It shouldn't be possible to sleep on a Sonic game considering that the blue hedgehog and whether or not he was "ever good" feels like the most prominent and endlessly regurgitated topic amongst YouTubers and the internet at large, but I really think the series' Game Gear output is hugely overlooked in both its quality and its creativity. They did an excellent job adapting the 16-bit formula through Sonic 1, 2, Chaos, and Triple Trouble, but even after they nailed that down, they didn't hesitate to get weird with the very concept of Sonic. Sonic Drift 1+2 are pretty bog standard kart racers (I like 'em), but putting Sonic in a kart instead of making him run is inherently kinda weird, isn't it? Sonic R "fixes" that (I unironically love Sonic R), but that's a story for another day. There was Tails' Sky Patrol, an auto scrolling flying game that played nothing like a typical Sonic and only had Tails as a playable character. "What would Sonic be like without Sonic?" is what they were putting down here, and this wasn't the last time they'd interrogate the series' core identity. Sonic Labyrinth, a much maligned game from what I've seen, is more of a puzzle-like game that asks the incredibly bold question of, "what if Sonic was slow?". Seems like a downright heretical thing to ask, but Tails Adventure goes even further by bundling this and the previous question together:

"What if Sonic didn't have Sonic and was also slow?"

It turns out that such a question makes for a really impressive and enjoyable Metroidvania!

The Game Gear was more or less on its way out in 1995, which led to some really impressive games coming out around then and Tails Adventure really makes a statement with its scope. The other Sonic games tended to have runtimes of an hour or less, but this game gives you over 10 areas to explore and find and enough to do within then that you can easily get 4 hours or more out of it if you're thorough! I'm not normally one to give much credence at all to game length, but you really didn't see this kind of thing on the Game Gear much beyond RPGs, so I can't help but be impressed. These areas are pretty huge, too, oftentimes requiring multiple trips to find everything within them. They even brought the submarine back from Triple Trouble and gave it its own batch of items to use and nonlinear areas to traverse. Sometimes you'll find a cave you didn't know existed by exploring a new route with a different weapon and sometimes you'll stumble upon a boss entirely by accident. It's the kind of game that has me constantly going "how did they do this!?" and helps to validate my feelings towards the Game Gear as something that's far better than people often give it credit for nowadays.

You only get two buttons on the Game Gear (not counting start or the d-pad), but Tails Adventure gives you over 20 items and lets you swap between four at a time! Sure, this means you have to pause to swap items and can't bring everything with you, but it makes exploration a joy because you never know what you're going to get, especially since they were clever enough to make every item box look the same and hide the surprise every time. Sometimes, you get a new bomb or weapon that lets you get past things you previously couldn't, but other times, you get something that's just fun to have. The radio is technically "useless", but it lets you change the music in any level to any song from the game's soundtrack, which is pretty neat! Though they aren't in the game, you can get items that let you pull a trick out of Sonic and Knuckles' arsenals. Getting up close in this game isn't usually a good idea, but hey, seeing Tails punch like Knuckles does is pretty cute!

The premise of the game itself also feels like a stride towards wanting to make Sonic into something bigger than it was narratively in the video game space. Later games in the series like Sonic Adventure and Sonic Frontiers have Tails struggle with the idea of remaining in Sonic's shadow and earning the confidence needed to become the hero, but here he was cleaning up messes all by himself back in 1995! Making Tails slow seems like a weird choice, but I love how it gives him an identity that isn't just "Sonic but you can fly". Tails has always been the smart one of the group and the pacing of the game and the tools you use leverage his specialty, which is something that I feel like some of the other games forget about his character. He's an inventor, so instead of brute forcing or speeding past everything, you find new solutions to new problems by finding new things to use. Enemies are threats that you have to approach with the right tool from the right position. You're not barreling through foes, but instead calculating the best angle to throw bombs from. Your little robot friend can even be used to scout ahead and see what threats await you in the distance. Said robot is utilized for a whole bunch of puzzles as well since it can get into areas Tails can't due to its small size. You also have to earn the ability to fly for longer periods of time and take more hits by finding more Chaos Emeralds, which feels like a subtle way of showing the player Tails' increased confidence and skills as the adventure goes on. It's a solitary adventure so Tails doesn't have anyone to bounce ideas off of and it doesn't spell anything out, but because of its quieter and slower nature, the gameplay manages to convey a story of Tails gradually rising up to a challenge that only he can handle. It's nice when Sonic games take themselves seriously and try to grow their characters, you know?

