Game #041 | DUKE NUKEM Review (1991) | Not Beaten

DUKE NUKEM (July 1, 1991)

Genre: Platformer

Platforms: MS-DOS

Developer: Apogee Software

Publisher: Apogee Software

Started: April 1, 2023

Finished: April 1, 2023

Beaten: No

Playtime: 2 hours

Duke Nukem is not a franchise I'm familiar with, apart from the endless negative things I heard about Duke Nukem Forever over the last decade. I was surprised to learn that the game has its roots right here, all the way back in July 1991 on the MS-DOS. The series would go on to have three more releases over the following 20 years, including two 3D games, whereas this one is a 2D platformer/action shooter.

I've played this game for 2 hours in total and did not beat it. My main issue, which I will, among other things, touched on below, was the headache-inducing (literally unfortunately) sounds. But here are my overall thoughts.

STORYTELLING/CHARACTERS | 5/10

This game has a lengthy explanation on what's going on before you start, plus dialogue that happens between Duke and the game's antagonist, Dr. Proton, which I always appreciate for this time period. Dr. Proton is a scientist who has turned evil and wants to take over Earth (a popular backstory for video game antagonists at the time I must say). You are Duke Nukem (called Duke Nukum in game because an animated series apparently had a character with the same name, so the devs wanted to avoid a lawsuit), and have to stop Dr. Proton. The intro says the following: "Armed only with his pistol and his can-do attitude, duke is hte one person who might stand a chance of success." Really? A squad of hundreds equipped with that same pistol (or more?) couldn't stand a better chance? Duke then drops a brutal one-liner: "I'll be done with you and still have time to watch Oprah." I appreciate the silliness and am shocked at how long Oprah has managed to stay relevant, despite being one of the fakest and obnoxious people I have ever seen on television. It makes me wonder whether I should like Duke now. I digress.

GAMEPLAY | 9/20

There is nothing wrong with the gameplay in Duke Nukem other than the fact that it is very repetitive and limited in the amount of things you are able to do.

You control your character with the left and right arrow keys, you use the UP arrow key as the "action" key, like taking elevators upwards or teleporting, you use CTRL to jump and ALT to shoot your pistol.

Your goal is to reach the EXIT of an area, which can be pretty much anywhere in a given level. The game uses the space it has fully both vertically and horizontally. This means you can fall down the entire map in some levels, you have lots of space to cover from left to right and a lot of the levels are designed in a kind of labyrinth sort of fashion, as you have no pointers on where to go and some areas can be kind of similar looking. Your goal usually is to find a key to unlock access to other areas and/or the exit itself.

While you are on the lookout for the key, you have to fight off robot enemies and helicopters, you have to break crates which can either have healing items, miscellaneous items that give you points for your total score and dynamite, which explodes, so you have to watch out. There are also cameras that "watch your every move", and if you destroy every camera in a given map, you get bonus points. There is some light platforming here as well to top it off.

The game this reminds me of the most in terms of design is actually Bugs Bunny's Birthday Blowout. In that game, you also work your way through relatively large open areas with exits that can seemingly be everywhere, and on your way there, you fight enemies and collect stuff.

Unlike that game, Duke Nukem doesn't suffer from 3 FPS and basically 0 difficulty level, but I can't say I liked the level design of either game.

Duke Nukem doesn't really have the variety to keep you engaged for the 10+ hours it will take you to beat it on your first playthrough and for me, playing it at all was literally headache-inducing, which is a first for any video game I have ever played, mainly because there is no soundtrack here at all and all you here is those typical MS-DOS sound effects, which I never realized sounded so horrible until I played a game without any music.

MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 1/10

There is no voice acting, which is pretty typical and no big deal. But there also is no soundtrack, which is very odd. Literally no music at all. And then there is the sound design, which, if this didn't exist either, I would be inclined to at least give one point, but the sounds are so horrible and headache-inducing that I'd give this minus points, if it were to be in my rating system.

GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 4/10

The game looks like your cut and dry MS-DOS game. The sprite for Duke is a man who just constantly is grinding his teeth, the game lacks detail in environment and animation, there is some use of too strong colors in the background which isn't too kind on the eye and the background itself is either a still image or just pitch black. There are definitely stronger games than this that released for the MS-DOS at the time, so this wasn't that impressive.

ATMOSPHERE | 5/10

Pretty nice to see each episode move to a different setting (earth, moon, future), but visually, this game is rather basic looking and apart from the handful of dialogue that you see throughout the game, and the 0 music and ambient sound, there isn't really anything to give the impression of anything atmospheric, apart from the lack of which on the moon I guess.

CONTENT | 4/10

Game is pretty long but has pretty repetitive gameplay and mission design. Rewards for doing some extra stuff, like destroying all cameras, pretty much always is just some bonus points, so there is a lack of incentive to go through each corner of the map as well (if you can find your way there).

LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 4/10

A long game with labyrinth/maze like levels for no real reason. The gameplay variety here does not really justify the maps being so convoluted. The game has its fair share of fans still, just like any game from the past pretty much, but I doubt any new players will find a lot of enjoyment out of finding their way to the target, especially since the maps don't seem to be designed all too well.

CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 3/10

This is a platformer that doesn't really do anything differently. Perhaps it was an above average platformer on the PC, but there several other platformers who have done just about everything better than Duke Nukem does here.

REPLAYABILITY | 1/5

No real replayability after you're done, unless you want to get those bonus points and increase your score.

PLAYABILITY | 5/5

The game worked well at all times.

OVERALL | 39/100

This game is celebrated for being one of the best platformers for the MS-DOS at the time. Flux magazine ranked it the 39th best video game of all time in 1995. I have played 44 games for this challenge and this score would rank it 39th also. The lack of music and the terrible sound design really make for a brutal experience, and couple that with the repetitive nature of the gameplay and you really feel like you're in for a nightmare. Play it on mute, and it's not quite that bad, but still hasn't aged well.

Game #040 | SONIC THE HEDGEHOG Review (1991) | Not Beaten

SONIC THE HEDGEHOG (June 23, 1991)

Genre: Platformer

Platforms: Sega Genesis

Developer: Sonic Team

Publisher: Sega

Started: March 25, 2023

Finished: March 31, 2023

Beaten: No

Playtime: 4 hours

I took a few-month-long break from this challenge, only to return to arguably one of the most well-known video games of all time: Sonic the Hedgehog, which released on June 23rd, 1991 for the Sega Genesis. As someone who's childhood was dominated by Mario and Nintendo rather than Sonic and Sega, this was the first time I actually tried not only the original Sonic game, but any Sonic game period. 

Expecting a fast paced variation to the multitude of same-y platformers that the video game industry printed out in and around 1991, I was not disappointed. For the most part.

More on the game in detail below.

STORYTELLING/CHARACTERS | 4/10

This is another one of those games that doesn't really have any in-game storytelling apart from the boss encounters. You have to stop evil Dr. Ivo Robotnik, who snatches innocent animals and turns them into evil robots.

You, of course, are Sonic the Hedgehog. I'll give the manual of this game the honors to describe him to you: "It's Sonic, the real cool hedgehog with the spiked haircut and power sneakers that give him super speed." That's a cute description. Obviously, Sega finally found their answer to Nintendo's Mario with Sonic after trying with Alex Kidd from 1986 up until Sonic replaced him. Dr. Robotnik himself turned into an iconic video game antagonist as well, though after his first appearance here, I'd think it's either because he was just the villain millions of children were chasing back in the day, or because he has a more prominent role in future entries. Either way, Sega created one of the most iconic characters in video games here, and for that they deserve all the praise they got through the years. 

Every other character you know and love from the series isn't present here yet.

GAMEPLAY | 13/20

This is a 2D platformer the likes you've seen before. At least for the most part. You have to jump attack enemies to make them pop or avoid them altogether. You have to watch for spikes at the bottom of the screen, lest you want to see your demise. You need to take out bosses after the end of each area. You have to do this for multiple areas until you defeat the final boss. And you start with 3 lives to accomplish this. 

