Transport back in time by one week please! This mini review/round up was meant to go live last Saturday on Halloween, however due to a lack of internet speed and video problems it’s been delayed until today!
Jack Bros - Nintendo Virtual Boy (1995)
Happy Halloween…
The spotlight this week is on Jack Bros for the Nintendo Virtual Boy, a perfectly apt choice for Halloween. Jack Bros is a light hearted, spooky game featuring the Jack Bros mascots from the Megami Tensei franchise. Jack Frost and Jack Lantern are joined by one more Jack, Jack Skelton. Released 1995, it was published and developed by Atlus.
Jack Bros is eaisly up there as a contender for the best Virtual Boy game ever released (despite the fact there isn’t much competition).
Wario Land is the only other game to really challenge it for the top spot.
Jack Brothers’ Hee-Ho at the Labyrinth!
Halloween is the only day of the year where fairies can enter the human world. The fairies and human children look forward to this day every year, the Jack Bros head out for the day to have their annual fun. Before they know it, time has ticked to 11pm already. If they don’t get home before midnight, the portal to the world of fairies will soon close.
Taking on the role of one of the Jack Bros, in the last hour of Halloween, you must venture home as quickly as possible. Fighting through multi floored Gauntlet style gameplay with an Anime twist of bizarre.
Gameplay follows a very similar style to Gauntlet; you can move in 4 directions and shoot in four directions, grab the keys and get out of there.
The Virtual Boy was able to make this style of gameplay much more involving using the second D-Pad. The D-Pad on the left is for moving and the one on the right is for shooting, in the direction you pressed. This allows very useful strafing which isn’t possible in the early Gauntlet games.
Instead of a health meter, you are given a timer which slowly disappears as you move around. But you have to watch where you walk, as contact with an enemy or obstacle will shave time off the timer. If it runs out, it’s game over!
There are various types of enemies, slow ghosts, fast cats, sneaky bomb dropping goblins and elves with bows. Once you have passed the initial tutorial floors instructed by Pixie, you’ll soon find yourself having to adopt multiple patterns of dodging and shooting these enemies, almost similar to a Shmup.
To continue its theme as a Shmup in disguise, you’re given a few signature bombs to let off in those times of panic and every level ends with a boss.
Although Jack Bros doesn’t show off the Nintendo Virtual Boy’s faux 3D capabilities, Atlus once again proved that gameplay is much more important than that added finesse. There are some nice effects while swapping floors, enemies that don’t look glued to the ground and if you look carefully, Jack’s Head is on a different level to his body. These are all nice subtle touches, that really add to the depth of the dungeon without making it look messy (Virtual Boy Waterworld, I’m looking at you).
Screenshots
Collector’s Information:
|
Final thoughts:
Unfortunately for anyone wanting a quick blast of Virtual Boy’s Jack Bros, you’ll have to accept the Virtual Boy was released at the wrong time. A time when all gamers were interested in was Polygons and fancy effects.
Jack Bros is often regarded as the rarest American Virtual Boy game out of the official 14 titles released. But don’t let that put you off this fine game, Jack Bros is well worth the price tag.