Tag Archives: Nintendo Power

Quality Control, Reviews, Video games

Quality Control Review – Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Fall of the Foot Clan

Get TMNT: Fall of The Foot Clan from eBay.

Get TMNT: Fall of The Foot Clan from eBay.

Well, it was my intent this week to put up another video review, this time of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Fall of the Foot Clan. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to record the video I needed for the review. But, fear not, I still have my audio – so it will instead be something more podcast-y. You can download the audio here.

You can find the usual eBay link in the picture. Also, please feel free to lead any feedback in the comments, or any recommendations for future games you’d like me to review.

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #16

Magazine Nintendo Power - Maniac Mansion V3 #2 (of 6) (_9) - Page 1Our Nintendo Power recaps continue with a standard issue of the magazine – Issue #16, for September of 1990. Our cover story is the port of Lucasarts adventure game Maniac Mansion… and I have to admit that I don’t like the cover art for this issue.

Letters: Well, we’ve gotten lots of letters from grandmothers who play NES games, now we’ve got a letter from a mom who plays NES games, though her main game of choice is Tetris. Look, Nintendo, while people have different tastes, and I will admit not everyone will like a Gears of War, adults and senior citizens will play “hardcore” games if you give them a chance, and the game is good. If they don’t like it, that’s okay too, but there will be a percentage of older gamers – moms, dads, seniors, who will play those games, and enjoy them, if they don’t suck. Hopefully, Wii Motion Plus will lead to some innovations in this game space, and lead to these games not sucking. In particular, if we do get a Wii release of Call of Duty 4 (hopefully with Wii Motion Plus support), hopefully it wil be that cross-over game.

Final Fantasy Strategy Guide (Pt. 3): You know, considering their next strategy guide issue is going to be Final Fantasy I, I hope they leave something for the special Final Fantasy Strategy Guide next issue. Anyway, we get some brief notes on the Mirage Tower and the Sky Castle. The guide itself is only 2 issues long. The rest of the “guide” is hyping their “Final Fantasy Treasure Quest” contest, which gets you and 4 friends a vacation. Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #15 (Guide #2)

Magazine Nintendo Power Guides - Ninja Gaiden II - Dark Sword of Chaos V1 #2 (of 6) (1990_8) - Page 1Next up is our second Nintendo Power Strategy Guide, for Ninja Gaiden II: The Dark Sword of Chaos. Unfortunately… Nintendo Power’s apparent weakness when it comes to cover art is the Ninja Gaiden games, because this one doesn’t look so hot. The photographed guy-in-black-pajamas is back, and the background doesn’t have any perspective to it at all. Look, guys, most of your cover art is great – but there’s some stuff where the photographed cover art doesn’t work that well – and this is one of those cases. Here I’d reccomend, basically, skipping doing the photographed cover art, and let one of your interior artists get a shot at the limelight.

We start off the issue proper with a semi-recap collage thing covering the last game. We also get a two page comic strip which, probably, recaps some of the content from the first cutsecene in a comic strip form… and at the very least they have the same letterer as Howard & Nester. Next up is a quick little dramatis personae, though the full sized art they have of Ryu is waaayyyy too western looking – it’s the chin, and something in general about the face structure. Everyone else looks okay though. We also get a list of the many generic monsters we’ll run into in the game, and the slightly less common power ups that will aid us along our way – including the new power of the Ninja Double/Shadow Clone, which is one of the most useful new powers in the game. Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #14

Magazine Nintendo Power - Chip & Dale's Rescue Rangers V3 #1 (of 6) (1990_7) - Page 1Well, we continue on with the Nintendo Power recaps/reviews with the first proper issue (one that isn’t a strategy guide) of Nintendo Power’s 3rd year. Our cover story is Chip & Dale’s Rescue Rangers from Capcom, which is another of the Disney licenced platformers that I haven’t played. The art is a bit of step down for Nintendo Power, but that isn’t saying much – it’s like saying “that movie wasn’t so great – for a Hitchcock movie”. It’s still better than the Ninja Gaiden cover. Anyway, the issue is, as is par for the course for Nintendo Power, about 105 pages long.

