Press B 309: Origins Of Kabuki: Quantum Fighter

You might have seen or played Kabuki: Quantum Fighter, but do you know what the original Japanese release was spun off from? This week we whip our hair back and forth explaining about this hidden NES gem.

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00:00 --> 00:08 I whip my hair back and forth. Today on—
00:08 --> 00:28 That's the line I was thinking. Nepo babies today on—
00:28 --> 00:38 Hello and welcome to another episode of Press B to Cancel. Uh, I am your host Werewolf and I am joined today by Sick Jake.
00:38 --> 00:41 That's me. Happy Friday.
00:41 --> 01:23 So, uh, this week we have decided to talk about Kabuki Quantum Fighter. Now, Before I explain where I'm at with this game, uh, in terms of my history with it, well, you know what? My history with it is almost nothing. So I've seen people talk about this game here and there all over Twitch and YouTube for years now. And I always felt like the consensus was that it was a really good game. So when you mentioned maybe we should do this one this week, I was like, all right, let's do it. Um, what's your history with it? Cause I had never played it before this week.
01:23 --> 02:12 I, you know, I want to say that I brought it up before on the podcast as a, uh, as a hidden gem pick, I think in the past. And, uh, much like yourself, I, I've, I've played a little bit here and there. I've seen occasionally videos on it. It's, it's one of those games where the style kind of hits you in the face, right? It's just this kabuki warrior with the bright red hair and that's his weapon. That's pretty unique concept for a video game. So I see that, but I, I'd actually never sat down to actually dive into it and play it quite a bit. The, um, the first time I saw it, I was a kid and, uh, there's, well, teenager. And in Canada, we used to have this show called Video and Arcade Top 10, which is a very low budget video game competition show. And they'd get 3 kids out there and they'd play a game and then they'd win prizes. It's also the show where I learned about LaserDiscs because LaserDisc was one of their sponsors.
02:12 --> 02:12 I think.
02:12 --> 02:55 I'd never seen a LaserDisc before. Didn't know anybody who owned one, but they advertised heavily on the show. But they would play, would play these, um, these, these games, right? And at the end they'd win stupid prizes and stuff. A very Toronto Canadian content show. And, uh, I remember the episode where they played Kabuki Quantum Fighter and they were giving tips on how to play the game and talking about it. And it was, is interesting. So for any Canadians watching, um, that's a show. But I mean, since then, I, I play a little bit here and there and, uh, Yeah, I didn't really dive deep into it. And then when we were casually talking about it offline, you kind of mentioned that there's a history with it in terms of like the changes between the Japanese version and English version. It's really actually very cool. And that kind of went down a rabbit hole this week about this game. So kind of curious to talk about it.
02:55 --> 03:04 Yeah. So what, Kabuki Quantum Fighter is one of those games where I was like, well, they just slapped words together and went, yep, that's the title.
03:07 --> 03:07 Yeah.
03:07 --> 03:32 And now that I've dug in this week and understand where it came from and how it got to that, it makes sense. But without that context, I think it still kind of doesn't make sense. They, and they slapped a reasoning in the game to kind of just like, uh, it's like a throwaway line to explain it away. Which is really silly.
03:32 --> 03:53 Even, yeah, like even the Japanese origin is kind of loosely, weirdly tied up, tied together to its origins at best. But even the American version, I guess we should explain what the story is, right? So the reason why you're a kabuki fighter in the first place is that you're, what's his name? Colonel, what's his name?
03:53 --> 03:55 Scott O'Connor.
03:55 --> 04:18 Scott O'Connor. Yes. A very American name. And it's a black blonde anime-ish kid looking kid, but he's supposed to be an adult colonel. And I guess the, uh, there's a computer virus. Well, there's like a futuristic city and there's like, it's controlled by computers. And then there's like a satellite in orbit that maintains the computer systems. Am I right? I think that's what the story was there. And something goes—
04:18 --> 04:21 No, the satellite was just for the defense systems.
04:21 --> 04:52 Is it? Hold on. I'm confused. This is the other one then. Oh, okay. So a virus, it's the year 2056. A virus has appeared in the main defense computer of planet Earth and the origins are unknown. Um, so the, uh, the protagonist Scott O'Connor is a military agent who has been basically trying to figure out what's happening and solve and fix the computer system, is digitized into the computer world. And his digital avatar is that of a kabuki warrior. This is the gist of it. And that's really all you get in terms of why. Yeah.
04:53 --> 04:58 They explain more about how he gets into the machine than why he looks like he does, 'cause—
04:58 --> 04:59 Yeah.
04:59 --> 05:25 There was like 4 scrolling text pages, if not more, in, you know, that slow NES crawl of letters, explaining that this is the first machine of its kind, it's untested, we have no idea what it'll be like when the human psyche enters the digital world and how it will represent itself. Right? Like, you get all this explanation, and he gets in there, and he's a kabuki warrior.
05:25 --> 05:27 Yeah. Just as you do.
05:27 --> 05:40 And they're just like, oh, wasn't your great-great-grandfather this famous kabuki actor or something? Maybe that's finally having an effect on you. Like, that's the line.
05:40 --> 05:43 It's very, very random. Very random.
05:44 --> 05:46 Yeah, I thought that was kind of silly.
05:46 --> 06:18 But what I don't, what I don't get is like the, so the, I mean, they changed from the Japanese version, but the, when I first saw the character of the Colonel, he looks like he's a 14-year-old boy, right? Like it's the anime face with the blonde hair, very short. It looks like a school kid. Like it's, it's odd. That's so when I saw that, I'm like, oh, well, it makes sense. They, they rethemed this for the American audience, but they, maybe they left the graphics intact. But no, this, this sprite of Oak, of the Colonel, that is done for this game. That was done for the American release. And it's very bizarre.
06:18 --> 06:35 Well, also like the, the larger sprite during the conversation when he is the Kabuki Warrior avatar is also original artwork to the Western audiences. Because that was not the artwork they went with in the Japanese game.
06:35 --> 06:36 Right.
06:36 --> 07:01 So like it's, it's like this really animated up looking character, like a very '80s anime looking warrior. your character. And then you've got like the, the cutesy young boy looking 25-year-old colonel. And then you go to the Japanese version and both of them are the face of Masahiro Takashima from the movie Zipang.
07:01 --> 07:05 Yes. Had you heard of this movie before or no?
07:05 --> 07:07 I had not.
07:07 --> 07:28 Okay. 'Cause like I had heard that, okay, I knew that the The story of the Japanese version of this game was different. Uh, and if you probably, maybe you can give the synopsis of the story, but I didn't realize it was a spinoff kind of, of a movie that came out earlier that same year. I think the movie came out in January of 1990 and the game came out almost a year later.
07:28 --> 07:28 Yeah.
07:28 --> 07:56 And it's loosely tied to the movie. And it's like, Zipan the movie, it starts like a Japanese samurai history flick in the beginning. Although, you know, there's a, there's a samurai character, there's a bounty on him, and there's, there's a bunch of people are gonna be bounty hunters are congregating over his bounty. A lady comes out, she's got this fancy looking gun, and then it kind of just goes off into sci-fi fantasy territory very quickly. It's a very interesting, fun movie.
07:56 --> 08:21 Yeah, it's, it's like somewhere between those like '80s cheese fest adventure movies like The Goonies or Indiana Jones or something like that. Uh, what was the other one I was thinking of? Um, Neverending Story. Like, it feels somewhere like that, but also like a traditional samurai movie to an extent, but then also kind of like one of those like low-budget spaghetti westerns.
08:21 --> 08:21 Yeah.
08:21 --> 08:46 So it's like somewhere in there. And the movie is— it's strange. I actually watched the whole movie today. Um, basically the plot is there's a golden sword, and that golden sword, uh, is the key to entering the secret land of Zipang.
08:46 --> 08:48 Yeah, the golden land or something.
