NES Launch Games Assemble! - Kung Fu, Pinball, Soccer, and Stack Up
NES Catalog #010-013
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Kung Fu
PUBLISHER/DEVELOPER: Nintendo
RELEASE DATE: June 21st, 1985 (JP), Oct. 1985 (US), Apr. 15th, 1987 (EU)
ALSO AVAILABLE ON: Arcade, Apple II, Commodore 64, MSX, Amstrad CPC, Atari 2600, Atari 7800, Game Boy, Saturn (part of Irem Arcade Classics), PlayStation (part of Irem Arcade Classics)
Thomas, the Kung-Fu Master, is pissed. His bodacious girlfriend, Sylvia, has been commandeered by the evil Mr. X and whisked away to the mysterious Devil’s Tower. Obviously, Mr. X captured Sylvia to draw Thomas out, but he’s unaware that Thomas’ kung-fu powers only grow stronger the more enraged he becomes. Five stories of minions and magical creatures are no match for his supernatural abilities.
Kung Fu is an early beat-em-up that lives and breathes by its flow. Rarely are there too many enemies on screen for you to handle. Thomas controls with near-perfect precision, and can kick, punch, jump and spin around with relative ease. Dodging a dragon’s fire breath before quickly turning around to kick multiple Grippers (enemies that like to hug), is one of Kung Fu’s many tense, wonderful scenarios. The one-on-one boss battles are also well-executed, though considerably less challenging than the levels themselves.
After five harrowing levels, Thomas dispatches Mr. X and rescue Sylvia. A passionate embrace is Thomas’ well-deserved reward. Unfortunately, all those kisses only delay the inevitable. Suddenly, Thomas, Mr. X and his minions, and Sylvia are all thrust back to level 1, like nothing ever happened.
It is the Arcade Curse. Kung Fu has only just begun.
B-
What I Wrote About Kung-Fu in 2012
“I personally get sucked into Kung-Fu every time I play it, even though it’s incredibly dated and not that good of a game. For me, the speed at which the enemies advance towards you keep the game (mildly) interesting. I also have a score to settle: I have yet to make it past the large black guy at the end of the third level. There’s still two more levels! I want to save Sylvia from Mr. X! Even in ’85, Kung-Fu wasn’t Nintendo’s finest hour, but it was another solid addition to a surprisingly varied original lineup.
B-
Pinball
PUBLISHER/DEVELOPER: Nintendo
RELEASE DATE: Feb. 2nd 1984 (JP), Oct. 1985 (US), Sept. 1st, 1986 (EU)
ALSO AVAILABLE ON: Arcade, Famicom Disk System, e-Reader, Gamecube (via Animal Crossing), Virtual Console (Wii, Wii U), Switch (via Arcade Archives), Nintendo Switch Online
Pinball used to be great. Or, at least, I used to think it was great back in the early '90s, back before I played every pinball game available on the NES (Pinball Quest forever). The top half of the board has seals that bounce balls on their nose (if you collect all eight lights in the upper right hand corner) and penguins doing gymnastics. You can hang your ball on the 100 point bumper and make it go through the 1000-point target dozens of times, if you’re lucky. With this technique, I could easily get 200,000 points in a single playthrough.
The bottom half has baby chicks in eggs (unhatch 'em all to get stoppers), playing cards that can be uncovered for points, good glory, so many bumpers, and seven numbered targets that, once hit, can send your ball back to the plunger.
Neither the top half nor the bottom half of the board are all that exciting, frankly, but together, they made for a serious time sink for my younger self.
Then of course, there's the bonus stage. Mario lives here, for some reason. As with all early NES outings, Nintendo's putting him to work. Here, Mario tries desperately to keep the pinball up in the air, a la Breakout, and knock out the floor where Pauline is held prisoner.
So many questions. Who trapped Pauline in what looks to be the vents of this pinball machine? Why can't Mario just jump up there like the baller that he is and rescue her? Why does he need a pinball?
I never asked these questions as a child. I didn't care. Pinball, Mario, bonus stages, exercising penguins, energetic seals, balls, bumpers and points everywhere. I embraced the madness, as we do when we're young.
Today, Pinball isn't great. Your ball tends to sink like a stone and/or be attracted to places where you don't want it to go. Neither the top screen nor the bottom screen are particularly engaging (Mario's Breakout moment, on the other hand, has aged pretty well). Unless you love collecting points or watching adorable penguins do calisthenics, the whole affair grows tiresome quickly.
In 1985, though? Pinball was the ultimate home pinball video game. Two screens with a bonus third screen? Talk about features. Your other options in 1985 were: Video Pinball for the Atari 2600 and Sega Flipper for the SG-1000, neither of which replicated pinball nearly as well as Nintendo's attempt.
Point is, Pinball got the job done for awhile. Today's relic is yesterday's moderate accomplishment.
1985: B+
Today: C
What I Wrote About Pinball in 2013
“On the lower half of the table, there are cards you can flip with your pinball, targets to hit, ducklings to unhatch – all for raging point glory. The bonus stage is where you’ll find Mario playing Breakout with a pinball, in attempts to free Pauline. Once Pauline falls, Mario can catch her, lead her to safety, and you’ll earn?… even more points. Pinball is an entertaining smorgasbord of strangeness that doesn’t overwhelm the player with useless clutter. Rudimentary virtual pinball at its finest.”
