I've just beaten Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers, a platformer for the NES developed and published by Capcom. Its producer was Tokuro Fujiwara, who was also the producer for the Mega Man series and the Gargoyle's Quest games. It released on June 8, 1990 in Japan and in NA the following day.
The game is based on the kids TV show with the same name, and one that I used to watch a lot as a child myself. It was a nice flash of nostalgia whilst looking up info on this game and I was surprised to recognize some of the characters despite me not having watched the show for at least 15 years.
The game starts with an image of Chip, Dale and their friends and a little text of Chip talking, who says that a neighbor's kitten was lost and needs to be found by them. From there, the 2D platforming gameplay begins. From my count, there are about 10 levels if you decide to do them all, but at least 2 can be skipped. Levels have multiple stages and conclude with a boss fight.
You get 3 hearts and 3 continues, after which you have to restart the game. The game is very short, I beat it in roughly 2 hours, and I'd say it's the best introductory platformer to late 80s / early 90s gaming that I have played so far. To put it simple: It can be beaten relatively quickly and it has pretty basic features.
More on that down below.
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STORYTELLING
The game revolves around the cast of the TV show with the same name. There are Chip and Dale of course, but also their friends, namely Gadget, who in this game scouts ahead and gives players clue on upcoming levels once they finish the previous one, Monterey Jack, who finds "secret doors and pathways" for Chip and Dale (manual) and Zipper, who can be found as a special item and flies around you for a short while to kill every enemy in sight.
The intro dialogue between the friends reveals that the Rescue Rangers have a new job: Find the neighbor's lost kitten. During your search, the shows main antagonist, Fat Cat, introduces himself as well and will have to be bested to win the game later on.
Characters don't show up or talk apart from this intro until the end of the game. In between, only Gadget shows up to leave tips on upcoming levels, and Fat Cat has one little speech as well, but that's it. There is no storytelling beyond that. So it was pretty basic, which was more than fine for a game of this year of course.
GAMEPLAY
You can choose to control either Chip or Dale or even play with someone else. In each level you play, you must walk and jump for most of the game and either avoid enemies or kill them by throwing crates at them. There are cacti, electric wires and of course gravity that you can die to, but all of these deaths can be avoided by simply timing your jumps. There is nothing creative that you need to do to make it through this game. There is no jumping and slashing in mid air, climbing walls or stacking power ups that you need to worry about, especially since none of the latter are even available in this game.
All collectables are there for you to get "1 Ups". Collect 50 nuts, get a 1 up. Collect 10 stars, get a 1 up. Collect a 1 up item, get a 1 up. The only additional gameplay element that is provided in the game world are metal crates, which you can use to stack them up and access higher platforms.
Other than that, what I describes is pretty much it. There are 4 or 5 boss fights where you need to collect a red ball and throw it at the enemy whilst dodging their projectiles. This was very easy for most of the game, only the final boss gave me some trouble there.
After every level, an overworld opens up where you choose the next stage to go to. You can sometimes go one of two directions and pick different levels, but I haven't really tried going back and doing the level that I had missed, so I don't know if you are stuck with the direction you go in. Anyway, this offers tiny bit of replayability in a game that otherwise doesn't offer much depth.
MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE
No voice acting. The music was good as per usual for games of this time period, there is a remix of the theme song of the TV show here too and the sound design was solid as well, or at least in line with how most games of this time made everything sound.
GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN
I liked the graphics here. Good use of colors and despite the technical limitations at the time, the devs did a good job of creating detailed environments that all had an interesting theme. There aren't many enemies here, but they look unique and have clean sprites. There are few animations here and no special effects, so the game did well on the artistic front outside of those two areas.
ATMOSPHERE
Does it feel like a Chip 'n Dale game? I can't really say, it's been a while since I watched the show. I assume the enemies have some relation to the show, maybe, and all the characters do of course, and there definitely is relation to the show in the soundtrack but I can't judge it too much beyond that. As its own thing, I liked how the levels mixed up its themes, had bright colors, detailed environments and multiple unique assets included.
