Rating of
4/5
Old School NES Games Reborn
dbarry_22 - wrote on 02/21/14
NES Remix successfully revisits several old games by challenging the player to complete specific tasks as quickly as possible.
When you see NES Remix and the long list of classic Nintendo games included, you probably think you'll get a chance to play the full versions of these games. That is definitely not true. In fact, although there are a few times where you get to complete a full level from one of these games, for the most part the challenges are taken from only a small specific part of a stage or level.
To give you an idea of what you are asked to do in this retro revisit, here's a few examples. In Super Mario Bros you may be asked to collect all the coins on the screen, collect a super mushroom, or get to the end of a level. In The Legend of Zelda, you may be asked to to kill the boss to a dungeon, or collect 10 rupees, or bomb a wall. In Excitebike you may be asked to knock over a few of your competitors or finish a lap. You get the idea. The more challenges you do, the more games open up and more challenges appear.
Here's the list of games included in this remix. They are all from the NES and mostly are from the 80's, meaning they're really old NES games.
Classic games you've probably have played and definitely know:
Super Mario Bros. (23 stages)
The Legend of Zelda (17 stages)
Donkey Kong (7 stages)
Donkey Kong Jr. (7 stages)
Excitebike (10 stages)
Mario Bros. (10 stages)
Games you've probably heard of but maybe haven't played much:
Balloon Fight (13 stages)
Clu Clu Land (8 stages)
Ice Climber (10 stages)
Golf (7stages)
Pinball (6 stages)
Wrecking Crew (11 stages)
Games that make only a brief appearance in the game:
Baseball
Donkey Kong 3
Tennis
Urban Champion (literally only 1 stage in the whole game)
As you can tell from the list, some games have more stages than others. Also, there can be multiple parts to a stage. For example, in Donkey Kong, one part of the stage may have you destroy a barrel followed by another part having you get climb to the top of a level. Then, the times of both parts would be added up for a finishing time. The last 4 games on the list above are only included in Remix and Bonus stages. Remix stages add an element to a challenge that wouldn't appear in the original game. For example, there are a few Super Mario Bros. stages in the Remix list that have Mario constantly run and you must get to the end of the stage without having the ability to slow him down. Or, perhaps part of the stage is blacked out or removed making you do it essentially blind.
Depending on your finishing time you will receive 1 to 3 stars. The more stars you get, the more stages and games are unlocked. And, if you finish the stage in a really fast time you will receive 3 rainbow stars. It took some effort, but I was able to finish all the stages in the game with rainbow stars.
You can post pictures and text with your times to Mii-verse. Some people brag about their times, others post hints as to how to get rainbow stars on a stage, others use it as a way to display art. It was nice to see on some of the stages what time it took to get rainbow stars. Of course, there weren't posts with rainbow stars on every stage so sometimes you had to guess what it would take to get them.
There are a few flaws with the game. There's no multiplayer, even though some of the games in NES Remix originally contained multiplayer. And, in my opinion, a few of these games didn't port well. For example, in Super Mario Bros. on the NES, I'd be able to run and jump with Mario fluidly without issue. As soon as I'd land I could jump again. It'd be flawless. In this game, after I'd land with Mario I'd have to take a step or two before I could jump again. I couldn't figure out if this was input lag or poor programming.
You'll notice poor gameplay with most, if not all of these titles. Remember these are the really old NES games so jumping, landing, and character reactions are often slow. This will be most annoying in Clu Clu Land and Ice Climber. Going for rainbow stars might drive you nuts when your Ice Climber fails to land on a platform, seeming to fall right through it or with Clu Clu Land not being able to swing around quickly enough only because the game doesn't react fast enough.
Old school game flaws aside this game, I found this game quite fun. It brought back a bunch of classic games I've played while introducing me to a few as well. It has a competitive and challenging aspect to it and can be played in short bursts. Depending on how well you want to perform, you can spend easily 10 to 20 hours playing this game. The price of $14.99 isn't exactly cheap, but in this instance I'd say Nintendo isn't ripping you off.
4/5
PS - It's not a coincidence that the full games included in NES Remix are available in the WiiU E-Shop I assure you.
