Tag Archives: super gameboy

FGC #582 Game & Watch Gallery

Let's watch some gamesThe best way to preserve your past is to literally own your past.

The Nintendo Game & Watch is technology that is fairly unique for this blog: the first Game & Watch was released before I was even born. While I have always considered myself blessed to be a games preservationist that has grown alongside the gaming medium, Game & Watch arguably belongs to Generation X with its initial release in 1980. Premiering with titles that I am doing my best not to describe as “primitive as a Flintstone”, the Game & Watch initially showcased games like Ball, Flagman, Vermin, and Judge. These pocket-sized devices all played one game per unit, and featured not only time-keeping functionality, but upwards of two game modes. Were these titles basic? Yes, of course. But could they be fun? Absolutely! If nothing else, they beat playing with your calculator on a train ride, so further Game & Watch titles were consistently released straight through 1986. At about that point, the Gameboy was preparing to take over the portable market, so new Game & Watch models became limited, and new titles for the “system” began to dribble out at a slower pace. But, for a time, Game & Watch ruled the roost, and Nintendo “the toy company” established itself in this new “videogame market” that may or may not have been recovering from an apocalyptic alien invasion (that is currently buried in New Mexico).

In short, if you are considering the whole of the history of videogames, you have to remember the Game & Watch. The Nintendo Entertainment System may have defined the home console for a generation, but just a few years before that box (and its dastardly robot) graced our shores, we were already playing with power, one Game & Watch at a time. And, while the “limited to one game” thing was saddening, this also encouraged an awful lot of wonderful mutations across the line. This was the first we saw buttons that increased or decreased in number according to a game. This was the first we saw the iconic crosspad. This is the first we saw “dual screen” gameplay, in both horizontal and vertical formats. Game & Watch is the first place we saw Luigi.

Boxes!And that latter point is pretty damn relevant, because when was the last time you heard about Mario’s other jobs with his brother? Nobody questioned when Mario claimed he was a doctor, because we were already used to his construction, bottling, and cement factory jobs…

A Mario Bros. where two brothers prove their plumbing credentials through flipping over turtles and crabs is the Mario Bros. everyone always remembers, but Game & Watch Mario Bros. was released four months before its arcade brother. It was a horizontal dual screen Game & Watch title, and saw Mario and Luigi (again, appearing in a game for the first time) working at some manner of delivery plant (is that a thing?). Both of the brothers (each clearly labeled by their respective joypads as “Mario” and “Luigi”) must work in tandem to pass something (boxes? cakes? bottles?) along and into a waiting delivery truck. There are not any “tricks or traps” to speak of, but the intermediary conveyer belt is a harsh mistress, and likely to break more than a few whatsits if the brothers (or your thumbs) don’t move fast enough. There are no monsters here, though, so this is a wholly mundane adventure focusing on what must be Mario & Luigi’s summer jobs. And speaking of jobs, this particular Game & Watch model eventually earned sponsorships from some businesses like Pokka (a Japanese food company) and Campari (an Italian liqueur producer). So Mario does know what alcohol is!

But if you are getting your historical information from Nintendo, Mario’s wine knowledge has been… let’s say obfuscated.

The new styleGame & Watch Mario Bros. has not been completely forgotten by Nintendo, but it has been diluted in modern incarnations. Mario Bros. appeared in both Game & Watch Gallery 3 for the Nintendo Gameboy, and Game & Watch Gallery 4 for the Gameboy Advance. Unfortunately, there was basically no way for modern (“modern” being “made after 1984”) systems to emulate the hugely horizontal play area of the original Game & Watch, so everything was compressed to fit a squarer playing area. And, obviously, Mario & Luigi now work at a simple package delivery company, so the impressionable players could never have an inkling that the super brothers were ever transporting wine. And the “modern” reimagining? Well, now we’ve got a cake factory in the works (not even a cement factory?), Wario is a delivery driver (that should not be allowed), and Bowser occasionally stops by to muck up the conveyer belts (dude does not have anything better to do today). In both the GBC and GBA versions, it is a much prettier and a more modern, palatable experience… but it isn’t remotely the same. The basic elements of Mario Bros. are there, but everything from the sunny graphics to the aspect ratio feels like an entirely different animal. For the first appearance of the most famous player two in all of gaming, Game & Watch Mario Bros. is preserved about as well as a sandwich bag filled with ranch dressing (honey, I know you hate to throw out food, but we have a perfectly good bottle of the stuff right there on door).

And don’t even get me started on Game & Watch The Legend of Zelda!

