I was very wrong.
There are a total of twenty-two Marvel video games released on the Nintendo DS; the last one, Lego Marvel Super Heroes: Universe in Peril, came out in 2014. 2014. People were playing PS4’s and their little brother could have just gotten a brand new original DS game. I was playing Dragon Age: Inquisition, and someone could have just gotten a Lego Marvel game on their DS. Fascinating.
This article is going to cover the third generation’s handheld offerings; the classic Game Boy, the iconic Game Boy Colour, and the Game Gear, which did in fact exist.
I have a feeling in my gamer bones that this is going to be terrible.
We’re covering 17 games this time around, so I ended up having to split this into three parts after I initially thought it could do it in two; forgive my transgressions, I implore you. Part One and Part Two will have 6 games as I prefer to frontload my suffering, and Part Three will have the last 5. It’s a hefty count for sure, but I’m going to power through them for your entertainment. Are you not entertained?
The Amazing Spider-Man
Year: 1990Publisher: LJN
Developer: Rare
Platform: Game Boy
Rare made this? Couldn’t have foreseen that one. This first in The Amazing Spider-Man trilogy on the Game Boy, this game was luckily not absolutely terrible and hasn’t cursed the whole article like Uncanny X-Men did last time- I’m still not letting it go. The game sees Spider-Man going through a gauntlet of a sort of Sinister Six lineup after they apparently kidnapped Mary Jane offscreen. A classic set-up.
New York; you can’t even walk down the street without being assaulted by a sewer lizardman.
The controls are mostly fine. You have your attack button, and your jump button. They’re both fairly responsive, though they both feel very slow. It’s not necessarily the fault of the developers as much as the obviously primitive hardware they’re dealing with. You can web sling across the screen by jumping forward and then holding the jump button in a sort of awkward maneuver that worked most of the time at least.
Enemies are plentiful, and they’re present is what I can say for most of them as they’re not particularly smart. They are all defeated in a single hit, but can deal a surprising amount of damage to you should they actually manage to punch the webhead. They also have a Wolverine thing going on where your post-hit invincibility is rather small, making you take a lot of damage quickly if something gets inside your sprite. You have three lives per continue, and three continues before you’re fully defeated.
Got ‘im, Spidey.
The game isn’t bad for being an early Game Boy game, and it actually worked mostly as intended so it was better than some of the home console versions last time. Overall, it was simply rather boring but again, considering the Game Boy’s hardware it’s to be expected. My time with this game was rather short, I will admit. Mysterio in the first level took a life or two off of me due to his gas attacks hitting multiple times quickly, the next level that saw me crawling up a building I cleared without issue, and the next boss of Hobgoblin took my first continue from me. The next level, however, was Spider-Man’s doom: the subway system. The lowly muggers and thugs presented no issue, it was the appearance of the nightmare creatures that truly did me in: the bats.
Forget the Sinister Six, or Venom or Kaine or the Jackal; these guys right here? Spider-Man’s deadliest enemy, no contest.
It was a combination of their number, the high damage they deal with each hit and the fact that they don’t stop moving and Spider-Man is not particularly agile in this that saw them eat through all but my last life. By the time I got to Scorpion, I was already softened up enough that he just flicked his tail at me once or twice and that was the end of Spider-Man, and my time with the game. I could have kept going, but I also could have done anything else. Like I said, not a terrible game but nothing special.
Score
2 Thwips out of 5.
The Punisher: Ultimate Payback!
Year: 1990Publisher: Acclaim
Developer: Beam Software
Platform: Game Boy
We meet again, Frank. More or less a port of the NES game to the Game Boy, there are a few differences that warrants it having its own summary.
The first one is that you can no longer see the Punisher’s well defined back running across the bottom of the screen, which has changed the game from third person to a first person game technically, but it also means you cannot dodge enemy fire. Instead, enemies have maybe a second or two of ‘grace period’ after arriving on screen before they automatically begin damaging you with their bullets. This makes the game entirely about reflexes as you have to very quickly take out enemies before they can start to damage you- coincidentally, the game is also much harder than the NES version. When it’s only a few enemies on screen it’s no problem at all, but when more and more begin to roll or jump or pop out from behind trash cans at you it’s very easy to take heavy damage before you can take them out.
It takes the gang members a couple seconds to calibrate their guns or something, you see.
My favourite change personally, however? Getting negged by Spider-Man in the opening mall stage. Classic Parker move.
Why did he even call me knowing I’m going to kill everything that moves? Seems a little out of character for Spider-Man. He watched as I gunned down like 50 people.
There are some other neat additions to the game, including some civilians occasionally wandering into the field of fire completely oblivious to the action around them- shooting them takes off a big amount of your health so try to avoid shooting the random shoppers, fishermen and forklift drivers, for Frank’s sake.
