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Retro Game Club Discussion Thread - 02 - Wonder Boy/Adventure Island [community]
 



Wonder Boy is really where it all started. Developed by Sega and Westone for the arcade, the game was a fast-paced platformer starring some boy, presumably wonderful, trying to save his girlfriend from some monster, and doing so shirtless in a kilt made of leaves. Now that takes some brass balls.

Wonder Boy plays as a platformer designed to eat your quarters should: it is very challenging. A lot of that challenge comes from the slipperiness of the character, a one-hit-kills-you design philosophy, and especially a strict time limit. Oh, no, there is no countdown ticking away in the corner of the screen. Instead, you have a "hunger meter" which slowly drains away unless you can keep feeding Wonder Boy fruit.

The title did well for Sega, and Wonder Boy became one of their mascots, enjoying about the same level of popularity as Alex Kidd (who?). But interestingly, Sega only owned the rights to the character and the lore of the game. The level design, the gameplay, the code, all of that belonged to Westone, who decided to team up with Hudson Soft to create an NES version of the game. The character still wears only a bunch of leaves, still uses the same weapons, still has to satiate his hunger with fruit, except that this time, the hero is not the blonde and lean Wonder Boy, but instead a chubby guy with brown hair and a cap, named Master Higgins after Hudson Soft's spokesperson in Japan. He looks nothing like him.

The games are almost identical, except that most people would agree that Adventure Island looks much worse.

So, you can chose whichever version you like (both are 500 pts on the Virtual Console) and start playing and discussing (and possibly cursing!).

Thank god for infinite continues...

edit - As Roykoopa suggested, why not add either Wonder Boy or Adventure Island to your collection, and indicate you are currently playing it?


List of Awesome:
ludist210 (finished Wonder Boy)
anon_mastermind (finished Wonder Boy)
nate38 (finished Wonder Boy)
RoyKoopa64 (finished Wonder Boy)
X‑pert74 (finished Wonder Boy)
Zero (finished Wonder Boy)
TriforceBun (finished Adventure Island)

Guillaume (finished both Wonder Boy and Adventure Island)

URL to share (right click and copy)
04/09/11, 03:07    Edited: 05/05/11, 04:30
 
   
 
I actually own Wonder Boy in Monster World for the Genesis (I think) on VC. Not sure which WB game that is, but I remember liking it (except I still haven't killed the last boss).

I kind of like keeping it NES/Master System for the moment, though. There're plenty of games that've held up quite well on those systems that people haven't tried out, and they're cheaper than the 16-bit games too.

All of the suggested games sound good to me so far. Princess Tomato is the only one I haven't actually played at all--is it supposed to be good?
04/24/11, 00:43   
@Guillaume Oh boy

I don't think it's too soon for a new poll, but then I did beat the game really early I'm definitely ready for a new poll, if everyone else is.

I don't know if everyone here has played Ninja Gaiden already. I mean, everyone has some game or another that they've never played, yet is popular. I myself have yet to play Chrono Trigger for instance. But I can understand keeping things 8-bit; partly since there's a wider variety of obscure games on the VC for the NES and Master System than there are for the Super NES or Genesis. Although I think TG-16 would be an interesting addition. I've really never had a chance to play much of that library, so I'd be interested in seeing it on the poll.
04/24/11, 01:07   
If I'd seen you were gonna make a new poll, I would have recommended Faxanadu. It's 8-bit, most people have never heard of it, and it's supposed to be pretty sweet.
04/24/11, 01:14   
@Jargon

It was in the poll once, no one cared.

I will put these less popular options in the running again once we get through the ones that always get the most votes.

@TriforceBun

Well it looks interesting to me. Click the link I gave to see what Nintendo Life had to say about it.