Rescue the laundry!But let’s not imagine we live in a world where Game & Watch and its contributions are completely ignored. Why, there’s Mr. Game & Watch right there, starring in one of Nintendo’s most popular franchises. And his “package attack” move echoes exact animations from Game & Watch Mario Bros. Same for his down taunt, which recalls the exasperated sitting of the brothers when completing a level. And we just got a Super Mario Bros. 35th Anniversary Edition Game & Watch! It didn’t actually include Game & Watch Mario Bros., but it definitely included… uh… Ball, apparently! And Super Mario Bros.! Everybody likes Super Mario Bros. better anyway! What’s the problem?

Well, the problem is that whole likability thing with a healthy mix of hardware versus profitability. Would people rather play Super Mario Bros. or Game & Watch Mario Bros.? Well, considering the Game & Watch collection was a modest hit, while Super Mario Bros. is a game that is continually released on every system ever produced by Nintendo (and with a few weird mutations, too), it seems pretty obvious that more people are interested in seeing the brothers when they are a little more super. And that is convenient, because Super Mario Bros. can be perfectly (or at least reasonably) emulated to practically any device with a screen, whereas the wine factory (I am sticking to this for you, Campari) requires two side-by-side screens for a perfect experience. And Nintendo has decided to drop this whole “dual screen” thing as of the retirement of the 3DS and WiiU, so official Nintendo hardware is out of the question. Could some other company, maybe one without as many valid revenue streams as Nintendo, carry this burden? Some “lesser” hardware manufacturer would be happy to reissue a few Mario games. An Evercade for the Game & Watch? I know I would be down for such a boutique item.

Octo!But it ain’t gonna happen. Nintendo holds an iron grip on any and all legal ownership of Mario, Luigi, and the Game & Watch. It would not be as profitable to focus on “perfect” Game & Watch preservation as it would be to steer those resources into other departments, but, by the same token, there is no way Nintendo is going to let someone else profit from technology made by Nintendo nearly 40 years ago. The original creator of Game & Watch died nearly 25 years ago (!), but Nintendo is going to own that hardware lock, stock, and barrel until the day you die. And if you are under the mistaken impression that Nintendo would be cool with some modern modding, go ahead and ask anyone that listed a video on youtube about how to hack the latest Game & Watch release. Oh, wait, you can’t, because Nintendo copyright claimed all of them out of existence. Want to do anything you want with that fifty dollar doodad you got for Christmas? Not on Nintendo’s (game &) watch, buddy!

But this is the future for nearly all intellectual property out there. Nintendo will own Game & Watch for the next hundred years, and there is absolutely no reason they would ever have to loosen their grip on the IP. And, with that in mind, they control how Game & Watch content exists for the rest of time. You want to play the original game? No, no you don’t. You want to play with silly, beepy Mr. Game & Watch, and exchange tales of his “references” with your friends. You don’t want to remember when Nintendo was proudly peddling liquor sponsorships to get a foothold, you want to remember when the Nintendo Entertainment System defined gaming. There was never a “desperate” Mario that had to beg for your attention. There has only ever been a complete, genre-defining Mario.

History is what you make of it. And if you own your history, so much the better. For you.

