Dr. K's Waiting Room

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January celebrates two notable dates in science-fiction history: “National Science Fiction Day” on January 2 to coincide with the birth of world renowned sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov, and 12 January being when Arthur C. Clarke’s HAL 9000 was created. Accordingly, I dedicate January to celebrating sci-fi in all its forms.

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Quick Facts:
Although Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) inspired a bunch of anthropomorphic knock-offs, one of the most well-known was intergalactic rabbit Bucky O’Hare. The brainchild of Larry Hama, Bucky O’Hare was first serialised in science-fiction anthology Echo of Futurepast and, unlike some of his contemporaries, expanded into a wave of action figures, all-too-brief cartoon, and a couple of videogames. Konami’s little known arcade title echoed the beat-‘em-ups that made them a force back in the arcade era, but was seen as a serviceable brawler praised mainly for its cartoonish visuals and for providing an epilogue to the short-lived, fondly remembered cartoon.

The Review:
Bucky O’Hare is a 2D, sidescrolling beat-’em-up that essentially acts as a series finale for the cult classic cartoon. In it, up to four players battle across eight stages, fighting the Toad Empire, who have conquered planets in the “Aniverse”, imprisoned their inhabitants, and stolen the life force of the worlds for nefarious purposes. Players can pick from titular space rabbit Bucky, four-armed Dead-Eye Duck, Bucky’s strangely alluring first-mate, Jenny, and boisterous robot Android First Class/AFC Blinky, each voiced by the voice actors from the cartoon. While each is armed with a different pistol and has a different special attack, all four play exactly the same and your options are naturally limited to three buttons: attack, jump, and special. You can float for a short time by holding the jump button, occasionally hold fire to rapidly shoot (or melee attack up close), press jump and attack together for a jumping kick, and activate your character’s special move as often as you like. Bucky tosses a bomb, Dead-Eye surrounds himself with a temporary energy field, Jenny tosses an energy wave, and Blinky unleashes a flame-like blast. You cannot dash and, as far as I can tell, there are no co-op moves, but temporary power-ups, health restoring orbs, and extra life gold bars occasionally spawn from special doors. These briefly power-up your standard shot or your bomb to deal greater damage, though there are no other weapons to pick up, no objects to throw, and no explosive barrels or destructible objects to mix-up the gameplay. Two stages see you flying around on a jetpack and one has you barrelling through the Toad mothership on a spacebike, avoiding barricades and blasting enemies, though there are no bonus rounds to break up the monotony.

Bucky O’Hare mimics the cartoon to an impressive degree, featuring fully voiced, partially animated cutscenes that include cameos from Willy DuWitt and Mouse (who never appeared in the show). Cutscenes progress the story and raise the stakes between each stage and the sprites are full of life and character, with the Toads fleeing in fear, marching along or saluting, and each playable character sporting colourful idle poses or being scorched by flaming hazards. Everything looks ripped right out of the cartoon and there’s generally always something happening in the background, from battleships looming by or burning up, to Toad tech filling the horizon or the mechanical depths of the heavily fortified Toad Star. Things are a tad clunky, however, as your sprite often disappears when respawning (though this might’ve been an emulation issue) and characters are quite sluggish to control. While most stages simply have you travelling from the left to the right, gunning down nigh-endless enemies, Stage 4 is an autoscroller that forces you along an unstable asteroid belt. You must jump when prompted to avoid falling when the asteroids crumble and fight to rescue Mouse, who makes traversing the level much easier by spawning grassy platforms (though you’ll still have to watch out for meteor showers). When jetpacking in Stage 3, you’re hard pressed to avoid the electrical hazards filling and darting across the screen, and bursts of flame or erratic burning rods often dog your progress when on the ground. Stage 2 introduces diagonal, sloping paths and sees you freeing captive rabbits before fending off enemies and wall-mounted missile turrets in a rising elevator section. Turrets attack from the background or rise from the sand, giant cannons fire explosive shots from behind barricades, electrical hazards sometimes creep across the floor, and enemies occasionally spawn from pods or leap in from passing ships to add to your troubles.