Letters: We start off with a thank you for how wonderful the Nintendo World Championships worked out. Alas, but with the exception of the World Series of Gaming (and similar tournaments) we’ll never see their like again. We also get the invention of an automatic cord winder for the NES invented by a 9-year-old-kid for the Invent America project. Oh, and once again, we get a testimonial about how borderline bulletproof the NES was – a family in the US Virgin Islands got clobbered by Hurricane Hugo, and their house was wrecked. However, the TV still worked (once they got a generator set up) – and so did the NES! God the NES was a tough system. Except with regard to the pins – and that bit was entirely Nintendo of America’s fault, by going with the VCR style design rather than the top loading design of the Famicom. Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #13 (Strategy Guide #1)

Magazine Nintendo Power Guides - Super Mario Bros 3 V1 #1 (of 6) - Page 2This week, as the next issue of Nintendo Power I’m covering is a strategy guide, I’m going to do a review of the guide and then a review for that game. Now, I’m not going to necessarily do full playthroughs of all these games, particularly since some of these are RPGs (and thus entail grinding), or are just really long. I’ll do what I can, though. Usually these games are classics as well, so the reviews will more be my impressions about the game and general remberances. Due to length issues, I probably won’t have YouTube videos for these reviews, as I suspect my coverage will be longer than YouTube’s 10 minute time limit. We’ll see.

Well, the guide itself is shorter than we normally consider strategy guides to be – only 85 pages long. However, considering the length of the game and the size of the levels, this isn’t too unreasonable. The guide starts off with techniques first, before moving on to the level maps. We get information on Mario’s various moves & power-ups. The guide poo-poos the over-world items of the Anchor (which makes the Koopa’s airship stand still) & Music Box (which makes the Hammer Brothers stand still) though, which I disagree with. I’d spent a few occasions desperately chasing down the Koopa airship after having beaten all the levels, unable to catch the bloody thing. Similarly, I’ve had a few occasions where I really didn’t want to fight the Hammer Brothers, and found the Music Box very useful at avoiding them (or getting them to hold still so I could catch them if I wanted to take them on.) Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #12

Magazine Nintendo Power - Super C V2 #6 (of 6) (1990_5) - Page 1Well, we have now come to the end of Nintendo Power’s second year, with significant changes to come in the magazines’s second year (with it basically becoming a monthly magazine – sort of). This issue (#12 for May-June of 1990) is, as it’s almost always been, of average length for a magazine about 100 pages long, and our cover story is Super C. Once again, we also get some of Nintendo Power’s great cover art. I just want to stress this again – Nintendo Power, when it brings it’s A-Game (as it’s doing right now) puts out better cover art than any contemporanious video game magazine.

Letters: We get a question about why a game costs $40-50 when it only takes 10% of that to manufacture the game (basically, it’s because of all the work that goes into the programming of the game, and the game testing needed to make sure the game works). We also get questions about getting the magazine in a French language edition for Quebec (the person writing the letter reads, speaks and writes french fluently, but his English isn’t nearly as good). Well, considering the small size of the market in Quebec, it’s not economical for Nintendo Power to produce a French edition for just that market and they a similar thing for Spanish. Something tells me that might change in the modern US. While the US isn’t actually a bi-lingual nation, there are enough people who learned Spanish before they learned any other languages to make it feasable. Continue reading →

Standard
Quality Control, Video games

Quality Control – Wrath of the Black Manta (NES)

Get Wrath of the Black Manta from eBay

Get Wrath of the Black Manta from eBay

Well, for my latest Quality Control column, my original intent was to do another video review with commentary. Unfortunately, I ran into the problem. When I did my review playthrough, and started recording, the game started freezing every time I was recording. This is important because I was playing the game differently this time than in my original play through (for example, I was trying to get the note on the first section of the level). Anyway, I don’t think this is a problem with the Rom, or with the software I’m using to record. I think it’s a problem with the game. A really big problem.

