As soon as you will start playing Blaster Master, you will be greeted by an opening cutscene about a boy, Jason, and his pet frog who grew to gigantic size after jumping down a hole. So Jason leaps into a battle tank just lying there and proceeds to chase his frog. Yeah... Japanese games sure have weird stories.

Except that this story was dreamed up by the US localisation team. And they weren't trying to match what was on screen: those cutscenes are specially made for the NA/non-Japan version!

In the original Japanese version, the game takes place on the planet Sophia the 3rd, located near the center of the Epsilon Milky Way, in which an advanced civilization flourished. In the year 2052, the emperor Goez, who has conquered the rest of outer space and of whom Goez declared himself as a god, invades and conquers Sophia the 3rd. The only survivor of Goez's raid is the Science Academy's Nora Satellite, who has escaped and plans to build a weapon to defeat Goez's forces. They build an all-purpose tank called "Metal Attacker", commandeered by a boy named Kane Gardner, to take the lead in the counterattack. The game's opening sequence shows Metal Attacker dropped into the battlefield.

No, it doesn't make more sense at all. But why the change at all? No one knows.

Probably more important than the story, is the gameplay: Blaster Master follows in Metroid's footsteps, with a giant labyrinthine map, countless upgrades that augment your mobility and exploration capabilities, and challenging combat. Oh, and caves that "Jason" has to enter without his tank, played from an overhead perspective.

So it's definitely its own beast. But with finite (3) continues, weapon upgrades in the overhead segments that downgrade each time you get hit and a really confusing world layout, it's quite possible that this is one RGC game no one on NW will finish... At least you will get to experience excellent music, great graphics, and overall, solid action.


Why not add Blaster Master to your collection, and indicate you are currently playing it? And don't forget to rate it when you're done!


List of Awesome
Complete the game.

@chrisbg99
@nate38
@X-pert74

List of Awesomer
Complete the game, and draw your own maps! Now that's old school...
@X-pert74


List of Awesomest
Complete the game without using continues.

@chrisbg99

URL to share (right click and copy)

I beat the game! I almost 1CCed it, but I used exactly one continue I scanned my maps though, so you guys have proof that I made them (not imagified, in case people here want to go through the game blind... or make their own maps!):



Area 1-6

Area 7-8



I made these maps with absolutely no references, aside from the game itself. The Area 1 map in particular is a little sloppy, since it was the first one I made, but after that I started to make each map more exact. For the most part each square on the grid equates to one screen length in the game. There are sections which don't take up the whole screen, or screens that have two parallel paths showing simultaneously, so I tried the best I could to show these in places where it was absolutely necessary. This is the map key:


X - first screen of the game
box - indicates doorway between rooms
long vertical rectangles - ladders (at least all the major ladders, I think)
O - on-foot hut
O w/ checkmark - good on-foot hut (I usually noted one for each area, though in the last couple worlds almost all the huts I think are worthwhile for grinding certain items; usually gun upgrades. Huts that don't have this either don't have much of value, or I found to be too much of a pain in the neck to be a worthwhile visit. I noted in a couple places what specific items each hut is good for; mainly in the last world, but didn't think to do that for most of the game)
red O - boss hut
numbers - doorways to different areas
letters (Area 7 only) - doorways to different rooms in same area
* - indicates that the map "loops" in that area
the symbol that looks like a pointy "infinity" sign - indicates that the map "loops" in that area (used for Area 6 only, since there are two looping paths there)
? - place of interest (usually notable for backtracking, either after getting the current area's tank upgrade or getting a future tank upgrade)
other random stuff - I put lines going part of the way through a room if a floor blocks your path through the left side, but not the right side, for instance. I also noted a couple of land masses which are notable either for blocking your way, or which are required for you to traverse. It's not totally clear from the map, but it should (hopefully) help you remember what is in certain rooms of an area)
star - heh, I put exactly one star in the map, for Area 7. There are a small handful of gun upgrades that are found in the sidescrolling tank sections, so I wanted to put a note for that one particular upgrade)


Guillaume, if you want to add my maps to the first post for people to refer to, feel free to do so I fully admit they aren't perfect, but I found them helpful as I was going through the game. Making them really helped me learn the layout of most of the game, and helped cut down on revisiting pointless side paths if I didn't need to do so.



Anyways, Blaster Master is now one of my favorite games. It's not perfect, but I find it really lovable, and it's so amazing with all that it accomplishes. It's truly an epic NES game, and the premise for the North American version of the game is really charming. It also has awesome music! I love almost every song in the game; I'd put its soundtrack up there with soundtracks like Contra or Mega Man 2. Blaster Master is cool


EDIT: reuploaded maps to tinypic, since Photobucket shrinks them

It feels like no one is participating in this aside from us few, even though this got the most "yes" votes. I guess most people really had no idea this was a Metroid-like game with no map.