FGC #582 Game & Watch Gallery

  • ToadholeSystem: Technically ROB chose the Gallery for Gameboy, but I did a lot of focusing on the Gameboy Color enhanced Game & Watch Gallery 3. Also tossed in some Gameboy Advance Game & Watch Gallery 4 action, too. I have a lot of random Game & Watch Galleries scattered about the place.
  • Number of players: You can link cable all of these games, right? If you can’t, I’m still going to claim they are two players, because you can at least do some boxing in Game & Watch Gallery 4. It counts!
  • Can’t you just be happy with the fact that there are four Gameboy games that preserve Game & Watch titles? Well, yes, that is good, but the last Game & Watch Gameboy title was released in 2002, with the more digital versions only seeing release as recently as 2008. While Game & Watch games are technically available in some ways (you can grab the GBA version on WiiU as of 2016), it sure seems the birth of Nintendo gaming is going to stay locked away in a vault.
  • So you’re saying a new Game & Watch line will be released seven seconds after publishing this article? Yes, that seems to be how it works.
  • Favorite Game & Watch game (collection based): Octopus is part of Game & Watch Gallery 1, and I appreciate how that game has always been as “simple” as other G&W games, but contains an awful lot of strategy. Or maybe I just like matching wits with an octopus. Whatever! You want the spiritual ancestor to practically every videogame I have ever enjoyed, though, just check out Octopus.
  • Love that little guyFavorite Game & Watch game (modern revision): Game & Watch Gallery 4 went harder than it had to with its remixed graphics, and I appreciate that Donkey Kong Jr. got one final showcase before he was retired seemingly forever. That little dude always needed a few more starring roles, and Gogglebob.com does not officially recognize Donkey Kong (of Donkey Kong Country) as Junior’s grownup incarnation. And further proof Mario once had a mean streak!
  • Favorite Game & Watch game (that we will never see again): Mickey Mouse had his own Game & Watch game. Like another children’s star, it was a game involving our hero grabbing eggs from chickens. Minnie was responsible for watch/alarm duties. And we will never see it again, because I cannot imagine the legal quagmire that would result from both companies even addressing the issue. This never happened, guys!
  • Goggle Bob Fact: Game & Watch Mario Bros. is one of the first videogames I ever played, as my cousin had that Game & Watch, and I successfully begged my parents to let me try it. I am moderately certain Toddler Goggle Bob did not immediately break the thing… but my memory from that time may be a little hazy.
  • Did you know? The Nintendo DS title Personal Trainer: Cooking, which is little more than a dedicated cookbook that is somehow not Cooking Mama, included Game & Watch Chef as a hidden feature. Chef… is not a game that is going to make you a better cook.
  • Save 'em!Would I play again: I like revisiting the infant stages of the Mario we know today. I would totally be down with all of these titles being ported to the Switch, as they work very well for dealing with random boredom. Other than that, though? Well, sometimes it is nice to know something is being preserved, but maybe I could play something else…

What’s next? Random ROB has chosen… What Did I Do to Deserve This, My Lord? 2 for the Sony PSP! Oh, what I have done to deserve this, my ROB? Nothing? It’s actually a good game? Okay, great. Then please look forward to it!

Where is Little Mac?

FGC #511 Pokémon Gold / Silver / Crystal

In these uncertain times, I’ve been thinking about sequels, storytelling, special people, and, specifically, this old man:

How ya doin', old man

That GIF is a capture from Pokémon Red (or Blue, if you’re nasty), and it features an old man that lives in Vermilion City, a beautiful town by the sea. He’s using his pokémon to help build a home overlooking the nearby port, and, assuming Lt. Surge doesn’t expand his gym to conquer the entire seaside, it should provide a lovely view for the man’s future. He’ll build his house by the ocean, and retire to enjoy his autumn years in a rocking chair overlooking gorgeous waves of magikarp capering across the beach. Maybe he’ll relax on the S.S. Anne when he needs a vacation, but he’ll always have a charming home to come back to.

Except when you return to visit the old man in Pokémon Gold/Silver, a game that takes place three years later, you find this sorry sight.

NOT GREAT, BOB

The poor old man is still out working in the fields because he is literally poor. His dreams are denied, and, apparently as some manner of karmic punishment for his hubris, he is forced to stand out in this empty field with Pokémon 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He is there during the day. He is there in the dead of night. The new clock feature of Pokémon Gold/Silver reveals a man eternally caught between a rock and a hard place, and his machamp is never going to smash that rock.

And his sorry, never-ending fate is all thanks to one man.

Let us skip ahead a bit to Pokémon Ultra Sun/Moon. Like many (all?) Pokémon games, PUS/M contains an area where the game’s developers hang out within the game. Your avatar can wander around these faux Game Freak offices, and speak to NPCs that are based on the real creators of the real game you’re playing right now. Neat! And, since the PUS/M generation of Pokémon games was the first to allow transferring pokémon from Pokémon Gold/Silver, you can potentially have poképals in your Generation 7 team that originated from Generation 2. If you do, one of the Game Freak developers will offer this special bit of dialogue regarding the older game:

“When we were having trouble fitting all the data in for Gold and Silver, and we were really in a pinch, this amazing guy came along and made a program for us that solved all our problems. He went on to become the amazing president of a real big company soon after that, too.”

WINNERThat “amazing guy” was Satoru Iwata, a man responsible for more than a few amazing videogames, and the eventual “amazing president” of a “real big company”, Nintendo. For a more detailed explanation of what happened, according to interviews from around the release of Pokémon Heart Gold/Soul Silver, Iwata was working at HAL at the time, but somehow became a liaison between Nintendo and Game Freak, despite technically working for neither. And, since Iwata was an expert programmer, he used his knowledge from converting the battle system of Pokémon Red/Blue to Pokémon Stadium and his general familiarity with the Gameboy to create a graphic-compression tool that allowed the programmers of Pokémon Gold/Silver to cram more Pokémon content into a Gameboy cart than ever before. Pokémon S/G was initially far too large for a Gameboy title, but now the programmers had so much room to breathe, they could practically fit two Pokémon games on there!

