Lunar Ball & Karateka retrospective: Castle crasher | NES Works Gaiden
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 ก.ย. 2024
- This week, a pair of games that have both been covered before on this channel... twice! So, rather than belabor the point, this episode works more as a treatise on the rapid rise and shakeout of the Japanese games industry around this point-the brief Nintendo-led gold rush of 1985 and the harsh reality that followed.
Production notes:
Video Works is funded via Patreon ( / gamespite ) - support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its TH-cam debut! Plus, exclusive podcasts, eBooks, and more!
NES/Famicom footage captured from @analogueinc Nt Mini; arcade footage captured from MiSTer with thanks to @MiSTerAddons. Video upscaled to 720 with @atemsoft xRGB Mini Framemeister.
![เขามัทรี - เอ็กซ์ ศุภกฤต - จอนนี่มิวสิค [ Official MV ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/AS9ufKuQIVs/mqdefault.jpg)
It's a small thing, but I'm glad you keep showing Epoch's games from the TV Vader and Cassette Vision/Super Cassette Vision during your b-roll. They're more or less nonexistent in many histories of the era despite their influence.
You might enjoy the "exclusive content" tier of my Patreon, as I am currently two episodes into a monthly series on Cassette Vision that will be exclusive to patrons for 18 months.
@@JeremyParish Delightful! And I'm so sorry if you had to play Wai Wai Monster Land for that series. It's... Rough.
Boot up my multicart, choose Karateka, switch to battle stance and taking a step backwards to fall off the cliff. Reset multicart and choose a different game.
That's my experience with this game, and it was an obligatory part of famiclone sessions for me and my sisters. Many chuckles were had.
I once met Jordan Mechner a couple of years ago at a UCLA football game tailgate, of all places.
I remember that he was both completely unsurprised that I instantly recognized his name and completely uninterested in talking about Prince of Persia.
Can you imagine how many people have asked him things about Prince of Persia over the years?
@@ArcaneAzmadi True, he probably thought he was finally finished talking about it
When I first played Karateka as a kid (on a bootleg multicart) I never figured out that you needed to enter a combat stance. So the game appeared to me to be a beautifully animated practical joke on the player. That was par for the course for the arcade, so I was only slightly surprised to see it on a home game.
I was the same. Played on a bootleg multicart. Didn't know you had to change to a fighting stance and would be killed immediately. Once I figured that out, then I didn't realize you could go back to the standing stance to run. So after I defeat an opponent, I would SLOWLY plod on to the next fighter.
@@Rando1975 lol reading this definitely sounds like the first time I played it. Slowly hunkering along
OTOH, the end of the game could be a very nasty prank on the player. Once you got to the princess's chamber, you had to immediately run to her. If you hesitated too long, or approached her in a combat stance, she'd suddenly attack and OHKO you.
@@jasonblalock4429 yeah, I heard about that. LOL.
Same here, I now want to go back and play it properly, haha
An interesting history lesson of Broderbund and the mini-crashes of the japanese Famicom-market, kinda more interesting than Karateka itself. Now I'm really more interested in finding out why the Disc System helped sales and quality control in the 80's, harder to make pirate copies or was it cheaper to produce games on the discs?
The Disk System had a higher cost of entry, but it allowed users to take a blank disk (About $20) to participating retailers, where they could pop it into a kiosk and download a title for around $5. So there were no cartridge manufacturing costs for the publisher and customers could experience brand-new titles for pocket change. (It also gave the Famicom hardware a shot in the arm by adding a new, higher-quality audio channel.)
It definitely was nice to learn about Broderbund's history on Japanese PCs. And, looking forward to Star Luster next time (one of the better Star Raiders clones).
This was a really dense video that had a lot of information that I haven’t seen anywhere else. Thank you.
I heard that right after Prince of Persia first released for the Apple 2, it was a very slow seller, and was outsold by...Karateka, Jordan Mechner's previous game.
I mean, who was even buying Apple II games in 1989?
@@JeremyParish Elementary schools? 😂
Could you flip the Prince of Persia disk upside down to play the game upside down? No. So clearly Karateka was the superior game. 😁
2:06 - Nice shot!
4:32 - That's a lot of Bombermen! (I wonder if they escaped the underground plant like the master runner did?)
7:40 - I have come to love this tune
8:30 - It reminds me so much of Layla's grenade physics
Recently subscribed to this channel and have been duly impressed with the quality of the retrospectives and production values. Keep up the great work, Mr Parish🫡
A Tampopo clip?
Further proof that Jeremy is a man of good taste.
Ah, yes, Tampopo. Or as I like to call it, Iron Chef: The Movie.
This movie enthralled and traumatized me when I was 14
@@ravikanodia What about it traumatised you? If you don’t mind me asking.
@@BenCol the fetish sex scenes.
@@ravikanodia Oh god yeah, that egg-yolk scene. Don’t know how in hell I forgot that. Maybe I repressed it.
The part about how the disc system stoped a American like game crash from occuring in Japan was really interesting. I'd watch a entire video about that.
I got a lot of nostalgic memories from C64 Karateka. Managing to master the combat mechanics and avoid the cheap insta-kills the game throws at you (screw you, falcon!), ended up being very satisfying. Also it's funny that the main character in the PC version of Prince of Persia was pretty much Karateka's without the belt (he looks kinda out of place with his white pajamas while everyone else is wearing Arabian clothing).
9:12 The C64 version also had that shifting camera between you and the approaching enemies, but the slower performance gave you enough time to react and avoid the sucker punch (but not enough to react to the falcon if you aren't expecting it)
The Broderbund logo in red on black from box/manual of The Ancient Art of War is burned into my mind.
For me, it's Print Shop and it's clunky fonts we used on those long banners we printed up on our C64.
The music for Lunar Ball/Pool reminds me of Marble Madness. Not sure why though.
'Apologize to the pork by saying ... "See you soon."'
Does that mean he has eyes in his stomach, or that he forms lasting friendships with his bowel movements?
To answer with another question; you may LIKE your ramen, but do you LOVE it?
yesss Tanpopo
"you must pat the pork, give it respect!"
tampopo in the intro.....
First game I ever played on Apple was Karateka on an Apple IIe
I've spent soooooooo much time on Lunar Ball imagining it was Side Pocket cus I didn't have the money to own a Mega Drive and actually play Side Pocket at home for way too long.
Its kind of funny to see Japan had negative opinions of western games when so many were more popular over there than they were in their home country. Now many weren't ported properly or anything but its still kind of funny. Still don't understand how they borked Spelunker. They were so close to a definitive version of it.
It's a shame we never saw that port of Karateka over here. It would have made for an excellent black box '86 release. A title known in the West (I had played it first on an Apple II) that looks great and has a high framerate? It would be the perfect companion to Kung Fu.
The Nes version of karateka should have been released in the USA in the first place. 😀👍🎮
Sometimes these things never happen.
@@ChristopherSobieniak I agree and we may never know how that will turn out.
Karateka is one of those games I'd always see referenced in Famicom parody videos on Nicovideo ages ago. Dunno if it's considered "kusoge" or just an abstractly funny game. One of the best things is taking a couple steps backwards from the starting position and falling off the cliff into an immediate game over.
Ah, Soft Pro. I'm looking forward to your coverage of Breeder, which will be... well, shoot, whenever you get to the end of 1986, which I assume is going to be a while. Oh well... good things come to those who wait.
I'm not continuing Gaiden past December 1985, sorry!
Ah, I see... good to know!
I don't play video games so that I can kick slower than I can in real life.