So, suffice it to say, you really shouldn’t play this game. Now, for the sake of completeness, and not wanting all my prior play-through and my audio recording I did to go to waste, I’m going to just put up the MP3 of my recording instead on Megaupload and call it good. Keep in mind I started recording the audio before I started doing the video recording of my play-through, but I still stand by my remarks.

Megaupload Link.

So, let me know what you think. If you prefer the audio format to the YouTube video, let me know in the comments. Similarly, if you’d be interested in me turning this into an out-and-out podcast, let me know as well (and maybe buy some stuff so I can afford to get the hosting a podcast would require – and a mike that doesn’t suck.)

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #11

Magazine Nintendo Power - Super Mario Bros 3 V2 #5 (of 6) (1990_3) - Page 2So, our Nintendo Power recaps continue and, since yesterday’s recap of EGM was filling a gap in the issues I’ve reviewed, I’d say I’m catching up. The fact that Nintendo Power is, at this point in it’s life, bi-monthly helps make it easier for it to catch up. This issue of Nintendo Power, for example (#11), is the second-to-last issue of it’s second year, and brings us into 1990. I’m still 2-3 years behind everyone else, but if it stays as bi-monthly for a few more years of the magazine’s life, I’ll be able to catch up more quickly. Anyway, this issue is about 102 pages long, and features Super Mario Bros 3 on the cover. No, the game isn’t going to be my Quality Control pick. It’s Super Mario Bros 3, of course it’s going to be good. Nor will Silent Service be my pick – I played the crap out of it when I was a kid and I loved it. So, maybe something else will be my pick.

(Opens the magazine) I just had to open my big mouth. Nintendo Power is now, essentially, going monthly. They magazine proper is now going monthly, but now they’re doing special strategy guide issues in the down months. Being that the magazine already is heavy on the strategy guides, which thus basically serve as marketing by showing how cool the games are… things just got busy. Unless I can’t find copies of the strategy guide issues, then it’s business as usual. (Looks online) Yep, I can find the strategy guides. Well then, I’ll be recapping those. Depending on how the strategy guides work out, I may have to adjust my criteria for the Quality Control columns then. We’ll see. Continue reading →

Standard
Quality Control, Reviews, Video games

Quality Control – Batman (NES)

Get Batman for the NES from eBay

Get Batman for the NES from eBay

Alright, I’m doing something slightly different this time. I’m not going to be doing the review as full text. Instead, I’ll be doing this primarily as a youtube video with narration – particularly since this time I fixed the problems with the game audio intruding on my voice over. If this works better, let me know either on the comments here, or on YouTube. Hopefully, if I get a job soon or find if the site starts to make some money, I’ll be able to get a real mike and work on improving the sound quality of my voice over.

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #10

Magazine Nintendo Power - Batman V2 #4 (of 6) (1990_1) - Page 2We’re on to issue #10 of Nintendo Power, for January of 1990. It’s a new year, a new decade, but not a new volume, though we’ve got a new hand-held system coming out. Our cover story for this issue is for the Batman game, featuring The Dark Knight small and in the background, and Jack Nichelson’s Clown Prince Of Crime large and in the foreground. Well, much like in The Dark Knight, it’s the Joker who steals the show. This issue’s a little longer than the last one, about 100 pages long.

Letters: We’re starting off with letters about the changes to Mario’s nose – and accusations of plastic surgery? *headdesk*

Batman Strategy Guide: Excuse me for a minute while I break out my Danny Elfman playlist (a track by Mystic Knights of The Oingo Boingo starts playing) No, the other Danny Elfman playlist! (Elfman’s main title for Batman starts playing). Much better! Anyway, we get maps of some if the first few stages (1 through 3), as well as notes on the last two episodes (4 and 5). Not much else here. They don’t even have any notes on what the power-ups do. Admittedly, often times these notes will be included in the manual, but it’s still useful to have that information in the magazine article, as the magazine is physically larger than the manual, making it a little more difficult to lose the magazine. Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #9

The cover of Nintendo Power #9

The cover of Nintendo Power #9

Alrighty then. Our Nintendo Power recaps take us to November & December of 1989 and issue #9 – the halfway point of Nintendo Power’s 2nd year. Their cover story is one heckuva title, and one which I’ve already talked about previously, at least the history of it – Tetris. Again, Nintendo Power is, at this point in its life (and I think in general), rather small, only about 100 pages long.

