It’s October, which means it’s Halloween and it’s the duty of every content creator to do some kind of horror-themed content. As a result, I’m taking a look back at WildStorm’s second series of Resident Evil comic books, the four-issue Fire and Ice series published between 2000 and 2001. This time around, WildStorm have ditched the anthology format in favour of a continuous, original story revolving around a bunch of original characters, the hitherto-unknown Special Tactics and Rescue Service (S.T.A.R.S.) Charlie team. Last issue, Falcon’s Charlie team made short work of a circus full of infected zombies and were introduced to a new team member, munitions expert Raquel Fields, who is hiding a hideous mutation on her arm. Having recovered a disk naming two Umbrella facilities (one in Alaska and one in Mexico), the team has split into two and the last issue ended with Falcon’s sub-team face-to-face with a literal Day of the Dead south of the border…
There’s a bit of dissension in the Alaska team…
Issue two opens in Alaska with the second sub-team (the knife-wielding Australian Quan Williamson, former zoo security guard turned semi-superhuman bad-ass Patrick Brady, and team leader Rosa Cardenas) riding snowmobiles down the frigid mountains of Alaska. There’s a little bit of dissension in the early going as Quan, whom we were informed through a few dialogue boxes and brief snippets of his backstory has a bit of a problem with authority, takes umbrage with Rosa’s orders. However, a stern word from her is enough to quell that and he heads out while a monstrous bear watches on.
Raquel lops off her bony growth, which is clearly the best solution…
The story then jumps back to Mexico where Falcon’s team (including newcomer Raquel and tech-savvy Jesse Alcorn) open fire on the legions of zombies in an ironic perversion of the Day of the Dead festival. Oddly, despite Raquel being the munitions expert, it is Jesse who prepares a bomb while Raquel covers him; however, while doing so, she discovers a strange, bony growth coming out of her arm and decides the best way to deal with it is to chop it off with a meat cleaver! Meanwhile, back in Alaska, Brady tries to allay Rosa’s concerns over Quan’s absence by theorising that he has a crush on her; she dismisses this, however, and suggests, in a near-inaudible whisper, that she would be more interested if Brady had a crush on her. We’re only on the second issue, guys, are we really doing this sort of thing? I guess it’s an easy, cliché, artificial way of creating some kind of investment in these characters so we care more when their lives are in jeopardy or they get infected or die but it just kind of comes out of nowhere as I’m not really seeing anything that suggests any kind of sexual tension or attraction between any of these characters.
Once again WildStorm awkwardly shoe-horns in the puzzle aspects of the videogames.
Anyway, they are interrupted by some kind of flying creature; it’s not really revealed what it is but it’s apparently threatening enough for the two to rush back to their snowmobiles to get their weapons. However, they are stopped in their tracks when they find they are surrounded by large, monstrous bears and bipedal walruses whales, and even a particularly fearsome looking penguin! Back in Mexico, Raquel blows the explosives but gets into it with Jesse when he inexplicable runs towards the explosion rather than staying clear (honestly, the artwork doesn’t make it massively clear what’s going on in these panels). Falcon quells the dissension and gets the team back on track towards their primary goal (…pretty sure we just saw that with the other sub-team…). Raquel draws Falcon’s attention to a particular piece of artwork in one of the ruined houses that bares a set of runes that Falcon says match up with those identified by Jill Valentine and Chris Redfield from the Spenser Mansion. This despite the impossibility of even spotting such a small, insignificant set of etchings and Jesse scoffing at the importance of the painting.
They couldn’t have just driven straight there?
The clue leads the team to Umbrella’s laboratory, a temple-like structure somewhere in Mexico, and while I like the attempt to call back to the puzzle solving elements of the videogames…the team had a disk of data that led them to Alaska and Mexico. They acquired it from Umbrella so why were they just knobbing around in town rather than going directly to the lab? Why did they need to find an obscure clue to lead them to the obviously ominous structure? It just feels like they could have driven through the Day of the Dead festival and fought those zombies on the way to the lab and weaved the puzzle elements in some other way, like opening the entrance or something.
Brady knocks out a monstrous whale and then stupidly trips and knocks himself out!
The story jumps back to Alaska, where Quan has just finished setting up the “evac helipad” (which just looks like some lights stuffed into the snow) when he gets called back to assist Rosa and Brady with their situation. It turns out that whatever has infected these animals hasn’t just allowed whales and walruses to walk on land but also allows penguins to fly (so I guess the thing that flew at them earlier was a penguin, then…). Thankfully, my earlier criticisms regarding Brady’s suitability as a S.T.A.R.S team member comes to the forefront here as, though he’s able to blow the leg off a mutated wolf…thing and knock out a whale with the butt of his gun, he stupidly trips and falls in an effort to save Rosa from being beaten and skewered to death by a bear and walrus. As he falls, he smashes his face on an ice-hard rock but it only stuns him; in other comics and media (and in real life) this would probably kill him but I guess Raccoon City puts a lot of funding and effort into training and toughening up their zoo security guards.
Klaus and Venk return from WidStorm’s previous mini series.
Luckily, a mysterious individual and his sharp-shooting comrade, Mr. Venk, tranquilise the creatures and load them, and the S.T.A.R.S. team members, into their van to transport them back to preserve Whitlam’s research. If you’ve read WildStorm’s original Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine, or my weekly reviews of each issue of that series, you’ll recognise the names and faces being tossed around in these last few panels: the unnamed, monocle-wearing man is Klaus; he and Mr. Venk appeared in WildStorm’s original comic series where they recruited the troubled youth Dexter Whitlam (who had transformed to and from a “G”-like creature using a stolen sample of Umbrella’s G-Virus) to Umbrella in issue five.
This issue’s art is bland and lacking the gore that made the first mini series bearable.
I quite enjoy how this series allows WildStorm to expand upon the roles of the original characters they created to fit into the Resident Evil lore; as I mentioned last week, none of these characters are particularly engaging or visually interesting thanks to them holding on to a lot of the worst one-dimensional clichés of comic books of the nineties (bulging muscles, a disdain for authority, and a penchant for leather and violence) but I’d much rather see these minor characters getting a bit more of the spotlight than WildStorm creating even more uninspired original characters. What lets this issue down, though, is the artwork; the art wasn’t particularly striking in the first issue but it’s even worse here. While Lee Bermejo (who would go on to much bigger and better things at DC Comics) and Shawn Crystal make decent use of shadows and lighting, the creatures are bland, boring, and rendered very gloomy; it’s not always clear what’s attacking the characters or what is going on, and everything looks painfully simple and dull. It also doesn’t help that the issue doesn’t really have any of the blood, guts, and gore that the original mini series showcased; the macabre spectacle tends to salvage the lacklustre writing of WildStorm’s Resident Evil comics and, without it, we’re left with these clichéd, one-dimensional characters who are trying way too hard to look, sound, and act tough rather than exuding the effortless cool and charisma of Resident Evil’s most popular characters.
My Rating:
⭐⭐
Rating: 2 out of 5.
Could Be Better
Are you familiar with WildStorm’s Fire and Ice Resident Evil comic books? What are your thoughts on the plot and characters so far? Which obscure or forgotten Resident Evil videogame or character would you like to see expanded upon in other media? Do you have a favourite piece of ancillary Resident Evil media? Drop a comment down below and come back next Tuesday for my review of issue three.
Released: May 2019 Originally Released: December 1989 Developer: Konami Digital Entertainment/Konami Industry Co. Ltd Original Developer: Konami Also Available For: Family Computer Disk System (Famicom), Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Wii, Nintendo Wii U, PC, and PlayStation 4
The Background: After dramatically altering the straight-forward action/platforming of the original Castlevania (Konami, 1986) with the awkward and frustrating Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest (ibid, 1987), Konami went back to the drawing board for the third outing and, thankfully, opted to return to the formula that worked so well in the original game. What resulted was one the more well-regarded titles in the series; Castlevania III made up for a lot of the failings of the second game by not only ditching the role-playing elements of Castlevania II but also featuring the unique ability to ally with one of three other additional characters, each with their own strengths and weaknesses, and being able to switch to them on the fly, and also offering branching paths for the player to take. I was primarily aware of Castlevania III’s due to Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (Konami Computer Entertainment Tokyo, 1997), which continued the story of Alucard and directly referred to the events of the third game, and its influence on Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon (Inti Creates, 2018), which was, basically, a spiritual successor to Castlevania III. After being unimpressed with Castlevania II, however, I was happy to just return to the tried-and-true gameplay of the original Castlevania.
The Plot: A prequel to the original Castlevania, Castlevania III sees Simon Belmont’s ancestor, Trevor, arming himself with the legendary Vampire Killer whip and battling the dark forces of Count Dracula. On the way, he teams up with one of three new characters, each with their own motivations for confronting Dracula and, together, they journey to end Dracula’s curse.
Gameplay: Ditching the role-playing elements of the second game, Castlevania III is, once again, a 2D sidescrolling action/platformer; this time, however, players assume the role of Trevor Belmont, Simon’s ancestor. This doesn’t really alter the core gameplay that greatly, though; it seems clunkiness runs in the Belmont family tree as Trevor is just as stocky, weighty, and cumbersome as his successor, and also attacks enemies with the same whip and sub-weapons as Simon. What is new, however, is that the game offers the player the chance to take different paths at various times; the path you choose leads you to encounter not only different enemies and obstacles, but also an encounter with one of three additional playable characters. Trevor can team up with the sorceress Sypha Belnades, the acrobatic Grant DaNasty, or the dhampir Alucard and, at the press of a button, the player can (sl-ow-ly) switch over to controlling this character. While none of them can use sub-weapons, they each have their own abilities that, like the Vampire Killer, can be upgraded to deal more damage.
Trevor’s allies each have their own strengths and weaknesses.
Unlike in Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, you can only team Trevor up with one of these characters and they all share the same health bar and heart counter. They each have their own strengths and weaknesses, as well: Sypha attacks with a magic wand and can, eventually, unleash magical attacks upon her enemies but isn’t much for jumping; Grant can cling to walls and ceilings but is limited to stabbing at enemies from close range; and Alucard tosses fireballs and can transform into a bat to avoid enemies and obstacles entirely but this drains your hearts considerably. Yes, the hearts are back once again; luckily, there’s no need to waste them buying weapons and upgrades this time. Instead, you once again use hearts as your ammo and replenish your character’s health by breaking walls and finding pot roasts. As in the original game, the player is also fighting against a time limit, though I found this to be quite generous and never actually experienced a time over. Castlevania III offers far more instances of auto-scrolling than its predecessors; more than once, you’re tasked with out-racing a rising or falling screen, all while respawning enemies wait to swarm you at a moment’s notice. Jump too soon and you’ll die, either from plummeting to your death or touching the equally deadly top of the screen, but you’re not always safe on platforms either as Castlevania III loves to have blocks crumble beneath you or flip around to stab you with deadly spikes.
Castlevania III places greater emphasis on tricky platforming.