08:48 --> 09:10 The golden land of Zipang. And, you know, if you get there, it's full of gold and riches and all that, right? And that's loosely— they're playing real fast and loose with, uh, Oh, what was the, the sailor's name? Um, it was the Italian sailor, I think, that went over there.
09:10 --> 09:14 Oh, um, Gulliver's Travels, you're thinking?
09:14 --> 09:23 No, no, no. Uh, there was actually a sailor from Italy or Spain or something. I'm really blanking on the name.
09:23 --> 09:24 Marco Polo?
09:24 --> 09:27 Yeah.
09:27 --> 09:31 Okay. Where he goes to China and Asia and all that? Okay.
09:31 --> 10:14 Yeah. So that's actually where Zipang comes from, is it was a misunderstanding of the name Japan. And so it was originally brought back as Chipang, which is, I mean, that's not how they pronounced it in Japan. Like they, they had their own word for it as they do now still. But you know, that's where Japan comes from—is that mistranslation starting as Japan. Okay. So with this movie, they were like, "Well, you know, he messed it up, so let's just make it like that's another country that exists, and we'll just make that part of the lore of this movie." Like they really went with it.
10:14 --> 10:19 Well, it's more than a country; it's like it's like a special—it's like another dimension, right? Like you travel between.
10:19 --> 10:27 Yeah, it's like an alternate reality Japan kind of thing—feudal Japan. And, um, I say feudal, but it's like, what, 1800s?
10:27 --> 10:32 Because, um, there's technology, which is strange, right?
10:32 --> 10:42 Well, so there's a lot of idiosyncrasies, and that's on purpose because it's, it's a, it at its core, it's a silly movie. And I promise we'll get back to the game in a minute.
10:42 --> 10:45 Yeah, but this is, this is important lore to the game.
10:45 --> 11:19 How we get to the game. So yeah, it started as this movie. There's characters that have like Like weird binocular cameras with like a drone ninja star that he puts the little pictures inside of. Like it's a little mini shuriken. That's the film. And he puts that inside a larger shuriken. That's sort of a drone that flies all the way back to, uh, um, Oedo Castle or something is my guess. Um, to the emperor to inform him that this golden sword has been found.
11:19 --> 11:29 Yeah. When they find where the sword is located, it's like a tomb type of situation. And, you know, one guy's got a torch and then one guy straight up has a freaking flashlight. I mean, it's a little bit different looking, but it's a flashlight.
11:29 --> 11:30 Yeah.
11:30 --> 11:44 So the technology is there. It is odd. So yeah, 1800s is accurate, but it's, it's like a, it plays fast and loose with some tech in there. It's, it's an interesting mishmash. Like it's not, it's not historical period piece at all, despite the samurai stuff.
11:45 --> 11:52 And like some of the stuff in this movie made me think of stuff like Shaolin Soccer and—
11:52 --> 11:53 Yeah.
11:53 --> 12:37 What was the other movie he did? Kung Fu Hustle. Just because of the ridiculousness of some of the things. Like there's a point where there's ninjas, you know, fully clad, hidden from sight. And then like one is in the dirt, like in the ground. So you just see his eyes. And when he's spotted, somebody tries to stab him and the eyes are gone. The guy's just gone. Like he's not in the dirt there anymore. And then you see like they're rushing him half buried in the ground. So they're zooming through the ground like Bugs Bunny. Yeah. Swinging their swords at— there's all sorts of stuff in this movie like this. It is absolutely absurd. But when the story wants to be serious, it actually does a decent job of being serious.
12:37 --> 12:42 Yeah. Because it's a love story by the end, right? Like it's, it's, it's—
12:42 --> 12:53 Yeah. Yeah. And man, like they did some really cool stuff. So if you're listening, I would say, um, we should drop the movie link that you found on YouTube.
12:53 --> 12:55 Maybe I'll put it in our Discord.
12:55 --> 13:27 Yeah. Put it in our Discord in the, uh, newest episode chat so people can go check it out. But, uh, like I actually watched the whole thing today. I really enjoyed it. Um, there it, they did some really cool shots where there was like this really long pan from like lower floors up to the top at the end of the movie. where there's like multiple things happening. There's a big old sword fight and there's characters rushing up the stairs past the sword fight. And then at the end, a dude like grapple hooks his way up as the camera pans over to the side.
13:27 --> 13:27 Yeah.
13:27 --> 14:14 Like, it was this really elaborate shot. I was like, this is like, this must've taken a few resets to get this right. This feels really big budget for this movie because the movie did not feel super big budget the whole time. But it did some really cool stuff. There was like at one point they transferred from Japan to Tippang, and it's like it sort of rides the line of like the Take on Me music video in stylized. Yes, they do some camera tricks with the polarization. And yeah, yeah, it was really wild. So this this movie is definitely worth a watch, but keep in mind. It's not all meant to be taken seriously. It's back and forth. And I laughed out loud a bunch of times.
14:14 --> 15:00 Like the hero himself is, um, what do you call that hairdo? It's like a pompadour kind of with a mullet. Like it's like, uh, it could have been Ziggy Stardust in ancient Japan if he really wanted to, but he talks in like, um, a very character style of like almost like a Yakuza type of character, right? A lot of swearing. Very brash, very aggressive. It's, it's interesting, but he's definitely playing the samurai type character. I dig it. It's, it's a fun movie. But then by the end of it, it's like, there's that. Yeah, it's a love— it's ultimately a love story. There's some interesting stuff there. I, I thought the final battles are really cool. I like the, the, the ultimate villain and the armor he wears, a very ridiculously fantastic armor. The armor reminds me of something out of Elden Ring, to be honest with you.
15:00 --> 15:00 Yeah.
15:01 --> 15:17 When I first saw the armor, I could swear I've seen that in Elden Ring. That's how, that's how ridiculously bulgous it was and how weird it was. And lots of gold glitter everywhere. It's, it's a definitely, it's an interesting fantasy flick. And to think that this, this led into a video game is kind of odd.
15:17 --> 15:27 So there was also like a weird puppet animatronic elephant. Yeah. It's never really had any purpose.
15:29 --> 15:29 He was just there.
15:29 --> 15:39 They— yeah, the elephant's just there, but they never really use it for anything. It's never— it's in some scenes and then it's just not in some scenes anymore.
15:39 --> 16:00 Like, the movie had a budget. Maybe they could have saved themselves some money in certain places like the elephant and put it towards somewhere other areas. But it's definitely an interesting flick for sure. But it's— but ultimately though, it's a fantasy movie really. And yeah, Kabuki Quantum Fighter is not a fantasy game really at all. It's not supposed to be. No.
16:00 --> 16:12 So then, you know, we get from that movie to the game. So the Japanese game, which, uh, is called, I think, uh, Jigoku.
16:13 --> 16:16 I have it here. Uh, Jigoku Gogoraku Maru.
16:17 --> 16:18 That's what it was.
16:18 --> 16:20 Which is, I think, the name of the legendary character too.
16:22 --> 16:44 Yeah, his name was Jigokumaru, I believe. Yeah. Um, but yeah, it's, it's, and then you go to the title screen of that game and it says all that, but then it also proudly displays the movie title Zipang as well. Yeah. So it's like, yes, this is a tie-in, but only barely.
16:45 --> 16:48 Well, like the director of the movie was a, an advisor for the game.
16:49 --> 17:05 So like there are ties to it, but yeah, there are in the opening movie you see, or in the opening, I guess, cutscene of the game. If you, that's what you want to call them on the NES, but, uh, you see the golden castle from the end of the movie.
17:05 --> 17:06 Yeah.