The catch: You gain in speed as you gain in momentum. This means, the longer you can run forward uninterrupted, the faster you become. I don't know why I am explaining this, you all know Sonic. ... Running fast allows you to reach otherwise unreachable heights and areas to boost your score, find secrets and generally avoid the pitfalls that avoid you at the bottom of the screen.

Those pitfalls? Those aforementioned spikes for example. There are platforms you can jump on mixed in with spikes, and if you fall into them, you take a hit.

["Health" in this game explained: Taking a hit is not fatal as long as you carry 1 coin or more with you. If you get hit, you lose that coin. You can try to pick it back up before it disappears. If you run around with no coins, any hit is fatal, unless you have picked up a power-up item that acts like a shield. This is similar to Mario in that he'll instantly die if you are small Mario, but get infinite health as long as you can find mushrooms after every time you take a hit.]

With the spikes, the problem is, it doesn't matter whether you carry coins, because you don't gain i-frames if you take a hit from them. So you end up taking the hit, which throws you vertically into the air and back down on top of the spikes, which then kills you. That was pretty annoying, though they are easy to avoid once you start remembering the level map.

There are also snakes which you can only hit if you jump on top of their head, but it's easy to miss to at first and jump on top of its tail, which will damage you. Early on, there is also spike bridge which keeps spinning, and I still haven't figured out when to jump on top of it without avoiding the spikes. 

I haven't gotten too deep into the game to see what about half of the levels look like, but as you can see, it's a typical design of figuring things out as you keep playing. The Arcade design with these types of games hasn't really aged well because instead of spending a couple hours and beating the game, devs put these mechanics in place to keep you playing for dozens of hours before you win, as otherwise you'd notice that the game in actuality is quite short. One full playthrough takes less than an hour, if you can actually win. And unlike a game like Super Mario World, where I would collect 30+ 1Up's without any issue, the extra lives are much more hidden, and presumable scarce, here.

There are some parts where you have to hop on platforms as they slowly appear, or where you have to avoid spikes at the bottom as previously mentioned, and those sectioned kind of felt out of place in a game that has speed as its main theme.

When you reach full speed though, and everything loops quite well, the gameplay becomes satisfying. But to reach that kind of fluidity will take you a while, at least in this specific game.

MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 6/10

No voice acting. I have mixed feelings about the sound design, as I thought that some effects sounded pretty good, but some pretty bad. The sound of the ground beneath me collapsing just sounds unnecessarily aggressive, the sound that keeps playing when you have the shield power-up equipped just shouldn't exist (I would describe it as such: "hatufff") and the 18 sounds that play at the same time whilst you are in the secret 'floating maze' area sounded unnerving. I think Sega could improve a lot in this area in future iterations, though I'm obviously complaining on a high level here. The soundtrack, at least for the first half of levels which I was able to play, sounded pretty good. The Green Hill Zone music I was already familiar with through, among other things, it being sampled into rap songs. In general, I thought the soundtrack was nice to listen to. 

GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 7/10

The graphics here look pretty good for its time. Some zones are rather basic looking in presentation, some way too busy, but overall, the game is definitely above average visually. If you have played a future entry, this might be a bit harder to look, I can't say, but if you're a newcomer to the series, this game definitely fits right in with just about any game in this era. Though to me, this game is many steps behind Super Mario World in graphical presentation nonetheless thanks to Super Mario World's variety in presentation and much cleaner and unique animations. Though back then, this wasn't the predominant opinion, and you might feel differently today as well. 

ATMOSPHERE | 6/10

There isn't really much here to put into a cohesive unit that emanates an immersive "Sonic-like atmosphere", and I feel like that's something that will work itself out in the upcoming releases. 