Such areas are often accompanied by broken staircases and fireball-spewing pillars; rather than taking the time to destroy these, its far better to watch their patterns and time your jumps to avoid them entirely. This is made all the more troublesome by the fact that it seems far more difficult to climb up and down stairs in this game; previously, I experienced no real issues with this mechanic but, in Castlevania III, I constantly found myself slipping down a bottomless pit rather than going down stairs as I intended. It doesn’t help that going down stairs seems a lot more troublesome than going up, and Castlevania III is far more vertically layered than its predecessors. There’s a couple of other obstacles to contend with here as well, most notably the rotating gears in the clock tower and the swinging pendulums that you must jump to (while avoiding erratic bats) to reach the final staircase to Dracula’s throne room. The path you choose will determine which enemies and obstacles you’ll come up against, lending the game a much greater degree of replayability than its predecessors as you can experiment with different paths and different characters on each playthrough.
Graphics and Sound: Castlevania III is a far more ambitious title than its predecessors; there are a variety of environments here, and even Dracula’s castle has received an upgrade in its details, obstacles, and colour palette. This makes the game far more detailed and ambitious than previous Castlevania titles, which can make it difficult to spot your character’s sprite against some of the more meticulous backgrounds, especially as some areas of the game start you on the right-hand side of the screen, rather than the traditional left.
8-bit Castlevania has never looked better.
Thankfully, the game seems a lot more stable than its predecessor but is still, clearly, pushing the limits of its 8-bit hardware. There is far less slow down and sprite flickering than in Castlevania II but it is still present, mainly because the enemies constantly respawn in most areas and, when these areas are filled with other obstacles or moving elements, the game can struggle a bit with rendering everything but it’s nowhere near as noticeably or obtrusive as in Castlevania II. Castlevania III features easily the most ambitious soundtrack of the series so far; composer Hidenori Maezawa helped to create a custom VRC6 coprocessor to provide the game with five extra sound channels, effectively doubling the sound channels available in the Famicon version. While this had to be downgraded slightly for the NES version, Castlevania III still features some of the most memorable tracks and versions of Castlevania’s iconic themes, resulting in one of the most impressive 8-bit soundtracks of the time.
Enemies and Bosses: Like Simon, Trevor will battle a slew of gothic and supernatural enemies and bosses, many of which featured prominently in the first game; he’ll come up against skeletons (who throw bones, wield swords, or reassemble themselves), the always-annoying bats, crows, and Medusa Heads, and giant spiders (who spit out smaller spiders this time, rather than webs…) Trevor also battles against swarms of zombies, fishmen (who hide underwater and attack with fireballs), and axe-throwing knights but he’ll also encounter some decidedly tougher enemies; flying, shield-wielding gargoyles, hunchback-like goblins who bounce around the screen, and mud men, for example.
Castlevania III‘s bosses more than make up for Castlevania II‘s.
While Castlevania II largely abandoned boss battles, Castlevania III brings them back in full force…but makes the equally disappointing mistake of repeating many of these battles. You’ll battle the Cyclops and Mummy more than once (which is a shame as these are relatively simple or annoying fights, respectively) and battle new versions of the Queen Medusa, Giant Bat, and Frankenstein Monster. However, you’ll also battle against the Skull Knight and the two Water Dragons; while this first battle is easy enough, the latter is made all the more difficult by the fact that it’s pretty easy for your character to take a hit and be sent careening to the deadly water below.
You’ll have to defeat Grant and Alucard to recruit them.
To recruit Grant and Alucard, you’ll first have to defeat them in battle. Similarly, you’ll also have to fight against a doppelgänger of your character; even if you switch characters during this fight, the double switches accordingly, meaning you can’t just tank Sypha with Trevor’s superior attacks. I found this to be one of the more difficult boss battles in the game, easily up there with Death’s first form and the gauntlet against two Mummies, a Cyclops, and the demonic Leviathan. After being a pitiful shell of his former self in Castlevania II, the Grim Reaper returns with a vengeance here; not only do you have to battle him and his maniacal scythes in a startlingly accurate repeat of the fight in Castlevania, you’ll also have to fight Death’s second form. Luckily, however this is simply a giant floating skull that spits scythes at you and isn’t too difficult…providing you survived Death’s first form with enough health!
Dracula now has three forms to contend with!
Similarly, Dracula is now a far more formidable foe; this time, you’ll face the Count in a three-stage boss battle. In the first, he surrounds the player with pillars of fire, spawning a third right underneath you; in the second, Dracula’s becomes a floating mass of blood-spitting heads; for his final form, Dracula becomes a gigantic, demonic background element who zaps at you with laser bolts and manipulates the ground. As in the first game, Dracula’s only weak point is his head, meaning it’s best to have the axe for this boss fight; the most difficult thing about Dracula’s first form is making sure you have enough room to manoeuvre between the pillars of fire to avoid the third pillar. The second form isn’t too bad but it’s best to run underneath it so you don’t get cornered. The final form is pretty simple but, like the Water Dragons, is made more annoying and difficult by the presence of bottomless pits. Despite this, though, it’s pretty easy to dodge the Count’s attacks and lob axes at his head until he’s finished.
Power-Ups and Bonuses: Each character can upgrade their attacks to deal more damage, as is the Castlevania tradition; it’s worth noting that, if you’ve upgraded the Vampire Killer and switch to your partner character, the upgrade won’t carry over and you’ll have to grab the upgrades for your partner as well. This is very much encouraged; I partnered with Sypha for my first playthrough and never upgraded her attacks, meaning she just uselessly smacked skeletons with her stupid little wand. When I switched to Alucard, I upgraded his fireball and it became a very handy spread of fireballs, so it’s best to upgrade each of your characters. All the sub-weapons from the first Castlevania return as well; this time, I found the axe the most useful as there seems to be more flying enemies, or enemies placed above you, or more uses for this compared to the Holy Water.
Additional Features: Like its predecessor, Castlevania III features a password system, which allows players to continue their game after a game over. Inputting certain player names and passwords will also grant you extra lives, allow you to skip to certain levels with different partners, or jump to the game’s “Hard Mode”. Yep, like the first game, once you clear Castlevania III and view one of the game’s four different endings (each of which is pretty positive, in comparison to Castlevania II’s endings) and the game’s credits, you’ll be plonked right back into the first stage in Hard Mode. As you’d expect, enemies deal more damage to you in this mode and, while some are missing, you’ll encounter tougher enemies a lot sooner. The Xbox One Castlevania Anniversary Collection has four Achievements available for this game, one for finishing the game with each of the game’s partners and one for finishing it with just Trevor, and the same features available for the other games in the collection (save states, frames, and display options).
The Summary: After Castlevania II turned the franchise on its head with its annoying day/night system, barren castles, and reliance on obscure clues and role-playing elements, Castlevania III is a fantastic, and much welcome, return to form. Unlike the sequel, this prequel takes everything that worked in the first game and improves upon it; there are branching paths, more playable characters, more options available to you, and vastly improved environments. It’s clear that Castlevania III is pushing the NES to its limits and is an extremely ambitious title for an 8-bit system; Konami would go on to improve upon many of these elements in later, graphically-superior games in the series, but it all started here. The bosses are better, the environments are more interesting and varied, the characters add some much-needed variety and, despite the same janky controls that plagued these earlier Castlevania titles, this is clearly the best of the 8-bit Castlevania games and, thanks to the different paths and character options available, offers far more replayability than its predecessors.
My Rating:
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Great Stuff
What did you think about Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse back in the day? Did you play it on the NES back in the day? Which of the four characters did you prefer? Whatever you think about the game, or Castlevania, in general, leave a comment below and check out my other Castlevania reviews.
Earlier this year, in a shameless attempt to grab more views around the release of the slightly disappointing Resident Evil 3 remake (Capcom, 2020), I did a weekly review of a five-issue comic series based on Capcom’s popular survival horror franchise which was published between 1998 and 1999. Given that, at the time, there were only two Resident Evil titles to work from, with the third still in production, Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine didn’t have a lot of material to work with and, whether through a direct mandate from Capcom or a conscious decision on the part of its creative team, largely decided against including direct adaptations of the source material and, instead, preferred to tell spin-offs, side stories, and interludes. Most of these, honestly, didn’t really add much, if anything, to the series lore; we saw what happened in the diner moments before Claire Redfield arrived in Raccoon City, for example, and follow Jill Valentine, Chris Redfield, and Barry Burton on a zombie slaughtering tour across Europe and Leon S. Kennedy fight giant, mutated bat creatures but a lot of it fell far from the mark.
Honestly, Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine was at its best when it was telling recapped, truncated, or heavily modified adaptations of the firsttwo games and was saved from mediocrity by some truly stunning and gory artwork. Although the series was short-lived, WildStorm revisited the Resident Evil franchise with a four-issue follow-up series published between 2000 and 2001 that, as it’s Halloween this month, I’ll be looking into. The Fire and Ice series focused entirely on original characters, some of whom even return from Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine, and featured many of the same writers and artists as that first five-issue series, so it’ll be interesting to see if WildStorm have better success this time around with their original characters and stories than they did last time or if they’ll spew out more drivel like Jill inexplicably battling with a werewolf.
Fire and Ice introduces us to a third S.T.A.R.S. arm, Charlie team.
Issue one opens up with the hitherto-unknown Special Tactics and Rescue Service (S.T.A.R.S.) Charlie team battling against circus freaks infected with the Umbrella Corporation’s infamous G-Virus. The team, led by Falcon, consists of the knife-wielding Australian Quan Williamson, the high-kicking Rosa Cardenas, the tech-geek Jesse Alcorn, and Patrick Brady, who lugs around a comically large energy blasting bazooka.
From simple security guard to highly-train, semi-superhuman S.T.A.R.S. member.
If Brady sounds familiar, it’s because he appeared in Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine where he was a simple security guard at the Raccoon City Zoo; although he managed to survive against a hoard of infected zoo animals, he was bitten by an infected prairie dog and exposed to the G-Virus. Luckily, he was saved by Leon (…because of course he was) and a S.T.A.R.S medical team were able to reverse the G-Virus effects (…despite the fact that they had failed in every other attempt). Somehow, as a side effect, Brady could also “sense the presence of the G-Virus” which, alongside his “natural fighting skills” (I mean, he was a security guard so I guess he had some training but I doubt it’s anything like Leon or Chris’s. Plus, I remember him panicking and running a lot in his first appearance…) got him a spot on Charlie team.
Charlie team is…colourful, if nothing else.
After filling us in on Brady’s story, the comic then spends the next few pages introducing us to the rest of the team: Falcon, a muscle-bound archetypal action hero who seems like Terry Crews before Terry Crews was a thing and also briefly appeared in Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine, is a former Army Ranger who was betrayed by his superiors and framed for an unexplained “international incident” before being inexplicably recruited by S.T.A.R.S. Rosa Cardenas is a bad-ass goth chick; a Mexican raised on a Hopi Indian reserve who is proficient in “tracking skills” who has a personal grudge against Umbrella and their experiments after her mother was killed in the aforementioned diner during the Raccoon City outbreak. Quan Williamson is not only Australian but also of “Thai descent” who left behind his promising academic career and his love of vehicles and machinery because of his natural aversion to authority and his desire to form a band, though his life was forever changed after he witnessed Leon’s fight against the aforementioned bat-men. The violent and slightly unhinged Jesse Alcorn also has a disdain for authority bordering on the psychotic as he used his “amazing computer skills” to hack in NORAD and nearly caused a nuclear war, after which he was given a choice: life in prison or join the S.T.A.R.S. Charlie team.