17:06 --> 17:47 And then you see it like sort of become the city and then become the golden castle again. So they're, they're implying that something is going on with T'Pong and the digital world, like their, their computer systems or whatever. And so, they have scoured the nation to try and find someone who can go into this machine. It's very similar to the Scott O'Connor machine, right? They still need to get the brain into the computer system to fight this virus. But I guess in the Japanese version, it's not just a computer virus; it's like something to do with Zipang and the. the creatures from there. I'm not—
17:47 --> 18:11 I think it's like a spirit or something from there, but it's, it's affecting their cities digitally. Not, it's not like magical. It's still, it's still a digital virus of some kind or that kind of essence. Yeah. But the, the different, the change from Zippon, the movie being this fantasy flick and samurais to, to hard sci-fi. Yeah. Sci-fi thing. Right. It's, it's very bizarre and very loosely tied, but there is a tie there. at the beginning of the game.
18:11 --> 18:37 Yeah. And then the main character, whose name is just Bobby, Bobby Yano. Bobby Yano. He's 15 years old, which, you know, when you see the kid's face in the US, in the American, the Western game, uh, you're like, okay, yeah, that tracks. He was originally 15. And then you see the face of the character and it's straight up the dude from the movie.
18:37 --> 18:40 Yeah, like digitize the actor's face for sure.
18:40 --> 19:03 Yeah. And then in the close-up cutscenes of him as the Kabuki warrior, it's straight up just him again from a scene early in the film. Like we're talking the first 5, 10 minutes of the movie where he's swinging his Kabuki hair all around because he's in the Kabuki getup in the movie. And so they use that outfit.
19:03 --> 19:07 A little bit though, right? But not a— it's not a focus of the movie, right? Like he's a samurai fighter. He doesn't— No, he doesn't.
19:09 --> 19:25 Like, it— that's the introduction to the character, is he's doing this kabuki thing to sort of like put his opponents off balance a little before he reveals himself to be who he is and fight them. And we're talking like a massive horde of people. It's absurd.
19:25 --> 19:47 Well, the genre piece, I guess, there— the one man versus 50 ninjas, I guess, is the idea. But it's— the kabuki theme is like barely there in this movie, really. I mean, the villain is kind of— is kind of a kabuki getup himself. But the hero really outside of that first few, few minutes really isn't. And he doesn't really attack anybody with his hair the entire movie. It's mostly a samurai thing.
19:47 --> 20:32 They're usually given a little something. Um, at least back then they were usually given a little something to go on to design the game. Right. I'm guessing they got to watch the first 5 to 8 minutes of the movie and went, all right, we got our idea. So that's, that's my assumption there because it's really early on. So it's, it's, it's deep enough into the movie to where you get the idea of what sort of movie it is, but you don't get a whole lot of time with Jigoku doing his thing. You mostly see him doing the, the kabuki spiel. And so they like, he didn't even attack anybody with the hair. He was just swinging it around.
20:32 --> 20:53 Yeah, that's it. Like for, for the game, if the game gave you a sword as a weapon, then it'd be like, all right, I get it. It makes sense. But there's no swords in this game whatsoever. It's anything but swords in the game. Right. Cause the movie is very much samurai swords the entire way through. And then the game is none of that.
20:53 --> 21:07 Yeah. He's got what, 9 swords in the movie? Yes. And none of those are the golden sword or the other stone sword that gets made. Like he's just got his 9 swords that his compatriots carry around for him.
21:07 --> 21:25 Right. Whereas like in the game, it's the main weapon is his hair, right? It's his red is, and it's also like shockingly bright red hair that he swings around. Or if he crouches and attacks, he does this little pitiful little punch. Right. So that's like the main 2 attacks. It's just not a sword to be found, man. It's, it's odd.
21:25 --> 21:56 And then from what I could tell, I watched about, I think, 3 of the 5 levels. Um, of the Japanese game after beating the, the Western game. And it looked like they didn't change anything in terms of, uh, visuals, in terms of just basic gameplay or mechanics. Like that's all looked exactly the same. So I couldn't see a different sprite anywhere in the, in the standard gameplay.
21:56 --> 22:33 I had read that the, for the final boss. portion of the boss is blue in one version and red in the other, but I, it looked the same to me. I really couldn't tell. Um, I did play the, I did play the Famicom version though, in terms of gameplay, cuz it's very common for, for games to be either easier or harder depending on the region. But when I played both side by side, they, they, they felt the same, same level difficulty, enemy did damage is the same, same number of lives. So very much except for the cutscene changes, which. Which, unless you speak Japanese, unless you can read Japanese, you probably wouldn't know that the story is that dramatically different. It's just that the images are different. Um, but gameplay-wise—
22:33 --> 22:50 I was using Google Translate for like watching all of it. I would like pause it. Okay. Translate this screen. Okay. Translate this screen. So I just kept doing that and then skipping through the level and doing the next part. And so that's how I got the story out of it. I was just curious about the changes.
22:51 --> 23:14 But like, it's not, it's not an, it's an NES game. It's not an in-depth story no matter how you swing it. Like you get a couple of cutscenes between stages and that's it. And it's not even a long game really. It's only 5 stage, 5 worlds, I guess. And then there's a final 6th stage for the boss. Um, although a couple have, I guess, like, I think the 5th world was divided into 2, but it's not a very long game. You could beat this if you're good at it in like 30 minutes.
23:14 --> 23:22 I think 2 of the stages have like multiple segments before you get to the boss. Yeah, I think it was stage 2 and stage 5.
23:22 --> 23:23 Right.
23:23 --> 24:16 But yeah, it's, it's not that long a game. And as I was, uh, I'll reiterate this for the audience because I told you this before we started the episode. Um, today was the first day I've ever played the game. I did beat the game using save states. Like I save stated my way. I power save stated my way through this game. Um, and there were points like at first I was trying to be like, all right, if I die, I'll just reload my save state back at the beginning of the stage. So that way, you know, it's kind of like a checkpoint, but I don't want to have to deal with game overs because I don't have that kind of time. Right. And I do have to say, this game was designed to be a very tight, frenetic platformer. If only the platforming were good.
24:18 --> 24:26 So, okay. My first impression of the first, the first stage was fine. I thought it was okay. It didn't seem that challenging and I got, I got through it pretty quickly.
24:27 --> 24:29 But by the time I got— Yeah, you kind of felt like Batman or something?
24:29 --> 25:03 Yes. And in fact, it very much, when you look at this for, again, for a game that's supposed to be a sci-fi, hard sci-fi, a digitized character, it's very much like horror style theme graphics. I mean, Human Entertainment, the developers, they also did Monster Party and I feel that vibe. But the palette does remind me of Batman a huge, um, but like, it doesn't feel like it doesn't feel like you're in a computer, but the, by the time I got to stage 3, stage 3 is when the platforming got obnoxiously bad, like stupidly bad. They introduced ice, which we all know was that, what's that famous quote from Sinister?
25:03 --> 25:04 Ice wasn't even the worst part.
25:04 --> 25:09 Really? I was gonna say fuck every ice level ever. Yeah. Go ahead.
25:09 --> 25:35 No, the ice was not the worst part in this game. The worst part was Trying to manage jumps from the hang, which like, that was probably the tightest part of the game was the, you know, he's suspended and you're making those jumps. And, you know, how long you hold the jump button really has an effect on how high he'll jump jumping off of those.
25:35 --> 25:35 Right.
25:35 --> 26:03 And there's a delay on the time because he's got to like start the motion to jump. So you get used to that. And I feel like that was well designed, except for the fact that a lot of areas were built to where you just cannot time that perfectly enough to not get hurt or bump something or whatever. Like you're, you're just kind of hosed in certain spots, which I found very frustrating.