I think the game is inferior to the NES version but that’s to be expected in some ways- overall it’s a good port to a weaker system. It’s still a solid experience, however, so maybe give it a go.
Score
3 Uzis out of 5.
Captain America and The Avengers
Year: 1991Publisher: Data East
Developer: Realtime Associates (Game Boy and Game Gear versions)
Platform: Game Boy, Game Gear
Oh no, it’s Captain America and the Avengers again. This time, it’s a straight beat ‘em up unlike the previous NES version keeping it more in line with the original arcade game, which is why the handheld versions are getting this dedicated entry. The Game Boy and Game Gear versions are identical save for the latter having colour, so this will be for both of them.
First thing I see when starting it up? A character select screen, we may be in for a slightly better time than the NES version.
Any game that actually has the Vision as a playable character is A-OK in my books. The poor synthoid is always getting left out.
It took about 10 seconds for that slight optimism to get destroyed by laser blasts. The hit detection is just as bad as the NES version. The first enemy I encountered randomly took about 9 repulsor blasts to defeat, which doesn’t seem like a lot until you’re playing it. I’m not going to lie, I almost wanted to just stop there.
It may look like I’m punching this generic enemy in the face, but apparently I’m not despite Iron Man’s armoured fist being physically located inside the enemies face on a molecular level.
I eventually just started jumping over every enemy that I could, save for the ones that spawn in at certain points on the edge of the screen that you need to defeat to keep going. For those ones, I stood directly where they came out and mashed the attack button which saw me effortlessly defeat them before they could even do anything.
I didn’t even need the Vision’s super-intelligence to figure this strategy out.
The format may be different from the NES version, but it has the same black soul of mediocrity and abysmal programming in its digital heart. If you can’t tell, I hate these games.
I made it to the first boss, the Living Laser, then got defeated in a single energy blast due to the previous enemies eventually draining me due to the hit detection issues.
Vision looks unimpressed, as am I.
That’s all I have to say about the handheld versions of Captain America and the Avengers. There’s still the original arcade version?
Score
1 Shield out of 5.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2
Year: 1992Publisher: Acclaim
Developer: Bits Software
Platform: Game Boy
This is the sequel of sorts to Rare’s The Amazing Spider-Man we went through at the beginning. I say ‘sort of’ as they have no continuity or connections to one another, and both 2 and 3 were made by a different developer, Bits Software. Some may recognize the name as the developers of the previous articles’ unsung masterpiece of Spider-Man: Return of the Sinister Six; truly a prestigious company, and the pride of British developers. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was the first of the company's Spider-man games, predating Return of the Sinister Six by two years. How’d it all start? Well…
Got a humanoid lizard problem? Just trap him in a corner of the room that he can’t get out of, then punch him back into being human.
It starts with Spider-Man once being framed by some of his villains, who in this case are not the Sinister Six for once but instead are a fearsome five,.
My first experience with this game was not a good one. You start in the middle of a destroyed building, I’m not sure what’s going on with New York in this game but it’s all ruins and boarded up windows apparently. I came outside, and was immediately bombarded with pumpkin bombs and what I can only describe as old time-y chimney sweeps wielding torches like they’re hunting down Frankenstein’s monster.
I don’t know either.
I basically wandered around while trying to unsuccessfully kick the Hobgobin on the rooftops because the bane of any gamer’s existence has once again wormed its way into this article; terrible controls. In this instance, they are responsive but specifically the way you attack while jumping, and the jump itself, is just strange and bizarre. I tried to attack Hobgoblin while in the air, but I kept shooting a web around instead of actually attacking. I then accidentally stumbled onto the real jump attack- to do a jump kick, you instead have to hold the jump button down. It’s just bizarre, really. Why is it like this? It baffles me.
Anyway, I quickly died. Then died again after wandering around the city and finding some empty buildings. This game was my first on this list, not being one I quit after only 10 minutes- that was already taken several times. This was the first game I decided to break the ‘true gamer’ rule for, and I looked up a guide. I know, but something compelled me to give it another go and I clearly needed some direction. That’s when I discovered that this game is an adventure game; you have to collect various items through contrived means in order to progress, and they are contrived in this game. How do you get over the electrified fence just on the edge of New York in this game, which leads to a robot factory oil field as this game exists in some sort of surreal landscape? Why, you have to use the oil can that you found in a locked room indistinguishable from the other doors you cannot enter, unlocked using the key that Hobgoblin drops when he’s defeated. How do you defeat Hobgoblin considering he’s seemingly invincible to all attacks? Why, you have to shoot a web line at him, then hang on and slowly drag him to the ground while dodging the other enemies shots; then he’ll get off his glider and you can punch him.
Oh yeah, this would definitely be anyone's first guess as to how to defeat him.