Falcon is angered that Umbrella were waiting for them and specifically name him.
By this point, you might have noticed a common thread being weaved throughout the members of Charlie team: not only are they somewhat reminiscent of Task Force X (known by their more colourful title as the Suicide Squad) from DC Comics, each of them has either briefly featured on WildStorm’s previous Resident Evil comic series or has some link, however tenuous, with an existing and popular Resident Evil character. This reminds me very much of the way Paul W. S. Anderson would rope in popular Resident Evil characters like Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory), Carlos Olivera (Oded Fehr), Claire and Chris Redfield (Ali Larter and Wentworth Miller), and Leon Kennedy (Johann Urb) into his later Resident Evil movies (2002 to 2016) simply to give their approval to Alice (Milla Jovovich), the all-action star of his film series. As in those films, this association does very little to endear me to these original characters as all it does is make me wish I was watching (or reading about) the actual Resident Evil characters rather than these knock-offs. Frustrated by the onslaught of circus freaks and animals looking to tear their throats out, Falcon gives the order for the team to deploy a series of bombs and blow the whole circus to cinders. In the aftermath, they discover a mortally wounded Umbrella employee who, with his dying breath, not only hints that Umbrella were aware and prepared specifically for Charlie team’s arrival but also drops Falcon’s name, sending him into a rage.
Raquel is assigned to a sub-team but is hiding a mysterious infection.
Back at their headquarters, Falcon introduces the team to their newest member, munitions export Raquel Fields, who essentially acts as the audience surrogate for the remainder of the issue as Falcon gives a brief introduction to his team members and then delves into a full-two page spread recapping the events of the firsttwoResident Evil games and detailing Charlie team’s overall mission goal: to track down, and put down, Umbrella once and for all. Although she claims to have missed the opening mission due to being knocked out in a training session, it turns out that Raquel is undergoing a severe mutation from a wound she sustained that she is going to great lengths to keep hidden from her team-mates. Having acquired a disk from the Umbrella agents at the circus, the team is then split into two sub-teams to investigate Umbrella’s laboratories in Alaska and Mexico, where they are apparently working on developing new viral strains. Rosa is placed in charge of Quan and Patrick in Alaska while Jesse, Raquel, and Falcon head south of the border; it’s this scene that really hammers home just how militaristic S.T.A.R.S. actually is; this was briefly shown in Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine but, generally, especially in the original Resident Evil videogames, the team always seemed to be more like a black ops arm of the Raccoon City police department rather than an extension of the U.S. military (even though they clearly had ties to the military).
The issue ends on a cliffhanger with a literal Day of the Dead!
The issue ends on a cliffhanger as, when Falcon and the others arrive in Mexico, they discover that the annual Day of the Dead festival has become a literal Day of the Dead as the townsfolk are actually flesh hungry zombies! The final page of the issue is a teaser for issue two (which hints at a Tyrant but…well, we’ll see) and a quick blurb from editor Jeff Mariotte introducing readers to this new mini series.
The action is loud and bloody…when it actually happens.
Disappointingly, the first issue of Resident Evil: Fire and Ice contains more exposition than action; it reminds me of the first issue of Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine, which was more interested in retelling events than actually showing us them directly and creating tenuous links to characters we know and love from the videogames. However, when the action does kick in, it’s just as bloody and explosive as ever and the artwork is decent enough, for the most part, but the character designs are extremely derivative and very nineties for a comic released in 2000. Each character is decked out in bulging muscles or impractical leather and buckle-clad outfits, wielding massive weapons and sporting such impractical accessories as eye goggles and a Mohawk. Visually, it allows you to easily tell each character apart, which is especially helpful when you’re dealing with original characters, but none of them exude the simple aesthetic of the earlier Resident Evil characters who didn’t need anything more lavish than practical, military-grade hardware and gear.
My Rating:
⭐⭐
Rating: 2 out of 5.
Could Be Better
Did you read Fire and Ice when it first released? If so, what did you think of Charlie team? Did you ever read the earlier Resident Evil comics published by WildStorm? Which Resident Evil videogame or character would you like to see a comic book series about? Do you have a favourite piece of ancillary Resident Evil media? Drop a comment down below and be sure to check out my review of issue two.
Released: May 2019 Originally Released: August 1987 Developer: Konami Digital Entertainment/Konami Industry Co. Ltd Original Developer: Konami Also Available For: Family Computer Disk System (Famicom), Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Wii, Nintendo Wii U, PC, and PlayStation 4
The Background: If Castlevania (Konami, 1986) has a reputation for being one of the more difficult games of the days of classic 8-bit home consoles then Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest has an even more infamous reputation for being, perhaps, the most frustrating and confusing title in the entire series. Famously lambasted by the Angry Video Game Nerd for its obscure hints, non-linear gameplay, and frustrating gameplay mechanics, Castlevania II stands as the black sheep of the franchise. Castlevania II follows a trend in NES series of the late-eighties in that, rather than improve and define the gameplay mechanics and structure of the first game, it takes a dramatic right turn; in this case, into a more non-linear, adventure-style role-playing game (RPG). We saw a similar thing happen with Super Mario Bros. 2 (Nintendo EAD, 1988) and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link (ibid, 1987), which both featured deviations from the gameplay styles of their predecessors. Rather than being a relatively straight-forward action/platformer, Castlevania II places far more emphasis on grinding for experience points (EXP), levelling up, purchasing items, talking to non-playable characters (NPCs), and using key items in obscure ways. Because of this, and the game’s dodgy reputation, I can’t say that I was too excited to delve into this game; to make it easier, I’ll admit to using a guide so I would know where I was going and what I was doing, which was enough to make this a more annoying experience than playing the first game.
The Plot: Seven years after defeating Count Dracula in the original Castlevania, Simon Belmont finds himself suffering from a fatal curse placed upon him by the evil Count. To break the curse, he must “prossess” Dracula’s five body parts in order to resurrect, and defeat, the Count once more.
Gameplay: Castlevania II is a sidescrolling action/adventure platformer; players once again control the legendary vampire hunter Simon Belmont, who controls largely the same. Once again, Simon is a slow, plodding character with little control when leaping from platform to platform, and suffering from the same annoying trend of throwing himself backwards into bottomless pits or deadly bodies of water when hit with attacks.
Simon again attacks with his whip or a number of sub-weapons.
Simon primarily attacks enemies with his trademark whip, the Vampire Killer, and can throw a variety of sub-weapons at his enemies. As before, the whip can be upgraded to deal greater damage but, in a twist, this must be done by purchasing the upgrades from NPCs. Similarly, the sub-weapons are acquired either by defeating one of the game’s handful of bosses or buying them from NPCs, placing a greater emphasis on the collecting of hearts. As Simon defeats enemies, they will drop hearts; these can then be used to buy new weapons and upgrades, as well as being your ammo for using sub-weapons. As items and upgrades come at a high price, you will be finding yourself farming for hearts a lot throughout the course of the game. This is helpful, in one way, as Simon now gains EXP for dispatching enemies; with enough EXP, he will level up, further increasing his health bar. However, working against him is the fact that, at regular intervals, the game will suddenly succumb to the curse of night. When night-time falls, the enemies deal greater damage, take more hits to defeat, increase in number, and even swarm the game’s usually safe towns. The towns also close up at night; the normally-vague and fearful NPCs hide indoors, the church (which is the only place Simon can refill his health) and other buildings shut their doors, and Simon is forced to sit and wait for the sun to rise and dispel the curse. This night-time mechanic has, rightfully, drawn the ire of many commentators over the years and rightfully so; it’s an annoying, frustratingly awkward mechanic that takes way too long to load up, lasts for far too long, and generally results in you either standing around like a moron waiting for the night to end or battling tougher enemies to gain more hearts.
The game’s “clues” leave a lot to be desired…
Compounding the matter is the fact that the game’s translation leaves a lot to be desired; NPCs dish out incredible vague and obtuse “clues” that really don’t help your progress through the game. You’re given items with little explanation as to their purpose and are required to use them in some really weird ways; without a guide, I really don’t see how anyone would be able to figure out that you need to kneel down by a body of water or in front of an impassable wall with a certain gem in order to access new areas. All this might be bearable if the game made up for it with some interesting levels and dungeons but it really doesn’t; the bulk of Castlevania II’s enemies are found in the overworld and all of the castles look and feel the same. You’ll jump across the same spiked pits, attack the same enemies, and acquire Dracula’s accursed body parts in the same way (throwing a wooden stake at a glowing orb, of course). Hell, the final castle doesn’t even have any enemies; it’s just a minor inconvenience of a maze leading to an anti-climatic battle with the Count himself. Depending on how long you take to beat the game, you’ll be treated to a variety of endings; sometimes, Simon prevails but succumbs to his wounds, others he will triumph unabated. This is probably where Castlevania II’s replayability comes into play as you’re encouraged to get the best ending but, considering how annoying it is to slog through this bland adventure, I can’t say that I’m too interested in trying to beat it any faster or better (or play it ever again, for that matter).
Graphics and Sound: Castlevania II doesn’t really improve upon its predecessor much; it looks, feels, and sounds pretty much exactly the same, with the same limited sprite animations and colour palette.
There’s a lot of level variety but some annoying graphical bugs.
If anything, Castlevania II is a graphical step down as there are often so many enemies and sprites on the screen at the same time that you’ll notice some sever sprite flickering and super annoying slow-down. As if Simon wasn’t slow enough, he’ll now jitter through the air and, often, it feels like you’re walking through wet mud; it can massively affect your trajectory when trying to clear deadly pits or spikes and mean the difference between a decent health bar and struggling to progress. At the same time, the game does feature a soundtrack to rival its predecessor; “Bloody Tears” has since become a recurring theme in the franchise and I like that the music changes when the game shifts from day to night but, as good as the music and sound effects are, they’re not enough to really increase the appeal of this game.
Enemies and Bosses: Once again, Simon will battle against a slew of gothic and supernatural enemies; he’ll mostly encounter skeletons and spear-wielding knights in the castles and areas he visits but will also battle mummies, bats, floating eyeballs, and Medusa Heads as you progress. Boss encounters are few and far between and a pitiful inclusion compared to the battles you endure in Castlevania; there are only three boss battles in this game, two of which can be bypassed completely (though you’ll miss out on two of the game’s stronger sub-weapons), and all three are pretty pathetic compared to the first game. This is best exemplified in the battle against the Grim Reaper, which was an annoying test of my endurance and skill in Castlevania.
Bosses are few and far between, with even the dreaded Count being pitifully easy.
