NES #28: Magic Johnson's Fast Break

Developer: Software Creations

Publisher: Tradewest

Release Date: 1990

 (The jersey is just a generic one, but in a couple years there would be a team called Magic. That's kind of fun)

There are two reasons I wanted to review Magic Johnson’s Fast Break even though old sports games don’t get many clicks. The first one is that Pat Contri claimed, in what just may be the end of his Amico coverage, that it is a one-star game. That’s enough to make me want to play it right there. I love playing games that are old, bad, and that I already own despite having no recollection of playing. The second reason is that I live in Magic’s hometown of Lansing, Michigan. He’s probably Lansing’s most famous native son, and the competition is surprisingly stiff. Lansing was also home to Malcolm X, Burt Reynolds, and Stephen Seagal. That’s impressive for such a modest sized city.  Sadly, there aren’t too many games based on other famous Lansingites, so I was excited to revisit Magic Johnson’s Fast Break as a tribute to my adopted hometown. Of course, just like everything he said about the Amico, Pat Contri was right about this one. No wonder I forgot about this game. It’s about as slight as a basketball game can be.

 

Magic Johnson’s Fast Break is a 2-on-2 basketball game that feels more like a tech demo than a complete game. I feel that the only reason it exists is because four people can play it at once. Being able to play with three other people is a fun concept, but you still have to make a quality game if you want people to actually buy what you are selling. Unfortunately, outside of four-player action and Magic Johnson’s disembodied head, this game has nothing going for it. There are only two unnamed teams that you don’t even get to choose, and all four characters play exactly the same. Every player is equally adept at stealing the ball and shooting three pointers, and I didn’t notice much difference in speed. The only option besides number of players is difficulty which makes for very little variety. It probably won’t surprise you by now, but there is also no season or tournament mode. So if you’re playing one player it’s just one game per difficulty level. How anyone thought such a skimpy game was acceptable so late in the NES’s lifespan is beyond me.

 

I might be more forgiving if the gameplay was solid, but there are problems with this too. This may be the only time that a sports game on the NES is too fast. I suppose fast is in the title, but the speed comes in annoying ways. After a shot is made it goes instantly to the inbound pass. It’s so quick that half the time I didn’t even realize what was happening. Stealing and passing are both done with the B button, so often possession would change mid steal and I would accidentally inbound it to the wrong team. This isn’t helped by the lousy shot animation. The net doesn’t move, the fans don’t cheer, and the shots are so low angled that it’s hard to tell if a shot is good or bad until possession changes. The NES was already five years old at this point. There’s just no excuse for such bad execution.

 

Like most branded sports games from the era, you don’t actually get to play as Magic Johnson. Instead, you are merely encouraged by him. When you do something impressive like making a three pointer, he will pop up and say something like “nice bomb kid.” Honestly the only good strategy in this game is to shoot a three every time, so you’ll see Magic a lot. It’s a good likeness, but it gets in the way more than anything. Sometimes he won’t pop up until the other team is running down the court which messes up the timing. It’s hard to defend when the action suddenly stops mid drive. This is a strange case where the game would be better with less of its star. He gives very generic advice between quarters which is fine but pointless. He will congratulate you if you win the game. Being congratulated by Magic Johnson does have a certain thrill to it, but I wish this was a game that made me feel more accomplished. In the end Magic’s compliment rings hollow, much like the game itself.

 

There were a few moments when playing that the score was close, and the game was somewhat exciting. I will admit that I enjoyed myself in these moments. This might be more because of the inherent fun of basketball than the game itself, however. The slight fun I had keeps it out of the cellar though, and it ends up right under Fester’s Quest on both lists. The fact that there are already eight games on my NES list under this one is either a bad sign for the console or the result of my questionable game selection. At least I know that many good games lie ahead.

 

NES Quality Percentage: 14/28 or 50% 

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NES #27: Fester's Quest

Developer: Sunsoft

Publisher: Sunsoft

Release Date: 1989

(That is some appealing cover art. I wish the game actually had the mansion in it.)