Letters: Of note this issue is a letter from a 75-year old retiree, with a poem about playing Legend of Zelda. We also get letters about the NES not recognizing that a cartridge is in it, or not reading the cartridge properly – thus the power light is flickering on and on. Fortunately, Nintendo makes cleaning kits to help you clean out the dust. Well… that’s part of it. There’s one other little thing… because the NES basically decided to design the system so it looks like a VCR (or a Betamax player), instead of using the top loading model of the Famicom, the system has problems with pins getting bent on it. This is something Nintendo doesn’t go into in this letter, and I don’t think it’s anything they ever acknowledge in the pages of Nintendo Power, except maybe when they launch the later top loading NES later. Continue reading →

Standard
Quality Control, Video games

Quality Control – Duck Tales (NES)

Get Duck Tales for the NES from eBay

Get Duck Tales for the NES from eBay

Alright, so after trying our hand at a Falcom action-platformer/RPG, that was part of the insanely long Dragon Slayer series, our next Quality Control column (as I mentioned yesterday), takes us to a more traditional platformer – Duck Tales, from Capcom, part of a long series of Disney themed platformers from Capcom, this one based on the TV animated series, which featured Scrooge McDuck going on various Indiana Jones-ish adventures, plus having to contend with more conventional enemies like the Beagle Boys (who want to steal his money).

The Premise:

It is the first part of the show’s description that the game is based on.  As Scrooge McDuck, you travel around the world, to the Amazon Rainforest, “The African Mines” (presumably meant to be King Solomon’s Mines – just shortened to fit the NES’ character limit), Transylvania, the Moon, among other places, retrieving various legendary treasures, among other stuff, while going up against such classic Duck Tales foes as the Beagle Boys, Magica DeSpell, and Flintheart Glomgold. Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #8

Magazine Nintendo Power - Duck Tales V2 #2 (of 6) (1989_9) - Page 1Our Nintendo Power recaps continue with issue #8, for September of 1989. Our cover story is Duck Tales. I must admit that I haven’t played any of the Disney platformers, and I’ve heard very good things about this one, so which gives this high marks early on for my Quality Control game. Now, we could get other games this issue which interest me even more. We don’t have a lot to cover this issue, as it’s only about 100 pages long. So, let’s move on, shall we?

Letters: We start out with a letter from a family who ran over their NES with their ’84 Cadillac, but was able to open it up, and the system still worked. Unfortunately, that doesn’t settle those problems with the pins getting bent, a problem that the top-loding systems didn’t have.

Duck Tales Strategy Guide: Well, after a very small letters column, we move on to our strategy guide for Duck Tales, and get maps for the Amazon Jungle, Transylvania, the African Mines (presumably meant to be King Solomon’s mines with the Serial Numbers filed off). We also get strategies for beating the Inca king (the boss of the Amazon level), the King of the Terra-Fermies (from the Himayalas stage – which we don’t get a map for), and Magica De Spell (from the Transylvania stage). Continue reading →

Standard
Uncategorized, Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read: Nintendo Power #7

The Cover of Nintendo Power #7

The Cover of Nintendo Power #7

Well, Nintendo Power has begun its second year, and it’s starting off rather nicely, with a Mega Man II cover story, with some rather nice sculpture work on the cover. The magazine is still bi-monthly though, and it’s also significantly shorter than the past few issues, with it only being 100 pages long-ish.