Here, Death is slow, predictable, and easily dispatched after a few hits. Similarly, Dracula is renowned for his ludicrous ease in this game; granted, this battle is potentially harder if you didn’t acquire the Golden Knife sub-weapon but even without it, you can land a ridiculous number of his as Dracula spawns into the arena and defeat him before he can even launch a single attack. It’s a dismal end to a dismal title and as though the developers knew that gamers would struggle with the game’s level-up system, day/night cycle, and more obscure elements so over compensated by significantly reducing the number and difficulty of the game’s bosses.
Power-Ups and Bonuses: As before, Simon can upgrade the Vampire Killer as he progresses to new towns and visits new areas. Certain NPCs will sell you an upgrade that turns the whip into a chain and its eventual strongest form, the Flame Whip. However, to acquire these upgrades, you’ll need to not only locate these NPCs (usually they’re hidden behind blocks or walls that must be destroyed with Holy Water) but also have enough hearts to purchase the upgrade. Similarly, the first game’s sub-weapons return but must be purchased with hearts, which are also necessary to use these items. However, perhaps because of his pivotal the Holy Water is for checking for illusionary blocks, the Holy Water is free to use so you can spam it as much as you like. There’s some new power-ups here as well, though, like the powerful Sacred Flame or the Laurels, which make Simon invincible for a short time, and cloves of Garlic (which, when used in the right place at the right time, spawn an NPC who will provide Simon with free upgrades).
Additional Features: Castlevania II features a password save system, which was probably very useful back in the day when most gamers were renting the game or, lacking a guide, were unable to finish the game in one sitting. Unlike the first game, though, there is no “Hard Mode” awaiting you; the game is hard enough as it is and you’ll need to be really good at it in order to beat it fast enough to get the game’s best ending. If you’re playing the version featured in the Xbox One Castlevania Anniversary Collection, as I did, you can earn an Achievement for completing the game and make liberal use of the save state feature to chart your progress and come back to where you left off whenever you want. There are also a number of frames and display options, though they don’t really do much to improve the appeal of this game.
The Summary: No matter how you look at it, Castlevania II is a poor follow-up to Castlevania. I was expecting a lot worse but I can’t deny that the game is far less fun that the original; it’s a slog to get through, even with a guide, and just a far more boring experience. Perhaps if the game made better use of its castles and included challenging bosses it would have more appeal. The day/night cycle is annoying but I like the added challenge it provided; the problem was that, most of the time, I just stood around like an idiot waiting for the sun to rise so I could heal up and continue. Any game that means you have to stand stationary for minutes on end is a bad game for me, and Castlevania II asks way too much from players; I get that a lot of RPGs and games back then were vague and non-linear, but this game takes the piss with its terrible “hints” and massively obscure item usage. I can’t see myself returning to this title again any time soon.
My Rating:
⭐⭐
Rating: 2 out of 5.
Could Be Better
Did you play Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest back in the day? Do you agree with the reputation is has for being one of Castlevania’s weakest titles or do you feel it’s an under-rated gem? Which of the titles in the series do you consider to be the best, worst, hardest, or easiest? Whatever you think, drop a comment below and check out my other Castlevania reviews.
Well, here we are; it’s been a long few weeks but we’ve finally reached the last issue of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Color Classics Volume One (Eastman, Laird, et al, 2018). This full-colour volume collects the first seven issues of Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird’s initial run of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) comics, plus two one-shot issues featuring Raphael and Michelangelo (here referred to as “Michaelangelo”). Unlike the family-friendly TMNT that took childhoods by storm through the cartoons and action figures, these turtles are darker, far more serious, all dress in red, and routinely cut down their foes while also getting bloodied and battered up. These initial comics books introduced many TMNT staples and plot points that would be heavily featured in the first two live-action movies, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Barron, 1990) and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze (Pressman, 1991), as well as inspiring many episodes of the cartoons that followed. We’ve seen the TMNT confront and kill the Shredder, the dishonourable ninja behind the death of their master Splinter’s master, battle Baxter Stockman’s robotic Mousers, befriend and turn to April O’Neil when Splinter goes missing, and be teleported across space by the T.C.R.I.’s (alien brains inside robotic bodies) and battle the dinosaur-like Triceratons! We’ve also seen Raphael form a begrudging alliance with Casey Jones, a violent and sadistic masked vigilante, Mike deliver some Christmas cheer, and now, finally, it looks like the TMNT are finally on their way back to the familiar sights and sounds of New York City.
The TMNT arrive with some uninvited guests…
Speaking of which, issue seven opens up outside the T.C.R.I. building where the police and national guard have arrived and established a perimeter on account of the massive, suspicious beam of energy that had struck the building like a bolt of lighting from the sky. This is, of course, the Transmat Device finally beaming the TMNT back home; the T.C.R.I.’s stand ready to stun the turtles (since the last time they met, the TMNT attacked them in a frenzy after discovering Splinter being held in their facility) but are shocked to see that they didn’t just bring the TMNT back to New York…they also brought the TMNT’s new ally, Professor Honeycutt, and a whole bunch of angry Triceratons!
While the T.C.R.I.’s try to stun the Triceratons, the TMNT just straight-up kill them!
Though weakened and unacclimatised the Earth’s atmosphere, the Triceratons know a Transmat Device when they see one and immediately attack the T.C.R.I.’s to seize it. Caught in the middle, the TMNT join the fray and attack both groups; although the T.C.R.I.’s take care to try and stun the aliens rather than out-right kill them, true to form the TMNT have no such qualms about fatally wounding the Triceratons during the fight. With the Triceratons either dead or stunned, the TMNT are finally reunited with their master and father-figure, Splinter, and finally allow the benevolent T.C.R.I.’s to explain themselves rather than flying in all guns blazing. It’s been a long road but the TMNT are at last reunited with their mentor and it’s very satisfying to see this reunion get a nice full-page depiction.
The aliens explain their part in the TMNT’s origin.
After April arrives at the T.C.R.I. building and quickly leaves as she feels unable to help, learning that the military is preparing to force their way into the building to find out exactly what is going on, Splinter recaps the events of his escape from the Mousers and being cared for by at T.C.R.I. This leads to the T.C.R.I.’s explaining an extended version of the TMNT’s origin from issue one; it turned out that, twenty years ago, about a hundred of the aliens crash-landed on Earth during a peaceful scientific expedition; only a third of them survived the crash and, with no way of getting or contacting home, they assumed the guise of normal, everyday civilians and slowly accumulated the wealth and capital to purchase the T.C.R.I. building and begin constructing a Transmat Device to get back to their home world. During the construction of this device, they had to transport technology and salvage from their crashed ship and, during one of these runs, the fated canister of ooze fell from their truck and gave birth to the TMNT as we know them today. So, after all that, the TMNT are literally the by-product of alien technology; who would have ever thought that would be a thing…
The TMNT finally return home.
Unfortunately, all the fighting in the building has damaged some of the aliens’ systems and, to make matters worse, the military have finally forced their way in. The T.C.R.I.’s send their automated defences to subdue the soldiers but, when they realise the machines aren’t deadly, the military bust out the heavy ordinance to force their way further into the facility. Thanks to the assistance of Professor Honeycutt, the Transmat Device is repaired but, with the soldiers seconds away from breeching the Transmat room, the TMNT and Splinter are forced to follow the aliens into the beam to parts unknown once more. Back in April’s apartment, it is revealed on a news report that the T.C.R.I. building was destroyed in the aftermath to ensure that the aliens’ technology didn’t fall into the wrong hands. Though she laments the fate of her strange new friends, April is overjoyed when the TMNT and Splinter materialise in her bathroom, finally back home once more.
The Krang-like aliens are more benevolent than their appearance suggests.
And that’s a wrap for the TMNT’s first seven issues. Honestly, the concept started off strong with a ridiculous parody of the likes of Frank Miller and then went truly off the rails by introducing mad scientists, killer robots, and aliens all within the first four issues! It’s absolutely bonkers but it absolutely works and, best of all, this issue is full of the TMNT action I’ve come to love about these early issues; the TMNT get down and dirty with the Triceratons once more, cutting and stabbing them to death in the melee and once again carry the wounds of such a battle, which is always a mind-boggling sight to see after how watered down the TMNT would become in the subsequent cartoons. Speaking of which, it is equally still just as strange to see the brain-like aliens act so benevolently considering how much of a constant threat Krang was to the TMNT over the years. The T.C.R.I.’s aren’t given much of an explanation or even a true species name in these issues and all we really know about them is that they came to Earth with apparently-nonviolent intentions and were stranded there for twenty years; they never try to harm or kill anyone, even when their robotic shells are being blasted to smithereens, and, right when you think they’re going to abandon or betray the TMNT at the issue’s end, they stay true to their word and return the TMNT back home with the fully-recovered Splinter.
These aren’t the TMNT you knew from the cartoons!
Honestly, I am regretting that it’s taken me this long to properly get into these original interpretations of the TMNT. I knew of their darker, more violent original incarnation and remember reading at least the first two issues in an original printing but, once the Color Classics books were released, I knew that this would be the best time to finally explore these first few issues and see what the TMNT were originally all about. Will I get another volume and continue the story, or perhaps take a stab at the much-lauded IDW series? Well, probably not as I like to buy the physical books and I only have so much space but, after reading this first volume, I have to admit that I am very tempted to make room for some more TMNT action and seeing how Eastman and Laird developed these iconic characters into fully-fleshed out personalities.
My Rating:
⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 3 out of 5.
Pretty Good
What are your thoughts on the original, more violent versions of the TMNT? Did you read this first issue when it first came out or, like me, did you discover it after the TMNT took the world by storm? What did you think about the original versions of Shredder, the Foot Clan, Baxter and the Mousers, Casey Jones, and April? Have you read the Color Classics books? If so, what did you think? Do you, perhaps, prefer the IDW comics? What is your favourite piece of TMNT merchandise? Whatever your thoughts and memories of the TMNT, feel free to leave a comment below and, if you’d like to see me bring back Turtle Tuesday or cover other TMNT media, please let me know.
Released: May 2019 Originally Released: September 1986 Developer: Konami Digital Entertainment/Konami Industry Co. Ltd Original Developer: Konami Also Available For: Amiga, Arcade, C64, Family Computer Disk System (Famicom), Game Boy Advance, Mobile, MS-DOS, Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Wii, Nintendo Wii U, PC, and PlayStation 4
The Background: Castlevania (known as “Akumajō Dracula”) is notorious for its reputation as not just inspiring an entire sub-genre of videogame (the “Metroidvania” genre) but also its punishing difficulty. Back when Castlevania was first released for the NES, videogames (especially those on Nintendo’s ground-breaking platform) were built to last. As many gamers simply rented titles, and videogames were still heavily influenced by the pay-to-pay formula of the arcades, it wasn’t conducive for home console titles to be easy to complete and few titles exemplify that mentality more than Castlevania and its sequels. Given that I grew up mostly playing SEGA consoles, my experience with Castlevania has been understandably limited; I tried to change that with Castlevania (Konami Computer Entertainment Kobe, 1999) on the Nintendo 64…but that was shit. Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon (Inti Creates, 2018) was such a fun experience that I jumped at the chance to play through one of Castlevania’s most celebrated titles, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night(Konami Computer Entertainment Tokyo, 1997) which, in turn, led me to playing through its spiritual successor, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night (ArtPlay, 2019). Though I have also finished Super Castlevania IV (Konami, 1991) on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System Classic Edition, I leapt at the opportunity to buy the Castlevania Anniversary Collection for Xbox One and play through these classic titles and see if I can conquer their notorious difficulty.