26:03 --> 27:02 So for our audio listeners who don't, who have not heard of Kabuki Quantum Fighter. Um, so Wolf explaining that there's these like handlebars throughout the stages or like platforms you hang from. And there's 2 types. There's one that you hang from and then you can jump on top of it as a platform. And then there's another one with angled tops where you can only hang from and you have to jump from bar to bar. Um, I like the look of those. Like you said, the, the very fluid animations, the animations of this game are excellent for the jumping. Um, the thing is, you're right, when you first jump on a handlebar, You can't jump off right away. Otherwise you'll, you'll screw up the momentum or screw up the height. You have to give it a second to settle and then you can jump. Once I gave it a second to settle, it was okay for me to get through most of it. Um, the parts that are a big F you are the ones where you're being shot at while you're on them. But I found in level 3, the things that are shooting at you, you can actually destroy them. Um, and that's why, that's why I really started to use the sub weapons in the game to take things out at range.
27:02 --> 27:02 Yeah.
27:02 --> 27:16 And then that way, that way I could then tackle the platforming. So I didn't have too much of a headache on it, but after watching gameplay of later stages, I know that the last half of stage 5 is pure handlebar platforming and it looks like an absolute nightmare. I don't think I'd be able to do that.
27:16 --> 27:30 No, I actually did not mind that part of the game at all. Like that part was fine. Um, it's actually the worst part of this game for me was the, what was intended to be tight platforming while he's on the ground.
27:30 --> 27:32 Oh, I see.
27:32 --> 28:07 Because it always seemed like the jump was delayed or not responsive sometimes. And which is really weird because on the platforms, like you hit that and he's like, I got you, we're going. And if you just tap it, it's the little tiny, just barely letting go, just catching a little air. If you hold it for like a split second, he catches a little more air maybe. And like the longer you hold it, the higher he'll jump. It's really responsive there. But there is no path, no, no way to press the button short enough to get just a little air when he's standing on the ground.
28:07 --> 28:07 On the ground?
28:07 --> 28:31 Okay. Don't understand. And there's a, there's actually a part where there's a, like a, there's an easy path and a hard path on either side of the screen when you're vertical platforming. Right. Right. And the easy path is you make a very shallow jump. to get over there, which is damn near impossible. Out of probably 80 attempts, I made it 3 times.
28:31 --> 28:34 Is this stage 3?
28:34 --> 28:35 Yeah.
28:35 --> 28:38 The gray stage? Yeah, I think I know that section. Yeah.
28:38 --> 28:54 And yeah, you go up there on the left and you just like handlebar jump, handlebar jump, you're up to the next section. Whereas if you don't go that way, you go right instead, you got to do the back and forth as far as you can jump from platforming.
28:55 --> 28:55 Right.
28:55 --> 29:01 And it's tedious, long, and sometimes you fall because he just doesn't jump when you push the button.
29:01 --> 29:24 So there are sections where, where the ceiling is kind of low and there's stuff in the ceiling that will hurt you if you bump into it. And I can definitely feel you where you're, you're walking through and you just want to do a little tiny hop. And you're right, if you don't time that exactly, you're going to hit the ceiling and take some damage. And that, that's kind of annoying. But I didn't feel it was—
29:24 --> 29:35 I did find— no, it was kind of that bad. I found the ice way worse. I did find that when you jump, you can cut the jump short by pressing down.
29:35 --> 29:37 Oh, interesting. Didn't know that.
29:37 --> 29:50 If you press down, it'll just start his descent, but he starts— it's, it's not like up, you press down and, oh, I guess I'm arcing down. No, it's up, you press down and he's like, wow, and drops like a He's practically a Thwomp.
29:51 --> 29:55 So kabuki quantum Thwomp.
29:55 --> 30:03 Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So it like, I can tell they wanted this game to be good.
30:03 --> 30:07 Every developer wants the game to be good.
30:07 --> 30:28 I don't think it is. I really don't think it's good. Um, it's, it's better than some other NES games I've played. Like it's definitely not. as bad as Werewolf: The Last Warrior, uh, by a long shot, but it's nowhere near as good as the best games I've played on the NES.
30:28 --> 31:07 So, okay. So for me, in terms of like where I put this in terms of NES platformers, uh, it does feel like they got inspiration from Batman, uh, or Ninja Gaiden. I would rather play this than Batman. I find the jumping in Batman to be far worse. I hate Batman on NES. A lot to respect of it. It's really cool, but the, the platforming's awful in that. At least here I, I can jump, right? So I, I feel like it's better than Batman. I feel like in some aspects it's better than Ninja Gaiden, right? There's none of that. Ninja Gaiden's the one that has knockback when you get hit.
31:07 --> 31:09 Um, no accidental wall grabs.
31:09 --> 31:25 Yeah, no accidental wall grabs, right? But I mean, obviously Ninja Gaiden's a much better game than Kabuki Quantum Fighter, but it's also much longer. This is a very short game compared to a lot of those. Uh, but I think, I think the physics are not that, they're not terrible. They're not great. It's not Mario. I just— sure.
31:25 --> 32:04 It's, it's just wild to me how different the suspension platforming is versus the ground platforming. Like in the air, it all feels tight, cohesive. You understand the timings real quick. It all makes sense. It all responds to how you push the buttons. Yeah. On the ground, it's, it feels like, uh, you know how it was a little slippery slidey in Mega Man 1 and 2, like, and everything felt just a little delayed. Yeah. No, no, no. Just in general, Mega Man actually felt like that in the first 2 games. Like you'd stop and then he would slow down and stop a little. Like it was—
32:04 --> 32:04 Oh, okay.
32:04 --> 32:18 It, it doesn't feel tight on the ground. Like it feels like it was programmed by somebody else entirely for the ground, for the, you know, jumping instead of the suspension jumps. So I don't know, it just feels very different.
32:18 --> 32:28 I think Mega Man 2 platforming and physics are just fine. So I think they're okay. I don't feel it's slight unless you're talking to Flash Man stage, in which case, yeah, he slips all over the place.
32:29 --> 32:37 Um, and I mean, it's like the suspension jumps feel like Mario 3. And the ground jumps feel like Mario 1. Like it's different.
32:37 --> 33:44 I like the, I like the jumping in Mario 1. Well, if I have to rank these Mario games, it's pretty high up my list. I, I, there is physics issues for sure. I agree with you. It feels different on the ground than it does hanging from the bars. And there are sections, especially stage 3 is really what, which was make or break for me because then it adds in ice, which messes, messes up your momentum in spots, but it also has the single blocks you have to jump on. But some of the blocks are also conveyor belts, which is always a bad time in these kinds of games, right? So there's a sequence where it's single blocks that are conveyor belts. There's flamethrowers hitting everything, shooting at you, and you have to get up there very quickly. And if you fall the wrong way, you can easily drop down a few floors. That's not the greatest level design. It's kind of, it feels kind of cheap and that's level 3 and it kind of gets, it kind of goes worse from there. Um, where it's, it's weird because the first, The first stage honestly was pretty well balanced. It was fun. It was easy to go through. And then like stage 2, I felt the platforming-wise was fine. The only issue I had stage 2 is they only give you 200 seconds, so you had to rush to finish the stage in time. But otherwise it was fine.
33:44 --> 33:45 I don't think that was that bad.
33:45 --> 33:46 Really? I, I was running outta time.
33:46 --> 33:48 I never had an issue with the time.
33:48 --> 34:33 I was down at 20 seconds when I had the couple times I had to go through that, that stage. It was brutal. Like everything else is like 300. I think they give you like the bosses, they give you 300, which is unnecessary. But yeah, stage 2, for whatever reason, felt very short, but it was a long sequence. So I was rushing. But then stage 3, you have 300 seconds again, but then it's also much trickier platforming for sure. So that was, that was kind of where I hit my limit. But, um, I don't know that I think that, I think it's okay. It's an okay platformer. Certainly not the best. It's, it's absolutely not. But, but I, I think it's, I think it's around the, the platforming ability is around. Batman, right? Like it's better than Castlevania's bullshit jumping, but it's not as good as like, yeah, Mega Man.
