Together Retro: Licensed to Thrill (Licensed 2D Platformers)

[ESauced]

Lion King is pretty brutal but honestly the most infuriatingly hard level is probably the second one. You have to time some of the jumps off the flamingo seemingly arbitrarily as sometimes you’ll die without having hit a thing. Add in getting tossed into the water by a monkey for an instant death and the level is a recipe for a broken controller.

Why is it that a lighthearted song in the movie was turned into such a brutal level? How diabolical we’re those developers?

I don’t think I’ve beaten the game but I came close when I was a kid and I imagine I could handle it now if I had the patience. Most times I’ve tried as an adult I’ve turned it off at the second level and switched to Aladdin to get the bad taste out of my mouth.

[Sload Soap]

I usually handle the second level in Lion King okay but that's because it's burnt into my memory. I also had it on PC so I beat it on keyboard which just makes me anxious thinking about now.

The level I dislike the most is the stampede. The shoddy hit detection is exacerbated with some mid-90's faux 3D scrolling into the screen and it's just the worst. After that the game kind of levels out until the battle with Scar which is just a crapshoot. Hasn't aged as well as Aladdin.

I bought the Disney afternoon collection so have a few more options now. Darkwing Duck looks interesting.

[alienjesus]

You ain't seen bad hit detection and wonk controls until you've played The Lion King. It's one I could best back in the day, the SNES version I believe. But yeah it is no walk in the park whatsoever if only because of awful programming and just really weird design at times. It is utterly absurd how long the pink monkey maze level is too, which is really early on. Then from there I recall there being numerous levels and points in the game that can easily completely break a run and drain your lives up.

No easy task, Simba.

So, first off, from everything I've heard, the SNES version's hit detection is way wonkier than thr Mega Drive. The Mega Drive one is strict for sure, but it's not that bad.

The pink monkey maze, if you know what you're doing, involves roaring at 4 monkeys total, and takes about 30 seconds.

You're not wrong about the parts that can drain your lives though, game is damn tough.


The second level isn't that hard, and the stampede is at least pretty short. The hardest points in the game imo are Hakuna Matata (stage 6) with it's really tricky boss fight, Be Prepared (stage which is just outright the hardest level in the game, and the final boss, which is a pain to pull off.

[Xeogred]

You'll notice I meant the second level in general, which others just mentioned being insanely long too. And no way new players are clearing the end of that maze in 30 seconds.

Gotta be prepared to pull off some Tekken combos against Scar too.

I'm definitely not sure if I've played much of the Genesis version though, I'll have to check it out. In general though... I woudln't say I like the game much, it was just one of those "well I'm a kid and this is one of the games I have, better play it for years" cases.

[Xeogred]

(bad end?)

Just knocked out Darkwing Duck.

Definitely for the Mega Man fans, the Capcom touch is here for sure. But I did have a few issues. It took me awhile to realize that holding up causes Darkwing to raise his cape for a shield that blocks some projectiles. That is fine, except that you do this while jumping too. I didn't even notice this until the end of the game but I think this is the main reason why jumping and shooting was often problematic. If you're accidentally holding up and he's using the cape, you're not going to be firing at anything in front of you. The jumping and precision isn't quite as good as Mega Man either. There's also some vertical scaling sections except that, once the screen pans up, if you fall back down... you're falling to your doom. So the area doesn't pan back down towards the ground or wherever you started the climb. Overall it was harder than Mega Man (maybe not 1) to me, since Darkwing can only take four hits. It's easy to get health drops throughout though that fully restore your health and extra lives aren't too hard to grab, usually one per level. Some of the bosses were a real pain namely because of the controls not being as smooth as you'd want... more than several of these bosses will often shoot some projectile upwards that falls down to hit you from above, while you're dodging stuff on the ground and trying to hit the boss. No health bars on the bosses either and they take quite awhile to knockout. The final boss was a huge pain and the beginning is kind of pure luck, it's similar to say... the Super Ghouls true boss or Mega Man X's final Sigma form, you have to scale upward to hit something while these two orbs are constantly respawning and shooting crap at you while knocking you down. But you can get into a cycle of shooting both the spawning bots and hitting what you need to hit for the boss. If that makes sense. I did enjoy the hanging mechanic, Darkwing can jump and hang onto some objects or the bottom of some platforms you can then jump upward onto. This led for some cool puzzle areas as well. But, you will probably rage a little with a few accidental deaths due to the controls here and there.

Overall, very cool for sure though and I liked it more than Castle of Illusion for the two I've beaten so far.

[pierrot]

Don't hold back; tell us what you REALLY think.