The Plot: With the immortal vampire Count Dracula threatening the entire land, Simon Belmont, the latest in a lineage of legendary vampire hunters, takes up the feared whip of his ancestors, the Vampire Killer, and journeys into Dracula’s castle to end this threat.
Gameplay: Castlevania is a sidescrolling action/platformer in which players control the vampire killer Simon Belmont. Being an 8-bit title released in the early days of the NES, Simon is a bit of a slog to control; he’s stocky, heavy, and very awkward. Simon does okay when walking in a straight line but isn’t so great at jumping or changing direction on the fly, which can make for some tricky jumps.
Attack with Simon’s whip or sub-weapons.
Simon attacks Dracula’s minions with his whip, the Vampire Killer; Simon can attack standing up, while ducking, and while jumping but can only attack in the direction he’s facing, which can make hitting flying and more active enemies very difficult. Luckily, Simon can also acquire a number of different sub-weapons, which can make it easier to attack the more awkward enemies or to attack from a distance. Speaking of which, while you’ll collect a whole bunch of hearts during the game, these won’t refill your health. I’ve never understood why the developers decided to have the hearts essentially be the ammo for your sub-weapon rather than health as it goes against every piece of videogame logic I know. Instead, you’ll have to break open walls and blocks to find food, which will replenish your health. Simon also starts the game with three lives and can earn more through earning enough points; once all your lives are spent, though, you do get unlimited continues so it’s not a complete loss.
Watch out for the knock-back; it’s a real bitch!
As you journey through Dracula’s castle, you’ll battle not only a whole slew of gothic-inspired enemies but also the clock; each of the game’s eighteen stages carries a time limit. If you don’t manage to reach and defeat the boss before the timer counts down, you’ll lose a life. You’ll also have to deal with the game’s finicky controls and devastating knock-back, which can easily send you careening down a bottomless pit, into water, or simply to the previous screen. Either way, it’s usually instant death for Simon. You’ll also have to climb a number of stairs during the game and, while Simon can defend himself on the stairs, he can also walk right through them and fall down them, which means certain death. As a result, it’s not really advisable to barge in all guns blazing; enemies all have a specific pattern that you must learn, and exploit, to defeat them. Many times, it might be easier to simply dodge the enemies with a well-timed jump, duck, or simply walking past them as they swoop by; whatever it takes to reach the boss with as much health and ammo as possible.
Graphics and Sound: Being that it’s an 8-bit title on the NES, Castlevania obviously looks rather pixelated and dated by today’s standards. There aren’t many frames of animation used in the game and, yet, there’s a surprising level of detail. Though limited by the NES’s colour palette, sprites still manage to pop out from the surprisingly-detailed backgrounds; rendered in a reddy/browny hue, Simon always sticks out compared to his surroundings and enemies, making it easy to see where he is. Some enemies can blend in a bit, as they’re mostly black or red against black or red backgrounds, but they’re easily recognisable once they start their attack patterns.
Castlevania‘s backgrounds are surprisingly detailed.
Considering the majority of the game takes place in a castle, the game’s environments are quite varied; Simon journeys through standard brick-and-mortar gothic architecture, across the outskirts of the castle’s rooftops, and through the grimy dungeons and flooded tunnels of the castle. Each levels is punctuated by some of the most iconic videogame themes ever realised; Castlevania introduced gamers the world over to such catchy tunes as “Vampire Killer” and “Nothing To Lose”, which would become staples of the series. There’s also some unobtrusive in-game sound effects, too; Simon’s whip makes a satisfying “Whoosh!” as you swing it, you always know when you’ve picked up items, and there’s even an indication of when you’ve landed a successful hit on a enemy or boss.
Enemies and Bosses: Dracula’s castle is chock full of all manner of gothic and supernatural enemies, many of which have since become cliché, especially in NES titles. You’ll encounter zombies, ravens, skeletons, and mermen and most of these bog-standard enemies are simple enough to get by or take out but the game soon starts placing them in awkward locations, having them throw projectiles at you, and also has them respawn when you go off-screen. Things really begin to ramp up once you encounter the Medusa Heads; these float around the screen in a predictable arc but seem never-ending, and are at their most deadly whenever Simon is climbing stairs. Personally, I had the most trouble with the hunchbacks, who randomly just hop all over the place and are a pain in the ass. Axe-throwing knights and fireball-spitting dragons also add to the game’s challenge, particularly in one notorious corridor that has three knights and a near-endless slew of Medusa Heads.
The Grim Reaper is a pain in the ass and actually tougher than the dreaded Count Dracula!
The gothic influences continue with the game’s bosses; you’ll battle a giant bat, the Medusa Queen, two Mummies, Frankenstein’s Monster (with the hunchback-like Igor), and the Grim Reaper himself. While most of these aren’t too much of a challenge with the right sub-weapon (generally the Holy Water), the Grim Reaper was probably the most frustrating experience of the game thanks to his sporadic attack pattern and constant spawning of scythes. Eventually, though, you’ll do battle with Dracula himself in a two stage final battle. Dracula initially attacks by teleporting around his tomb and firing a spread of projectiles at you and, while Simon can destroy these with his weapons, Dracula can only be damaged by hitting his head and he has a nasty tendency to warp right into your path. After defeating Dracula’s first form, he’ll transform into a demonic, gargoyle-like bestial form. While he deals heavy damage in this form, he’s actually a lot easier to whittle down, especially if you have the Holy Cross Boomerang sub-weapon; once again, Dracula can only be damaged by hitting his head, so it’s best to run underneath him as he leaps at you, toss the Boomerang and also attack with your whip to damage Dracula and dispel his fireballs. Overall, the difficulty spike in the bosses is noticeable once your reach Frankenstein’s Monster but inescapable when you battle the Grim Reaper; how players managed to trump that asshole with no save states is beyond me.
Power-Ups and Bonuses: As mentioned, you can upgrade the Vampire Killer to increase the damage it deals but you can also pick up items to increase how many of your sub-weapons you can throw. These are pretty much essential to defeating the game’s tougher bosses, especially Dracula, as it allows you to spam the more effective sub-weapons rather than relying on the whip. There are a number of different sub-weapons available in the game, each with their pros and cons: the axe travels in an arc, for example, allowing you to better hit flying enemies and the knife allows you to attack from a safe distance. The stopwatch can briefly freeze all onscreen enemies, but this isn’t really that helpful when you’re surrounded by enemies or battling certain bosses, and the Rosary will eliminate all onscreen enemies. Perhaps the most useful weapons are the Holy Water, which stuns enemies and deals successive damage, and the Boomerang, which flies back to Simon and thus deals twice the damage.
Additional Features: Once you complete the game and sit through the laughably-bad credits, you’ll automatically return to stage one with all of your upgrades, score, and remaining lives. However, you’re now playing in Hard Mode! Hard Mode places different enemies in different places and ramps up the difficulty significantly as enemies move faster and do more damage. If you’re playing the version featured in the Xbox One Castlevania Anniversary Collection, as I did, you can earn an Achievement for completing the game and can even cheese it using save states; this may be frowned upon by some but there’s nothing stopping me (or you) not using this feature if you wish. There are also a number of frames and display options, though they can’t do much to improve upon the original’s pixelated goodness.
The Summary: In the end, Castlevania more than lives up to its reputation; even using save states, the game is a tough experience as you can only hold one sub-weapon at a time and having the wrong one at the wrong time can make bosses and certain sections near impossible and the time limit means that you can’t dawdle too much waiting for an opening. Yet, the game is fun; the challenge comes from learning enemy attack patterns, attacking every block and candlestick holder looking for health, upgrades, and hearts, and a bit of trial and error in getting past some of the game’s tougher sections. With the exception of the Grim Reaper boss battle, which I found a tedious and frustrating experience, and a few annoying times where the game crashed on me, I enjoyed myself from the beginning to the end and am glad that I finally got the chance to play Castlevania.
My Rating:
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Great Stuff
Did you play Castlevania back in the day? Which of the titles in the series do you consider to be the best, worst, hardest, or easiest? What did you think to the Castlevania Anniversary Collection? Do you agree with the tactic of manipulating save states to win at games? Whatever you think, drop a comment below and check out my other Castlevania reviews.
When I bought first Color Classics (2018) volume of the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comics, I went in a little bit blind. I knew that Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird’s original versions of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) were far darker and more violent characters and I knew that they killed the Shredder in their first issue and went on to both befriend April O’Neil and battle Baxter Stockman and his robotic Mousers, but I never expected that the TMNT would be beamed into the far reaches of space within the first seven issues! Since issue three, the TMNT have been searching for their missing mentor and father-figure, Splinter. Their search took them to the mysterious T.C.R.I. building and saw them teleported to the alien city of Peblak, where they befriended the “Fugitoid”, Professor Honeycutt (a humanoid scientist’s consciousness trapped within a robotic body) and were hounded by the forces of General Blanque. After Honeycutt, the only one capable of constructing a Transmat Device and returning them home, was kidnapped by the dinosaur-like Triceratons, the TMNT gave chase and ended up choking to death in the cargo hold as the Triceraton ship docked with their technologically-enhanced asteroid base.
The TMNT are held captive as collateral.
Issue six picks up right where issue five left off, with Honeycutt being brought to the command deck to witness the awesome sight of the Triceraton homeworlds, a whole series of asteroids all hollowed out and filled with space-faring technology and domed cities. While Honeycutt is taken to meet with the Triceraton’s leader, Prime Leader Zanramon, the Triceratons stumble upon the TMNT in the cargo hold. They’re sat in deep mediation, presumably to lower their heartbeats and control their breathing and make the most of the limited oxygen; however, it also leaves them helpless, allowing Zanramon to hold them captive in his attempt to force Honeycutt to construct a Transmat Device to aid their wars.
The TMNT engage in a brutal fight to the death!
However, despite the threat to his new friends, Honeycutt remains resolute in his decision not to construct a Transmat Device for any reason as the threat to life is just too great, even if it means the TMNT will die. The story then jumps back to Earth to check in on April, who is beside herself with worry as the TMNT and Splinter have been missing for some time now. A news report reveals that the national guard have been called in to investigate some strange goings-on at the T.C.R.I. building, which does very little alleviate her fears and worries. Back at the Triceraton homeworld, the TMNT are forced to enter the Triceraton arena in a fight to the death. Luckily, the TMNT have been provided with oxygen kits to allow them to breathe and they’ve been allowed to keep hold of their weapons and, even better, the wrist injury that had slowed “Michaelangelo” down over the last few issues is no longer a problem, meaning that the TMNT are able to battle at full force, inflicting bloody, fatal wounds to their Triceraton opponents.