So they did. Want to revisit the world of Pokémon Red/Blue in Pokémon Gold/Silver? You absolutely can!

Back in 1999, Pokémon Gold/Silver had some huge shoes to fill, as Pokémon Red/Blue (maybe even Green) was one of the most successful Gameboy games of all time. It launched a franchise that is still ridiculously profitable popular to this day! And, while there had been a number of auxiliary Pokémon games capitalizing on the original 151 Pokémon, this was the first “new generation” ever for this already beloved series. Whether the concept was Iwata’s demand or simply something Game Freak decided “might be cool” (accounts on this matter differ), Iwata’s graphics compression utility allowed for the inclusion of not only Pokémon from the supremely popular initial Pokemon title, but also roughly 90% of its entire world. It was the perfect move at the perfect time for the series, as it married the new to the notable, and those familiar gym leaders and locales could stand shoulder to shoulder with the future of the franchise. Discovering a whole, well-known world over at the right edge of the map was simultaneously a reward for the player, and a reassuring statement that the Pokémon world wasn’t going to forget its past. It was everything a Pokémon fan could ask for.

SLOWUnfortunately, while this was the best possible outcome for a sequel, it was not all rainbows and rhydons for the population of Kanto. Claiming that Pokémon Gold/Silver contained the entirety of Pokémon Red/Blue’s home region is a bit of a stretch, as much of PR/B had to be truncated and reduced to fit the world and pacing of its sequel. Viridian Forest, the humble pikachu’s ancestral home, was reduced to a scant few rows of trees. Pokémon Tower, a place for deceased Pokémon to enjoy their eternal slumber, was overtaken by capitalism and converted into a gaudy Radio Tower. Cinnabar Island became “the ravaged town of the past” when a volcano erupted and permanently destroyed the entire city. In short, in service of a sequel, it appears major ecological disasters rocked Kanto and its citizenry, eternally marring their home.

And, yes, in this damaged world, a man is without a home, and has been standing alone in a field for three years. And it’s all thanks to one man using his expert programming knowledge to expand one Gameboy game. The Old Man of Vermilion could have lived in the quantum uncertainty of most JRPG NPCs, but, no, a genius had to step in, revolutionize Gameboy programming, and damn this helpless fellow to an eternal existence alone, unloved, and exposed to the elements. No other Pokémon game revisited Kanto at a later date, so Iwata’s expansion on the sequel was this Old Man’s final curtain call.

Even the Pokémon Gold/Silver remakes left him out in the cold.

STILL NOT GREAT, BOB

And this is the cruel nature of sequels. Even though we always want more content from our favorite worlds, they often must abolish happy endings for the sake of revisiting drama. Every new season of a television series must reset its characters to prevent them from remembering previous lessons, and every adventure series has to revive an ancient evil or two to keep the swords swinging. Every videogame that revisits old areas must constrain these previous worlds to smaller digital footprints, and lives have to be ruined to keep the franchise flowing. Do you think Brock wanted to forever be a gym leader in some podunk town? Of course not! But he’s got to return for that cameo, so here he is. Buffy the Vampire Slayer must live, die, and live again, Harry Potter has to revisit a fresh hell every single year, and Pokémon’s own Red has to spend the rest of his days huddled in a cave with his Pikachu. It is the curse of sequels, and we inflict it on our heroes because we can’t live without knowing what happens next.

But there is still hope.

Shake itIn 2017, ShockSlayer released Pokémon Crystal Clear. It is an extensive romhack of Pokémon Crystal, the official Nintendo upgrade to Pokémon Gold/Silver. It features a number of graphical upgrades (all the Pokémon “map sprites” now actually look like their assigned Pokémon), significant quality of life changes (you no longer need to know CUT to travel greater than fifteen yards), and you can select a starter from a variety of Pokémon that range from charmander to porygon to ditto. Most significantly, however, it adds the ability to travel the world of Pokémon Gold/Silver as easily as choosing the FLY command, and offers the opportunity to start your quest in either Johto or Kanto. In other words, it takes the basic gameplay of Pokémon G/S/C, and transforms it into an expansive, open-world adventure where you are no longer inhibited by Team Rocket blockades or an inability to surf. You can fight the signature gyms in nearly any order, and they all scale to your experience level (or at least badge count). It is an amazing way to experience a decades old game, and adds a breath of fresh air to the whole Pokémon experience. It is a damn shame that Nintendo has forced Pokémon Crystal Clear to scamper off to hide in the darker corners of the internet, as this is a “hack” that deserves to be spread across the light of day.