CONTENT
There are about 10 levels with bosses at the end of multiple of them. Almost every level adds new enemies, however there are a total of 10 enemy types overall, so variety is pretty limited there. The game is also very short at 2 hours or so based on someone with my ability, which I would call average. There is little filler, so I'll take 2 hours of this over 10 hours of some of the other, more unfair platformers, but at the end of the day 2 hours are pretty short and apart from themes and some new enemies, levels don't really mix it up in any other noticeable way.
LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN
Artistically pleasing as levels are, they are not different enough in terms of gameplay challenge. I'd put this on lack of gameplay variety rather than the lack of puzzles, lack of environmental hazards and low enemy variety, but overall it's a combination of all those things.
CONCEPT/INNOVATION
There isn't really anything the game does that stands out over the rest or moves the needle. Graphically I thought this game was above average, but if you just look at gameplay, you'll notice that it is pretty simple. There are no power ups in this game. You can't climb. You can't run faster, you can't double jump and you can't fly, you pretty much can't do anything apart from three things. Walk, jump and throw. Throwing is limited to apples, bombs and mostly, crates, which one hit enemies and clear your way forward. It's not a bad gameplay hook and the game doesn't need all of the things I mentioned before, but a bit of mixing up or one more feature or two would have served the game well. As it stands, it feels like a solid entry into the genre if for nothing else.
REPLAYABILITY
There isn't really any variety here, so the only reason for replaying this after winning would be to beat your high score AND to choose a different path in the overworld when you select stages.
PLAYABILITY
The game worked well at all times.
OVERALL
Here is a game that uses a license and the platforming experience of its developers to be an enjoyable, albeit extremely average platformer. Due to its basic features, yet good soundtrack, solid graphics and short game length, it combines to make for a solid game to introduce newcomers to late 80s / early 90s platforming games. But unless you're the biggest Chip 'N Dale fan or have played this when you were young, it is unlikely that this makes for a game you will remember for long, which may be fine depending on your expectations.
WHAT THEY SAID AT THE TIME
- Gary Barth for GamePro Issue 9 (Apr 90): "Chip 'N' Dale Rescue Rangers boasts the same fast action and detailed Disney graphics as [...] Mickey Mousecapades and Duck Tales."
The game is based on the kids TV show with the same name, and one that I used to watch a lot as a child myself. It was a nice flash of nostalgia whilst looking up info on this game and I was surprised to recognize some of the characters despite me not having watched the show for at least 15 years.
The game starts with an image of Chip, Dale and their friends and a little text of Chip talking, who says that a neighbor's kitten was lost and needs to be found by them. From there, the 2D platforming gameplay begins. From my count, there are about 10 levels if you decide to do them all, but at least 2 can be skipped. Levels have multiple stages and conclude with a boss fight.
You get 3 hearts and 3 continues, after which you have to restart the game. The game is very short, I beat it in roughly 2 hours, and I'd say it's the best introductory platformer to late 80s / early 90s gaming that I have played so far. To put it simple: It can be beaten relatively quickly and it has pretty basic features.
More on that down below.
____________
STORYTELLING
The game revolves around the cast of the TV show with the same name. There are Chip and Dale of course, but also their friends, namely Gadget, who in this game scouts ahead and gives players clue on upcoming levels once they finish the previous one, Monterey Jack, who finds "secret doors and pathways" for Chip and Dale (manual) and Zipper, who can be found as a special item and flies around you for a short while to kill every enemy in sight.
The intro dialogue between the friends reveals that the Rescue Rangers have a new job: Find the neighbor's lost kitten. During your search, the shows main antagonist, Fat Cat, introduces himself as well and will have to be bested to win the game later on.
Characters don't show up or talk apart from this intro until the end of the game. In between, only Gadget shows up to leave tips on upcoming levels, and Fat Cat has one little speech as well, but that's it. There is no storytelling beyond that. So it was pretty basic, which was more than fine for a game of this year of course.