Backed into a corner, the TMNT are suddenly bathed in a familiar light…
Spotting Honeycutt in the Prime Leader’s executive box, the TMNT hatch a plan to hijack a floating platform and attack the Prime Leader and his guard. The battle is swift and the TMNT rescue Honeycutt and take Zanramon hostage, forcing him to guarantee them safe passage to his personal ship. Once again arming themselves with laser rifles, the TMNT engage in a shoot-out right as they reach the docks and Zanramon is killed in the crossfire (by his own troops, no less). Pinned down, the TMNT beat a hasty retreat to a nearby elevator only to find it full of yet more Triceratons. However, right as they are about to be gunned down, the TMNT, Honeycutt, and a handful of the Triceratons are bathed in a familiar light and disappear from sight… This is first TMNT issue I’ve looked at since beginning Turtle Tuesday that doesn’t really focus on the titular mutant turtles for the majority of its pages. Instead, we’re shown and told the specifics of the Triceraton society and spend the first half of the story with Honeycutt being threatened and April being reduced to a helpless wreck.
When the TMNT get to fighting, the issue really picks up.
Things finally pick up once the arena battle begins, in which the TMNT return to their violent, bloody glory, slicing up the Triceratons, cracking their skulls, and skewing them in their life-or-death battle. It’s always great to see the TMNT cutting up their opponents with reckless abandon and this continues as soon as they get their hands on those laser rifles and start gunning down Triceratons without hesitation. None of them really get much of a chance to stand out in this frantic setting, however, and all we really garner from this issue is that the TMNT are increasingly desperate to get back to New York.]
My Rating:
⭐⭐
Rating: 2 out of 5.
Could Be Better
What do you think of the Triceratons as a TMNT enemy? Would you have preferred to see this issue spend more time with the TMNT or did you enjoy seeing Eastman and Laird expand the scope of their off-the-wall comic book series? Did you know that T.C.R.I. actually stood for “Techno-Cosmic Research Institute” and do you agree that this is a ridiculous name? What is your favourite arena-based fight in comics, videogames, or movies? Whatever your thoughts, drop them in the comics below and come back next Tuesday to see where the TMNT end up this time!
When I talked about Raphael: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, I mentioned that, of all the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) as originally conceived by of Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, Raphael has stood out the most in terms of personality. Given that all of the TMNT look and sound the same and are only really separated by their individual weapons, it stands out even more when one of them shows a bit more personality in these early issues. But, while Raphael has stood out the most, each of the TMNT has showed glimpses of their individual personalities…except for “Michaelangelo”. Up until now, “Michaelangelo” has simply been a ninja turtle; it took him fives issues to exude anything even resembling a personality and even then it wasn’t anything that impressive. We’ve seen him able to hold his own when sparring with Raphael, and even best his brother in combat, receive an injury when battling the Foot Clan and having to deal with the handicap of this injury, and he was possibly (most likely) the turtle who got drunk on one alien alcoholic beverage. Apart from that, he may as well not really be there; Leonardo has been the voice of reason and given the TMNT direction, Donatello has offered technical and scientific expertise (though basic), and Raphael has been depicted as an emotional hot-head who struggles with his temper but “Michaelangelo” has just been…there…
Mike takes the time to have some fun in New York at Christmas.
So it is slightly surprising to me that, of all the TMNT, it was Mike who received his own one-shot comic; as the only of his brothers to receive a one-shot at this point was Raphael, this seems to imply that Mike was just as strong a stand out, breakout, character as his temperamental brother but, honestly, I haven’t seen any evidence in this early issues to make a case for that. If anything, it feels like Leonardo should have gotten the one-shot treatment over Mike but, here we are. Michaelangelo: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle takes place before the TMNT were transported across space but after Splinter turned up missing; the TMNT are still staying at April O’Neil’s apartment and, wouldn’t you know it, it’s Christmas time in New York City and “Michaelangelo” is out exploring the city in the middle of a picturesque, stereotypical snow-covered Big Apple. Though he laments that he probably wouldn’t be able to take up ice skating, he jumps at the chance to try “sliding”, enjoying being out and amongst his fellow New Yorkers.
Mike stumbles upon a robbery taking place.
Rather than heading home, Mike decides to head to the shops to do some Christmas shopping but comes across a lost cat; taking a liking to the freezing kitty, Mike tucks him into his big winter coat and takes the cat with him to a nearby town store. Enamoured by the large array of toys and games on offer, Mike heads inside and, whilst playing, names his newfound friend “Klunk”; however, Klunk gets spooked by the toys and runs off to the toy shop’s warehouse. Following, Mike comes across a gang of masked individuals taking a truck full of this season’s most-popular toy (“L’il Orphan Aliens™”), which is due to be donated to a local orphanage. The thieves, however, knock out the driver and intend to steal the truck and sell the toys to make a profit so Mike, naturally, gives chase.
Mike busts up the thieves and retrieves the truck.
Grabbing hold of a loose light chord, Mike is dragged through the streets as the truck speeds away; after securing Klunk instead the truck, Mike makes short work of a couple of the goons but loses the truck when the driver speeds away. Desperate to get Klunk back and finish the job, Mike takes a chance on the driver driving erratically and without any real purpose and, luckily, catches up to the truck and takes out the driver by smashing through the front and driver’s side window. Mike plans to drive the truck back to the store but attracts the attention of New York’s finest, who have been on the lookout for the stolen vehicle, and Mike is forced to smash his way past the cops and an armed barricade. Ditching the truck down a nearby alley, Mike doesn’t want to just leave it for the cops to impound and, instead, opts to head back to his brothers at April’s apartment.
The TMNT deliver the toys to the orphange for a feel-good moment.
Mike (randomly called “Michelangelo” for the first time, though this correct spelling of his name wouldn’t stick for some time) doesn’t have to try too hard to convince the rest of the TMNT to help him out and, together, they take April’s van down to where Mike ditched the truck, load it up with the L’il Orphan Aliens™, and deliver the toys to the orphanage while dressed as Santa Claus and his helpful little elves. Compared to Raphael: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, Michaelangelo: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle is every schmaltzy, feel-good Christmas story you’ve come to expect from comic books. Literally the only thing this one-shot contributes is that it finally shines a light on “Michaelangelo” and allows him to stand out from his brothers. As realised in this story, Mike is like a wide-eyed kid; he enjoys being out in the city, especially amongst the snow and at Christmas time, and delights in playing with and being around all the toys and games. This contrasts quite severely with what little personality he has shown thus far as he’s seen to be relatively stoic, focused, and adept at martial arts rather than the laid back, pizza-loving surfer dude he would later become. Otherwise, there’s not really much else on offer here and it doesn’t really add much to the current ongoing arc of the TMNT struggling with the loss of their mentor and father-figure, Splinter. It’s nice to see Mike’s personality fleshed out a bit but, similar to Raphael’s one-shot, it’s not as though these developments are actually translated to the subsequent issues that I’ll be looking at for Turtle Tuesday. As a one-shot, feel-good Christmas tale it’s decent enough but I always feel like such stories are a bit of waste of time as I’d much rather get to the action or the character development more than celebrate the “true meaning of Christmas”.
My Rating:
⭐⭐
Rating: 2 out of 5.
Could Be Better
What did you think about this one-shot TMNT comic? Do you think Mike deserved his own spin-off or would you have preferred to see a different character get that honour? What do you think about schmaltzy Christmas tales in comics, cartoons, or movies? Whatever you think about this issue, or the TMNT in general, feel free to leave a comment below and come back next week as the TMNT continue to fight their way through alien goons and return home.
Released: 4 October 2019 (Hey! That’s my birthday!) Originally Released: 16 June 2009 Developer: Saber Interactive Original Developer: Terminal Reality / Red Fly Studio Also Available For: Nintendo DS, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Wii, PC, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Portable, and Xbox 360
The Background: Ghostbusters, as a franchise, has always had a bit of a chaotic history; the original Ghostbusters (Reitman, 1984) went through numerous rewrites and changes of concept to get the project off the ground, the under-rated sequel, Ghostbusters II (ibid, 1989), failed to match the critical or financial success of its predecessor and has been largely (unfairly) written off by cast, crew, and fans, and the difficulties stars and writers Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis had in getting a long-awaited third film into development eventually led to an all-female reboot in 2016, whose scathing reception finally led to an official continuation being green lit for release at some point next year. Personally, I blame a lot of this on star Bill Murray; Aykroyd and Ramis fought to produce a true third film for years, turning in all kinds of different scripts and concepts, only for Murray to balk at every suggestion and hold production back. Somewhere in that void, though, Atari announced that they were working on a new Ghostbusters videogame, one that would revisit a lot of the undeveloped ideas for the unproduced Ghostbusters III and even, after some back and forth with Murray (obviously), managed to reunite the four main characters of the movies for what is largely considered to be the third Ghostbusters movie…but in videogame form! I first played Ghostbusters: The Video Game on the PlayStation 3 and remembered enjoying it for its fidelity to the original movies; having the four main cast members back, featuring the same locations, music, and aesthetics, all gave the game a sheen of quality largely missing from other similar videogame tie-ins. Yet, for whatever reason, I got rid of the game shortly after completing it and always regretted that decision so, when the remastered version was announced for Xbox One, I jumped at the chance to revisit the game and try to figure out what it was that kept me from keeping the game in my library the first go around.
The Plot: Some time after the events of Ghostbusters II, the Ghostbusters are universally lauded and have an official contract with New York City to conduct their business. However, when a supernatural energy pulse emanates from the Gozer exhibit at the Museum of Natural History, ghosts begin to increase in frequency and, alongside a new recruit, the titular Ghostbusters find themselves facing off Ivo Shandor, who seeks to merge the Ghostworld with the real world.
Gameplay: Ghostbusters: The Video Game: Remastered is a third-person shooter, of sorts, in which the player takes control of an unnamed new Ghostbusters (generally referred to simply as “Rookie” or some variation). The Rookie is given the…honour?…of lugging around the Ghostbusters’ new experimental tech, doing all the team’s heavy lifting, and generally being sent in to investigate disturbances first to reduce the risks faced by the team. As you might expect, given the nature of the franchise, your primary goal is to use the Ghostbusters’ patented Proton Pack to fire a stream of nuclear-charged protonic energy at various ghosts, whittling their health down until they are ready to be trapped in a small mechanical box. When ensnaring a ghost, you have to keep an eye on the steadily rising bar on your Proton Pack; if you simply hold down the R trigger with reckless abandon, your Proton Pack will overheat and you’ll be left vulnerable while you wait for it to recharge. Therefore, it’s advisable to press the R button to vent the pack and keep your Proton Stream going strong; basically, it’s like a reload function in a shooter. Once the ghost is worn down and in your Proton Stream, you can slam it to weaken it further or force it into a trap but you need to be careful that you don’t cross your stream with those of the other Ghostbusters as you’ll get blown on your ass. Once you successfully trap the ghost, you’ll earn in-game currency that is used to buy new upgrades for your Proton Pack to make catching and trapping ghosts slightly easier. I say “slightly” because the main issue with trapping ghosts is that the game doesn’t have an auto-lock on or any kind of lock-on feature, basically meaning your Proton Stream goes flying all over the place and can be extremely difficult to aim and keep trained on a ghost, especially as the fly around the game’s locations.
