Selling videogames must be impossible.
I apologize, but I am starting to become high off my own supply. I have been writing videogame reviews (“reviews”) on this website for the last ten years. Give or take a few sabbaticals, this has been a constant process over the last decade. And, as has been noted on this site before, it has well and totally broken my brain. I cannot play a videogame without having thoughts of “what’s the angle here?” or “how would I describe this to my audience?” And, considering that audience has only grown over the years, I feel like I must be doing something right. Which means I have to keep doing it! I can no longer enjoy my favorite hobby without considering how to transform a game into a weekly post. But at least the tradeoff is that I can claim that I have gradually gotten better at that task. Ten years of Gogglebob.com! And the main benefit to Goggle Bob is that I can freely switch between third and first person talk about videogames with more nuance than when I started. I am a videogame writin’ pro.
That said? I have absolutely no idea how to describe DUCK: Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper.
Let’s ease into it with the basics. DUCK: Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper released in 2023 for Steam, and dropped on consoles a few weeks back (for anyone reading this article in the post-apocalyptic future of maybe a month from now, publication year is 2025). The story is typical: a group of five duck friends find a cursed “100 in 1” videogame cartridge, and said cursed cartridge attempts to eat the souls of our featured ducks through a series of videogame challenges. Of course, you, player, are responsible for guiding these be-thumbed ducks through the various challenges that will keep them alive. And… you know what? We are doing pretty well so far. “Protagonists have a problem that can only be solved through completing a series of challenges” is Videogames 101. Mario is rescuing a princess, but running, jumping, and mastering fiery flowers is his path to success. The Light Warriors have to stop a time loop that has unleashed 2,000 years of Chaos, but all you have to do is select the FIGHT command 50,000 times. When you get down to it, “heroes beat curse through doing stuff you control” really is the ur-videogame scenario.
But what the duck doin’? That is where things get complicated. The official ad copy is that there are “100 microgames”. Microgames? I know that word! That is how you describe WarioWare: Mega Microgames! And I freakin’ love WarioWare! My ADD-addled brain adores the idea of hopping around genres every ten seconds, and the instant endorphins of “solving” a microgame before the clock ticks down means that I am enjoying myself the entire time. RPGs, platformers, and even whatever genre we are assigning Mega Man this week (robot ‘em up) tend to include great expanses where practically nothing new happens. You get into the groove. You expect the unexpected, but are continually running up against the same exact scenarios. There is not a single dude picking his nose. WarioWare: Mega Microgames never spends long enough on any one microgame to get boring. And you lose a game? Well, you lose a heart or whatever, but then you move on to the next challenge. Maybe you are good at the latest microgame, or maybe you absolutely crash Wario into a wall. Whatever the outcome, you are moving on immediately, and another ten microgames are coming at you as quickly as you can press that A button.
DUCK: Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper is not that. Yes, there are microgames abound, and the basic setup of WarioWare is here. You complete a series of smaller challenges, and then there is a “boss challenge” at the end that is much more complex in controls, objectives, and length. But there is a vast gulf between the microgames of DUCK and WarioWare. The secret difference that only becomes apparent after your first failure? You are meant to win in DUCK. In WarioWare Mega Microgames, if you do not immediately understand a microgame (or just suck at dodging an oncoming car), you lose a life, and immediately move on. The idea is that you have to “survive” on your limited number of lives, and sally forth to the finale to (hopefully) clear the level. DUCK still has a similar lives/number of challenges setup, but if you fail a challenge, you get a do-over. During Story Mode (which is comparable to WarioWare’s usual initial mode), if you are playing on Normal difficulty and fail a challenge, you are immediately asked if you would like to try again. In “Original” difficulty, there is a cheat code offered (presumably to better simulate battling with a malevolent retro cartridge), and infinitely repeating a challenge is possible so long as you remember how to press those direction buttons. Any way you slice it, if you fail a microgame, the intention is that you will keep trying until you get it right. Health points instantly become less of a “survival” situation, and simply a mark of how many games you are willing to skip. Thus, your HP is transformed: those ducky lives are now currency. What are you willing to pay to skip a game you do not enjoy? And to further draw the parallel, with the exception of the absolute final level, if you maintain enough lives, you can skip the boss of any set of challenges. Don’t like an extended 3-D maze horror boss level? Just walk out! Hit da bricks!
And this radically transforms this WarioWare-alike into something totally different. Now every challenge can take ten seconds or two hours. Alright, two hours may be a bit much, but I can confirm I spent at least ten minutes on one challenge where the speed of a rising balloon had to be carefully calibrated down to the second to avoid angry birds and/or rockets. I eventually won! And why did I bother? Because I was playing blind, and had no idea if the next game was going to be literally impossible. I am a gamer. I play a lot of games. So I know there are genres and styles that I hate, and would not want to play for longer than ten seconds, left alone hours. So, yeah, I know I can complete this balloon challenge, and I am going to keep banging my head against that wall because I will beat it. I will solve this problem.