Mailbag: Of note this issue is a leter about hard working gamer who put built his own arcade cabinet using at TV, a NES, two NES Advantage sticks, and, of course, his own arcade cabinet framework. He even painted the sides. Very nice. They’ve also moved their Power Players spotlight to the front, but as it’s basically people hyping how awesome a gamer they are, I’m skippingthis. I really don’t need to cover people showing of their E-Wangs (which is the same reason, basically, why I don’t cover high score lists as well). Continue reading →

Standard
Quality Control, Video games

Quality Control – Cobra Trangle

Cobra Triangle Box ArtSo, my Quality Control for this issue is Cobra Triangle from Rare. This is, basically, a speedboat racing/shooting game. There’s no story to the game. Basically, you go through a series of about 25 stages, cycling through a 8 different stage types: Reach the end of the stage with boats trying to stop you, reach the end of the stage with obstacles (like whirlpools and log jams) trying to stop you, reach the end of the stage while jumping over whirlpools, (and for variation) collect as many power-ups as possible within the time limit, keep as many people as possible from being taken by enemy boats within the time limit, hit as many targets as possible while making your way to the end of the stage, take a number of mines to goal within the time limit, and defeat a boss within the time limit.

Being that 5 of these level types require you to either kill things, or have you fending off attack while completing the goal, the game is kind enough to give you some power-ups, using a Gradius-style power-up bar, with options for a speed boost, missiles (which actually work a little more like a split attack) and temporary invulnerability, among others. Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power Issue #6

Nintendo Power #6 Cover

Nintendo Power #6 Cover

Moving on to our next issue of Nintendo Power, issue number 6, for May and June of 1989, bringing the magazine’s first year to a close. Our cover story is a 10 page feature on the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle game. Being that this issue is 119 pages long, that’s not insignificant. We’re also getting additional coverage of Bayou Billy, more coverage of Ninja Gaiden, and the results of the Nester Awards voting.

Letters: Not as much of interest this time, though we do get a compliment for the excellent service from the Nintendo Game Councelors. Continue reading →

Standard
Quality Control

Quality Control – Hudson’s Adventure Island

Hudson's Adventure Island Box ArtHudson’s Adventure Island (originally released in Japan as Master Takahashi’s Adventure Island) is an interesting game. Having never played any of the Wonder Boy games (the game series that Adventure Island is a clone of), I came into this positively cold, not knowing what to expect. I have to say that it’s not the best game I’ve ever played, nor the easiest, but it is interesting. I managed to actually record some video of a play-through this time around – I’ll get it up on my vodPod sidebar once GameTrailers is finished processing it.

The Premise:

You play as Master Higgins (in the Japanese version, it’s Takahashi), a guy whose girlfriend has been kidnapped by an evil chieftain while on vacation on a tropical island, and you have to go to rescue her. Continue reading →

Standard
Uncategorized, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #5

Why couldn't the cover have been like this?

Cover for Nintendo Power #5

Cover for Nintendo Power #5

 

So, we move on to Nintendo Power’s 5th issue, for March and April of 1989, with the cover game being Ninja Gaiden. I must admit the cover image isn’t as good as the images of the past 4 issues. It’s a guy in stereotypical Ninja black pajamas holding – I’ve got no freaking clue what he’s holding. If anyone who worked on this issue of Nintendo Power is reading this and you know what he’s holding, please let me know in the comments. This issue weighs in at about 106 pages, with a new section related to game previews in addition to the “reviews” (aka Strategy Guides) we’ve gotten previously.

 

Mail Bag: Well, as we reach the end of Nintendo Power’s first volume, we’re coming to one of our first notable changes in the magazine, one that I would say brings it more in line with most other video game magazines – they’ve moved the letters column to the front of the magazine. It doesn’t seem like a lot, but it does a have a psychological impact – putting the focus early on to reader feedback, and their responses to the feedback. There are a lot of letters here from parents, and from senior citizens as well. Again, let it not be said that Nintendo consoles have, in the past, been unable to appeal to the moms and grandmothers demographic through hardcore games. We also get an letter from an honest-to-god educator (Steve Gibbs, an English teacher) praising Nintendo, particularly Legend of Zelda and Zelda 2) for promoting critical thinking skills. Continue reading →

Standard
Quality Control

Quality Control – Skate Or Die (NES)

 