@everyone

I guess I will be more open to suggestions in future polls. Personally, I find most of your suggestions really interesting, I just don't think they have much of a chance against the current choices. Unless a bunch of you started requesting one particular game, like it happened with Adventure Island.
04/24/11, 01:38   
Edited: 04/24/11, 01:39
I went back to playing New Adventure Island (TG-16) on the Virtual Console. The game is a whole lot more fun to play than AI, and my god is it ever pretty. I've never considered myself a graphic whole but if I had seen graphics like these in the NES days, if someone had put this game and the original AI side by side in front of me 20 years ago... well I actually think the TG-16 would have had a shot over here in North America.

There is no way someone could have played the NES and not looked at the TG-16 with envy.

Of course, in reality, while the PC-Engine came out in 87 in Japan, the TG-16 came out in 89 over here, and so its competition wasn't the NES as much as the Genesis and SNES (quite honestly though, the TG-16 kicks the Genesis' ass).

And New Adventure Island came out in 92. So its competition was Super Mario World and Sonic, not SMB3 and Alex Kidd.

Still, it's really, really impressive.
04/24/11, 23:17   
I feel like checking out more TG-16 games sometime. I don't know much about the library though, aside from it having a bunch of shmups (which I think are okay, but aren't my favorite genre).
04/25/11, 00:31   
There are a bunch of fun platformers on the system, almost all of them by Hudson.

New Adventure Island is one of them, and it's fun. Though I just beat it. It wasn't "easy", I still used multiple continues per stage, at the end, but the infinite continues, the slightly more forgiving difficulty and the fact that it has fewer levels made it relatively painless to get through.

It was fun. 8/10.
04/25/11, 01:43   
Guillaume said:
There are a bunch of fun platformers on the system, almost all of them by Hudson.

New Adventure Island is one of them, and it's fun. Though I just beat it. It wasn't "easy", I still used multiple continues per stage, at the end, but the infinite continues, the slightly more forgiving difficulty and the fact that it has fewer levels made it relatively painless to get through.

It was fun. 8/10.
What additions does it have compared to the original Adventure Island? And are there dinosaurs?
04/25/11, 03:48   
@Guillaume
Isn't almost everything on the system by Hudson, in some way or another? It was a very impressive first-party assault, almost on par with Nintendo. Same with SNK and the Neo-Geo. Nobody else wanted to support their systems, so they had to. Or maybe it was something else. I dunno.

I think Sega made most of the Master System games, too. Even ports of other companies' stuff.
04/25/11, 23:19   
@Anand

Well, after some reseach, Hudson Soft acted as a publisher for a lot of games. Bonk, for instance, was co-developed by Atlus (!) and Red (?), published by Hudson Soft in Japan by NEC in North America.

Still, I'm very impressed with Hudson. In my book, without a doubt, Hudson Soft >>> Sega, both as developer and publisher.

@TriforceBun

Just in case you have not noticed it.
04/25/11, 23:26   
Edited: 04/25/11, 23:27
Yeah, they published a lot of third-party stuff, too. So did Sega, I think. But you know that I'm going to agree with the Sega hate! They were a strong arcade force, though.
04/26/11, 00:18   
BTW still knocking away at this one. Up to 8-3 right now. I could probably finish it in a single sitting, if I really wanted to, right? Or is there some stage I'm going to get massively stuck on?
04/28/11, 01:33   
If you're playing AI, 7-4, 8-2, 8-3 and 8-4 are the trouble spots.
04/28/11, 02:34   
I'm playing Wonder Boy!
04/28/11, 04:32   
@Zero

Bah, you shouldn't have that much trouble with the rest.
04/28/11, 06:28   
Late to the party, but I just finished 9-4 in Wonder Boy. 9-1 gave me fits. The rest of the game wasn't nearly as bad.
04/30/11, 06:16   
@ludist210

Nice! You make the list!
04/30/11, 07:33   
@ludist210 Really? Hmm, that's where I am right now. Haven't tried it out yet.
04/30/11, 08:29   
Finally finished!

Wow @ that ending. I mean, @ the complete lack of an ending.
05/05/11, 04:31   
Well at least Tanya gives you that thank-you message That made me happy enough, by 8-bit game ending standards.
05/05/11, 06:32   
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