And, in taking so long to “solve” one problem, it is revealed that DUCK: Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper must be a puzzle game. I was not playing DUCK like a twitchy WarioWare action game, I was playing it like King’s Quest or Ace Attorney. I was using my entire inventory to find the solution to this puzzle, just my inventory was “presses of the A button”. Wait. Aren’t titles where you do that kind of thing designated “adventure” games? Puzzle is, like, Tetris, right? How the hell am I supposed to classify DUCK now!?
So I am back at my central thesis: actually selling a videogame to anybody must be unbearable.
I have completed DUCK: Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper, and I can say that I like it. There are some bad bits (any references to Ice Climbers will not be tolerated), but I would say I enjoyed about 90% of the experience. I would recommend DUCK to others. But it is not truly a WarioWare-style game, because the “rapid fire” nature of that title is neutered by being encouraged to retry challenges. It is not a puzzle game, because anyone expected to “solve” these challenges in a manner similar to less active adventure games would be demolished the first time they needed quick reflexes. But this is not a reflex-based game, because some of the most difficult challenges may be something closer to a “find the hidden object” or “please the girl” (long story). DUCK: Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper is kinda like a whole lot of games, but not enough like any of them to truly claim that it would be the same experience. DUCK is unique! And that’s terrible!
Bah!
Go play DUCK: Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper. Just… go play it. If I compare it to anything, you’re going to get mad at me. If I say it is emulating retro entertainment, you’re going to start yelling. If I claim the final boss somehow becomes both a platformer and Guitar Hero, you are going to have me arrested. Just play the game yourself, enjoy it, and have a quackin’ good time with ducks.
Man, am I glad I don’t have to sell these things…
FGC #712 DUCK: Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper
- System: Every. It was just Steam, and now it is on Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and whatever Playstation is current. We at seven yet?
Number of players: There is a five-player mode. That’s ridiculous and rare! Unfortunately, I purchased this for the same system that houses Mario Kart, so I am never going to see anyone say “Hey, let’s fire up DUCK for a few rounds!”- Did you buy this game entirely because the logo looks like a simulacrum of the Dig Dug font? That is an awful/true accusation.
- Pick your poison: Like WarioWare, there are some minigames with recurring themes and characters. Unlike WarioWare, the ultimate sorting of games is not by play style or stage, but by those recurring themes. So categories include (but are not limited to) Adventures of SOD, Anime Style, Construction Site, and DwarFest. My favorite category is Japan Box, as it is basically a series of emulated NES games.
- Favorite Minigame: You can be a duck blowing up fish, and the gameplay is just Bomberman. Not nearly enough games pay homage to Bomberman.
- So, there is an entire minigame inexplicably based on Ice Climbers? Yes. All the games in the all the world, and Ice Climbers is revisited. After decades, I still blame the Super Smash Bros. Melee development staff.
- The Goggles Do Nothing: Glasses are not goggles!
And goggles should never be identified as something to be insulted! - A sign of the times: There are a number of popular memes referenced in various games. In fact, there are so many that their attendant category is dubbed “memeology”. And if I have learned anything from “burninating” being referenced in Final Fantasy Advance, it is that memes must be preserved in videogames, so that later generations can look at a surly cat and say, “Why is the game acting like this is funny?”
- Speaking of Which: The absolute first mini game I played on DUCK was their version of Flappy Bird. Considering the “bird” had been replaced with a duck, which is still a bird, there was not much to distinguish it from the 2013 original.
- So, did you beat it? The final level of story mode is a WarioWare-esque situation wherein you must complete challenges to preserve HP and eventually reach a boss. Does this invalidate my entire essay? No, it is only 16% of the whole experience, and should be treated as such. That said, the “final boss” is a platforming challenge that does draw on skills seen in previous microgames, and then… Guitar Hero without the music. So, just, ya know, press buttons on the right lines. It is a supremely odd choice for a finale… Though I do not envy the team that has to figure out how to cap a “100 games” experience. How do you pick one essential videogame experience that defines gaming as a whole? And not make it Gitaroo-Man?
- Did you know? One of the categories is Crazy Scientist, where various “mad science” tasks are performed. There are activities like repelling secret agents, blowing up the moon, and building bizarre ray guns. And the scientist is a gray-haired fellow in a lab coat that appears to have an army of pickle-people. I am certain this is not a reference to anything in pop culture.
- Would I play again: Probably sporadically. Endless Mode is a way to get something similar to a WarioWare fix, and I just plain need that sometimes. So, sure, I’ll duck into DUCK from time to time again.
What’s next? Random ROB has chosen… Kirby and the Forgotten Land + Star-Crossed World Nintendo Switch 2 Edition! That’s a mouthful! Please look forward to it!
