the same way about games. Sure, we like a game to push us around a little, but we don't like it when it pushes us to the ground and kicks our ribs while we weep uncontrollably. Even games known for their tremendous difficulty like Dark Souls or DayZ are fair, to a degree.

When a game goes out of its way to absolutely pummel you into the ground no matter what you do, that's no fun. When a game appears to be a normal, happy fun time game and then proceeds to kick you in the teeth repeatedly, that's double plus unfun.

The Adventures of Dino Riki is one of those kind of games. Oh, it starts innocently enough, looking like a top-down shooter with a cute little caveman. Within mere seconds of starting the very first level, though, you're surrounded by enemies and die.

Look, I'm not even exagerrating. Here's a video if you don't believe me. This video was recorded after TONS of practice, and it's as far as I can get without dying.

Your character moves so slowly that you can't really evade these attacks either. I don't know how they assumed that anyone was supposed to be able to beat one level, let alone the game. It was like the designers put together a flow chart on how they wanted the game to play and all they came up with was:

The really odd part is that The Adventures of Dino Riki seems like a relatively polished game in all other aspects. If it wasn't so incredibly and pointlessly difficult this would be a unique and fun experience. I mean, a caveman shooter? That sounds like a blast! As it is, there's not so much a difficulty curve as there is a difficulty brick wall, and embedded in that wall are rusty plague needles and infected shards of hot glass.

It's way too hard to recommend to anyone, but if you happen to be a gaming masochist, go nuts.

Final Rating:

Next Week: Adventures of Gilligan's Island

Why Is There No Pokemon MMO?

Pokemon is a very popular series, but most people will admit that it definitely needs a refresh of some sort to keep it going on into the future. The most prominent idea floated around is that Nintendo needs to make some sort of Pokemon MMO (massively multiplayer online game).

In fact, most people who follow gaming closely will express bewilderment that Nintendo hasn't already done so. After all, it's an idea that’s just out there, waiting for the picking. People are clamoring for it. It's the next logical step. Why has Nintendo done nothing about it? What's wrong with them? They don't like money, or what?

There's one major reason that Nintendo hasn't made a game like that, and it actually gives us some hope for a future Pokemon MMO.

Anyone who plays MMOs knows that before your game starts, it checks major files with the server and patches the game. This is a constant process on the part of the developer because there are always new exploits and hacks that damage the game and make it unstable for other players. An unpatchable MMO would be anarchy, a lawless wasteland that would leave players disenfranchised and the MMO makers completely vulnerable to attacks.

Maple Story was a popular MMO, and they made a version for the DS. However, it was entirely single-player with very few multiplayer features. How come? There was a huge problem: The DS didn't have the capability of upgrading firmware, much less installing patches into games. That made it a prime target for hackers, who were able to run almost any DS ROM off of a flashcart and very nearly kill third-party support for the DS. Imagine what that sort of environment would have done to a Pokemon MMO.

The Wii had the capability of upgrading the firmware, but not to install patches. That led to major problems. For example, Metroid: Other M had a show-stopping bug that could trap players in one room, and the only way to fix it was to send your save file in an SD card to Nintendo for them to fix it and send it back. GoldenEye for the Wii had persistent multiplayer that quickly got hacked. Imagine what sort of environment that would have been for a Pokemon MMO.

The good news is that the 3DS accepts patches. They've already tested this with Mario Kart 7 by closing off an exploit in one of the races. If I was a conspiracy theorist, I would guess that Nintendo purposely left the exploit in until after launch so they could test out the patching system.

Either way, that’s a good sign. Now that Nintendo has games out there that accept patches and can stay abreast of the crazy things that hackers are going to try to do, there’s a really good chance that they’ll bring a Pokemon MMO to fruition, either on the 3DS or the Wii U. At the very least, we have more hope now than in the past.

NES Replay: The Adventures of Bayou Billy

Developer: Konami
Publisher: Konami
Released: 1989
Raped: You Gon' Get It

In NES Replay, we go through each NES game from A-Z to see if they're any good. Today: The Adventures of Bayou Billy.

Our tastes change quite a bit from childhood to adulthood. When I was a kid, for example, I loved the Ernest movies. I watched and rewatched Ernest Goes to Camp and Ernest Goes to Jail and could practically recite them from memory. I look back and cringe because I can't believe what bad taste I had.

Likewise, the cover of The Adventures of Bayou Billy looked so cool to me when I was a kid. He looked like the ultimate guy you don't want to mess with, and I wanted to play Bayou Billy so badly. Now, I look at the cover and see a creepy-looking guy who's probably a child molester. Funny how we notice different things as we grow up.

So, twenty years later, I finally got to play Bayou Billy. I'd love to tell you that it's a lost classic and you don't know what you're missing, but if I told you that I would be lying through my teeth.

Bayou Billy has three different types of levels: Side-scrolling beat-em-up levels where you can barely hit your opponents and have to punch them practically eighty times before they die, shooting levels where you have a very small amount of bullets and frequently get shot by people you didn't see coming, and a driving level that I never got to because I so disgusted by the first two types of levels.

YOU GON' GET RAPED

First, the beat-em-up levels. You have to line up with your constantly-moving opponents practically to the pixel, then try and throw a punch at them. If you hit them, they'll hit you right back. They don't get stunned for a moment like they should, and they all appear to have just as much health as you do. What should be a Bayou Billy beatdown turns into a grade-school slapfight, with Bayou Billy on the ground puking on the basketball court and crying.

The shooting stages are a little better, but on some of the bosses, the enemies will appear on screen and shoot you immediately. I mean immediately. You don't even have time to shoot them first because they land and immediately start filling you full of holes.

Here's the crazy thing: Most of the time, developers would make the Japanese version of a game harder and the American version easier. Not so here. Apparently, the Japanese version of this game is easier. They cranked up the enemies' hit points just for us in the little old US of A. I don't know why Japan hates us so much.

The Adventures of Bayou Billy is awful. The boxart has a serious case of rapeface, and even the FAQ on GameFAQs admits that Bayou Billy is a piece of garbage. You tell me what I should rate this game.

Final Rating:

Next Week: Adventures of Dino Riki