34:33 --> 35:20 But I mean, you know, when you jump in Castle, like as you play Castlevania, like it all feels cohesive. So when you make that jump, it's that jump. Like the game programs you to be like, okay, this is how it works. And if Kabuki Quantum Fighter's mechanics didn't feel so different in the aerial jumps versus the ground jumps. I would probably be less frustrated with it. Um, but based on my experience with it today, uh, you know, just the gameplay, like we're going to, it's an NES game. So we're just going to leave the story at the door. We don't care about the story with NES games. We're talking about gameplay unless it's like an RPG or something, but this is not, you know, this is, this is no cinematic masterpiece by any means.
35:20 --> 35:22 That it even has. Story between the stages.
35:22 --> 35:25 It does have a lot of story between the stages.
35:25 --> 35:29 And like, there's not a lot of graphics to it, but there's there, right?
35:29 --> 35:40 Yeah. I love that old dude with the cigar in the cutscenes when they show the group of people at the computer. Like he's just standing there smoking a cigar the whole time.
35:40 --> 35:49 Chain smoking. Yeah. This entire ordeal, this guy is digitized into computer. Like that's an everyday thing. And the guy's just smoking, giving him orders and It's, it's interesting. Yeah. Yeah.
35:50 --> 36:08 I thought that was kind of funny, but, uh, like as the game goes, the music is, some of the music is really good. Some of it is, eh. Um, so I'm inclined to give this game, and I know this is not something we usually do, but I'm thinking about it and I'm like, all right, I'd give this game like a 65 out of 100.
36:08 --> 36:43 Oh, that's harsh. Uh, the composer is, uh, Masaki Hashimoto. He's also the composer for Monster Party. And, uh, I feel, I feel the same vibe in terms of the music. It's, it's not amazing. It's, it's not, it's not Batman music, but it's, it's, there's a couple tracks that are pretty good. Yeah, it's decent. But then there's also like one of the cutscenes between the stages has this awful klaxon alarm that lasts way too long. Not what you want to hear. Um, I'm just looking at Kabuki Quantum Fighter back in the day. Computer and Video Game Magazine gave it 82 out of 100.
36:45 --> 36:45 Wow.
36:45 --> 37:13 EGM gave it 9 out of 10. So like, this is really, this is why I'm saying it's like I said, it was a hidden gem before, because I think many people have seen it, but have not actually played Kabuki Quantum Fighter. And I think when you play it, I think it's a decent game overall. I don't know about 9 out of 10, right? But it's, uh, like I said, I'd rather play this than Batman, right? Like there's other stuff we haven't talked about yet. Like there's, There is other weapons in the game. It's not just whipping your hair back and forth.
37:13 --> 37:17 Yeah, the sub weapons. And you unlock a new sub weapon on each stage.
37:17 --> 37:18 Yeah.
37:18 --> 37:19 Right.
37:19 --> 37:50 So, and like, they're variations of shots, I guess, right? Like, like, do you start off with, if they have a chip meter, which is your, your energy meter to use as your ammo to use your sub weapons. And you start off with like a very short range shuriken, I guess. And then you later on, you unlock like a longer range shot. Uh, you get a wavy shot, you get a triple shot, like you get different shots. And eventually you got grenades, which is how you beat the game. Did you find you use them throughout the stages or did you like me just save it for the boss and spam the hell out of the bosses?
37:50 --> 38:33 I used them in a couple of spots as the game went on, uh, just because there were certain spots where I didn't want to have to take damage. And so I was like, well, I'll use the ability rather than get hit. And ultimately it's not like it matters that much because if you use it, um, unless the thing drops Uh, uh, you know, a, a health restore or chip restore. And then it kind of makes it worth it. But ultimately, if you don't get anything from the enemy spending the power or taking a hit, it's kind of a wash once you get to the boss fight. Cause I don't know if you figured this out, but during boss fights, if you pause it, you can swap your chip and health energy.
38:33 --> 38:40 No, I know you could. That's how you swap a hit and select button, the weapon. I didn't know you could sacrifice health for chip energy.
38:40 --> 39:00 Yeah. When you pause the game, you can move it either way. If you need more health, just send that chip energy up into your health bar. Like I found it out by accident while the game was paused. It only happens during boss fights. Um, if you pause the game, you hit up and you're sending from chip to health. You hit down and you're sending from health to chip.
39:00 --> 39:02 You can't do that during stages though?
39:02 --> 39:03 No.
39:04 --> 39:11 That's such a weird— because the game doesn't tell you that. It's not like it's in the cutscenes. I wonder if that's in the manual. It's got to be, right?
39:11 --> 39:37 I, I feel like it's got to be in the manual, but I just accidentally found that out when I paused it during a boss fight. I was like, wait, wait, what happened there? Why did my health move? I was like, did I find a cheat? And so I tried it on a stage and it didn't work. And then I tried it on the next boss fight and it worked again. So I was like, okay, this is a boss fight mechanic where you can send energy back and forth strategically.
39:37 --> 39:43 I'm looking it up. I'm checking my mind palace because that's, that's too bizarre not to, to, to know.
39:43 --> 39:55 But I thought that was really cool. That's actually how I was able to beat the final boss. I had to spend my health to get more chip energy to throw dynamite at the guy in the final phase.
39:56 --> 40:05 Yeah, the final boss, I wouldn't say he's a very hard boss, but you definitely need to use your chip energy in full extent to throw those grenades at it. Otherwise you just, it just takes forever.
40:06 --> 40:20 I'm just looking at phase 1. You can get through phase 1, no problem without getting hit. Phase 2 is awful. So I had to like just try not to get hit and just blast him with as much dynamite as I could as quickly as possible.
40:20 --> 40:33 So in the manual, Yes. In the boss fights only, you can get more energy by trading your memory chips. Press the game by pushing select and then use the, the, the D-pad. That's wild.
40:33 --> 40:37 I thought that was, I actually thought that was a really cool mechanic.
40:37 --> 40:39 Yeah. I liked that risk reward.
40:39 --> 41:04 And the fact that like, you know, you're coming up on the end of a stage, maybe you have no chip energy and you got a ton of health. And so whenever you go between scenes, it gives you a little more health. Gives you a little more chip energy. So I was like, well, I'm going to get more health than I need. So I'll pause it and swap and it wouldn't let me swap. But I was like, ah, I couldn't figure out the boss fight and it let me swap.
41:04 --> 41:18 Do you know, do you know, you don't always get the same amount of chip energy back at the end of a stage. I couldn't figure out what the relationship was like. Is it if you do it faster, you get more chip energy? Is it more like, did you figure that relationship out? Cause sometimes you get a little bit and sometimes you get a lot.
41:18 --> 41:20 No, it always seemed like the same amount to me.
41:20 --> 42:08 Did it? I wonder if it was different for me. I don't know. It's, it's, it's different, but you're right. You, you might as well use it during a stage. Right. So like I did find that when I tried going through a couple other attempts through the game, um, especially like range, right? Cause your, your guy's so melee focused and there are things that attack you at range that can be quite annoying. So especially once you have the longer range shot. It's worth it just to pump up the shot weapon and throw that across the screen and take out the things. Like there's a stage 3 again, which again, that's the one I struggled with. The things on the wall that shoot you, trying to dodge those was driving me nuts until I accidentally hit it and broke it. And I'm like, oh, that's, well, that makes this a lot more accessible. I just need to shoot it from range and then it's no problem. And like, I think by that point you get your, your spread shot. So it's even easier to hit things.
42:08 --> 42:09 Yeah.
42:09 --> 42:47 But for the bosses, like the bosses aren't overly difficult. They do follow patterns, but if you have enough chip energy, you can just spam the attacks to take them down, right? Like there, there's one, uh, I think it was the stage 3 boss where you just sit in the corner with the grenades and you just throw them constantly and that's how you do it. And then, like you said, the end boss is all about staying at range, avoiding his shots at you, and then just throwing the shots at him. Like you can jump on the platforms and hang from them and kick them. I think that's how one way to do it. But knowing now that if you run out of chip energy, you can sack some of your health for more energy. It's so much easier to do with the weapons. It's interesting.
