Athletic World

Family "Fun" Fitness

Publisher: Bandai
Year: 1987
Genre: Power Pad


Do you own a Power Pad? The answer to that is, "No, you do not own a power pad because no one does." The Power Pad was part of an insidious plot to convince us to use video games as a way of staying fit and healthy. How stupid is that? So stupid that DDR made huge amounts of money off the idea. So stupid that all three major game systems of the 21st century are courting that same fitness nut "gamer" crowd through motion sensing cameras and motion capture controllers. It's all part of conspiracy to make gamers use games as exercise, and it finds all its roots here.

I "won," but at what cost?

John's Rating: 0.0 out of 5.0, because I don't have a power pad, and I'm not going to get one.

Athena

Athena will get the hang of winking someday.

Publisher: SNK*
Year: 1987
Genre: Platform


The gods must be crazy retarded. Athena is a game about the Greek Goddess of Wisdom a princess and her quest to rid the land of evil make really stupid life decisions. The plot begins with her opening Pandora's Box the Door Which Shouldn't Be Opened at Mount Olympus Victory Castle, leading her to enter the Underworld Fantasy World to battle some evil guy named Dante... no wait, that last one's right.

At least the best armor isn't a chainmail bikini.

John's Rating: 1.5 out of 5.0. Athena jumps a randomly determined height when you hit A. Let me say that again - you jump a randomly determined height when you hit A. It doesn't matter how long or short you hold the button, Athena either jumps very high or makes a tiny near-useless hop. Nothing I can figure out influences which one it will be. That alone would be a game-breaker, but it also suffers from obnoxious music, poor hit detection and a collection of nearly useless weapons that replace your useful weapons if you so much as look at them wrong.Oh, and levels have no check points. You're welcome.

* I know their first two games haven't been very promising, but SNK was a great company, I swear!

Arkanoid

Publisher: Taito
Year: 1987
Genre: Breakout Clone


Every day, people in the civilized world encounter, at bare minimum, four walls (presuming they have a coffee can in their bedroom to poop in), and you know what? Sometimes, we don't like it. Sometimes, a man just has to say, "You know what, Mr. Wall? Who the hell are you to come into MY house and tell me which of MY rooms are partitioned from one another?" For those of you who, like me, have found themselves injuring some portion of their anatomy in a furious tequila-fueled attempt at libero cubiculum, Arkanoid may well prove to be the cathartic experience you need.

"Hey, kid - wanna eff up some walls?"

Alpha Mission

SNK gets better, I swear.

Publisher: SNK
Year: 1987
Genre: Top-Scroll Shmup

Polygons, polygons everywhere.

Space Shooters are a staple genre of the NES. You might recall me giving Gradius the first perfect score of this blog, so I'm certainly not biased against that. Having said that, there are certain qualities I expect in a space shooter. The first is variety - repetition is a huge game killer for any sort of Shmup, so a large variety of environments and enemies is a must. The second is graphic consistency - if a game takes itself seriously, it should make an effort to do so throughout the entire experience, keeping powerups - for example - looking like part of the environment rather than annexes to the games graphic library. The third is a aesthetic quality - the audio and visual experiences should be unobtrusive if not pleasant. Alpha Mission is a generic space shooter example of not working very hard on any of this.

John's Rating: 2.0 out of 5.0. The only thing that stands out about this game to any meaningful degree is how annoying the music is. Beyond that, it's pure vanilla paste.

The 3D Battles of World Runner

The 3D Battles of
Most Elaborate Title Screen to date

Publisher: Square

Year: 1987

Genre: Action

It might surprise you to know that 3D imagery achieved through stereoscopy dates back to before the American Civil War. Yes, it's true: 3D images have existed for nearly two hundred years now. So while the 3DS has garnered considerable hype, it should come as no surprise to even the youngest most naive reader that it is neither the first 3D Game System, nor the first example of 3D games. The 3D Battles of World Runner might not be the first 3D game (although, to my recollection, it was the first one I had ever heard of and I can't find any predating examples), but it exists as a much-overlooked technical triumph of its time. At any time during gameplay (or even during the opening animation), the player can press select to change the view to a 3D anaglyph view appropriate for use with the old-school cyan/red 3D glasses.

The pink hair-dye of you-can-get-hit-once.

In the 3D Battles of World Runner is about a space cowboy named Jack who fights giant space worms. Given the track record for (almost) all things involving space cowboys, you'd think that I would be thrilled by a game that lets you be one of these brave hombres. To be honest, though, the cool concept and 3D graphics are really all the game has going for it. The gameplay is bland and forgettable, featuring little more than endlessly running forward and jumping over pits until you fight a simple boss so you can progress to a slightly different color scheme. The powerups are simple at best (such as the blaster gun and potion of lets-you-get-hit-a-second-time) and useless or horrible at worst (such as the mushroom of kills-you-instantly-by-exploiting-your-Mario-instilled-assumptions and the molecule of makes-you-invincible-for-all-too-short-a-time). The enemies all looked like they were borrowed from one of Dr. Seuss's more forgettable volumes, which I'll leave open to the reader's interpretation.

John's Rating: 2.5 out of 5.0. The game is playable and technically sound, and I remember renting it as a child and playing it for hours, but it really doesn't stand up to the test of time. Once you get over the novelty of the 3D images, it all runs together into a vanilla bean paste of bland-flavored bland. If you played this game as a child, it might provide a nostalgia injection. If you are a scholar of changing technology, it might be of interest to you as one of the first 3D games.

See you, space cowboy...