Super Thunder Blade Review

Game: Super Thunder Blade
Version: SEGA Mega Drive: Ultimate Collection Xbox 360
Year: 1989

The second game I have decided to feature is Super Thunder Blade. I really wish I hadn’t bothered. For those of you who haven’t played this before Super Thunder Blade is a Third person helicopter shoot ‘em up, but does swap to a top down view for boss fight. This really is one of the worst games I have ever played and trust me I have played some very bad games! I mean just look at the title screen image below, I expected the helicopter silhouette to fill in when I pressed start, but nope that’s it in all its glory, so not only one of the worst games ever but easily a contender for worst title screen ever too! Now I know a lot of the joy of playing retro games is the feeling of nostalgia and reminiscing but having never played this game before I really didn’t know what to expect… God was I in for a shock! I love old games, they are the innovators, game controls were super important, graphics although not up to today’s standard were still awesome in their own way (personally I prefer the old style 2D graphics) and new genres and ideas were born. But Super Thunder Blade disappoints on every count. 

Now that is just terrible!

So I booted up the game and jumped straight into the game without reading the controls or instructions and proceeded to die within about 10 seconds. There was a barrage of bullets coming from tanks on the ground and enemy helicopters from above. The main problem with enemy bullets is you have no real way accessing where they are headed, mainly because it’s incredibly difficult to work out the perspective. The other problem is the enemy bullets are quite large so they can be quite hard to dodge. On the other hand the players bullets seem to auto aim onto enemies so it just a matter of holding down fire to kill enemies whilst moving around the screen dodging bullets. Graphics are pretty bad looking back, but for the time they were probably pretty good. I’m not a huge fan of the old 3D style pixel art as I much prefer the 2D stuff. I think it’s just too confusing for players to get the right perspective. Gameplay as with all games in this era is bloody difficult, one hit and you’re dead! When you die you slowly fall to the ground and crash. When you use your next life you spawn on the ground where you died and you get to take off which is quite a nice touch. Controls are simply pull down to take off, then once in the air you use the control pad to move around. There is also a fire button and “hover” button. The hover button makes you slow down and eventually stop, but I found this of no use at all as the slower you go the more likely you are to get hit. 

A few seconds in and I'd already lost a life!

Half way through level one you encounter the first boss of the game. A rather huge tank. I did quite enjoy this sequence of play as you could get a better sense of perspective because your bullets aim in relation to your ship position. This was probably the only highlight of the game for me. Once defeated play continues until you reach the end of the level where there is a surprisingly nice screen transition, this changes the camera view from third person to a top down view. Once again I think this view point is far better as you can actually see what you are doing. The boss involves shooting planes and gun turrets on an enemy ship and once completed the ship blows up and the level ends.

Top down is just as bad! 

Finally once the game is over you realise that the title art might not be the worst piece of artwork in the game. Once you die you are presented with the most garish congratulations screen ever, I mean just look at it!!! You can also select a panda as your initials...?  

WTF??!?!?

Oddly the more I write about this game the more positives I seem to unearth… Maybe the totally shocking title screen made me hate everything else about this game?!?  Level 2 plays the same as the first level but instead of a city scape it’s in a desert, or maybe a beach? Quite hard to tell really! Unfortunately this is where I will have to end this review because the combination of the crappy game play, the disturbingly bad SFX (they will make your ears bleed) and horrific music meant I couldn’t take anymore! It is my plan to complete each game I review 100%, but in this case I’m willing to make an exception…. 

Gameplay - 2/10 Horrible controls, bad perspective and repetitive.

Graphics - 4/10 Graphics are poor, not for me thanks. 

Sound - 2/10 One word; nasty!  

Overall - 2/10 A truly horrible experience. I would recommend forgetting this game ever existed.  

Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle Review

Game: Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle
Version: SEGA Mega Drive: Ultimate Collection Xbox 360
Year: 1985

The first  game I have chosen to review is Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle. I have been a fan of Alex Kidd for many years but had never played this game before. I was more familiar with the Master System game Alex Kidd in Miracle World and Alex Kidd: The Lost Stars (I might revisit these in the future).