It’s quite impressive seeing how many enemies fill the screen in Bucky O’Hare. The Toad Empire use laser rifles, knives, grenades, and jetpacks and are bolstered by mechs, robots, mines, and starships. Most bosses are cumbersome and simple to defeat, however, such as Al Negator who fires a pistol and whips with his cybernetic tail. Toad Borg appears in Stage 2 and Stage 7, where electricity hazards add a bit more danger to his jumping punch, extending fist, and energy wave attack. After bringing down Stage 3’s climate convertor and taking out a gigantic, rock-like fish-thing, you battle the crazed Total Terror Toad. This dude jumps all over, blocking your shots, tossing a meat cleaver, and comically falling down the screen upon defeat. A handful of slippery, rock-hardened Toads guard Mouse in Stage 4, which is cleared by destroying a heavily armed Toad attack craft, which blasts across the screen and fills the arena with various laser blasts. After making short work of a strangely archaic, gear-tossing tank-like vehicle, Stage 5 culminates in a disappointingly simple fight against the Cyborg Spider, who wanders about firing energy bolts from its abdomen and summons web pillars. Although the race through the Toad mothership is exhilarating and includes a fight against a mechanical, shark-like submarine over boiling lava, the stage ends with a largely forgettable fight against a deadly Toad tank. This thing may be a huge target and might sport a second phase, but that’s just the gear mech again and it simply uses lasers and drill appendages to attack. Although you first encounter the Air Marshall on Stage 5, he flees after you destroy his fortified cockpit and largely avoids the fight in Stage 7. Instead, he floats about in his hovercraft and lets his minions fight for him, which is a bit of a letdown. The game then ends with a three-phase confrontation with Komplex-2-Go. At first, it stomps about causing splash damage with its energy bombs, then it loses its legs and causes flaming rods to rain down, before finally careening about the central core spewing debris and bursting into flames.

Final Thoughts:  
Bucky O’Hare may be a sadly forgotten beat-’em-up title and franchise, but you’re not missing out on all that much if you’ve never played this mindless brawler. While the presentation is top-notch, with the game perfectly aligning with and providing a fitting conclusion to the cartoon, the gameplay is needlessly tedious and simple. It’s mindboggling to me that the developers didn’t try to differentiate the characters more, like making Jenny faster or Blinky slower or Dead-Eye hit harder or shoot faster (he fours have four arms, after all!) It might’ve helped if the game had more power-ups, perhaps allowing you to call in other allies or the Righteous Indignation for assistance, or included a bonus game or two to rack up your score and compete against friends. While the sprites look fantastic and are full of life and colour, the backgrounds are painfully bland until the late game, with only a few memorable moments springled throughout (the asteroid belt, for example, and the Toad Star). I liked that the bosses sported text boxes and voice clips and were huge sprite, but they were disappointingly simple for the most part (though this may have been intentional to balance how grossly outnumbered players will be in this obvious coin-muncher!) Fans of beat-’em-ups will likely find Bucky O’Hare lacking compared to others in the genre, though it has a colourful appeal and is a decent enough way to waste about an hour of your time, especially if you’re a big fan of the cartoon and wanted some closure on it. It can’t be denied that it’s not as good as it could’ve been, though, or that it’s noticeably lacking compared to other brawlers of the time.

My Rating:

Could Be Better

Have you ever played Bucky O’Hare out in the wild? How do you think it holds up compared to other beat-’em-ups and the Nintendo title? Were you also disappointed that the characters all played the same? Which of the boss battles was your favourite? Do you agree that the game is lacking compared to other beat-’em-ups? Were you satisfied with how the game concluded Bucky’s story and would you like to see him back a comeback? What are some of your favourite sci-fi-orientated videogames? Feel free to share your memories of Bucky O’Hare in the comments and then donate to my Ko-Fi to suggest other sci-fi content for the site.