B+
Soccer
PUBLISHER/DEVELOPER: Nintendo
RELEASE DATE: Apr. 09, 1985 (JP), Oct. 1985 (US), Jan. 15th, 1987 (EU)
ALSO AVAILABLE ON: Arcade, Famicom Disk System, Gamecube (via Animal Crossing), Virtual Console (Wii, Wii U), Switch (via Arcade Archives), Nintendo Switch Online
Soccer is yet another one of Nintendo’s seemingly neverending early sports efforts. It’s not as delightfully unpredictable as Baseball nor as tranquil as Golf, but it does have a bunch of adorable sprites running around the field in short shorts. What more could you ask for?
That said, your soccer players move like slow-roasted, hot garbage. Likely due to the sheer number of sprites on screen at once, speed is non-existent here; concerning, given that soccer is typically a fast-moving game. Also, when you have control of the ball, you can only move up, down, left, or right, not diagonally, which just feels so wrong. Either through experience with previous soccer games or just watching soccer on TV, you’ll be screaming at your player to break free of his four cardinal direction programming, especially as the other side’s players bear down on you. Alas, he can’t hear you, for he is an ancient sprite trapped in the distant past.
Outdated mechanics aside, Soccer does everything you’d expect an old soccer game to do, including but not limited to: passing, blocking goals, penalty kicks (in case of a tie), a two-player mode for when you want to torture a friend/sibling/roommate, and most importantly, giving you the option to play as Brazil, the greatest soccer team in the world.
That’ll do, Soccer. That’ll do.
C
What I Wrote About Soccer In 2013
“The one drawback to Soccer‘s retro simplicity is its sluggishness: all of the players move like they’re knee deep in mud. If you stick with the game, you get used to the pace, but initially, the slow movements can be maddening. Still, for a sports game that just had its twenty-eighth birthday, Soccer gets around pretty well.”
B-
Stack-Up (Robot Block)
PUBLISHER/DEVELOPER: Nintendo
RELEASE DATE: July 26th, 1985 (JP), Oct. 1985 (US), 1986 (EU)
ALSO AVAILABLE ON: NES or bust
Stack Up is the “other” ROB the Robot game, the one that is less discussed due to its inadequacies and high cost. As with Gyromite, if you want to play Stack Up as originally intended, you’ll need ROB and all his gear to make it happen. At the time of this writing, a complete-in-box copy goes for around $1100.00 on the second-hand market. Even with ROB’s adorable visage encouraging you to bite the bullet, this is still about $1,099.00 too much…
Or is it?
“A fool and his money are soon parted” and Stack-Up, with all its colored discs and extensions, sits next to Gyromite by your CRT. Three tiresome game modes await you. The goal in each mode is for ROB to move the colored discs into a specific pattern displayed on the upper part of the screen. In “Direct,” Professor Hector returns to jump on buttons and steer ROB’s movements. In “Memory,” Professor Hector programs ROB’s movements before he picks up the discs, making for a more challenging and slightly more interesting experience. Finally, with “Bingo,” Hector colors out rows on a 5x5 board to issue directional commands to ROB. Enemies named Flipper and Spike undo Hector’s work, either through killing him or negating his commands. “Bingo” can be played with a second person, but it should really be played by no one. Three game modes might seem overly generous for 1985, but rest assured, Nintendo’s kindness is most unwelcome. After a little time spent with Stack Up, you’ll be weeping in sackcloth and ashes over your poor financial decisions.
ROB’s movements weren’t any faster in 1985, but at least Gyromite has an enjoyable, addicting gameplay loop. Stack Up seems designed to work you and ROB as hard as possible with little reward or enjoyment for your efforts.
D-
What I Wrote About Stack-Up in 2013
“Stack-Up makes ROB the star of the show, but the three mini-games do nothing but highlight his weaknesses. All he does is move discs from one place to another, and he needs Professor Hector’s suddenly superb jumping skills (remember when he couldn’t jump at all in Gyromite?) to even accomplish that. It’s not ROB’s fault that Stack-Up is an accidental display of his uselessness. It’s Nintendo’s fault for making ROB an endearing robot that barely works in spite of himself. A couple years after his debut, ROB was finished, and Super Mario was the star of Nintendo’s show.”
STACK UP: D
ROB’S WORK ETHIC: A-
ROB’S LEGACY: C-
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Not much to disagree with here, though I never played Soccer or Stack-Up.
Kung Fu is clearly the star here. I owned it for a while back in the day but found it too difficult and traded it away to a friend for Double Dragon. In 1989 or 1990, when we made the trade, I'd say I came out ahead, but in the present day, Kung Fu has aged better IMO. There aren't many games like it, and those that tried to follow it up, like Vigilante and China Warrior are actually worse, I think. I actually beat it for the first time maybe 10 years ago.
I remember renting Pinball around 1990, when it was quite old, and I found it OK, but it wore out its welcome quickly. I might have spent an hour with it, max. A friend already had Rock'n Ball by then, which was our go-to pinball game. I can't recall if Pinball Quest has any multiplayer options, but realistically, without something like Rock'n Ball's 2-player modes, an NES pinball game wasn't something I was going to spend much time on even back then.
My father would always crack up at the digitized voices between levels in Kung-Fu:
“Help me, Thomas!”
“Sylvia!”
And then Mr. X’s laugh: “HURR hurr hurr hurr hurr.” Less menacing and more mocking.
Or were the voices only in the arcade?