I have no witty starting sentence for this review, so let's just jump straight into this.

Hameln no Violin Hiki, or as it's known in English, The Violinist of Hameln is the twelfth game I'm covering on my obscure games list. Recommended to me by JamesBuc, thanks again for the recommendation.

This game is actually an adaptation of a manga series by the same name, running from 1991 to 2001. It also had an anime adaptation, however from what I have read the anime adaptation removed much of the humor that made up a good chunk of the manga.

Written by Michiaki Watanabe, Hameln no Violin Hiki is a Dark Fantasy with comedic elements, often featuring characters going from dark and moody to pathetically comical within seconds.

Both the manga and the game were published by Enix, the same Enix of Dragon Quest fame that would later join fellow developer Square and become Square Enix.

As an aside, fuck Square Enix. This has nothing to do with the review but I'm so pissed about their NFT bullshit at this point, and I haven't played a Square game in recent days so I figured this would be the time to bring this up.

Anyways, the game very much captures the comedic nature of the manga rather well I would say. There's plenty of wacky and zany humor to be found both in the presentation of its narrative as well as the gameplay.

So, what kind of game is Hameln no Violin Hiki you may be wondering? Well, it's a 2D Platformer. Honestly I was a bit shocked at first, given that the track record of James' recommendations have been very zany, and far from standard type of games, but I did come to realize that while it's a 2D Platformer, it still has a lot of wacky and strange elements that make it stand out from your Mario's and your Sonic's.

For one, you play as Hamel, the famed Legendary Hero. Your primary weapon is the violin which you play, which shoots out musical tunes that destroy your foes. You run and jump as you do, sometimes finding keys to open doors so you can reach your goal.

However, you are not alone. Traveling with you is Flute, a teenage girl from a village that has been attacked by Monsters. She brings with her not only the comfort of having a traveling companion, but a very cool mechanic as well. By pressing the pause button, you can select a costume for Flute to wear, from an Ostrich to a UFO.

Wearing these costumes allows for you to use Flute to help overcome obstacles, like flying over a bottomless pit with the Bird, or breaking down walls with the Robot.

And they're not situational either, all of the suits at least have one capacity that makes it so that they can all be used out of their primary scenario based merely on your preference. Think of it as the Balan Wonderworld costumes, but actually done efficiently.

Not only does Flute bring that with her, but also your secondary means of attack.

So funny story, when I started the game, I got stuck on the first level after I threw a rock at a wall so that it would break. The rock disappeared but there was a second wall behind it. I had thought I softlocked myself, and I died twice trying to find what was wrong. That's when I suddenly grabbed Flute and threw her into the wall, breaking it.

That's right, Flute herself is your secondary means of attack, which also goes to some of her costumes. The curling iron can be used to smash through lines of enemies, and the Bomb is self explanatory.

Now at the end of each stage you can get stars based on Flute's physical condition. Usually by the end of the stage it's drained to zero, but it's ok. There is no negative penalty for it, the only thing you miss out on are the bonus stages.

These are only used to acquire money, which you use for temporary upgrades or costumes. I didn't really spend much money because I didn't think the temporary upgrades were that helpful, and because the game is pretty merciful with its lives and continues system.

For a platformer in 1995 this game is revolutionary in that it has infinite continues, and losing lives or a continue only starts you at the beginning of the screen that you were in when you died.

While I know that to some that may come out as the game being without challenge, honestly the game kicks your ass so hard by the end that a system like this doesn't really make the difficulty lesser, just more manageable.

While I very much enjoyed this game, I won't say there weren't any sour points. Boss Fights, particularly the fight with Bassoon, are not fun most of the time.

The Bassoon fight mostly being a waiting game while you deal with randomly spawning snakes that come from the ceiling and can hit you while you move. You have to use Flute to cover yourself from Bassoon's projectiles, and throw her to knock him off his guard and get some hits in. It's just an unpleasant balancing act, and the fact that the snakes seem to respawn at random parts of the screen, makes you run into them with no real fault of your own.

The Final Boss while challenging had one part that felt like BS which is when the boss charges down at you from the air, and you can't dodge it. Trying to throw Flute at them takes too long and isn't effective. Eventually I just resorted to Flute's UFO costume which deals damage to enemies upon contact, and that won me the day.

The other two bosses were just pathetically easy, though the third boss is notable for one, big thing. His name.

Full disclaimer, I don't know if this was a translation issue (I played this on zSNES with a translated rom pack), but the third boss of the game is named, and I quote, "Faggot".

Now a "Faggot" is actually a term referring to an instrument, as all of the bosses in this game are instrument name themed. That instrument is actually surprisingly enough the Bassoon, despite that being the boss before this one. The term comes from "Faggotti" which literally just means Bassoon.

I was pretty shocked at first when I saw characters in the game talking about this boss, and until I looked it up, I thought either the translation was wrong or that the work actually had such an offensive term used in it.

It is just a instrument reference though, but I'm putting this as a forewarning to those interested in playing just so that they do not get blindsided like I did.

Narrative wise, I don't know how much of the Manga is being adapted here, whether it's the first story arc or multiple, though I do think the ending of it just... ends. Like, it implies that the adventure will continue, but there's no game after this so you'd have to read the manga to see the rest and I don't know if the manga ever got localized, at least in the United States.

I don't really want to spoil it though, so it's up to you if you want to go further into the source material. I'm honestly considering it because this game gave me big Dragon Ball vibes.

All in all, Hameln no Violin Hiki is a great game, as a platformer it brings a lot of charm and uniqueness to the genre and I think this game would become rather Backloggd-core if more people played it.

Plus you can throw a girl into a brick wall and she breaks the wall, like, come on, that's fucking amazing.

I wonder how much calcium her bones have?