42:47 --> 43:03 That was, that was kind of a game changer to figure that out. And the first couple of attempts I had at the final boss, I was like, this is not going well. And I was like, wait, I have a ton of health. I just need to use it for more chip energy and kill him before he kills me.
43:03 --> 43:21 A lesson for us all. Always read the manual. It's crazy. Yeah. I'm trying to figure out why EGM gave this 9 out of 10. I'm looking more at reviews. Nintendo Power gave it 3.6 out of 5 for graphics and sound. Actually 3.6, 3.5 for most things. That's not a 9 out of 10.
43:21 --> 43:24 No, that's about a 70.
43:24 --> 43:25 I guess the guys at EGM must have liked it.
43:25 --> 43:27 Which is not far from where I was.
43:27 --> 43:28 Yeah.
43:29 --> 43:39 Let's see if we can find EGM Kabuki Quantum Fighter review. Sometimes people put those up online.
43:41 --> 43:49 Let me see here. The whole magazine is up there, but I don't know about the actual review.
43:52 --> 43:54 Yeah, interesting. I just do.
43:56 --> 44:53 I don't know. It's, yeah, like, like, like visually, let's see if I can— Well, he wants to take a quick look while I'll, I'll mention other graphics. I think like music, we said the music was okay. It's not, it's not, you know, completely memorable, but it's okay. But I think where the game really shines is the, the graphics. I think the graphics are outstanding for this game. I think the vibe is there. We, we said before, it looks similar-ish to what they did with, with, uh, what Batman has, and that's a positive. Like, right? Like it's a, it's a darker tone, but still bright and vibrant cuz it's the NES. But I like the designs of all the enemies. I love the character. I love the fluid animation as he is flying from bar to bar. That's really well done. Like it's a very nice looking game and like all the stages, even though there's only 5 of them, they're all pretty visually distinct. Like there's, there's not much in the way of repeating tiles. The only thing I think, which is maybe as a, as a gotcha, is the enemy variety is maybe lacking, right? You tend to see a lot of the same enemies through the different stages. I mean, it's still decent.
44:53 --> 45:18 You do get new stuff. I felt like you were given more enemy variety early on than later. Okay. The first stage has what, like, there's the 2 different versions of the samurai. There's the dog thing. There's the, the weird rover jumping. Yeah. There's like a drone thing. Uh, there's the Fire, the flamethrower guy.
45:18 --> 45:22 Yeah. And Max Headroom shoots fireballs.
45:23 --> 45:28 Yeah. The Max Headroom thing. So there's like 7 or 8 enemy types on the first stage.
45:28 --> 45:38 Yeah. And like, I'm not, and I'm not bullshitting. It's like a, it's like a balding guy with sunglasses. He shoots fire at you. Yeah. I don't understand that design of that character at all.
45:38 --> 46:05 It like opens up and then goes, yeah. And then closes back up to show the face again. Um, on the last stage, on stage 5, as you're doing the vertical climbing and stuff, there's an enemy that's just kind of there to give you drops because you just take, you take him out in one hit. He doesn't shoot you. He just hangs out on the bars and he just looks like this weird doofy Dr. Mario virus that's trying to do pull-ups and failing.
46:05 --> 46:09 Oh, is that the blue guy?
46:11 --> 46:22 Yeah. And so you just run up and kick him real quick. And as long as you get to where he was, as you kick him, you'll get a heart. So he's just like, give you a goodie kind of guy. Like he's just a gimme.
46:22 --> 46:25 I appreciate that.
46:25 --> 46:28 I was not upset about, but it was kind of funny.
46:28 --> 46:35 He's just hanging out. He's just a dude. It's so weird.
46:35 --> 46:45 The first time I was like, what the hell is that? And then he didn't do anything. He just kind of cruises back and forth a little bit and that's it. I was like, all right, you're not scary at all.
46:45 --> 47:04 Yeah. But the design is okay. Like, I think, I think the graphics are really good. And the, the aesthetic of the stages is, is not sci-fi-ish. It is more like the last half of Contra, right? Or like it's, it's a weird bio horror, which is an odd theme for a game that's supposedly supposed to be sci-fi.
47:05 --> 47:10 Yeah, biohorror is a good term because I was gonna say it looks a little H.R. Giger, which it does a little.
47:10 --> 47:11 A little bit, yeah.
47:11 --> 47:29 But then there's also like one of the stages is just full of oversized human skeletons lining the walls. So that's not really Giger-ish, but, uh, yeah, it's definitely like writhing tentacles, pulsating brains.
47:29 --> 47:30 Yeah, it's, it's interesting.
47:31 --> 47:43 And I think Part of that is, uh, I actually thought that was kind of neat because the further you get in, the less mechanical it looks and the more biohorror it looks. And I feel like that's how they represent the virus, you know?
47:43 --> 47:46 Okay. I can see it now.
47:46 --> 48:04 So it kind of worked in that regard. Yeah. But yeah, like the, the boss designs were odd because like the first one's just a sort of humanoid dude that jumps around. And then what was the second one? I don't even remember.
48:04 --> 48:19 I keep thinking of Gemini, but it's, um, it's also a guy that jumps around, but he has a little, um, satellite that shoots lasers. And then at some point he splits into 2. Yeah, splits into 2 on one side of the screen, and then he shoots his little laser ball that—
48:19 --> 48:46 yeah, so yeah, he's very Gemini Man. Um, and then the 3rd stage is all of a sudden like this weird Audrey 2 plant monster looking thing that spits acid bolts at you and becomes invincible as he flies across the room back and forth. And you either have to duck under him or jump over him. And, you know, sometimes he'll let you wail on him for a while when he lands. And sometimes the moment he lands, he'll just spit poison and fly again, which sucks.
48:46 --> 48:47 Yeah.
48:47 --> 48:56 The 4th boss was that weird robot that just kind of walks toward you and Shoots little drones that also fire at you.
48:56 --> 49:01 He's the one you can just get in the corner and spam his attacks. You take him down. Yeah.
49:01 --> 49:30 No, I did that for a while and then he went to the ceiling and you can't reach him. And so I had to start throwing dynamite at him so he can just go hang out on the ceiling too high for you to reach with your attacks, which sucks. Okay. Um, and then the final boss was also, you know, a very Giger-ish looking thing. It's like a sort of giant robot head with A lot of biological parts looking to it. Yeah. Sorry, my throat's drying out.
49:30 --> 49:57 Yeah. And it's like, like robot head and like a tentacle bio head that goes up and down and shoots at you. But then there's the 2 handlebar platforms in front of it. They're high up, but if you get up there, you can get close to his face and kick at him, but you have to make sure you dodge out of the way of his attacks, but there's a timing in the first phase. Where it's not so hard to avoid his, his tri-shot, but then the second half of it, he shoots lasers, I think it is, or they're faster shots and it's a little bit more tricky.
49:57 --> 50:04 They're faster shots that can go in multiple directions instead of just going forward from where he shoots from.
50:04 --> 50:30 But like, I mean, overall in terms of like the amount of damage the attacks do, the game doesn't feel unfair, right? Like, like a lot of games in the NES felt difficult for no damn reason, right? Like in this game, the challenge is more the annoying platforming more than anything else. Like even in the stages itself, when you take damage, I never worried about it because you have such a large health bar and health pickups aren't that rare. They do drop quite often. So I didn't feel it was that bad.
50:30 --> 50:38 I will say, uh, my first 6 attempts, I couldn't beat the first stage.
50:38 --> 50:42 Really? I didn't have any issues with the first stage. I kept dying.
50:43 --> 50:45 Oh no, I kept dying. Okay.