But, more importantly, it makes one more change to the canon of Pokémon.

This is fine

He still doesn’t have a home, but he has hope. Hope! What more can an eternally homeless old man ask for?

A story continuing might make its stars more miserable, but there’s always a chance someone else will pick up the torch and make things better. There might not ever truly be happy endings, but there’s always fresh hope for ongoing happiness.

FGC #511 Pokémon Gold / Silver / Crystal

  • System: Nintendo Gameboy / Gameboy Color, and then available virtually for the Nintendo 3DS. Whatever the system, your save battery has expired by now.
  • Number of players: You’ll never catch ‘em all without trading, so two.
  • Eat crunchSo, which version: Can I just say Crystal Clear now and forever? This is not the first time Gogglebob.com recognizes a fan creation as the definitive version of a game, but the existence of Crystal Clear does provide an actual reason to play an older Pokémon game, as the “free-form” gameplay found here isn’t simply overwritten with the upgrades of the later games. Crystal Clear is a new experience that isn’t going to be moot when we see Let’s Go Eevee’s Silver Soul or whatever.
  • Favorite Gym Leader (this generation): Whitney is just like, “screw it, you have to fight my cow”. And then her cow completely wrecks your %$&#. Kick ass and roll out, Whitney, you deserve it.
  • Favorite Gen 2 Pokémon: Mareep/Ampharos. Ampharos was my original MVP in Pokémon Gold, as surfing across vast seas and thunderpunching tentacools into the stratosphere caused my Amphy’s (named Asimov) levels to similarly skyrocket. Then, quite a few years later, I wound up asking out my now fiancée on Mareep Community Day. So, yeah, that Pokémon definitely gets a spot of honor.
  • The King is Dead: Seemingly exclusively to counter the dominance of Psychic type Pokémon in R/B, this generation introduced the defensive Steel type, and the offensive Dark type. This means that Tyranitar made the scene, and now the legions of psychic legendaries have to worry about a godzilla that is perfectly willing to eat a mountain on its way to stomping a Mewtwo.
  • What time is it: This was the first Pokémon game with an internal clock. I’m simply noting this because it explains why I still think you can only catch Lapras on Fridays.
  • Goggle Bob Fact: In high school, another student and I may or may not have intimidated a freshman into choosing a particular starter so it could be traded and bred to match our lack of said starter. This is what a nerd bully does, apparently.
  • POKEMON!Did you know? Pokémon Crystal was the first mainline Pokémon title with animated Pokémon. We really take it for granted nowadays when a Pikachu can turn its head, but back then, this required the noble loss of approximately 10,000 good pixels. Their sacrifices will not be forgotten.
  • Would I play again: I really enjoyed playing through Pokémon Crystal Clear… but it’s still Gen 2 Pokémon. Going to go ahead and mosey over to some of the more modern releases when I don’t feel like juggling my monsters in Bill’s PC.

What’s next? Random ROB has chosen… Crystal Castles for the Atari 2600! I know it’s an old game, everyone, but please bear with me. Please look forward to it!

FGC #460 Final Fantasy Legend 3

Stay dampHow the hell do you screw up friggin’ time travel!?

Okay, to be clear, we’re not talking about how do you screw up while time traveling. A healthy 80% of all time travel fiction is based entirely on this concept, and, give or take a Time Cop, that’s always a good time. It’s the human condition, right? You go back in time with your intricate future knowledge of how you’re going to make everything better, make a few changes here and there, and Bob’s your uncle, Hitler is president. Whoops! I think we all learned a valuable lesson about not messing with the natural order of things (and I would seriously like to speak to whichever time traveler is responsible for our current political situation).

No, what we’re focusing on today is how you mess up a story that involves time travel. After all, time travel is one of the best tropes in all of storytelling. Want to change the past? Duh! We all do! But changing the past (and hopefully avoiding Hitler) isn’t the only option available with time travel. Want to see the future? Or drop that text book, and experience the past like a tourist? Or how about traveling through time to prevent a “bad future”? Did anyone order a child from an alternate timeline? Hell, let’s go nuts, screw up the timeline, and see an alternate reality where bad is good and good is wearing ill-fitting leather. Time travel opens the door to any number of wonderful tropes and stories! And leather!