At your request, I've decided to take off the kid gloves:

[ZeroAX]

Without going through the entire thread, can I join by playing magical quest 3 on the SNES? It's the one I installed to my snes mini because it seemed the most interesting in the trilogy.

[Xeogred]

Play whatever you want that's within the genre or theme. That's the point of the revamped TR.

And I beat another one!

1. Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse (Genesis)
2. Darkwing Duck (NES)
3. Batman* (NES)

* = replay




Most anticipated replay of my lifetime. Batman is a game I rented a lot as a kid and somehow, I beat this game when I was 4 years old off and on. I can't compute how but I just know I played the heck out of this game and could defeat the Joker. Despite being a big fan of this at my young age, it's one I don't think I've touched much at all 25 plus some years later. I'm sure I emulated it off and on at some point, but the only memories I have of this game are very specific playing it at my grandparents on their huge wooden brown TV before my parents and I moved to another state and I wasn't even in kindergarten yet. Dang!

It holds up extremely well and I've never doubted it, because it's Sunsoft. The graphics and music are A+ quality. Batman controls well and the walljumping is awesome. Although in one of my pics there from the last level, that clocktower area was a huge pain and lots of trial and error. The third boss was brutal as well, but going in with full health, tons of weapon ammo to burn, and then he's not too hard. The other bosses were pretty easy, though with Joker you just can't get hit by his gun which does a huge 3 damage to your health. I eventually realized the ceiling pods that dropped out infinite enemies were basically a lot like those pits in Metroid that keep spawning those bug flyers, so it was easy to refill health and ammo at those points. Well... I say easy, but you have to be careful with the timing of taking out these things here. You often didn't have much platforming space to maneuver around them, so I was often getting some health only to get hit and even stun locked a bit while trying to escape their little spawning patrol. And sometimes my punches wouldn't land on them or other enemies. I'm noticing when I go back and emulate some stuff, I can't rapid fire button mash like I normally would, but have to get a rhythm down so the actual inputs register against hitting an enemy.

There were a few moments I laughed, remembering that I knew some of these technical tricks when I was kid. Farming for ammo/health at points in this and other games (TMNT, the sidescroller came to mind), or even manipulating the screen a bit to make some enemies disappear without having to defeat them. Happened a few times while playing Batman.

I used save states but I just wanted to finally revisit this one and it was a blast. I actually don't think I've ever played Return of the Joker. But I do remember playing the cool beat em' up Returns. I'll probably check those out soon. But I'll always have a soft spot for the original Batman - The Video Game! An NES essential for sure.

[noiseredux]

Ducktales: Remastered
2013

I played a lot of Ducktales on NES growing up. It was a pretty great Capcom platformer that mashed up the basic Mega Man gameplay with a less linear approach. It had great level design, fantastic music and was totally a licensed game that appreciated its source material.

That's why I think that Way Forward did such an excellent job modernizing the game. Much like the care that Capcom put into making a fun and authentic Ducktales game, Way Forward obviously cared about creating a remake that highlights what was so wonderful about the original game to begin with. They didn't go nuts trying to make it a "new" game so much as they just wanted to make the prettiest version of an already great game.

Visually, Ducktales: Remastered is top-notch. I'm sure that this is what the game looked like to me when I was younger and had a better imagination. But these hi-def designs make it look like you're playing the damn cartoon. It's awesome. The animations are all so detailed and fluid. But none of that would matter had they botched the game play. I'm glad to say that everything - from Pogo jumping to golfing - works just as perfectly here as it did in the original. In fact I found that the muscle memory took right over and I was able to speed through these levels just as I always had.

There are also treats to be found in the audio department. For one thing Jake Kaufman is as talented as ever here. His takes on these classic (and I mean CLASSIC) songs are handled with so much love. There isn't a tendency to go overboard remixing here and instead we get the original tracks re-recorded and sounding fantastic. "Moon Theme," I love you. Likewise all the newly recorded dialogue is definitely going to appeal to fans of the old TV show. These vignettes help add in a real story and make it feel like you're just playing through one new episode of the show.

Admittedly, the downfall here is the over-abundance of cut scenes. I mean it's not Metal Gear Solid level, but they come a bit too often. I was fine watching them before and after levels, but the ones that occur mid-level feel jarring and slow down momentum. Luckily, you can skip them quite easily.

All in all, Ducktales: Remastered is a welcome remake in my book. And apparently it'll be one that I replay every few years in a sitting or two for a nice shot of nostalgia.

[pierrot]

Without going through the entire thread, can I join by playing magical quest 3 on the SNES? It's the one I installed to my snes mini because it seemed the most interesting in the trilogy.

I thought it was the worst game of the three, and pretty decidedly not fun, but it's a 2D platform game based on a license. So you should be good on that front, anyway.