There are some things in life that annoy me far more than they should, such as when IGN released their list of the top 100 NES games well over a decade ago. It was fairly obvious that they did not play the nearly 800 North American games for the system and create an honest list. They simply took the most famous ones and threw in a couple of ultra-rare ones for good measure. It’s something I should really stop thinking about. I know video game lists are meaningless. Well, besides mine anyway. I suppose it bothers me because their rankings seemed to be based more on memory than merit. How else do you explain IGN ranking a game like Fester’s Quest, one that’s much more famous for its flaws than its strengths, all the way up at #45? Either the folks at IGN hadn’t played it since the early 90s or there just aren’t as many good NES games as I thought there were. Honestly, I don’t like either of those options. I’m ranking around 800 of them, so having so few good games to play would be a depressing slog. So, I played Fester’s Quest at the end of 2022 just a few weeks within me writing this review. I’m not clouded by nostalgia and can talk about it honestly. Sorry IGN, but Fester’s Quest is just not that good. It’s not the worst game on your list, but it sure is a flawed gaming experience.

 

Fester’s Quest is a game that every gamer around my age played and enjoyed for about fifteen minutes. It starts out looking like a Zelda inspired adventure game. That’s certainly an exciting prospect when most licensed games at the time were boring side scrollers. Fester’s gun is upgradable, and there are items and money to collect. Why, this game looks like it’s going to be complex and interesting. There are even other Addams Family characters to find in random houses that give Fester helpful items. Sadly, if you make it very far past the first boss, which is no easy feat in itself, you start to realize that all the complexity is just facade. It doesn’t get much more basic and repetitive than Fester’s Quest, which is really strange considering it’s a game where Uncle Fester is fighting aliens. How can a game with such an interesting premise end up so boring?

(I thought this was really cool when I was eight)

 

Some of this game’s flaws are very famous. Fester’s gun is only effective at its highest level, but getting all the upgrades can take a while and there are enemy drops that lower the gun’s level. If you get a pile of enemy drops at once, it’s best just to stand still and wait for them to disappear. What kind of a game makes you scared to pick up items? It’s also famously difficult in large part to the constantly respawning enemies. I like a good challenge, but not a boring one. The main difficulty in Fester’s Quest comes from being too slow to avoid the onslaught of enemies. There are a few times where strategy and skill come into play, but it’s mostly just slowly inching forward while constantly shooting. I highly recommend using a turbo controller for this game. Yes, even though I don’t like it much I still think you should play it. Play everything!

(Usually I love games with keys and hot dogs. I guess there's always an exception.)

 

What surprised me the most about this game, however, is just how shallow it is. Sure, it looks like an expansive world, but it’s depressingly linear. A street scene leads to a hole which leads to a sewer. There are a few houses to visit, but they are on the normal paths and only need to be visited once. All the sewers look the same and mostly have the same enemies. Even when a new enemy is introduced there will soon be a thousand of them making the novelty wear off quickly. The bosses are hidden in Wizardry-esque 3D dungeons, but each one is comprised of gray, smooth walls and floors. Even a couple of the bosses are strangely similar which is sad since there are only six of them. Even the UFO at the end of the game plays just like any other sewer section with different graphics. Everybody hates the sewer sections, and yet by the halfway point they start to take over the whole game. The streets only exist to house items and give Fester a chance to buy a life restoring hot dog. Never underestimate the healing powers of meat in old video games. There are less items to collect as it goes on, so by the end it’s just pop into one sewer, kill a thousand slime monsters, pop back out of the sewer, and go to the boss maze.

(Sewers made a big comeback after TMNT got big. I'm not joking. I was there!)

 

Sunsoft has a good reputation with retro gamers, but honestly, I’m not sure if I like any of their NES games all that much including Blaster Master. Fester’s Quest fits into that Sunsoft mold of taking way too long to finish because it all has to be done in one sitting. I don’t know what they were thinking making a game that takes hours and hours to complete without being able to stop and come back later. In Fester’s Quest when you die you go all the way back to the beginning. You keep your items, and the bosses stay dead, but you still have to slowly trek back to where you left off. If you think those sewers are tedious the first time, just think about having to go through them a dozen times while your weekend quickly melts away. I love video games more than anything, but I don’t want to get stuck in a tedious loop for hours. It gets old fast.

 

As you can already tell, Fester’s Quest is not going to rank particularly high. Sure, it’s in my top 45 NES games, but that’s just because I haven’t ranked 45 yet. It’s not quite bad enough to fall into the red section, but It’s still in the middle of the blue section. It’s not as tedious as Hogan’s Alley so I’ll give it that. Hopefully more and more NES games I review will end up in the green section. I play so many bad obscurities on here because the great games have been reviewed to death, but I might play some classics in the near future just to remind me why it’s my favorite console of all time. I still believe in you NES. I just hope after I review them all I don’t feel differently.

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