FIGHT!And let me tell you a secret about time travel stories: don’t ever try to figure them out. Time travel is always, always going to be a complete mishmash of conflicting ideas and contradictions with the very concept of cause and effect. And that’s fine! It’s time travel! It breaks all the physical rules of the universe, it may as well also cause a broken brain. So don’t bother trying to figure out how there can be more than one Trunks at one time, or how you can’t wrap a gun in beef shank and bring it to the past, or why the hell bringing a teenager on a time travel expedition would ever make sense. It’s all just nonsense from the moment someone goes back to the future, and you’re expected to not think too hard about how Bruce Banner accidentally invented the fountain of youth while trying to quantum leap. You can’t ruin time travel by not properly following the rules for a fictional event. Time travel is the Wild West of storytelling, and you’re perfectly justified in claiming that if two time travelers kiss, they instantly become horny lizards or something. It’s cool! That’s just how time travel works in this universe, and they’re going to have a wonderful little reptilian family. Be happy for the lizards!

And time travel can be amazing in videogames. Videogame narratives by their very nature must be linear. You can have a flashback in Lost, Breaking Bad, or [please insert name of show that premiered in the last decade], but that simply doesn’t work in a videogame. If Mega Man has a “flashback level” to before the adventure started, he’ll lose all his sweet robot master weapons and extra lives. And that just wouldn’t do! It’s even worse in JRPGs, where experience is key, and your character must start at level zero. A flashback in a JRPG would never fly, because your hero has to start as a blank slate, or, at the very least, an inexperienced townie. Seeing some “ten years earlier” with a child that somehow knows Ultima is not even a possibility.

WORM!But time travel? That’s how you meet the past. Swing on back, take your time in a special dungeon or town, and meet all the villains before they became corrupted by malevolent fog. Or use time travel in new and interesting ways, like by changing subtle items in the past to greatly influence the future. Plant some beans. Break some walls. Distract the guy building the wall. Time travel opens all sorts of avenues. And in your better games, time travel offers entire worlds. Here’s the craptastic present, an even more rotten future, and a glorious past that you can restore with a little elbow grease (and giant swords). But at least there are lasers in the future! That should help you save the day. Just remember to take your time and explore every nook and cranny to discover the difference between these disparate time periods!

Final Fantasy Legend 3 seems to present itself as such. Right from the start, you are introduced to our quartet of heroes, three of which hail from a future approximately fifteen years ahead. Our fourth warrior is a woman from the present, where the rest of the gang has been raised and trained after being smuggled back with the aid of a mutant professor and his time machine. Everyone is informed that the world is being flooded by a nebulous evil god/master (pick your translation), and it is now their job to travel between the past, present, and future to find enough pieces of that time machine to lift off and launch a missile right into this damp god’s face. And that’s a great excuse for an adventure! It promises three different time periods (and thus three different worlds) all in the midst of this forever flood. And, bonus, as the game progresses, we’re also granted the ability to dive beneath the waves, so there’s a full trio of underwater “worlds”, too. Let’s see how that coral reef has developed over thirty years!

So it’s kind of a shame when it all turns out to be bullshit.

Painful!Here’s the basic flow of Final Fantasy Legend 3: You start in the Present, and venture through a tower. This grants you the ability to go back in time. Now you can participate in a rescue mission in the Past that guarantees an old lady and a young girl will be alive in the future (present). Back to the Present, and it’s time to waddle around another tower or two. This allows travel to the Future, where some helpful future townsfolk grant the ability to access a floating continent. The floating continent, you’re told, does not have “time”, so it is an area that does not have a past, present, or future. Then it’s off to Heaven (Pureland) and Hell (Underworld), which are under similar time restrictions. These three areas (Floatland, Pureland, and Underworld) contain a healthy 60%-75% of the dungeons in the game, and, as part of the finale, they’re going to be the largest/longest dungeons as well.

Did you see what happened there? This is a story that introduces a time machine from the first moment, and then doesn’t even use the damn thing for at least half the game!

That’s how you screw up a time travel story, dear readers. If you’ve got a time machine, and you’re not using it, you’re doing something wrong. Use all the toys in your toy chest, and never turn your time machine into a glorified airship. Final Fantasy Legend 3 dropped the ball, but you don’t have to.

But if you do mess up, just go back in time and try again. At least it would make a good story.