50:46 --> 50:54 No, it was, it was first stage was easy for me, but then the second stage, I kept running out of time. And then the third stage was platforming hell. And that's what messed me up.
50:54 --> 51:03 The second stage, I found myself having to farm health at the beginning when I got there, cause I had almost no health from the boss fight.
51:03 --> 51:29 Right. But like the second stage throws a wrench at you in that the first enemies that come at you all take like 3 times the damage that they did in the first stage, like the amount of hits they take is much higher and that felt weird. Um, but like when I watched people play through this game on YouTube, a lot of people are just skipping fights. They're just dodging the enemies and going like not even speedrunning. They're just not bothering killing everything. It was interesting.
51:29 --> 51:38 Yeah. I did find as I got further in the game that sometimes that's the best choice is just avoid the interaction at all and just keep going.
51:38 --> 51:40 Yeah. Just peace out.
51:44 --> 52:01 Yeah, I'm, I forgot to keep looking for that EGM review, but I don't know if I'm going to find it. It's fine. I think it'll, I might be able to find it like and put it in the Discord or something later. But, uh, I'm sure there's like some website that has magazine scans and all that.
52:01 --> 53:01 Yeah. Like, I mean, there's, um, there's a game journalist I follow on Twitch and YouTube all the time. His name is Jeff Gerstmann. He spent like a year or so going through all the NES games, playing them and ranking them. He has Kabuki Kwan Fighter in his top, I think it's like 105 or something. It's just outside the top 100 NES games. And I feel that's okay. I think that makes sense. It's definitely not a top 50 game by any stretch, but it's not a bottom tier game at all. Like, this is a decent game. Like, this is a game I, I could have rented and been happy with it for a weekend. But I don't think I'd wanna buy it. I don't think I'd be playing it again and again. It's not long at all. It's very, very short. And unlike many other NES games of the time, this is not punishingly difficult combat-wise. It really, it really is. The challenge really is the physics of the jump, of the platforming. And, and I feel like I could have, if I had more time with it, I think I could have gotten through it. I think I could beat this honestly. And I don't say that often, Bogey, especially for the NES.
53:01 --> 53:16 Oh, I might have found the issue. I just need to actually find the review. Where is it? Do do do. Page twenty-two.
53:18 --> 53:24 Page twenty-two references the page, but it won't link to the page. It just says page twenty-two in the volume of the EGM.
53:27 --> 53:32 I was told it was issue twenty-four, but that. I don't know if that makes sense.
53:32 --> 53:43 I'm seeing volume 4, number 19 is what I'm seeing. Interesting. It's okay. What we'll do is we'll, we'll put it into Discord, uh, for those who are interested in seeing it. But it is interesting that—
53:43 --> 53:44 I'm very curious what the wording was.
53:44 --> 54:04 Yeah. Like Nintendo Power giving it 3.5 out of 5 and then EGM's like 9 out of 10. It's like, and then Computer and Video Games magazines, which was another popular magazine for the time, uh, 82 out of 100, which is also kind of high. I think 70 out of 100 is, Is where I would consider it to be. Like, it's, I think it's a fine game. It's a fun game.
54:04 --> 54:06 That's not far from where I was.
54:06 --> 54:09 Yeah. Well, would you give it 60?
54:09 --> 54:11 65.
54:11 --> 54:23 Okay. I don't know. I think, I think it's more a little bit higher than that, but it's just short. I think is the biggest thing is it's very short. Like it's, I don't, it's not the only short Nintendo game, but it's, oh, you found it?
54:23 --> 54:24 I found it.
54:24 --> 54:25 Okay.
54:25 --> 55:26 Yeah. Yeah, it got 9s across the board from all 4 reviewers. My goodness. Uh, difficulty average level 6. Um, a dangerous experiment is being conducted in a lab. A test subject is being converted into binary code and then sent into a computer to battle the infecting viruses. Armed with the ancient kabuki move handed down from your ancestors, You must battle your life down at the picosecond level. That was not the word, a word I was expecting to find in here. As you defeat more and more enemies, you get extra weapons, including a head of long red hair that whips out and kills. So let me just, I'll look at the third review. Let's see what that one says. Get zapped into a computer à la Tron and take on a new dimension In gameplay, this game— oh my gosh, that— it's hard to read through the red 9.
55:26 --> 55:30 The visual design of the '90s was great in magazines.
55:30 --> 55:43 Yeah. This game breathes new life into the NES, loaded with great graphics, excellent gameplay, and lots of technique. Similar to Gaiden, but more intense. Cool bosses and power-ups. Thrash those bad guys.
55:43 --> 55:51 Interesting. Yeah, it's— Yeah, 'cause this is 1990. This is a late NES game. So it definitely looks like one.
55:52 --> 56:14 I don't know. Yeah. What the other games in that issue? Uh, Operation Tsarlor Mercenary, which I played on the Lynx. G.I. Joe. I don't even remember playing that. Arch Rivals. Rad Gravity. Oh my God. I forgot about that game. Awful.
56:14 --> 56:16 I did not like that one. Yeah.
56:16 --> 56:19 Somebody gave it a 6. The rest of them gave it 3s and 4s anyway.
56:19 --> 56:25 Uh, game reviews. It's interesting.
56:25 --> 56:27 I love looking back at these old magazines.
56:27 --> 56:49 Yeah. I used to, EGM and GamePro. I used to, I used to get every single month. So I was a big fan of those. I had Nintendo Power when I was really young, but it was EGM that I really loved. Um, I love the design, the layouts of these magazines, like it to They're so— text was hidden half the time. It was just part of the style of magazines. Like, it was just so weird.
56:49 --> 57:12 Yeah. I mean, that does— I know we're getting off on a major tangent here, but honestly, the styles that they had by issue 19 are way better than their first year because I have some of the early ones and it was still looking rough by 19, but the first year was real Uh, bare bones.
57:12 --> 57:51 It's a different time. I don't know. This game was fine. I think this game is good. I stand by, I think I called it a hidden gem in earlier episodes and I think that still fits. I think it is a hidden gem, maybe a hidden gem that people have seen, but maybe have not played. And I think it's worth playing through, especially considering it is not the hardest NES game around. It's, and it's fairly short, right? I'm not, it's not like Holy Diver. Right. Which is ridiculous to go through. It's definitely an easier game. Like, I think I could beat this with some extra time, but whereas I can't beat Ninja Gaiden, I've tried for months at this point. I can't get through that fucking game.
57:51 --> 58:01 I was kind of wondering if maybe Quantum Fighter had any mods to like tighten up the controls, but I guess not.
58:02 --> 58:15 I saw a ROM hack that, that graphic swaps it to be Batman. Batman versus Predator, I think is what the ROM hack was, but it doesn't, but it doesn't change. It doesn't change the, um, the gameplay at all. Just the sprites.
58:15 --> 58:17 It's just the visuals. Yeah.
58:17 --> 58:21 Yeah. Yeah. It was pretty, pretty funny. That's funny.
58:23 --> 58:34 All right. Well, I think we've said what we need to say about this game. Um, I honestly, I kind of liked the— my favorite part of this week was watching that movie.
58:37 --> 58:49 I just didn't know it. I didn't even know, like, I knew the differences in story because that's everywhere, but I didn't realize that the Japanese game was a spinoff of a freaking movie. That is crazy to me. Um, that's wild.
58:49 --> 58:55 Yeah, it was a movie tie-in and A really bizarre one at that.
58:55 --> 59:26 Yeah. So, and definitely the, I mean, the movie was very easy to find on YouTube, but I, you know, I'll post links around somewhere off of YouTube for folks who want, who are curious and it's subtitled. And I think, yeah, it's fun to watch. It's definitely cheesy, but to think that this is a game spun off from it. There's another game actually too. Um, I didn't get a chance to look at it. There is a PC Engine game that's supposed to also be related to the movie. There's, that came out around the same time. But I don't, it's not really, it's not Kabuki as far as I know. It's something different.