You’ll have to dip in and out of both views to scan everything.
When you’re not trapping ghosts, you’re tasked with exploring your surroundings, many of which are extremely faithful recreations from the first Ghostbusters movie. You can do this in third-person mode, where you’re able to sprint and blast at a whole host of destructible items, or switch to a first-person mode, equipping both the Psychokinetic Energy Meter (P.K.E. Meter) and the Ecto Goggles in the process. In this mode, you’ll scan your environment; when the P.K.E. Meter turns red, a ghost is nearby and you can hold the R trigger to scan it and learn its weaknesses to aid you. When the meter turns blue, it means you’re close to one of the game’s many Cursed Artefacts, which can be collected to add bonus items to the Ghostbusters’ firehouse and earn you a couple of Achievements. This mode is very similar to the forced first-person perspective of Resident Evil: Revelations (Capcom, 2012) or the detective vision from the Batman: Arkham series (Various, 2009 to present) in that, since it’s your only real indication of where you need to go thanks to the game lacking a traditional map, you’ll be spending a great deal of your time either in scan mode or flipping in and out of it to scan every ghost you encounter. Personally, I feel the developers could have incorporated the P.K.E. Meter function into the game’s heads-up display, placing it in the bottom left corner and having it light up whenever something of interest was near so that you spend more of your time in third-person mode but, once you’ve scanned everything you need to scan and know where you need to go, you’ll probably not be switching to this mode in future playthroughs.
Keep an eye on your health gauge and be sure to revive your team mates!
The Rookie is portrayed as fairly clumsy in the game’s charming cutscenes but, in-game, he’s generally quite competent; his health is measured on the side of the Proton Pack and, whenever you start to take too much damage, the screen will flash and turn red, so it’s best to use the B button to awkwardly hop out of harm’s way or find some cover until your health replenishes. If you or any of your Ghostbuster allies take too much damage, you’ll need to be revived or revive them yourself, respectively; if you’re all incapacitated, the mission is failed and you’ll have to reload your last checkpoint. There are a couple of drawbacks to this: one quite crucial one is the your character can sometimes be incapacitated in just one or two hits, leaving you at the mercy of your computer-controlled allies, and another is that there is never an onscreen indicator of when the game is auto-saving so, when you die, you could be sent all the way back to the start of the mission or you could be sent back to right outside the last door you entered. It’s also doubly frustrating that the game has such long loading screens; considering this version is supposed to be optimised for the Xbox One, I don’t expect to be sitting there for a minute or two while the game struggles to load up my last checkpoint. When you’re not busting ghosts, exploring your environment, or scanning your surroundings, you’re tasked with solving a few rudimentary puzzles. Generally, these are as simple as crossing a room and activating a switch but, often, some kind of obstruction will require the use of your Proton Pack and other attachments to clear the way, such as moving an electrified wire out of water, clearing slime or vines, activating a winch, or yanking open doors with your slime tether.
Obtuse puzzles break up the game’s action.
The game can be a bit obtuse with telling you exactly what you need to do, though; there’s a part in the sewer where you need to clear out the black slime so you can proceed further and there’s literally nothing to tell you to use your slime tether on the weights next to the gate. Later, when on Shandor’s Island, I was faced with a locked door; Egon Spengler (Ramis) helpfully said something like “Do what I do!” but all he was doing was standing still. I am not ashamed to admit that it took me a good couple of minutes to spot the seemingly-obvious stairs that led down to the hedge maze, and the solution to this puzzle, below. The main appeal of Ghostbusters: The Video Game: Remastered is that it is chock full of attention to detail, little Easter Eggs, and call-backs to all the best and most beloved moments of the first movie. For me, though, this is a double-edged sword as, while the game clearly acknowledges and takes place after the second movie, everything about the game is geared towards it being more of a Ghostbusters 1.5 or a “real” Ghostbusters II as the characters are all modelled after their appearances in the first movie (despite looking different in the second), the music is all ripped straight from the first movie’s fantastic soundtrack, and very little of the game revolves around any of the fallout of the second movie beyond the inclusion of slime. It almost feels like the developers should have simply had the opening mission of the game be a flashback to the events of the first movie and then just presented the rest of the game as taking place between the two films or in place of the second as, while the game’s narrative just about line up, it’s clearly more geared towards paying homage to the first, more popular movie.
Graphics and Sound: Ghostbusters: The Video Game: Remastered is a bit of a mixed bag: on the one hand, the game’s locations, ghosts, bosses, and in-game models look amazing but, on the other, the game’s pre-rendered cutscenes (and even those that use the in-game models) leave a lot to be desired. In its first mission, the game takes the team back to the Sedgewick Hotel from the first movie, which is recreated in stunning detail. Here, you’ll explore these familiar surroundings and then engage in an extremely faithful recreation of the Ghostbusters’ first encounter with Slimer before heading out into Times Square, making your way up a building, and battling the reborn Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. Another mission takes you make to the New York Public Library to settle up with the Librarian Ghost from the first film and, between missions, you’ll get to freely wander around the Ghostbusters’ firehouse. All of these familiar locations are recreated in meticulous detail, ripped straight from the first movie, and really make it feel as though you are playing a true Ghostbusters videogame.
The game’s locations become suitably horrific and grandiose.
The game then expands upon its locations considerably, transporting the team to the Lovecraftian Ghostworld, where spirits and spectres roam freely, a nightmarish version of Central Park, dilapidated cemeteries, a suitably Gothic and haunted island, and even a hellish version of the ghost dimension. While many of these locations are quite linear (you can explore but, more often than not, you’ll just run into a dead end), they are full of little details, lighting effects, and Easter Eggs to find and things to do. Almost everything is destructible, for one thing, and you can interact with certain elements (water fountains, the exhibits in the museum, and others), though, at the same time, environments can feel a little bland and restrictive. The in-game models are pretty much spot-on, though, especially for the ghosts and the Ghostbusters themselves. Despite the faithful recreation of the returning actors, though, the models can end up looking a little bit like action figures; they’re a bit stiff, their eyes tend to get washed out or swallowed up by their faces, and the cutscenes are often a little out of synch.
There’s a stark contrast between the pre-rendered cutscenes and the in-game ones.
There’s also a marked difference in quality between the pre-rendered cutscenes and the in-game cutscenes, which is to be expected but, again, I expect more from a remastered version of a videogame. The game’s soundtrack, though, is fantastic; every track is a familiar tune (or heavily based upon tracks) from the first movie (again, no love for the sequel in this regard), which only adds to the immersive experience. The four main actors return to voice their characters and it is amazing to hear them all bantering and bouncing off of one another in true Ghostbusters fashion. It’s just a shame, then, that the game includes this weird glitch where the in-game audio and spoken dialogue will cut out when you wander too far from the group; this kind of makes sense as you’ve moved out of earshot but it can also happen if you stand still and simply rotate the camera and, most embarrassingly of all, often happens mid-way through an in-game cutscene. I also couldn’t help but notice that Bill Murray’s reading of some of his lines felt far less natural as he over- or under-emphasised certain words and generally came across as a complete inept moron, even more so than his character, Peter Venkman, is generally portrayed.
Enemies and Bosses: Given that you’re placed in the shoes of a rookie Ghostbuster, you’ll be spending the majority of your time tracking down and busting ghosts of all shapes and sizes. Your first mission is to recapture Slimer but, from there, you’ll also hunt down all kinds of other spooks, all of them rendered in the same semi-translucent style presented in the movies. Sometimes, you’ll also have to contend with possessed items, such as candlesticks, coffins, and tombstones, which will spring to life and scurry after you and are immune to your traditional Proton Stream.
Ghosts and other enemies come in many different forms.
These minions can’t be trapped and must be dealt with using the other attachments you get to your Proton Pack, meaning they’re far more annoying as enemies as they’ll swarm around you, throwing projectiles your way, and generally keep respawning until you seal off the portal that birthed them. Some ghosts also have the ability to possess nearby non-playable characters or even your fellow Ghostbusters, meaning you’ll have to hose them down with your Mood Slime before you can capture the offending ghosts. Others bring massive statues and suits of armour to life or transform the environment to suit their needs but one thing most of them have in common is that you’ll need to switch to different attachments to whittle them down and they are slippery devils that force you to run around in circles getting pummelled by projectiles and attacks, constantly reviving your teammates or being.
Mr. Stay Puft is a joke compared to some of the enemies you’ll have to contend with!
Easily one of the worst enemies in the entire game are the kamikaze cherubs you encounter late into the graveyard mission; these little bastards not only shoot at you with flaming arrows, they also fly at you head-first and explode, dealing massive damage. If that wasn’t enough, you also have to contend with a never-ending slew of possessed gravestones, Ray Stantz being all but useless as a partner character, and the fact that the only way to clear this area is to slam or slime tether the cherubs into a gate. This kind of frustration really brings Ghostbusters: The Video Game: Remastered down; it’s just so inconsistent as one minute you’ll be having a whale of a time busting ghosts and, the next, you’ll be beaten to a pulp in seconds over and over and forced to sit through those long-ass loading screens. This inconsistency is translated into the game’s boss battles as well; after making short work of Slimer and a ghostly fisherman, you’ll do battle with the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man and, honestly, the little Marshmallow Minions he spawns throughout the preceding mission are more of a threat than he is! You simply hang from a tether, clear away his minions, and then zap him in the face enough times to turn him into marshmallow mush once more.
Azetlor is easily the game’s toughest boss!
The next mission sees you settling the score with the Librarian Ghost, who surrounds herself with a shield to drag the fight out a bit but is nothing compared to Azetlor! This demonic entity is comprised of books and is initially protected by its mask, which you must shoot your Mood Slime at for what feels like an eternity. Once the mask is finally removed, you’ll probably fail the mission almost immediately as Azetlor makes mincemeat out of you and your team mates. Apparently, you’re supposed to dodge into the portals scattered throughout the arena to avoid Azetlor’s attacks and ignore reviving the other Ghostbusters but this never worked for me as, when you enter a portal, you exit it with the controls slightly janky so if you press up on the analogue stick you just jump back through the portal again! Seriously, the boss battle was the most annoying and challenging boss in the entire game, including the game’s final bosses!
The game’s other bosses can be a drag but aren’t exactly challenging.
Later, you’ll have to chase the Spider Witch around her lair; after dealing enough damage to her, she disappears and you have to desperately follow your P.K.E. Meter to find her before she replenishes too much of her health, making this battle more of a chore than anything. You’ll also encounter a giant Sloar chained up in a dungeon-like sewer, which you must bait into attacking you so you can damage the glowing weak spot on its head. When you reach the finale of the game, you’ll battle against Ivo Shandor himself in a two-stage boss battle. In the first, he has possessed the New York City Mayor and is protecting himself with a green energy shield. You’ll be constantly reviving your team mates as they are either pummelled into submission by the skulls that home in on them (and you) or instantly incapacitated by Shandor’s whirlwinds but, if you blast away at Shandor’s shield with your Mason Collider, he’ll activate four nearby pillars to regenerate his health. Blast each of these in turn and the battle will end, making the most difficult part about this boss simply having enough Ghostbusters alive to see the mission through.
