Over the many years that they have been a company, Nintendo has created many franchises, with them still making entries for a good number of them to this very day. However, there have been plenty of franchises they have made that they let slowly die over the years with a major lack of releases, such as F-Zero, Earthbound, and Advance Wa- wait a minute, that last one is getting a remake soon, never mind on that one. Anyway, you get the point, there are many dead Nintendo franchises, and one of the ones that has been treated more poorly than most of the others would be Kid Icarus.
Whenever people bring this series up, they mainly talk about Kid Icarus: Uprising (as they should, because that game is fucking amazing), but in terms of the original Kid Icarus, the one that started it all, it still holds up pretty well, and I had a pretty good time with it overall. I wouldn't consider it perfect by any means, but it does still hold up quite a bit after all this time.
The story is simple, yet it is enough to get you engaged (at least for me), the graphics are good, even if they don't look as good as other NES games at the time, the music is very catchy and iconic, the control is pretty good, although I wish Pit's movement was a little less floaty, and the gameplay is simple, yet diverse enough to where you won't get bored with the game easily.
The gameplay in Kid Icarus is pretty varied, with three separate gameplay styles seen throughout. The first is a 2D platformer mixed with adventure elements, where you traverse up and to the right of stages, shooting enemies, gathering hearts and hammers, while also exploring the various doors that you find along the way, where you can defeat enemies for even more hearts, buy plenty of items to aid you on your quest, gather upgrades to your bow, and face off against endurance tests to gain upgrades to your arsenal. Even after the my second time playing through it, I had a lot of fun with these levels, as it does feel pretty satisfying to conquer these stages and their challenges, with the upgrades and items also being extremely helpful for what you have to deal with throughout.
The second gameplay style would be with the fortresses at the end of each world, where you go through a dungeon-like labyrinth, freeing Centurions, buying more items that help you out, and fighting bosses to get the three Sacred Treasures. To be completely honest, I don't like these parts of the game. A lot of the rooms in these labyrinths look incredibly samey, meaning that it is incredibly easy to get lost, and it can take a long while to find the boss to get a move on. Not to mention, there's also those times when you get turned into an eggplant, and you gotta go to a hospital to take care of that, which can be a hassle.
The third and final gameplay section (also, spoilers for a 35+ year old game or whatever) is when you collect all three of the Sacred Treasures and you then enter a side scrolling shooter segment, where you also fight Medusa to beat the game. This section is also pretty good, and can be fun at times, although I wish you had a much higher firing rate for your projectiles.
In terms of overall complaints I would have with this game, I would say the difficulty could be a little too much at points, with enemy spawn points and rates can be pretty unpredictable at times, along with enemy movement being very erratic at points. In addition, in order to use several of the upgrades you get, you need to have a bigger, full health bar, which is kind of a hassle, but it isn't too hard to get there. And finally, the boss fights SUCK. Seriously, they just walk, float, or jump around, and you shoot them, that's it. There is no variety in their strategies, except for maybe a fireball or two. Hell, even with the final boss, you can literally just sit there and spam the attack button, and you won't get hit.
Overall, while it does certainly have plenty of problems, I still find the original Kid Icarus to be pretty fun and different compared to other Nintendo games at the time, and I would definitely consider it a classic of the NES library.
Game #85
Whenever people bring this series up, they mainly talk about Kid Icarus: Uprising (as they should, because that game is fucking amazing), but in terms of the original Kid Icarus, the one that started it all, it still holds up pretty well, and I had a pretty good time with it overall. I wouldn't consider it perfect by any means, but it does still hold up quite a bit after all this time.
The story is simple, yet it is enough to get you engaged (at least for me), the graphics are good, even if they don't look as good as other NES games at the time, the music is very catchy and iconic, the control is pretty good, although I wish Pit's movement was a little less floaty, and the gameplay is simple, yet diverse enough to where you won't get bored with the game easily.
The gameplay in Kid Icarus is pretty varied, with three separate gameplay styles seen throughout. The first is a 2D platformer mixed with adventure elements, where you traverse up and to the right of stages, shooting enemies, gathering hearts and hammers, while also exploring the various doors that you find along the way, where you can defeat enemies for even more hearts, buy plenty of items to aid you on your quest, gather upgrades to your bow, and face off against endurance tests to gain upgrades to your arsenal. Even after the my second time playing through it, I had a lot of fun with these levels, as it does feel pretty satisfying to conquer these stages and their challenges, with the upgrades and items also being extremely helpful for what you have to deal with throughout.
The second gameplay style would be with the fortresses at the end of each world, where you go through a dungeon-like labyrinth, freeing Centurions, buying more items that help you out, and fighting bosses to get the three Sacred Treasures. To be completely honest, I don't like these parts of the game. A lot of the rooms in these labyrinths look incredibly samey, meaning that it is incredibly easy to get lost, and it can take a long while to find the boss to get a move on. Not to mention, there's also those times when you get turned into an eggplant, and you gotta go to a hospital to take care of that, which can be a hassle.
The third and final gameplay section (also, spoilers for a 35+ year old game or whatever) is when you collect all three of the Sacred Treasures and you then enter a side scrolling shooter segment, where you also fight Medusa to beat the game. This section is also pretty good, and can be fun at times, although I wish you had a much higher firing rate for your projectiles.
In terms of overall complaints I would have with this game, I would say the difficulty could be a little too much at points, with enemy spawn points and rates can be pretty unpredictable at times, along with enemy movement being very erratic at points. In addition, in order to use several of the upgrades you get, you need to have a bigger, full health bar, which is kind of a hassle, but it isn't too hard to get there. And finally, the boss fights SUCK. Seriously, they just walk, float, or jump around, and you shoot them, that's it. There is no variety in their strategies, except for maybe a fireball or two. Hell, even with the final boss, you can literally just sit there and spam the attack button, and you won't get hit.
Overall, while it does certainly have plenty of problems, I still find the original Kid Icarus to be pretty fun and different compared to other Nintendo games at the time, and I would definitely consider it a classic of the NES library.
Game #85