| Adventure Island II 1991 HudsonSoft, NES/Famicom |
Adventure Island II was released for the NES in 1991 (and maybe Famicom in 1988, not sure). It is the sequel to Adventure Island. It seems when they released this they dropped the "Hudson's" from the title. Again, this series is based on the Sega Arcade game "Wodner Boy".
This time the Witch Doctor's followers have abducted with Tina Again, and once again, Master Higgins is in the South Pacific island area searching for her in a side scrolling action adventture game. Same idea as last time, collect fruit for energy while fighting various creatures such as snails, frogs, birds, and spinning skullfist things. This time, kinda' ripping off super Mario Bros. 3, you travel between multiple islands where you play stages and defeat a big boss guy. Eight Islands, about 5 stages per. This one was a little more popular in the United States. It really bumped up the gameplay a bit adding Dinosaurs into the mix (which was a popular thing at the time, with the sitcom Dinosaurs and things like Encino Man being popular at the time - not da' mama!). The control is a lot better, lot more fluid, and less stiff, and the bonus rounds are better. It feels less like some kind of wacky game show and more like a legit NES game of the period.Redneck Higgins Gunna' Bild Hisself a Raft! - My Experiences I found out about this game actually via our seasonal book-fair in 2nd grade, where I used to buy various Nintendo Hint Guide books - which were where I'd find out about stuff beyond the usual Mario/Zelda/Final Fantasy/Street Fighter/TMNT stuff. One of the games in the first book I got was this one. Which I also rented from Blockbuster, and found I quite well liked it enough to put it on my want list periodically when I felt like it. It's a vast improvement over the first game, which came out in 1986. The controls are smoother, jumping is better controlled, and the newer power-ups are a lot more fair and balanced compared to the 1986 original. There's also a new bonus round where you grab a spinning egg and win some points or a power-up. Playing this again as an adult, it's a fun little time waster, and actually still just as fun as I remember, so I'm glad I have it across two platforms, one portable - which is the screenshot up top (Sup' 400-in-1), and the Pocketgames 150-in-1 Famicom Multicart.Videos Other Stuff |