Shandor’s final form looks more impressive than it actually is.
Shandor then assumes a far more demonic form, that of the “Architect”, an enormous Satanic being that forcibly drags you all back to the Ghostworld in a final encounter that is laughably easy compared to some of the bosses and enemies you’ve battled up until that point. Seriously, I had to revive my team mates the least in this battle and never once had to be revived; you simply keep your distance, blasting at Shandor with Boson Darts and, when he moves to the centre of the arena to regenerate, blow up the pillars. Wash, rinse, repeat, and he’s done in no time at all.
Power-Ups and Bonuses: As you progress through the story, you’ll be gifted with additions to your base Proton Pack; you start out with the basic Proton Stream, which can whittle away a ghost’s health, ensnare them, and slam them to help trap them, but soon gain access to additional components. The first are the Boson Darts, highly concentrated bursts of protonic energy that are great for clearing out large swarms of enemies and dealing heavy damage, though you can only use them a couple of times before your Proton Pack overheats. Next, you get equipped with the Dark Matter Generator, which allows you to blast at enemies with a shotgun-like Shock Blast or freeze ghosts in place with the Stasis Stream, both of which can be handy for crowd control and giving you time to regenerate health. After this, you’ll get access to the Slime Blower, a smaller, heavily modified version of the ones seen in Ghostbusters II. This allows you to clear caustic black slime from the environment, reduces certain enemies to mush, and allows you to attach slime tethers to objects and ghosts. Unfortunately, the lack of a lock-on feature makes using the slime tether in this latter fashion more frustrating than helpful and it is, by far, the feature I used the least. Finally, you upgrade to the Composite Particle System, which allows you to use the Mason Collider for a rapid-fire function similar to a machine gun. You can also use the Overload Pulse to have your shots home in on a specific target, both of which can be useful for rapidly wearing down ghosts for the capture. While you never get to drive the Ecto-1b (that honour is, awkwardly, generally left to Winston Zeddemore (Ernie Hudson), my second favourite Ghostbuster after Ray), it does feature a few times in the story mode and is, at one point, equipped with the Super Slammer Trap that allows you to instantly trap ghosts once they’re lured over to the car. Otherwise, you’ll be using your own trap to grab the ghoulies and earn cash to spend on upgrading each of the features of your Proton Pack to reduce overheating, speed up the trapping process, and other improvements that marginally improve the experience.
Additional Features: As you progress, you’ll unlock each story chapter to replay on one of the game’s three different difficulty settings. This is crucial to revisiting areas and finding any Artefacts you missed, scanning and recording every ghost in the game, and earning all of the game’s Achievements. While you can replay from each mission’s checkpoints, the upgrades you’ve purchased don’t carry over and you can’t take features like the Slime Blower back to the first mission, for example, somewhat limiting the game’s replayability. You’ll also unlock the game’s cutscenes to view in the game’s “Extras” menu but that’s pretty much it; you don’t unlock any additional characters or costumes, there’s no post-game content, and even the multiplayer aspect from the original version has been excised from this remaster! Apparently, all of these features (and more) were apparently planned for the game and a multiplayer component was supposed to be released shortly after the remaster’s launch but, as of this writing, it’s not happened.
The Summary: Soon into playing Ghostbusters: The Video Game: Remastered, I suspected what it was that kept me from keeping the game in my PlayStation 3 library back in the day. While it looks and sounds fantastic and really feels like an authentic Ghostbusters experience, the game is just so damn inconsistent; it looks great and can be really fun to play, running smoothly and featuring some great vocal work from everyone involved who isn’t Bill Murray but then wham! Suddenly you’re faced with an obtuse puzzle, lost in maze-like corridors, or battling enemies and bosses than can one-shot you and your team with cheap, difficult to avoid attacks. Honestly, it really stinks that the developers couldn’t at least release the game with couch co-op; the game begs for it, seeing as you’re running around with the other Ghostbusters the entire time, so a split screen multiplayer would have only increased the game’s appeal. Plus, not adding anything new to the game for this remaster is a real disappointment; the only thing that’s been changed is that the graphics have a bit more polish and that’s it. We could have gotten new skins or costumes, maybe even some extra Achievements or gameplay modes but, instead, we’re left with a slightly better looking version of the base game that really doesn’t deserve being bought at full price. It’s great to see all the guys back together and to experience a version of what Aykroyd and the late, great Ramis had planned for Ghostbusters III but, as a complete package, Ghostbusters: The Video Game: Remastered fails far more than it succeeds and is recommended only really for hardcore Ghostbusters fans.
My Rating:
⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 3 out of 5.
Pretty Good
What did you think of Ghostbusters: The Video Game: Remastered? Did you play the original version; if so, which console did you play it for and how do you think this remaster holds up compared to the original? Which Ghostbuster is your favourite? Which Ghostbusters videogame do you have fond, or bad, memories of? Do you think I am being too harsh on Bill Murray? Are you looking forward to the new Ghostbusters movie? Whatever you think about Ghostbusters, drop a comment below.
These last few weeks, I’ve been going back over Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles original comics every Tuesday for “Turtle Tuesday”. In the last issue, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) finally found their lost master, Splinter, being held in suspended animation in the mysterious T.C.R.I. building. However, in their haste to jump into battle with the T.C.R.I. inhabitants (sentient brains inside robotic endoskeletons), the TMNT were caught in a teleportation beam and vanished from sight. Issue five continues right where the last issue left off, with the TMNT materialising in an unknown place, surrounded by gun-wielding soldiers and accompanied by a cute little alien robot.
The TMNT find themselves lost on a strange, alien planet.
Fighting their way to freedom, the TMNT soon discover that they’re not in New York City anymore; instead, their in the futuristic city of Peblak, an alien city on an alien world inhabited by all kinds of…aliens. Their new companion, Honeycutt, recognises the device that transported the TMNT to be very similar to a theoretical machine he had in mind, the Transmat device, however the TMNT’s hopes of Honeycutt being able to transport them home are quickly dashed when Honeycutt reveals his long and convoluted origin.
Honeycutt had no interest in his inventions being used for warfare.
It turns out that Honeycutt was once a human scientist working on the Transmat Device for the government; however, as they wanted to use it as a means of warfare, he abandoned the project to focus on his Mentawave Helmet, a device capable of boosting the wearer’s capacity for telepathy and telekinesis. However, while answering a distress call from his worker robot, Sal, Honeycutt was struck by a freak bolt of lighting while wearing the helmet and tangled up in some wires with Sal. When he awoke, he found his human body was destroyed and that the Mentawave Helmet had, somehow, transferred his consciousness into Sal’s body. General Blanque, whose soldiers the TMNT fought in the opening panel, discovered Honeycutt’s charred remains and blamed it on Sal, declaring him a Fugitoid, ordering him to be hunted down and destroy. A really out of place and tacked on aside at the bottom of the page, however, reveals that Blanque knew about what had really happened (…somehow) and actually wanted to capture Honeycutt to abuse his Transmat technology.
The TMNT are attacked by Blanque’s troops while scoping out a nearby bar.
Either way, the TMNT and Honeycutt decide to work together to get off-world and escape Blanque’s forces; however, while scoping out a nearby bar for a pilot or a means to escape the planet, they are attacked by Blanque’s forces once more. Despite being slightly intoxicated by the alien alcohol, the TMNT manage to hold their own thanks to acquiring the soldier’s laser rifles. Just as all hope seems lost, the bar is attacked by a group of Triceratons, massive aliens that resemble bipedal Triceratops dinosaurs. The Triceratons capture Honeycutt and the TMNT give chase, resulting in a chase scene through the skies of the city using flying cars. Still reeling from the affects of the alcohol, and being unfamiliar with the alien craft’s controls, the TMNT are soon knocked from the sky by the superior Triceratons and, feeling the pressure of the events they’ve had to endure, Donatello briefly freaks out.
As the ship docks, the TMNT are left choking to death in the cargo hold…!
Luckily, some of Blanque’s soldiers fly overhead and the TMNT follow them to a massive shoot out between Blanque’s forces and the Triceratons; arming themselves with some laser pistols, the TMNT fight their way onto the Triceraton ship, gunning down anyone and anything that gets in their way. Before they can properly search the ship for Honeycutt, it takes off and leaves the atmosphere far behind. Honeycutt is taken to converse with the Triceraton commander, who attempts to woo the former scientist into developing a Transmat Device for them rather than General Blanque. However, as the Triceraton ship prepares to dock with their base (a massive, technologically-converted asteroid), the TMNT suddenly realise that they are slowly asphyxiating in the cargo hold as the oxygen levels begin to drop…
It didn’t take long for the TMNT to be battling aliens and robots on an alien world!
Man, we’ve come a long way from the first issue…it’s only issue five and we’ve already seen the TMNT fight rat-eating robots, battle aliens inside robotic bodies, teleport across the galaxy, be trapped on an alien world, and now they’re choking to death, lost in space! Suddenly, the idea of teenage mutant ninja turtles fighting a dishonourable ninja in razor-sharp armour doesn’t seem so far-fetched! It’s honestly commendable how quickly Eastman and Laird decided to just go balls-deep with their already ridiculous premise; it would have been so easy to keep the TMNT grounded in New York and on Earth, fighting ninjas or thugs or being typical superheroes but, instead, they had them going up against aliens within no time at all.
In a change of pace, Donatello freaks out following all the crazy stuff they’ve endured.
Equally impressive is that the injury “Michaelangelo” sustained to his wrist in the last issue continues to be a factor in this issue…at least, it is at the beginning of the issue. Add to that and Mikey actually shows slightly more personality this time around; he’s actually the first to leap into action against Blanque’s forces (rather than, say, Raphael) and it appears as though he’s the turtle who gets drunk in the bar (though, to be fair, it’s hard to say since all the turtles look the same). Additionally, Donatello stands out a little more in this issue, pulling faces to distract Blanque’s forces so Leonardo can impale them on daggers, piloting the flying car they use to chase after the Triceratons, and freaking out when they get knocked from the sky. The TMNT have been noticeably struggling since Splinter went missing back in issue three but the only one who has really lost his cool over their situation so far has been Raphael so it’s a nice change of pace to see one of the other turtles give in to the stress of the pitfalls they’ve had to go through in the space of a few nights.
My Rating:
⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 3 out of 5.
Pretty Good
What did you think of this issue? Do you think it was maybe to soon in the TMNT’s life to shave them thrown into space and battling dinosaur-like aliens or do you enjoy the wacky, off-the-wall nature of the TMNT comics and concept? Now that we’re a few issues in, which of the TMNT do you like the most from these original issues? Whatever your thoughts about the TMNT, drop a comment below and come back for next week’s instalment of Turtle Tuesday in which Mikey takes the spotlight for his own one-shot issue.
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