February:
March:
April:
May:
June:
July:
August:
58) Contra: The Alien Wars (GB) (3.5) (8/1) (~30 minutes)
59) Super Smash Bros. (N64) (8.0) (8/6) (~20 minutes)
60) Battletoads (Japan) (NES) (7.5) (8/10) (~40 minutes)
61) Castle of Dragon (NES) (2.5) (8/10) (~1 hour)
62) The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (NES) (3.0) (8/10) (~30 minutes)
63) Strider (NES) (6.5) (8/11) (~2 hours)
64) Commando (NES) (3.5) (8/11) (~1 hour)
65) Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa (NES) (6.5) (8/12) (~1h30m)
66) Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie (GEN) (4.0) (8/12) (~1 hour)
And the blitz continues. First, Strider hasn't seen me beat it since probably 20 years ago. So I gave it a go. It's rough, but also manages to do some interesting things. The non-linear action-adventure structure elevates it above just a straight hack-'n'-slash. There's likely no way the arcade version would have worked out very well at all on NES. (And of course, this isn't a port, it was developed at the same time as the arcade version.) If the tech were just a bit more polished, and the localization a bit better, this would be upper-tier material. As it is, the game feels like it's going to fall apart. The jumping in particular is rather egregious, with lots of hanging on the sides of objects and questionable hit detection. And that wall-jump... well, let's just say that it can be done, but it makes Super Metroid's version look easy-peasy.
Another Capcom release, Commando, is a decent enough conversion of the arcade game, in that it somewhat approximates the action, but like Strider, it feels like the wheels are going to fall off at any moment. Enemy soldiers just flat-out disappear, everything blinks and flashes weirdly (so does Strider, by the way), and the aiming is a lot like Jackal or Contra in the arcade in that it takes time for your shot to change direction. Just a simple 8-way firing mechanism would have made the game easier. It's really not all that good, and surpassed by a lot of stuff that came later on the system.
Now, shifting to Konami, Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa proves a prime representative of the sort of game that would have never crossed the pond in the '80s/'90s. Weirdness is the name of the game, including controlling the titular Upa, a baby that hits enemies with his rattle to inflate them, which you can then send careening toward enemies. You can also ride the inflated enemies, which proves to be a decent chunk of the platforming. Mostly inoffensive action and a few tricky bits define the game, and if you're looking for something weird from Konami's library, this is worth trying.
Last, and almost least, is Power Rangers: The Movie on Genesis. There's only one description that comes to mind here: generic brawler. Very little variety in enemies, combos that feel a little sluggish at times, and characters that don't seem to have any real differentiation doom this to lower-tier licensed junk. Technically rather solid, but mainly a low-effort cash-in.
