Year: 1991
Genre: Beat ’em up, vehicle driving, platforming
Developers(s): Rare Ltd.
No. of players: 1-2
Published by: Masaya Games
NOTE: I intended to play as far as I could with two players so I could write how that is, but I basically didn’t think anyone but a handful of people -who were unavailable- would be up for it. I might update this later if I can get someone else to play with (netplay, of course). Also, I haven’t beaten this game yet because I haven’t gotten back to playing it yet -got pretty far, though!-. Also, I know the new Battletoads game is out now, but I haven’t played it, so I can’t venture an opinion on it.
In my Rocket Ranger review, I exposited about something I call the UK/European Video Game Design Model Of The 80s/90s. In summary, the UK/European Video Game Design Model Of The 80s/90s dictates that a good game must look and sound exceptionally well, but at the same time it has to be excessively and unfairly difficult to the point of being almost unplayable. Whether this was done because the developers were amateur, uncaring, or sadistic -many were one or more of those-, or to hide how short the games truly were, it just had to be done because it had to be done and that was the end of that. And in the days before Nintendo reined them in, Rareware inflicted the UK/European model on many an NES/Game Boy owner, while working for the likes of Nintendo themselves, Tradewest (the people who killed Double Dragon), Acclaim, and LJN.
It was Tradewest who published the game that would cement Rare in infamy for all time: Battletoads.
Fame and public preference are fickle things. One second you’re the biggest thing since sliced bread; the next, you’re either an Internet meme or public enemy No. 1. Between 1991 and 1993, Battletoads -one of many imitators of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles during that time period- was one of the biggest and most popular video game series in history. Now it’s a punchline for jokes about difficulty, when it’s not being presented as proof-positive that liking old video games is immoral. It’s mostly its own fault. Its games have a very deserved reputation for being ridiculously difficult by way of directly screwing with the player, most infamously exemplified by their original NES outing. However, I have read on The Cutting Room Floor, and I have since confirmed, that the Famicom version of this game is much easier than the NES original; still damn hard, but not torture. On the 26th of July, 2020, I was able to reach level 6 in one sitting, and a day later I got to level 9! So let’s take a look.
The story, which I have taken from the instruction manual of the NES version, is some pretty standard fare. An evil, voluptuous intergalactic conqueror and sorceress called the Dark Queen has been recently defeated by the Galactic Corporation and her forces have made a strategic retreat. On board the Spaceship Vulture, the three Battletoads -Zitz, Rash, and Pimple- and their mentor, Professor T. Bird, are escorting Angelica, Princess of Earth, back home. Pimple, who probably has a bit of a thing for the Princess, takes her out on a joyride through space. Soon enough they’re snatched away into the maw of the Dark Queen’s flagship, the Gargantua, and taken to the planet known as Ragnarok’s World, where they will be held captive inside the Tower of Shadows. Rash (player 1) and Zitz (player 2, even though he’s the team leader) rappel down to the surface of Ragnarok’s World on a rescue mission.
The game is a platformer beat ’em up with some vehicular racing levels. Starting with the third one (the infamous Turbo Tunnel), the levels become long, point-A-to-point-B obstacle courses with checkpoints, while still being either platforming beat ’em up or vehicular. The combat is very basic; you only have a punch -can do combos with it-, a jumping punch, and a headbutt (double tap forward to run and then hit B), but the Battletoads have the ability to “morph” parts of their own bodies to deliver automatic, finishing “smash hits”, such as a giant fist, giant ram horns, a giant boot, or transforming completely into a wrecking ball. The real core of the gameplay lies with the obstacle courses, for which the game certainly gets major points in terms of variety; after Turbo Tunnel, you have platforming in an ice cave, followed by dodging wooden logs and mines on a surfboard, climbing on giant snakes to reach the top of rooms full of spiked balls, Turbo Tunnel again but with missiles and electrical barriers, an elevator shaft with moving girders which have gaps to jump up through, and the inside of a giant plumbing full of gears and killer rubber duckies (another rule of the UK/European Model is to include as much non-sequitur, I-wish-I-was-Monty-Python-esque humour as possible). It adds up to 13 levels, culminating in a final fight with the Dark Queen for the fate of Pimple and Angelica.
The difficulty lies in learning the order, exact moment, and speed at which the obstacles will come at you, and the correct way to dodge each and every single one with pixel-perfect accuracy. The majority of hazards in this game kill you in one hit, from spikes to toxic gas to the rubber duckies. Even the beat ’em up parts are hard; the most basic enemies possible might require upwards of eight to ten hits just to weaken, but they only need to hit you once to drain half your life. And the bosses are some of the most intense you’ll ever see; most of them have one-hit-kill attacks that you have to be extra quick to dodge. The only item that replenishes health are small yellow flies which you can swallow (no pizza or hot dogs here; these are clearly not your regular anthropomorphic animal heroes!), but which only replenish one health point each -you can only have up to six- and which fly across the screen for a couple of minutes before leaving.
To alleviate the difficulty for Famicom players, the speed has been reduced, the number of obstacles has also been reduced, the distance between them has been made slightly longer, and some have been removed altogther. In Turbo Tunnel, for example, there are less walls, and the ones there are are further apart from each other than they were originally, while the ramps have all been moved to the ground and to the center (no floating ramps and no ramps on the sides). On my first time reaching that level in this version, I was able to beat it with only the loss of one continue; in subsequent attempts, I’ve been able to beat it with only the loss of one life. Similarly, in level 6, Karnath’s Lair, the giant snakes are all slow, and there are less spiked balls. In level 8, Intruder Excluder, some of the sentry robots, toxic gas dispensers, and shredding ventilators have been taken out to make certain jumps easier. In level 9, Terra Tubes,, the giant gears that chase you have been made slower, and some more sets of spikes have been eliminated. And so on. The result is comparable to Contra; tough, but not completely impossible to most people -I presume that most people who play old video games are good enough to beat the classics, but not necessarily godlike-. Consequently, I enjoy it far more than the original, to the point that it has allowed me to see the inventive involved in some of its level ideas. Riding a maze of giant snakes and upwards platform jumping through moving gaps are some of the most imaginative ideas for challenges I’ve seen in an old video game.
Of course, this is a UK/European Model game, and that means the graphics and sound are top-est of the top notch. Graphically, the game shows off some neat visual effects such as the 3D ship from the introduction sequence, the movement of the tall robots’ legs, the smooth waving background of the vehicular part of Volkmire’s Inferno, and the rotating Tower of Shadows. Sound effects aren’t very convincing (the Smash Hits are accompanied by a wimpy-sounding “plap” that does not sound like the fist of an enormous, muscular creature), but the music, by Rareware composer David Wise, is some very hard-hitting stuff; the title screen, the first three levels, and the cutscenes all have catchy tunes you’ll be still remembering after many years.
In conclusion: I think this Famicom version of the original Battletoads is the ideal version of the game. Still a challenge to the reflexes and memorization skills, but not as demoralizing as the NES vesion. It hits a certain “sweet spot” between frustration and enjoyment that I think all the best action games on NES have. If you’re planning on buying the real cartridge, though, a word of warning: it’s not easy to find.
Ognimod in English! 