Cover of Skate Or Die

Cover of Skate Or Die

In the annals of skateboarding games, the first game most gamers, even those who grew up in the 16-bit generation of gaming, think of when they think of skateboarding games is Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater. However, when you get to the 8-bit generation, the signature skateboarding game of the time, and the first game to be exclusively focused on  skateboarding (technically the first focused “extreme sports” game) is Skate Or Die! for the NES.  Coming out in 1989, while it is not the first game to depict skateboarding (an honor held by California Games), to a certain degree this is one of the first major sports games that were based off a real-world sport but not one that was either an Olympic sport or team sport. Continue reading →

Standard
Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #4

Nintendo Power #4 Cover   

Nintendo Power #4 Cover

This week we move on to the fourth issue of Nintendo Power for January & February of 1989. Our cover story this issue is their coverage of Zelda II: The Adventure of Link. According to the cover there’s also an feature about 3 upcoming football games, and the Captain Nintendo fanfic (I’m not going to dignify it as “serialized fiction” continues. This issue clocks in at, about, 110 pages, same as last issue.

Wrestlemania Strategy Guide: We’re starting off the issue with a strategy guide for WWF Wrestlemania, featuring basically most of the really major wrestlers from 1989’s Wrestlemania event (Wrestlemania V), and by really major I mean Bam Bam Bigelow, Andre the Giant, Honky Tonk Man, Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Ted DiBiase. Okay, not most of the really major wrestlers, but a lot of characters for a game on an 8-bit system. They have different power-ups for different characters, like Ted DiBiase’s money, Hogan’s crucifix (which is referred to as an “Golden X” because we can’t offend people with Christian imagery), and so on. Each characters also have their own different move lists, all of which have their own differences, that generally fit with the real-life wrestlers styles (Andre not having any top rope moves for example), through there are some odd elements like Hulk Hogan being able to do drop kicks but not having any leg-drops, Bam Bam Bigelow not having any front grapple moves, and so forth. Also, there aren’t any signature moves in this game, and no way to win by submission or knock out (which there was a precedent for at this time in the WWF – Ted DiBiase’s Million Dollar Dream). Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #3

Cover for Nintendo Power #3

Cover for Nintendo Power #3

We move on to Nintendo Power’s third issue, and it’s first holiday issue, for November and December of 1998. Our cover story for this issue is Track & Field II, and the page count has come back up to about 110 pages. As always, the magazine moves straight to the features and strategies from the page after the table of contents.

Track & Field II Strategy Guide: Well, right off the bat, the game’s got a bunch more events than the original Track & Field. For example, we’ve got fencing, archery, swimming, pole vaulting, high-dive, shooting, horizontal bar, canoing, and taekwondo. The controls of the game look fairly simple, for example, in fencing one button controls attacking, one controls defending, and then the D-Pad handles movement and combining one direction with a button performs a certain attack or defense. It isn’t exactly Street Fighter, but it’s got a bit of complexity to it. Anyway, we get strategies (and the controls) for each event. Continue reading →

Standard
Video games, Where I Read

Where I Read – Nintendo Power #2

The cover for Nintendo Power - Issue #2

The cover for Nintendo Power - Issue #2

Now, onwards with our Nintendo Power recaps with Issue #2, covering Castlevania II, which was the first Castlevania game I ever played. This issue is about 105 pages long, which is actually a drop in the page count from last issue, which is different for most gaming magazines. Normally the second issue is longer than the first issue (but not always).

Bionic Commando Strategy Guide: So, we have a strategy guide for the original version of Bionic Commando, which has been since been remade for the X-Box 360 and PS3 as Bionic Commando: Rearmed which you can get through X-Box Live Arcade, and through the Playstation Network. I’ve already purchased that game, and it’s decent (though it’s hard). It’s one of the first action platformers I recall that was non-linear in it’s path to the conclusion (Capcom would later borrow the map system from Bionic Commando for their second G.I. Joe video game), and it didn’t let you jump – but instead it gave you an alternative in the form of your grappling arm, as opposed to, say, Robocop which did precisely jack. In the course of my discussion of this game, I’ll go over any differences I observe from the NES version of the game to the re-make. Continue reading →

Standard