I've always had a soft spot for this one since I had it when I was young, but I'm very pleased to see it's even better than I remembered it being. Aside from some underwhelming final bosses, it's a consistently compelling adventure that grows on you more and more as you keep unraveling its mysteries and discover just how deep it goes. I tend to find myself fatigued with the Metroidvania genre nowadays, but I guess all it takes to bring me back in is an unexpected spin on two formulas combined into one!

Ah Phantasy Star 4.

I decided to replay this on a whim after some friends decided against it as a game club pick, and with cheats and such I was done in about 6 hours or so.

It's just such a wonderful experience. Planet hopping, offing the big bad guy(s), funny dialogue, gorgeous looking graphics. I just adore it.

I don't have incredibly deep thoughts, but I just like it a lot.

There's a fun game with awesome combat underneath all the unfair tricks of NES era games.

Combat encounters are insufferable in the late game. Exploration is really punishing as a result, despite that being the one of main selling points of the game. On the other hand, boss fights and dungeon crawling are actually pretty fun and you can see the later Zelda game DNA in that.

Fetch quests and hints are really obtuse and hard to understand. For one quest you have to look for a mirror, which is found by stabbing under a table in the same town as the quest giver. This mechanic is never repeated anywhere else in the game.

Out of all Zelda games, this one is most in need of a remake. Only play this game with a guide, a rewind function, or hack to make the game easier.

The first Super Mario Bros. and the first Legend of Zelda are pretty adequate games. I can appreciate the phenomenal impact both of these games had on the medium of gaming while enjoying my time playing them to some degree. I can declare that both games are well crafted, and their age hasn’t entirely diminished their competency. While I can praise these games for retaining some sense of enjoyment, neither of these titles is even in the top five of my favorite games from either franchise. Any emphatic appreciation for both debut titles mostly extends to the sense of respect I have for both of them while not feeling too passionate about either as individual gaming experiences. The same sense of respect also applies to the first Metroid game, the first entry of Nintendo’s staunchly bronze-winning franchise, while Mario and Zelda fight over which of the two franchises gets gold or silver. The Metroid series is near and dear to me as Mario and Zelda. However, this is mostly due to the myriad of sequels after the first title of the series, as is the case with Mario and Zelda. The respect I have for the first Metroid game on the NES does not extend to the same level of admiration I have for the first Super Mario or Legend of Zelda game, or at least not to the same extent.

I get the impression that Metroid was intended to be Nintendo’s mature franchise meant to offer something for an older demographic. The whimsical influences that crafted both Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda stem from quaint Japanese folklore and nostalgic memories from Miyamoto’s childhood. Alternately, Metroid’s influences borrow inspiration from science fiction films like Alien and the surrealistic, otherworldly art of H.R. Giger. I don’t think I have to further detail how these influences would warrant a completely different experience from Mario and Zelda. Metroid is concretely in the science-fiction and space epic genres, but the series has always straddled the horror genre as well. The Alien influences are conspicuously interwoven into subtle aspects of the game, like Ridley being named after the film’s director and the protagonist being a woman. Do I really need a spoiler veil for this anymore? More so than these minute aspects, Metroid channels the ethos of Alien’s iconic tagline, which is “in space, no one can hear you scream.”

Metroid’s atmosphere is intended to make the player feel isolated. The dreary emptiness of space has been portrayed more cinematically in the sequels due to graphical enhancements. Still, the 8-bit presentation that makes up the first Metroid evokes this feeling quite well. The consistent pitch-black backgrounds signify space better than anything, and it gives the developers an excuse not to implement vibrant backgrounds. The soundtrack runs the gamut from sounding triumphant to having a sublime eeriness, supported by one of the most effective 8-bit soundtracks of all time. Metroid also achieves this sense of uneasiness because everything on this extraterrestrial planet is hostile. Lava flows on the surfaces of Planet Zebes like a flowing river stream, and every strange creature Samus encounters wants her dead. Even the shrubbery on Zebes is bound to kill Samus in the blink of an eye if she isn’t cautious. Metroid conveys tension by making the player feel like a stranger in a strange land with no practical sense of respite or familiarity. Mario had Toad tell him that the princess and another castle and Link had the old mages to aid him in his quest, but Samus is on her lonesome. The galactic federation that assigned Samus on this lone mission never made one brief appearance or signal to survey the mission, leaving Samus to her own devices with total uncertainty surrounding her.