That seems to happen with every RGC, though. About half of the voters actually make real progress in the game. But people do tend to keep starting throughout the month, I'm sure we'll have plenty more folks checking out Blaster Master by December.

Haha. I'm usually a latecomer... I beat the first boss easily. Time to move on...

Yeah, spank that Plutonium Boss!

Which boss is the Plutonium boss?

Er, according to the Worlds of Power book, the final boss was the Plutonium Boss, but uh.... in the book, Jason had the misconception that the first boss he destroyed was the Plutonium Boss, so he got all excited about it after barely winning.

@Cryojin Oh, ok. I won't read that spoiler, since I just ordered the book last night I'm looking forward to reading it!

@nate38 True, but I was just looking at the thread for Rondo of Blood, and that one seemed to have been really active. Maybe people were raring to go at that since we'd had a break for a few months, but are burnt out now?

I have to admit, I feel ashamed that I haven't played it more.

I really don't want this game to be the first RGC I don't beat.

@X-pert74

Excellent work! And thanks for sharing the maps.

I played some more Blaster Master earlier today but not as much as I had wanted to! I beat the Area 4 boss, frog, who was extremely annoying! Once I determined he would be way too time consuming, I said "screw it" and cheated using the pause grenade trick. I mean, seriously, you have such a small window of opportunity to damage him, and it's extremely risky to get near the weak spot due to his multiple attacks.

Its pretty cool when you're forced to leave your tank in area 5 and explore underwater.

The area 5 boss, bubble crab, was an easier boss, as you can shoot away his projectile bubbles, but man that wore out my fingers!

So I got the Dive for my tank and started exploring more...

But considering all my gaming focus is about to center on Super Mario 3D Land, just hours away, this game will have to take a backseat for the time being. But I definitely plan to keep going, eventually.

@Guillaume How far have you gotten so far?

@roykoopa64 Thanks

The Area 4 boss is easily my least favorite boss in the game. Even with the most powerful gun, it takes forever to kill him, and if you get hit once then you lose the ability to hit him (relatively) easily. When playing through just last night, I had to do it with the middle-level gun because I got downgraded a few times, and it took probably 15-20 minutes to beat it (counting a break I took for my poor arm). The Area 5 boss is a piece of cake in comparison.

@X-pert74

AWESOME MAPS. I think I tried to do maps ONCE in a game. It didn't turn out well..

I admire your dedication!

Oh yeah, I forgot to say those maps are ballin'! As one 8-bit cartographer to another, I must say that is splendid work @X-pert74.

Thank you guys! I'm particularly proud of maps 3 and on. The first couple I might go back and update a little bit, if I ever feel so inclined. I think I marked one particular on-foot hut on the first map, which isn't actually in the game (it's to the upper left of the "gun/hover" hut)! Whoops

The Area 6 on-foot overhead ice levels are frustrating! The slipperiness is through the roof!

---

Wow, that is frustrating. I just went through a big portion of area 6, but I took a path that led me back to start of the area, and I can't go back because I can't shoot my cannon downward through the blue blocks! So I have to make my way all the way back there again. These looping areas are a mess.

---

Ah, it's not too hard to fully power up my gun in the rooms just prior to the Area 6 boss, but I lost my lives on him and have to restart at the beginning of Area 6. I wasn't able to pick up on his attack patterns quickly enough, and found it hard to predict where I should move to avoid getting hit. He seems pretty tough.

Area 6 has awesome music, I wouldn't have expected any less!

Alright, so what do I do, now? Do I give ourselves an additional month to play this game? The timing was probably poorly chosen...

If we're moving on to another game in December, I got the perfect suggestion: Actraiser, a cool game with fantastic music that isn't as difficult as most RGC games so far, and that can be beaten relatively quickly.

You might want to ask in a new thread; it doesn't seem like many people are still checking out this thread.

I hope we stick with this game, but it could mean another month of relative inactivity if people don't commit to it. Poor Blaster Master

Yeah Blaster Master doesn't deserve this neglect.

For shame people. What about Fred, all alone and mutated in a strange underground world full of weird monsters and stuff. Could make a man cry I tells you what.

For some reason I still can't get past the area 6 (ice) boss. His long arm attacks and small bullets are not too difficult to avoid, but he also throws these super fast 'ghost'-like projectiles every so often, and I simply can't avoid them.

Watching this video, this boss should go down quickly using grenades. I didn't even use grenades. Looks like I'm doing it wrong!