FGC #460 Final Fantasy Legend 3

  • System: Gameboy. There were actually two different versions, one published by Square in 1993, and another rereleased by Sunsoft in 1998 (because a certain game made Final Fantasy a tweak more popular). Both versions are exactly the same, give or take some terrible cartridge art.
  • Number of players: Four party members, one consistent guest character, but only one player.
  • So mysticMaybe actually talk about the game for a second: Disappointing plot aside, Final Fantasy Legend 3 is easily the most accessible of the Final Fantasy Legend titles. This makes sense, as this is right about when this “version” of SaGa branched off to form Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, and SaGa continued on in a different form on the Playstation 1. Or at least that’s how I remember it. Regardless, this is the rare SaGa/FFL game that doesn’t require a friggen chart to map out character progression, so it’s fun for a girl or a boy.
  • But the equipment system still sucks, right? Oh my yes. I might cheat my way into perfect stats just so I never have to manage the inventory ever again.
  • Favorite… form? You have a lot of options for character customization. No, wait, scratch that. You have a lot of options for whether you would like your party to devour gears and cogs to become robots. Or you can eat a hunk of meat and become a man-bat. You’ve got options. Regardless, the worm is the best choice, as he’s a friendly looking lil’ dude. For a monster.
  • Did you know? There was a DS remake of FFL3, and it never made its way over to Western shores. But some dedicated fans translated SaGa 3 Jiku no Hasha: Shadow or Light, and now you can play the dang thing in English. Hooray for our side! Literally!
  • Would I play again: I want to say there is a JRPG from the 90’s that uses time travel a little more effectively, so I’ll pass on this legendary adventure.

What’s next? Random ROB has chosen… Space Harrier for the 32X! That’s going to be a mammoth of a good time. Please look forward to it!

CHOMP

FGC #413 Bonk’s Revenge

It's Bonk timeI don’t understand Bonk.

Like many issues in our modern world, this appears to be a problem of education. I was a Nintendo kid that eventually picked up a few Sega games (who could say no to that hedgehog?). I consumed Nintendo Power like it was (the secret of) manna from Heaven, and knew nearly everything about every release for a Nintendo console straight through to the 21st Century. Sega was not going to take that kind of thing lying down, though, so the minute there was a hot new Sega Genesis title on the horizon, the advertising machines clicked into high gear, and everyone was inflicted with a deluge of information on blast processing or lock-on technology. And nobody cared! Sure, it was practically mind control aimed squarely at children who could scream at their parents until “Santa” decided to deliver a bevy of plastic cartridges, but it wasn’t all bad. After all, even if you couldn’t afford an $80 copy of the latest Street Fighter, at least you could read all those character profiles, and imagine the nefarious origins of that dude in the purple robes.

And then there was the TurboGrafx-16. I’ve got one of those puppies sitting right here in my gaming room, and I’m still not completely sure it was a real thing.

Going up?Let’s see here… Wikipedia claims that the TurboGrafx-16 was first unleashed upon the West in August of 1989, and was a living, breathing videogame console through 1994. I played videogames during that time! I played some of my most favorite videogames during that epoch! Yet, I can barely recall the TG16 being even the remotest of factors in the “console wars” of the early 90’s. Did the TG16… uh… do anything? Oh, it was the first console to have a CD-reading add-on? Well that seems pretty important. It was produced by Hudson, which is certainly a videogame company I’m familiar with. And its games look… uh… kind of pretty. Like, maybe early Sega Genesis, and a lot better than what was available on the NES. Yes, it appears that the TurboGrafx-16 should have been an integral part of early 90’s gaming, but… seems like a certain system managed to miss the boat.

Which means I missed the Bonk Boat.

Bonk was, for a time, the mascot for the TurboGrafx-16. There was Mario on the Nintendo, Sonic on the Sega, and that doofy caveman with the giant head over in TG16 land. So I was at least aware of Bonk. And, given the caveman aesthetic, I was pretty sure I knew everything I ever needed to know about the lil’ dude. He’s got a big head. He fights dinosaurs. He “bonks” dinosaurs with his big head. Occasionally he eats meat, and he goes from happy to angry to atomic. Sometimes he turns into a crab.

… Wait. What was that last part?

To briefly revisit something that has been established on this very site many times before, videogames are weird, y’all. Sonic is a blue hedgehog, and it’s completely normal that he collects rings for power while fighting an egg-shaped mad scientist. Elsewhere, the real hero’s little brother uses a vacuum to exterminate the undead from his recently inherited mansion. A vampire with a gun employs a magical rock to summon a dragon to shoot lasers at angry, sentient houses. Even our modern, “mature” videogames are full of ridiculous, reality-defying nonsense, like a man who can soak extra bullets because he’s more muscular than the other dudes, or dining room chairs that inexplicably provide more potent cover than lead shields.Chilly out there One way or another, we just accept videogame weirdness for what it is, and move on. The Prince of Persia can run up and down vertical walls with ease, and an armor clad space bounty hunter can scale walls through dutiful triangle jumping. Makes perfect sense!