This sense of discomfort is also supported by Metroid’s general difficulty. The term “NES hard” is usually synonymous with linear 2D platformers and beat em’ ups. Still, an unconventional game like Metroid upholds the reputation of difficulty the system was known for. The minimal graphical elements are an alluring part of the discomfort Metroid exudes, but the difficulty is a level of discomfort with negative connotations. I could attribute this to the myriad of aggressive enemies fling themselves at Samus from all angles. I could credit this to the fact that Samus can only shoot in two directions. The biggest detriment of Metroid’s difficulty is that health isn’t recharged after the player dies. Metroid was released the same year as the first Legend of Zelda, so it’s probable that both games borrowed features from one another in their development time. Once the player dies in Zelda, they restart from the beginning of the overworld with only three hearts. In Metroid, the player starts with only a fraction of one energy tank. It’s fine in the early sections of the game but becomes a giant hassle once the player seeks out energy tanks. In Zelda, the player could purchase healing potions, find a fairy fountain, or just come by the likely chance of finding a fairy in the field. In Metroid, there are no quick solutions for recharging Samus’s energy tanks. If the player dies, they’ll have to grind intensively to regain their health. The only efficient way to do so is by shooting at the insectoid creatures that pop out of vents, and they only give the player five points of health. This process was always so mind-numbing that I didn’t care that I was parading around a hostile alien world with only a fraction of my total health. Metroid also doesn’t come with the same save feature as the one The Legend of Zelda has. It’s not a very long game, but there is so much collecting involved that a save feature would slightly relieve the player.

Metroid is arguably the progenitor of the Metroidvania sub-genre, hence the first part of its namesake. The way the game functions is more like a “proto-Metroidvania” game because the genre's hallmarks were still in its infancy. Unfortunately, this means that the essentials of the Metroidvania genre aren’t quite present here. A map is vital to this genre because of all the backtracking, and there is no map to be found in Metroid. The alien planet in Metroid is a spacious realm of towering sections and long corridors, and it would have been nice to get the aid of a map considering the graphical limitations to make each section practically indiscernible from the next. Getting lost and feeling stuck is a core tenet of Metroid’s atmosphere, but its execution just pissed me off. Often, I’d kill Samus on purpose just so the game would send me back to the start of the area. That’s the extent of my frustration with being lost in this game.

I mentioned in my review of The Legend of Zelda that the game could be cryptic at points, but that game is as straightforward as walking down the yellow brick road compared to Metroid. Zelda’s more cryptic sections were still rather fair and just required thinking outside the box a bit. Some of the sections of Metroid are so obtuse that it feels like the player needs to exploit the game to progress. Some heart containers in Zelda took some extraneous searching, but most were rewards for defeating bosses. The energy tanks in Metroid are all hidden so well that I doubt anyone could find them naturally. These energy tanks are also imperative to comfortably facing the hectic final challenges of the game, so I wouldn't judge the player one bit for using a guide. Getting the Varia Suit was one of the most exploitative endeavors I’ve ever faced in any video game, to the point where I’m still skeptical as to whether or not what I did to get it was the intended method. It’s a suit that changes Samus’s color and adds a layer of defense, so its usefulness might give off the impression that it’s essential to obtain. However, the incredibly obtuse way to secure this valuable upgrade makes me think otherwise. It almost feels like the developers are fucking with the player.

The general objective of Metroid is to unlock a path near the entrance of the game that will take Samus to the final boss of the game. Before she does that, she has to track down both Kraid and Ridley and defeat them. For the extraneous trek, the player has to endure to get to both of them, their fights are laughably pitiful. These supposedly threatening galactic beasts are munchkin-sized foes with lazy, predictable attack patterns. Once the player unlocks the passageway after defeating both of these foes, nothing they’ve faced so far can prepare them for the trudge to Mother Brain. Metroids litter the corridors and can make the game hell for the player if they don’t utilize Samus’s ice beam with sharp reflexes. At the core of these halls lies Mother Brain sealed in a large glass container. It’s an iconic scene in gaming, but I was not aware that this is because of how brutal it is. Samus will endure an onslaught of laser beams, energy balls that appear from seemingly nowhere, and expunge at least 150 missiles on the regenerating blocking tubes and Mother Brain herself. I couldn’t tell you how often I had to restock on energy after dying in this section, probably enough to contemplate my life’s decisions. The player’s eventual success will result in an anticlimactic escape that almost cheats the Mother Brain fight.

Metroid is a game that was way too ambitious for the NES. The Legend of Zelda was ahead of the curve but understood the system's confines. Metroid wanted to fill a kiddy pool with the water it takes to fill an in-ground one, and overflowed. While I can admire the level of innovation the first Metroid offers, this only extends to the apparent building blocks that future Metroid titles and Metroidvania games stack upon. The design and gameplay aspects of Metroid are far too primitive to be executed competently in an NES game. The cryptic design, the lack of a save feature, and the heavy grinding for health grated on me. The other pioneering titles of these landmark Nintendo franchises may suffer from the imminent aging process, but the first Metroid was still heavily flawed back in its heyday.

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Attribution: https://erockreviews.blogspot.com