Pool Sharks, Space Heroes, and Pitfall Harry All Want Your Precious Time
NES Catalog #084-86
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Side Pocket
PUBLISHER/DEVELOPER: Data East
RELEASE DATE: Oct. 30th, 1987 (JP), Nov. 1987 (US), May 27th, 1992 (EU)
ALSO AVAILABLE ON: Arcade, Game Boy, Genesis, Game Gear, Super NES
You’re the young pool shark from across town. The other hustlers don’t know anything about you, but they like your look. You’re clean, you dress nice, and you’re unassuming. Your face is a blank slate, pure and formless, and you hold a stick like you were born with it. Question is… do you have what it takes? To ascend the ranks of the Data East Tournament Final, leave behind your City Master title, and become the World Champion?
Pool is about the vibe, but it’s also about your skills. Side Pocket ensures that you have everything you need to win, including a training mode, but is that enough? Hope you have an understanding of physics inside that perfectly coiffed head of yours. Rack up the balls, break ‘em, see where they land. Some of us are gifted with insight from above, to see where the balls will go before we even hit them. Others among us – the mere mortals – have to visualize where they might go.
Whichever way you land, this is pool. You don’t need a college degree, just some moxie. In Side Pocket, you get points for sinking the balls, period. However, if you sink them in the “correct” order – 1 2 3 4 5 6 – you’ll get additional points and a healthy amount of street cred.
Points are important. The more you have, the higher your rank. If you don’t get enough in a particular game to reach the next rank, you’ll play another game and try your luck again. Be careful, though: you only get ten misses for your entire run. Failure to get a ball in the hole counts as a miss; two misses for sinking the cue ball.
Side Pocket is basic pool, but you, the young, good-looking pool shark, will never die. Remember that.
Star Force
PUBLISHER: Tecmo
DEVELOPER: Hudson Soft
RELEASE DATE: June 25th, 1985 (JP), Nov. 1987 (US), Apr. 27th, 1990 (EU)
ALSO AVAILABLE ON: Arcade, Mobile, MSX, Switch (via Arcade Archives), PlayStation 4 (via Arcade Archives), SG-1000, Sharp X68000
Star Force is a classic video game shoot-em-up tale, you know the kind. A terrible, vague evil rules the galaxy. All the galaxy’s citizens are afraid because the evil seems too powerful to stop. A young soldier named Final Star, unlearned in evil’s conquering ways, says, “Not on my watch,” hops in a fighter jet, and proceeds to destroy all the evil in the galaxy. The people are saved, the hero is praised. Life finds a way.
While Final Star is determined and courageous, he must not allow himself to be overcome by setbacks and tribulations. 24 levels, each named after the Greek alphabet, beckon him into the darkness. Swarms of enemies, many with unpronounceable names like Faillar and Gadoha attack with pure reckless fury. They also unleash spiky bullets in quick succession, so much so that your entire screen is often covered with the enemies and their pointed projectiles.
How does Final Star absorb the hatred of Pure Evil by himself? Not well, but thankfully, he doesn’t have to fight alone. At the midpoint of each level, a mini-Final Star is trapped in a golden capsule, waiting to be released. Once Final Star absorbs this secondary ship, he’s equipped with rapid firepower and faster movement.
Secrets also abound in Star Force’s depths, and once uncovered, add to Final Star’s point total. Since extra points are the only way to gain extra lives, he’ll need to shoot anything and everything on the map to find them, including the many ‘B’s, the mysterious Zmuda Stegui, and the elusive Cleopatra.
Final Star’s mission in Star Force is a test of any player’s skill and endurance, but the deeper you get into the tragic Greek depths, the more rewarding it becomes. Tap the ‘A’ button like you just drank three shots of espresso and enjoy the ride.
Super Pitfall
PUBLISHER: Activision
DEVELOPER: Micronics
RELEASE DATE: Sept. 5th, 1986 (JP), November 1987 (US)
ALSO AVAILABLE ON: Tandy Color Computer (?!), NEC PC88
Pitfall Harry is back, but he looks like a completely different man, perhaps one we’ve seen before. No longer bound to the stick-figure confines of his Atari 2600 adventures, he’s put on weight, grown a mustache, bought a gun. At least he can still jump like a madman. “Soar” might be the better word, his arms thrust triumphantly in the air every time he leaps over danger. He looks so familiar, so unlike the Harry we once knew. Hmm… strange.
But there’s no time for pondering. Harry’s niece, Rhonda, and pet lion, Quickclaw, have been kidnapped by Moai Heads in the Andes Mountains. The Raj Diamond is hidden somewhere within the game’s 270 screens. And every winged, slithering, or hopping creature has it in for Harry’s iron-rich blood. Enough to make a grown explorer cry.
The Andes Mountains are treacherous, to say the least. In-game maps are scarce. You’ll have to make your own if you want to remember where key items are.
Oh, and items are invisible. That’s right, completely invisible. Jump in exactly the right spot, and they’ll appear, but where is the right spot? Trial-and-error, friends. Jump often. Jump everywhere. Maybe you’ll find the Spade, Diamond, or Heart Balls that unlock new areas. Or maybe you’ll find nothing and grow ever more frustrated by the frogs that won’t stop licking you to death.
Your tolerance for Pitfall Harry’s only 8-bit adventure comes down to a couple factors. Do you appreciate non-linear adventures that refuse to provide you with any help? Will you tolerate the tedium of jumping every step just to see if the key to Quickclaw’s cage will magically manifest? Can you get down with Pitfall Harry’s Super Mario makeover? If not, dump Super Pitfall in its own bottomless pit and never look back.
Not a great group this time, but let's see what we have:
Side Pocket - Don't think I've played it, but it just seems sort of wild that pool games are getting released at this fast a clip, after Lunar Pool. But I guess the pool hall was still a phenomenon at this time. I don't know much about that culture. I wonder if weekly pool tournaments were a thing.
Star Force - The vertical space SHMUPs are really starting to blend together. I feel like I probably rented this one, the letter thing sounds familiar, but very fuzzy.
Super Pitfall - Now this one, I owned and have many opinions. Objectively, it's a very poorly-designed game. I'm learning in this go-around through the NES library how cursed the name "Micronics" is.
YET, though it deserves to be hated, I don't hate it. And back then, I kind of liked it. Something about this game really grabbed my imagination. I think I played it more than Metroid. If I had to explain why, I would say it unlocked that "sense of exploration." I liked Rygar better than Metroid too for similar reasons, but Rygar is legitimately a much better game than Super Pitfall.
As a kid, I don't think I even thought of this game as one that had an objective or an ending. It was just a whole mysterious sandbox to explore. The mystery is the point: the journey, not the destination. Occasionally, I would jump somewhere and get one of the hidden items. Why did that happen? What was that thing? Just another intriguing mystery. I also found the area with the girl that you're supposed to rescue. Who is she [I'm just now learning it's your niece] and why is she there? Can you help her? I didn't assume that you could.
I guess Metroid didn't have any mysteries for me comparable to this. The fact that it makes more sense was actually a disadvantage.
'In-game maps are scarce. You’ll have to make your own if you want to remember where key items are.'
Lol, you see...this is the kind of secondary fun that kids today don't know they're missing!