The mix of sounds with everything that happens on the screen through the music and sound effects feels excessive and unconnected at times and the zones don't really tell me much about where Sonic is and what this world feels like. The soundtrack, while nice to listen to on its own, sounds like it lacks a little bit of punch to the speedster that Sonic is. Look, I know rambling about this is way too serious and ridiculous, and I agree, but that's what this section is for. I doubt many share these thoughts, but that's what I thought about whilst playing the game. Hello to you, if you actually are reading this. :-)

CONTENT | 6/10

This is a short game, if you actually manage to beat it. It takes less than one hour for a normal full playthrough. Of course, it'll take you 10+ hours to actually beat it because of all the trial and error. Besides blazing through the levels, there are some hidden secret areas that will grant you some power up items, extra lives and a boost to your total score, plus those Secret Zones where you can collect "Chaos Emeralds". The Chaos Emeralds in the original version are there to give you the good ending, if you collect them all. In some other entries, and in a 2013 remaster entry of this title, acquiring them all enables Super Sonic, an OP golden version of Sonic. 

In terms of the zone differences, the game does continue to mix things up the further you progress, though not in a major way. There are also no deviations from the core gameplay here by introducing other mechanics, which makes sense, as this is the first Sonic game. For example in Super Mario World, you have levels where you can acquire Yoshi, which changes gameplay up a bit, or you have special boss and ghost zones which play differently, among other things.

LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 7/10

The levels in this game are put into 6 different zones plus a final zone, with each zone differing in style. Levels are for the most part designed to enhance Sonic's strength, speed, by for example giving him spirals to run through and gain momentum. At the same time, some levels include parts that force the player to take it slower, unless the player is already extremely skilled and knowledgeable about the game to rarely run into any obstacles. Either way, there are some parts where you simply need to wait for platforms to carry you somewhere or to come down to your level so you can jump on top of them. 

Overall, the level design is unique thanks to the speed factor, but otherwise doesn't really stray far from the average platformer formula. That is to be expected though, as this is the first Sonic game made. 

CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 9/10

This game gets a big bonus for giving us the debut of Sonic and introducing speed as such a prevalent feature in its design, something you didn't really see anywhere else on this level. Is it very unique apart from those things? Definitely not, but I don't think it needs to be, at least until Sonic the Hedgehog 2 releases in November 1992.

REPLAYABILITY | 2/5

How replayable would this game be after you beat it once? Not a lot. You are unlikely to collect all Chaos Emeralds your first time through and will likely receive the bad ending, so the main motivations to play this again would be to beat your previous score and obtain the good ending.

PLAYABILITY | 5/5

The game worked well at all times, apart from the very few areas where I experienced slowdown, though that was a given for pretty much all Sega Genesis games at the time, and in the number of times it happened here, not a big deal at all.

OVERALL | 65/100

You want to know if Sonic the Hedgehog is worth playing today? I'd say so. Unlike Super Mario World, which was this game's main competitor at the time, I can't say Sonic the Hedgehog aged quite as well. That's tough to do however, as I would say that Super Mario World is probably the best platformer of the early 90s. Sonic the Hedgehog remains the debut game for Sonic however, and this piece of video gaming history is definitely worth experiencing, and once you get comfortable with the game, gaining more and more speed with Sonic will feel more and more satisfying. Future entries will of course present you with much cleaner experiences however.

WHAT THEY SAID AT THE TIME

• Steve Harris for EGM, Issue 24 (July '91): "Definitely, without a doubt, positively the most incredible action game ever created for the Genesis!"
• Boogie Man for Game Pro, Issue 23 (June '91): "Sonic the Hedgehog's multi-scrolling graphics are a knockout"

Game #039 | VICE: PROJECT DOOM Review (1991) | Beaten

VICE: PROJECT DOOM (April 26, 1991)

Genre: Platformer, Shooter

Platforms: NES

Developer: Aicom

Publisher: Sammy Corporation

Started: December 3, 2022

Finished: December 4, 2022

Beaten: Yes

Playtime: 2.5 hours

Vice: Project Doom is definitely one of the best named games I've played so far. Is it one of the best games games though? Well, not really. It does some things really, really well, it has a lot more storytelling than you would expect from NES titles, but it is a game that shares similarities with many, many other games out there and other games have done many things better than this one.