But Bonk is different. Or… it could be? This game is Bonk’s Revenge, which, according to upwards of 28 seconds of research (I’ve been busy lately, okay!?) is one of (in not the) best Bonk titles. It’s also a sequel, which means we are continuing the canon that was dutifully laid forth in the original Bonk’s Adventure. So there’s probably a basis for all of this. I came in late, no need to complain about not knowing who this Captain America guy is; this was probably all explained sometime in the past. There is doubtless a logical explanation for… I’m sorry, this whole crab thing is still getting to me.

According to only what happens in this game (and not any auxiliary materials, like an instruction manual or the inevitable Bonk Wiki), the story of Bonk’s Revenge features an evil T-Rex king splitting the moon (or just “a moon”?) in half, and apparently using that half of the moon to build some manner of dinosaur Death Star (in typing that, I just realized how badly I want Star Wars to be remade with dinosaur space wizards). Bonk ventures forth to reclaim that chunk of the moon, and, should he succeed, he is kissed by a grateful, apparently benevolent dinosaur that lives on the moon (?). As previously noted, Bonk can obtain meat to powerup to more deadly forms, and he can collect happy faces that will unlock train rides at the end of stages that can provide further bonuses. And, when he finally enters the Dino Star at the end of his adventure, unmarked underwater blocks may squish Bonk into a crab form. He becomes Crab Bonk, which is advantageous for… some reason?

And… I just can’t deal with Crab Bonk.

WeeeeeBonk would eventually show up on the Super Nintendo, presumably because Johnny Turbo stole his gig advertising the TG16. In that title, Super Bonk, Bonk would be able to eat meat to transform into a giant chicken or Godzilla. Strangely enough, science eventually taught us that this is exactly how evolution works, so that powerup transition makes perfect sense. But Crab Bonk? I have no idea what is happening with Crab Bonk, and it bothers me to no end. Is this a frog suit-like water-based powerup? A Wario Land-esque punishment? Some kind of Japanese running gag about dinosaurs turning cavemen into crustaceans? What is even happening in this game!? I could understand the brontosaurus ballerina that finished out the third stage, but Crab Bonk is blowing my mind! Please, TurboGrafx-16 Power, tell me what the hell is happening here!

But I missed the TG16, so I will never understand poor, forgotten Bonk.

Trying to understand Bonk after the fact is like banging your head against a wall.

FGC #413 Bonk’s Revenge

  • System: This is one of my few TurboGrafx-16 games, so it certainly gets a check in that column. It was also released on the Wii Virtual Console, and the Sony and Microsoft download services in Japan. There was also a Gameboy version, but that was a severely compromised port.
  • Number of players: The TG16 only had one controller port. That seems really shortsighted!
  • The Benefits of Bonk: If Bonk has one defining characteristic, it’s that, in a time well before “visual storytelling” was a thing in videogames, Bonk admirably tells his story with a sort of Looney Tunes-esque flare. Dude is a cartoon character in every conceivable way, and, right about the time he chomps onto a fishing line held by an enemy, you know something special is happening.
  • That Looks Like it Hurts: Bonk’s other big ability is climbing walls… through biting his way up vertical shafts. Gogglebob.com would like to note that this is a terrible idea, and, if you are worried about tooth decay, please do not try that at home.
  • Favorite Boss: There’s a dinosaur pirate riding a flying ship that launches torpedoes through the sky. That’s pretty hard to beat. I mean… he is the coolest boss, but, yes, he is also literally kind of hard to beat.
  • Did you know? Bonk’s Revenge for the Gameboy was a Super Gameboy title, and its unique Super Gameboy frame featured the generic mooks of the title sitting and watching the game as if watching a play. I’m going to go ahead and claim that Paper Mario totally stole this gimmick.
  • Would I play again: This is definitely the game I’m playing if I fire up the TurboGrafx-16 again. Then again, I only own four TG16 games, so that’s not saying much…

What’s next? Oh yeah, I promised a theme week, didn’t I? Well, how about we call this… um… Inexplicable 16-Bit Cavemen Week! Yes! That’s right! No Caveman Games! No Far Cry Primal! Just cavemen, and just cavemen from the 16-bit era! That makes perfect sense! So next we’ll be hitting Joe & Mac! They’re cavemen ninja! Please look forward to it!

Gulp