GAMEPLAY
You can choose to control either Chip or Dale or even play with someone else. In each level you play, you must walk and jump for most of the game and either avoid enemies or kill them by throwing crates at them. There are cacti, electric wires and of course gravity that you can die to, but all of these deaths can be avoided by simply timing your jumps. There is nothing creative that you need to do to make it through this game. There is no jumping and slashing in mid air, climbing walls or stacking power ups that you need to worry about, especially since none of the latter are even available in this game.
All collectables are there for you to get "1 Ups". Collect 50 nuts, get a 1 up. Collect 10 stars, get a 1 up. Collect a 1 up item, get a 1 up. The only additional gameplay element that is provided in the game world are metal crates, which you can use to stack them up and access higher platforms.
Other than that, what I describes is pretty much it. There are 4 or 5 boss fights where you need to collect a red ball and throw it at the enemy whilst dodging their projectiles. This was very easy for most of the game, only the final boss gave me some trouble there.
After every level, an overworld opens up where you choose the next stage to go to. You can sometimes go one of two directions and pick different levels, but I haven't really tried going back and doing the level that I had missed, so I don't know if you are stuck with the direction you go in. Anyway, this offers tiny bit of replayability in a game that otherwise doesn't offer much depth.
MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE
No voice acting. The music was good as per usual for games of this time period, there is a remix of the theme song of the TV show here too and the sound design was solid as well, or at least in line with how most games of this time made everything sound.
GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN
I liked the graphics here. Good use of colors and despite the technical limitations at the time, the devs did a good job of creating detailed environments that all had an interesting theme. There aren't many enemies here, but they look unique and have clean sprites. There are few animations here and no special effects, so the game did well on the artistic front outside of those two areas.
ATMOSPHERE
Does it feel like a Chip 'n Dale game? I can't really say, it's been a while since I watched the show. I assume the enemies have some relation to the show, maybe, and all the characters do of course, and there definitely is relation to the show in the soundtrack but I can't judge it too much beyond that. As its own thing, I liked how the levels mixed up its themes, had bright colors, detailed environments and multiple unique assets included.
CONTENT
There are about 10 levels with bosses at the end of multiple of them. Almost every level adds new enemies, however there are a total of 10 enemy types overall, so variety is pretty limited there. The game is also very short at 2 hours or so based on someone with my ability, which I would call average. There is little filler, so I'll take 2 hours of this over 10 hours of some of the other, more unfair platformers, but at the end of the day 2 hours are pretty short and apart from themes and some new enemies, levels don't really mix it up in any other noticeable way.
LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN
Artistically pleasing as levels are, they are not different enough in terms of gameplay challenge. I'd put this on lack of gameplay variety rather than the lack of puzzles, lack of environmental hazards and low enemy variety, but overall it's a combination of all those things.
CONCEPT/INNOVATION
There isn't really anything the game does that stands out over the rest or moves the needle. Graphically I thought this game was above average, but if you just look at gameplay, you'll notice that it is pretty simple. There are no power ups in this game. You can't climb. You can't run faster, you can't double jump and you can't fly, you pretty much can't do anything apart from three things. Walk, jump and throw. Throwing is limited to apples, bombs and mostly, crates, which one hit enemies and clear your way forward. It's not a bad gameplay hook and the game doesn't need all of the things I mentioned before, but a bit of mixing up or one more feature or two would have served the game well. As it stands, it feels like a solid entry into the genre if for nothing else.
REPLAYABILITY
There isn't really any variety here, so the only reason for replaying this after winning would be to beat your high score AND to choose a different path in the overworld when you select stages.
PLAYABILITY
The game worked well at all times.
OVERALL
Here is a game that uses a license and the platforming experience of its developers to be an enjoyable, albeit extremely average platformer. Due to its basic features, yet good soundtrack, solid graphics and short game length, it combines to make for a solid game to introduce newcomers to late 80s / early 90s platforming games. But unless you're the biggest Chip 'N Dale fan or have played this when you were young, it is unlikely that this makes for a game you will remember for long, which may be fine depending on your expectations.
WHAT THEY SAID AT THE TIME
- Gary Barth for GamePro Issue 9 (Apr 90): "Chip 'N' Dale Rescue Rangers boasts the same fast action and detailed Disney graphics as [...] Mickey Mousecapades and Duck Tales."