This game released on April 26, 1991 for NES in Japan and NA, and got a release on Nintendo Switch Online in August 2019.

STORY(TELLING)/CHARACTERS | 6/10

You play Detective Hart, to is tasked with investigating the "BEDA corporation", a front run by alien beings living on Earth in secrecy. They've developed a substance that was supposed to be food for the Aliens, however has been misused by humans due to its addictive natures, despite the fact that it has very bad side-effects.

Usually I would mention how the story resolves because for the vast majority of games, the plot and the storytelling in particular are afterthoughts. Not here. Vice: Project of Doom stands out in its storytelling and the sheer volume of its cutscenes. If I had to give a comparison, I think the Ninja Gaiden series fits best. After every stage, a cutscene plays with shots of the characters and lines of dialogue below. The camera pans left to right during these and the characters remain still otherwise, but this is very much unusual for this time and the #1 factor in which this game stands out.

There are some twists and turns in the story as well. That said, the storytelling isn't that great, probably because devs back then were game devs first and storytellers like sixteenth, so they're excused but the effort is there.

GAMEPLAY | 12/20

There are 3 types of stages in this game. In the first kind, you drive a car through a narrow driving lane and have to move side to side to avoid the edges, to avoid obstacles in front of you that damage you, and destroy/avoid enemy vehicles. This is not that great and there are only two short levels of this kind.

The second type is a side scrolling rail shooter kind of stage that repeats twice as well. You shoot enemies, some close by, some far away, before they shoot you. You pick up items they drop by moving the cursor above the items. You have a few different weapons you can use, some of which have higher AoE damage. It's OK and a nice-to-have change of pace, but I wouldn't say these levels are good. They're tolerable at best.

The third type, finally, is the main kind, 2D platforming with enemies everywhere. You have three weapons at your disposal, two of which need ammo (dynamite, gun). You also have a sword that you can slash your way through levels with. I mostly stuck with the sword. The timing window with your sword is not that long, so I often would be just early or just too late and get hit. It doesn't help that at many points, there are a lot of enemies coming from both angles. Some drop into view out of nowhere sometimes and immediately start shooting, which makes avoiding their shots impossible unless you move forward a step at a time, which would kill the pace and therefore your enjoyment of the game. So just eat those hits and keep moving. 

At the end of each level, a meat item drops which regenerates most of your health, so getting hit a bunch of times is not a big issue. So yes, this is not a "one-hit and you die" type of game, thankfully. But it's not a very original game either, at least in terms of its gameplay. In fact, it's very average.

MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 8/10

No voice acting. Sound design is typical for NES games, so it doesn't stand out. The soundtrack is definitely one of the better ones of all NES games I've played so far, and has some bangers, including the track they've used for many of the cutscenes. The track for Boss Battles 3-2 and 7-3 is also worth a listen. 

GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 4/10

It's very average graphically. It's an NES game, so it's inferior to some of the other games that came out at the time due to the move to 16-bit across the board. Artistically, it still has the ability to stand out but it doesn't. The levels and their artistic design are unimpressive and the kind of enemies that the devs have thrown into each level appears kinda random. You gut red ninjas flying out of the ground, fish too whilst bats come down from above, it just does not feel very thought out in that regard.

ATMOSPHERE | 6/10

The game is described as biopunk and noir. That's a nice mix of themes that you don't see often, and even if the technical limitations hinder the game from delivering a truly intense/atmospheric experience, I appreciate the difference in tone, especially in terms of its story the farther you dive into it. Within the levels, there is plenty of green and black but levels often rather feel like "levels" than actual places. More detail would have helped there.

CONTENT | 7/10

You have 10 levels I believe, all (most?) with multiple stages. 2 of those have you driving, 2 have you on rails. There are boss fights at the end of each level and probably over 10 minutes of storytelling all told. It's a good amount of content.

LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 6/10

This is mostly a very typical affair. Even though there are some levels where many enemies appear at once, it rarely really leans into the ridiculous like many other games do, even a game such as Ninja Gaiden, because enemies rarely take more than one hit to be defeated and you are such a tank with your own health. There is just one early difficulty spike for one boss that is just so insane that I wouldn't be surprised if the vast majority of players back in the day didn't manage to beat it. Thanks to the magic of emulators and rewind, I was able to eventually get it down, but man was that ridiculously difficult, especially since almost everything else in this game is very beatable.

CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 5/10

Innovative in only one thing, and that is its focus on storytelling. The way it tells its story is completely copied from Ninja Gaiden, but let's rather call it 'inspired' and be happy that storytelling is actually happening, something I'm always a big fan of. 

The game also features a good soundtrack, but is decidedly average in every other way. 

REPLAYABILITY | 2/5

Not really replayable apart from trying to beat your high score. But it's an important game because it leans away from the arcade into a more story-focused experience, which at this time, many games still didn't do. It even gave you a lot of health instead of one hit-point like many other games, so it wasn't too concerned with artificially increasing the play time of this thing either.

PLAYABILITY | 4/5

Playable for the most part. It just has that typical NES slowdown issue whenever 5+ sprites appear on the screen simultaneously. It happens often enough that I deducted a point. 

OVERALL | 60

Are you looking for something like the early Ninja Gaiden games in terms of storytelling, whilst the game maintained a similar retro style? Well, you don't have the wall jumping here, but other than that, Vice: Project Doom is the best comparison I could find so far. Storytelling is exactly the same, there is some (not a lot) of variety in gameplay and a very good soundtrack here, so give it a try. But don't expect anything special here, as this is one of the most average NES games you'll ever play apart from its storytelling.

Game #038 | THE BUGS BUNNY CRAZY CASTLE II | Not Beaten

THE BUGS BUNNY CRAZY CASTLE II (April 26, 1991)

Genre: Action, Puzzle

Platforms: Game Boy

Developer: Kemco

Publisher: Kemco-Seika (JP/EU/NA), Nintendo (NA), Laguna Video Games (EU)

Started: November 29, 2022

Finished: November 29, 2022

Beaten: No

Playtime: 1 hours

Well, I regret keeping this on my list. I have The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout as the 2nd worst game I've played in 1990's batch, but it was sort of entertainingly mediocre, so I thought I'd double down and play another Bugs Bunny themed video game. 

This time, that game is The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle II, a GameBoy game that initially released in April 26, 1991. Wikipedia lists it as an "Action" game, which I think makes it the least "action" Action game I've ever played. I'd rather call it a Puzzle game myself. I would also call it a bad game. Check out the "Overall" part to see my overall thoughts, check out any part you want if you want more detailed thoughts there.

STORY(TELLING)/CHARACTERS | 1/10

Very simple. Bugs Bunny's girlfriend, Honey Bunny, is captured by "Witch Hazel" and must be rescued by finishing 28 levels. The game starts by showing an image of the Witch's castle and the picture of Honey Bunny on top of it. Then the game starts. You'll get a tiny scene at the end but that's pretty much it. So pretty typical stuff for a puzzle / platformer type affair. 

GAMEPLAY | 5/20

You start a level and find yourself on a screen filled with enemies and doors. The goal is to enter these doors, find all keys, and then exit through the designated exit door. In between, you also have to pick up weapons or a hammer for example to kill enemies or   break some obstacles in your path. 

The idea is simple. The level is presented to you as a puzzle, and you have to figure out how to perform all necessary tasks in an order that allows you to beat it without getting hit. Because if you get hit even once, you die and have to restart the level. 

From the get go, I gotta say that the game design here is not that good. First, instead of simply picking up keys on the screen, you have to enter doors, all of which simply have a key. So why not just leave the keys on the screen and forego the minutes and minutes of time you will lose on opening all these doors over the entire play time. 

Second, the game seriously lacks in features. Opening doors and collecting keys is all you do. Apart from picking up those weapons, you can also use a rope to get to another platform and you can step on platforms that are marked as "Up" to jump up. The game picks up in difficulty the further you go of course, but this is generally it. There is a small sense of reward of finishing a level that you feel and the game as a package is much, much tighter than Bugs Bunny's Birthday Blowout, but it isn't really fun. 

MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 4/10

No voice acting. I didn't like the sound design that much. The sound of picking up keys got a bit irritating after a while, and the OST is only 7 minutes long. It's not the good kind of retro OST either, as its sound quality often is just subpar. 

GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 3/10

It's an early 90s GameBoy game, so it looks like you'd think it looks. There isn't much attention to detail here and the fact that jumping platforms are simply labeled "Up" shows how little passion went into this. There are 5 games of this type by the way.

ATMOSPHERE | 2/10

There is no atmosphere to feel here. You could put anyone as the main character and it wouldn't really feel any more out of place. If you are going to enjoy this, you'll enjoy it for the puzzle design, but I doubt it will offer you any value in any shape or form by the way it looks and feels.

CONTENT | 4/10

There are 28 levels here and a boss fight. It's not a terrible offering. If you enjoy the puzzle aspect of this game, there is plenty here to work your brain over, but I don't know why you would choose to play this if you could instead play any of the other 4 Crazy Castle iterations or, here is a thought, a good puzzle game, of which there are thousands.

LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 4/10

It works in that each level has a guaranteed way of being passable if you figure out the right way. Figuring that out on some levels can be somewhat of a challenge, so it does its job as a puzzle game, but it's too repetitive and not that fun to begin with.

CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 2/10

There is nothing here that could be considered innovating. As a concept, it works, that's probably the best thing to say here.

REPLAYABILITY | 1/5

Levels have a specific way of being completed and you won't really do anything differently the second time out. All you could do is try to finish the levels faster but why would you?

PLAYABILITY | 5/5

Unlike the other Bugs Bunny game I've played, this didn't play at constant 15 FPS, so that's a big plus. It works from start to finish without issue.

OVERALL | 30/100

This is a repetitive, boring puzzle game that feels like a reskin of a reskin of a reskin, even if it isn't so necessarily. There just isn't anything here to make it stand out, the way the game is designed is just not fun and I was shocked to find out that by the end of 90s, it had sold over 200.000 copies in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Game #037 | LEMMINGS Review (1991) | Not Beaten

LEMMINGS (February 14, 1991)

Genre: Puzzle, Strategy

Platforms: Amiga, MS-DOS, Atari ST, Amiga, FM Towns, SNES

Developer: DMA Design (aka Rockstar North), Sunsoft (SNES)

Publisher: Psygnosis, Sunsoft (SNES)

Started: November 10, 2022

Finished: November 11, 2022

Beaten: No

Playtime: 3 hours

I'm going to guess and say that the majority of you have played this game or, more likely, a game that is pretty similar to the idea that Lemmings puts forward, a puzzle(-strategy) game by DMA Design, initially released on February 14th, 1991 and ported to dozens of systems after its success as an Amiga game. I played the SNES version for this review.

FUN FACT: DMA Design, the developer, today goes by the somewhat known name Rockstar North and are creators of the GTA series. 

STORYTELLING/CHARACTERS | 2/10

You control Lemmings, which do exist in real life (small rodents). In this game, they are anthropomorphized, meaning they walk upright and can do human tasks like digging, climbing, jumping down whilst holding an umbrella etc.

There is a misconception in pop culture that Lemmings commit "mass suicide", something the devs seem to have chosen as inspiration for creating this game. 

In this game, all lemmings are identical copies of each other, you simply can change their behavior by equipping them with a certain task/skill like the ones mentioned in the previous paragraph. 

The goal of every level is to rescue at least a certain percentage of all Lemmings that are present in a given level. Once you do that, you can try to rescue the rest or have them blow themselves up and end the level.

Every time the puzzles go up in difficulty level, a little cutscene plays showing the Lemmings move across the screen.

I feel like there was some potential here for these little guys to have a bigger name across gaming than they ended up having because they do offer a certain charm.  

But as far as storytelling goes, the game doesn't offer anything beyond the basic goal of each level.

