The Retroist » NES

Devil World

Doug — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 02:23:55 +0000

I’ve been trying to complete my NES collection. I don’t want to get every NES game. There are just too many. But I’ve set my sights on getting every Nintendo-made NES game. To do that, I needed a list of those games. I got that list from Wikipedia. As I perused it, I saw all the old favorites: Zelda, Super Mario Bros., Metroid, Kung Fu, etc. I also saw some I’d heard of but wasn’t that family with: Family Team Games, Dance Aerobics, Anticipation. And then I found this one:

Devil World was one of the black label games, the games that were released at the beginning of the NES era. Not only so, but it was created by video game superstar Shigeru Miyamoto. Yet I had never heard of it before. How could that be? Well, it turns out that Devil World is pretty heavy on religious imagery. You played a dragon who tried to clear a Pac-Man-like maze while collecting Bibles and crosses. From what I understand, Nintendo had a strict policy against such imagery, at least for their North America releases. Usually, the iconography was just scrubbed out, as in Castlevania (ever wonder why what looks like a cross is called a “boomerang”?). In Devil World’s case, the imagery was too pervasive to be scrubbed out, and so the game was never released in America. It was released on the Famicon, though, and a European version was released as well.

I’m not sure if the European version will play in a North American NES, but you can use a Famicon converter (such as can be found inside some games) to play the Japanese version.

I can’t say it’s a shame we didn’t get to have it back then. It is basically a Pac-Man clone (albeit a clever and stylistic one), and I doubt I would have played it any more than Clu Clu Land or Urban Champion. But it is a big shame I didn’t know about it back then. The idea of a banned NES game would have been an awesome bomb to drop on my middle school friends.

RAD 13: M.C. Hamburger – A Review of M.C. Kids for the NES

Joshua Caleb — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 19:00:54 +0000

M.C. Kids (aka Mcdonaldland) is a very odd console/PC title released in the early 90s. If you haven’t guessed already, it’s based on the ubiquitous fast-food chain, Mcdonalds. It stars two generic teens that enter Ronald’s magical Mcdonaldland to retrieve his magic bag that has been stolen by the Hamburglar. Gameplay plays out in traditional platforming style; you can run, jump, pick up & throw blocks, etc. In fact, the game looks and plays very much like a simplified Super Mario Bros 3, almost uncannily so. The controls are a little more “floaty” compared to Nintendo’s own and you don’t simply run through level to level; you must collect an “M” card in each stage in order to advance to the next world. If you don’t, then well you’ll have to do the stage over again until you do. The game also lacks any sort of password or save feature and the difficulty is surprisingly high for a supposed “kid’s game”, though there is a two-player “hot-seat” mode were each player takes turns playing levels. (or when one player loses)

The graphics are fairly bland, with a lot of scenery being blatant rip-offs from Mario’s adventures. Music is slightly varied with unique tracks for several different stages, but all the “happy” 8-bit tunes begin to run together after awhile.

In other words, this is mostly just a bad rip-off of Super Mario Bros 3 for kids that comes off as, well, cheesy. (pardon the pun;) What do you think? While I have fond memories of playing this when I was younger, going back to it now just isn’t the same. It’s no Super Mario Bros and never was, but the rosy eyes of childhood tend to blur things like that.

Konami’s Contra & Jackal Comic Book Ad

Doug — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 15:52:38 +0000

Konami advertised heavily in mid-80s Marvel Comics. Here is one of my favorites.

InRetroSpection Episode 38: Super Mario Bros RePlaythrough

Joshua Caleb — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 16:00:54 +0000

It’s about time we played through the venerable Italian platformer. Not only do we hop & stomp through the original NES classic, but we also pop in the 16-bit remake from Super Mario All Stars.

Subscribe Here or in iTunes. Watch more Here.

The Konami Code Origin Revealed By Katsuhisa Hashimoto

VicSage — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 23:35:33 +0000

Katsuhisa Hashimoto, one of the creators of the classic Nintendo Entertainment System port of the arcade game Gradius spoke about the origin of the famed Konami code in a 2003 interview that GlitterBerri translated and Joystiq was kind enough to share.

“I had one guy under me, and he played through the coin-op version,” Hashimoto said. “That one’s really tough. I hadn’t played that much and obviously couldn’t beat it myself, so I put in the Konami Code.

“Because I was the one who was going to be using it,” Hashimoto said, “I made sure it was easy to remember. The game took around half a year to develop, and, at the time, putting the code together was like an entertaining puzzle. ‘How on earth am I going to be able to fit these passwords into the program?’ I’d ask myself.”

Let’s be honest here. Using the code on Gradius in NOT cheating. That game was tough. Check out this video by SHMUPGurus over on YouTube. This is the first of two videos that was made, a run through the NES Gradius without dying once.