Gameplay starts in "Rookie Town" and instantly shows how bad ass Alex Kidd really is. The first obstacles/enemy you are encountered with are some red cars, but how does Alex Kidd deal with this? He punches them and they disappear into a puff of smoke! The controls aren't as good as Mario or Sonic titles but they are still pretty tight. You can punch or kick to kill enemies/blocks. You can't attack when falling down which does annoy me a little.

Rookie Town! 

The next thing you will notice in Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle is the game designers continued fascination with Rock, Paper, Scissors... Entering any of the black doors will give you the opportunity to buy objects if you beat the shop keeper at a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors. The shop keeper looks like an older, overweight, purple Dhalsim, the other odd thing is that his team mascot seems to be some weird pirate teddy bear with pom poms! The music is the shop is mega, I left it playing while I was hanging up my washing and I was humming along. And so you know, this won't be the last we see of  Rock, Paper, Scissors....

Any relation to Dhalsim???

Some of the items you unlock in the shop are quite cool, my favourite is probably the classic motor bike as seen in other Alex Kidd titles, my least favourite is the Pogo stick, or as I nicknamed it the "Drunken Pogo Stick". As soon as Alex gets on the Pogo stick it is impossible to control with the character swinging all over the screen. Funny but you will lose lives using this power up! Other power ups include the helicopter, invincibly and the ability to see what the enemy is going to pick in Rock, Paper, Scissors. The motor bike lets you speed through some of the earlier levels, but is completely useless on many of the later levels.

When you get to level 5 which is the Pyramid level you will start encountering bosses at the end of most levels. However the is no tricky platforming challenge for you to endure, no it is yet more Rock, Paper, Scissors... My experience was pretty bad for this level. It took me a few attempts to get to the end of the level where you meet Princess of the Oasis, I played her in a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors and lost... I then died and was send back to the beginning of the level, no checkpoints in sight! Fortunately the enemies always use the same attacks so you can learn the outcome quite quickly. 

Most of the levels are the standard horizontal scrolling format but one of the later levels Rocky Mountain 2 is a vertical scrolling plat former which nicely breaks up gameplay. I say nice break but this level soon became a nightmare, thanks to the level after which is the hellish "In the Sky" level. In the Sky is a level which you must navigate with the helicopter which is a little tricky to control, but the main problem comes when you die... Not only do you return to the beginning of the level, you return to the beginning of the level BEFORE! So you go back to Rocky Mountain 2, which is more than a little annoying, especially after dying 3 or 4 times on In the Sky! But this game is very hard so it isn't for the faint hearted, any enemy is a one hit kill and most of the time you go back to the start of the level, there are occasionally check points but I only encountered 2-3 throughout my whole play-through. 

The last level; Sky Castle also plays differently from all the previous levels and is a single screen platformer, so the player transition from one screen to the next, similar to Castlevania. This level is totally awesome and I think could have been a game in itself! It is easily the longest and most challenging level but also brings more puzzle and speed elements into game play which you don't see in earlier levels. I wish that they would've done a full game based solely on this level as I think they could've come up with some really cool ideas and it almost makes the other levels seem like filler... 

Best level is the game! 

After completing this brilliant level you get to fight the final boss and I use the word fight very loosely. The boss is called "Ashra", and he is kind of like a version of Ganesha but instead of just normal arms, every hand is in the shape of either a Rock, Paper or you guessed it some Scissors! It actually looks quite a cool enemy but once again you have to play him at Rock, Paper, Scissors... This time you have to beat him twice before he is defeated. Once you beat him at Rock, Paper, Scissors you do actually have to punch him to defeat him, this is incredibly easy and you can just crawl under the Rock hands he is throwing an repeatedly punch him until he is defeated. This is one of the most boring and easy boss battles I have experienced from this era of gaming! But the awesome level you play before you get to him more than makes up for it... I won't spoil the ending but it isn't particularly entertaining! 

Yet more Rock, Paper, Scissors....

Overall the game is pretty good and it took me a good few hours to complete. I really enjoyed the last level which made me a little disappointed that the earlier levels weren't as good. I do however look forward to revisiting the other titles in this franchise. 

Gameplay - 7/10 Controls are pretty good but is let down by some power ups. 

Graphics - 8/10 Graphics are great, bright and fun. 

Sound - 7/10 Music would get 10/10 but some of the SFX are a bit average 

Overall - 7/10 A solid platformer which is well worthy of a play.