GAMEPLAY | 12/20

There are up to 120 levels depending on the port you play that are spread between four difficulty levels. In each level, a door opens that releases a set number of Lemmings. The game tells you how many of them you need to save to beat the level. 

The lemmings move forward at all times, no matter what, and if there is something that blocks their path, they simply turn around and go the other way. You are equipped with a bunch of "tasks" that you can give to the lemmings and your job is to choose the correct ones, at the correct times and in the proper order to successfully send enough Lemmings to the exit. 

For example, in the first level, you have to give your Lemmings the "digging" task, which makes them start digging up the ground beneath them. This opens up a path to the exit once they're done.

With each level, it starts getting more and more complicated of course. You need to mix multiple tasks up at once, figure out how to make a lemming cancel his task to help him escape as well, and well, ultimately decide how much you value your time.

Because as creative as the game design is, and as much fun it is to figure out the solution, it often is not the path to the solution that is hard to figure out. It is the wait. 

Once you have the solution, like for example digging open the ground beneath your lemmings, you now have to wait. and wait. and wait until they all slowly make their way to the finish line. I am not joking if I say that it takes minutes a lot of times for things to play out like you already know it will.

I've played for a few hours and a too significant amount of that was spent waiting instead of solving puzzles or applying the correct strategy. That made the game significantly less enjoyable that it probably would be in a more modern release where your characters would probably start moving much faster once the game knows that you opened up the winning path.

It doesn't help that later on, levels often became repetitive and, when checking a YT playthrough, I realized it just ended up being more or less the same over and over again, so I decided that I saw enough after a few hours.

MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 8/10

Voice acting is limited to some high-pitched noises and a few words. "Yippie", "Let's go", "Oh no" are things you will hear quite often, but generally the Lemmings remain pretty silent in this one. The soundtrack features some nice music, including a remix of Jacques Offenbach's "Infernal Galop".

GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 6/10

The graphics aren't anything special in this one, but the animations are really good for its time. The way the Lemmings hair flies from side to side as they keep digging for example is really detailed. 

ATMOSPHERE | 6/10

Nothing special that I want to mention in this regard. The artistic design of the levels, the kinda cutesy Lemmings, the noises they make, the music, it all combines to make a game with a cozy enough atmosphere but one that can stress you out pretty fast if you ever are stuck with any particular level, especially since it means you will have to blow everyone up to restart.

CONTENT | 6/10

120 levels, gets repetitive. Too much time is spent waiting on the Lemmings to walk around, too little on actually doing puzzles. It's an effective brainteaser but doesn't translate to a whole lot of fun at too many times.

LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 6/10

You have all those skills I mentioned at your disposal and try to figure out which ones to use and at which point. Some levels only allow you to use specific skills and all require you to get a certain number of Lemmings to safety on each level. It's fun, but the design does get a bit repetitive over time. More skills obviously would mean more variety. The amount available here doesn't really seem to support 120 levels whilst keeping it fresh.

CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 7/10

Obviously very innovative in its design, even if it doesn't always translate to a lot of fun. Especially once you figure out how to do a puzzle and are stuck waiting for minutes for your Lemmings to get a move on, the design shows its cracks. But the design could have been taken a number of different directions from here on out, and I'll be honest, as of now I don't know what happened to the series and if there are any spiritual successors.

REPLAYABILITY | 2/5

Pretty high. You can keep replaying to try and get more Lemmings out of a level, and you can even try your hand at figuring out how to get 100% of them out each time. It involves some advanced techniques that I didn't figure out myself, and one that adds a lot more waiting time to your playthrough, but it may be a worthwhile reward for people with plenty of patience and resilience.

PLAYABILITY | 5/5

It works well from start to finish.

OVERALL | 60/100

I can appreciate the game for its innovation. Unfortunately the way this is designed makes for a slow affair because a lot of the time playing this game is spent waiting for the Lemmings to go from A to B. More QoL improvements in later versions maybe have resulted in cleaner and faster experiences, but as it stands, this game was definitely way more enjoyable in the past than it is today, at least if you're a newcomer to this type of puzzle game.