59:26 --> 59:27 It's a different game.
59:27 --> 59:49 Yeah, I'm pretty sure altogether. Wow. Let me take a quick look here real quick. But yeah, it just, when I, when I'm like, oh, they changed the story, but you know, the sprites probably didn't change very much. But then you see the protagonist from the movie digitized in the, the Famicom game and you're like, oh wow, they really went there. It's just crazy. Yeah. PC Engine. That's TurboGrafx-16.
59:49 --> 01:00:00 Single screen action platformer for the PC Engine. Uh, it is a thematic reskinned version of Tecmo's classic arcade game Solomon's Key.
01:00:00 --> 01:00:07 There you go. That's what it was. That's such a weird thing.
01:00:07 --> 01:00:07 That's funny.
01:00:07 --> 01:00:22 I'm trying to find, uh, No, I don't think I'll have to find a link to it later on. I'm going to check it out, but I know it's dramatically different than this, but fun game.
01:00:22 --> 01:00:46 Yeah. Solomon's Key. I know that one. I've played a ton of that game. That's a very different game. It's literally a puzzle game. Yeah. It's, if you're familiar with Fire and Ice, it's similar-ish to that. Um, but Solomon's Key is also on, I think the Netflix on The Switch. So, Nest—
01:00:46 --> 01:00:49 Netflix. Sure.
01:00:52 --> 01:01:12 So yeah, you could try that one too, but I don't know, Kabuki Quantum Fighter. It was an interesting afternoon. I'll give it that. Um, but like I said, the, my favorite part of today was watching that movie. Yeah. I loved that movie. It was, it was up there with like Kung Fu Hustle and Shaolin Soccer.
01:01:12 --> 01:01:21 If you like those kinds of things, you'll probably enjoy Yeah, but I mean, Kung Fu Hustle is like funny on purpose, whereas this movie I think is just funny.
01:01:21 --> 01:01:24 No, I think this movie was funny on purpose.
01:01:24 --> 01:01:27 You think so? Okay. Yeah, because some of it's—
01:01:27 --> 01:02:06 Because I mean, the fact that they had ninjas like zooming through the ground, like half buried in the ground. Yeah. And then at what, like at one point, uh, the ninja, the main ninja gets his head wrap pulled off Right. He's got a full head of hair, right? Yeah. And it starts getting pulled off of his head and just keeps going in one long rat tail, topknot rat tail kind of thing that's like 50 feet long until they rip out that little piece of hair. And now he's bald for the rest of the movie. So yeah, they went over the top silly with a lot of things on purpose. Okay. I think it's pretty safe to say.
01:02:06 --> 01:02:23 Interesting. Yeah, he's the one with the clawed hand because I remember a sequence later on where he puts on a new hand and he, it just, again, it's the It's the 1800s tech. It's almost steampunk. Yeah. Mechanical clawed hand is, it's, it's interesting. Yeah. All right. Cool stuff.
01:02:23 --> 01:02:42 So, all right. Uh, with that, I think we could end today's episode. Uh, if you're interested in the discussion and maybe finding the link to the movie, you can check out our Discord, which you can find the link to either in the YouTube description or—
01:02:42 --> 01:02:44 Not this week because John was being an asshole to us.
01:02:46 --> 01:02:55 That's true. Well, other YouTube episode descriptions, I'm sure, are still there, right? But otherwise, you can go check us out at pressbtocancel.com. You can find our links there.
01:02:55 --> 01:02:56 Yeah.
01:02:56 --> 01:03:30 So there you go. You can also find us on Patreon at patreon.com/pressbtocancel. And there you can support us if you feel so generously inclined. And if you support us at the Circus Charles level or higher, We'll give you a shout out here in the episodes. So as of right now, thank you so much to Von Beardly and Enthusiast Jeff. And that's all I can think of as far as the spiel. Did I get everything?
01:03:30 --> 01:03:33 I think so. In terms of like—
01:03:33 --> 01:03:35 I feel like it came so easy, like I'm missing something.
01:03:35 --> 01:03:41 The one time we get it right and we're just like, something must have gone wrong.
01:03:42 --> 01:03:43 Yeah.
01:03:43 --> 01:04:24 In terms of stuff we're working on, uh, I am still working through ranking Mario. I had to take a break last week. I'm gonna try and do one this week, but I'm seeing a Jays game tomorrow, so I don't know how much time this weekend, although it is a holiday weekend in Canada this week, so maybe I'll be able to squeeze one in. But, uh, I do wanna get back to that. Um, if anybody's interested, I am ranking all the old Mario platforming games and I'm gonna be doing all of 'em from Mario Odyssey and Wonder all the way down to, I think the next one I was planning to do was Uh, Mario for the 5200 and, and, uh, and the Atari 2600. It's just, which are interesting takes on that game. So look forward to that. And I'll, I'll put that into Discord as well when they're up.
01:04:24 --> 01:04:51 Alrighty. Um, I don't have any videos right now, but I have, I do want to give a little shout out to a game I've been playing this week. Uh, Lucky Tower Ultimate. Um, I don't know what platforms, you know what? I can Google that real quick. I've been playing it on Steam. I don't know if it's on others, uh, but it was $15 US on Steam. Uh, looks like it is on Switch at the very least.
01:04:51 --> 01:04:52 Okay.
01:04:52 --> 01:05:14 Uh, or is coming to Switch, maybe something like that. I'm not sure, but look it up. It's very fun. It's very funny. It is a side-scrolling action platformer roguelite. Uh, it is full of dialogue. that is entirely voice acted. I can't think of, I don't think any of the dialogue actually has onscreen text. It's all voice acted.
01:05:14 --> 01:05:15 That's awesome.
01:05:15 --> 01:05:45 And there's just like one-liners and snark and throwaway jokes and bad jokes and, uh, sight gags and all sorts of stuff as you're playing through. It's really well done and it's really amusing. Um, like an idea and you, it, Sometimes the puzzle solving in it feels a little like, uh, getting creative the way you got creative in, uh, what was that game where you put in an item and it just appears? It was a puzzle game.
01:05:45 --> 01:05:46 Scribblenauts?
01:05:46 --> 01:06:11 Yes. Scribblenauts. So sometimes the puzzle solving feels a little Scribblenauts, like, uh, okay. You can just, uh, and it just, the gameplay itself, like you can go pick up, uh, the body of a monster that you killed and start wielding it as a weapon. And every once in a while he'll be doing it. And just as you smack something, he'll be like, body slam. Like that's the sense of humor in this game.
01:06:11 --> 01:06:12 That's awesome.
01:06:12 --> 01:06:27 And the amount of ways you die in this game and the reactions from your party members that you find along the way, it's, it's great. I recommend this game. It was, uh, I think it's this studio's first game, but it was published by AMC.
01:06:29 --> 01:06:32 Like the— I saw that. Is that the movie company or is that—
01:06:32 --> 01:06:33 Yeah. Like the TV channel.
01:06:33 --> 01:06:36 Is it really? So it's actually that AMC. It's not like a—
01:06:36 --> 01:06:38 It's AMC Games, I believe.
01:06:38 --> 01:06:40 So weird. Interesting.
01:06:40 --> 01:07:11 Um, so I thought that was neat. It's only $15. Fun game. Yeah. Only $15. Definitely worth it if you're looking for something to play and that sounds up your alley. Uh, the trailer on the Steam page. Highly accurate to what the game is like. Um, and with that, I think we can go ahead and wrap it up. Thank you for listening to another episode of Press B to Cancel. We appreciate you. We love you. Give us a like, follow, or subscribe. Maybe all of it. I don't care, but do something.
01:07:11 --> 01:07:12 Engagement.
01:07:12 --> 01:07:14 Yes. Engagement, please.