It keeps spiraling from there. It got to the point when I had to navigate a roller coaster while hanging from a cart, memorizing a very specific pattern of moving up and down on my web to avoid getting knocked off by platforms trying to defeat Carnage before I tapped out.
Did my experience with the guide improve my experience? Not really, but it did give me a small amount of more respect for the game for attempting something new. Was it good? Not really, some of the steps you have to take are so strange and unguessable that it’s borderline impossible. It’s obviously to extend the playtime, considering with the guide I probably could have beaten the game within half an hour if I kept going.
So, long story short- no, don’t play this.
Score
2 Thwips out of 5.
Spider-Man and the X-Men in Arcade’s Revenge
Year: 1992Publisher: Acclaim
Developer: Software Creations
Platform: Game Boy, Game Gear
I think at this point is when Acclaim (and by association LJN, as they were purchased by Acclaim in 1990 and used to publish many of these games as you’ve seen) had hit their stride in terms of shoveling licensed games out the door, employing the ‘shotgun’ strategy and going to the first cheapest developer that they could fine to slap something together. Spider-Man and the X-Men in Arcade’s Revenge is an obviously rushed product, half thought out and put onto store shelves to make a buck off of kids who just see the Marvel logo.
The game starts with you controlling Spider-Man as he attempts to free the X-Men from the clutches of Arcade, a very goofy and entertaining forgotten Marvel villain who traps his victims in ‘Murderworlds’; deathtraps often modeled off of various games, hence his name. He rarely ever succeeds at actually killing anyone, obviously, and it’s a complete travesty that he’s been forgotten to time as the concept, his pure goofiness and ineffectiveness is hilarious. Sorry, got distracted talking about something Marvel related that the MCU hasn’t ‘adapted’ yet.
To do this, Spider-Man has to traverse some sort of building and find what are, in my scientific terms, ‘doohickeys’ using his Spider Sense that shows you where one is when you get close enough. You have to collect them in a certain order, so the whole experience is one of jumping around the same maze sections trying to figure out how to backtrack to the other side of the level. It’s not fun.
What else do you call this other than a ‘doohickey’?
The Spider-Man section is terrible, but once you complete it the game opens up a little bit. After this you get to choose who you want to play as from Spider-Man and the members of the X-Men, with the team being the standard as portrayed by the seminal 90’s cartoon that inspired the game; Wolverine, Cyclops, Gambit, and Storm. Each character has two stages that must be completed before you can go on to fight Arcade as Spider-Man, and free everyone. It may sound kinda fun, but I assure you it is not.
What have they done to you, Wolvie? His claws are so short it’s comical.
For one thing, the game is brutally difficult to a fault. You have very little health and can only take a few hits before going down, the maze like nature of the levels will have you running around confused very frequently, and more than anything is a single design decision; every character shares the same pool of lives, so you’ll most likely end up seeing the game over screen very quickly.
The levels themselves, while maze-like, aren’t terribly designed, just brutally hard. The most interesting design is Storm’s levels being underwater sections. Why? Just think about that; a character most famous for flying through the air on wind currents and shooting electricity is stuck in a water level. Don’t worry, you can still attack; she can still shoot laser beams out of her eyes, for some reason.
Why does Storm shoot a laser beam out of her eyes? I don’t know. And yes, there are bubble enemies in her underwater stages; I will never be free of them.
As you can see from the screenshots, I was playing the Game Boy version of this game for this review. Both it and the Game Gear version are virtually identical save for the usual presence of colour, so it would get the same score.
Overly difficult mechanics and uninspired design equals something I would not recommend. Perhaps the 16-bit generation versions will be better when we get there, but probably not.
Score
2 Thwips (Spider-Man’s first in the title, sorry X-Men) out of 5.
The Amazing Spider-Man 3: Invasion of the Spider-Slayers
Year: 1993Publisher: Acclaim
Developer: Bits Software
Platform: Game Boy
The epic conclusion to the Game Boy Spider-Man trilogy, and a fitting end to Part One. Is it good? No. It’s the worst one yet. Don’t play it.
Alright, I’ll elaborate. The controls right off the bat are terribly unresponsive with your two buttons feeling like there's a 5 second delay on them sometimes, but it’s mainly the appearance of my nemesis once again that truly makes the game bad; the hit detection. Why’s it always the hit detection? Attacks hit sprites, sprites take damage, it should be easy.
It may once again look like that my foot is, in fact, inside this random thug but apparently it is not, as nothing happened. But it’s okay; he couldn’t hit me either.
The game starts off with Spider-Man patrolling around Central Park, and the game tasks you with defeating 20 muggers. Easy, right? Well, the atrocious controls and detection make it way harder than it needs to be. Something else that makes it unclear is what counts as a mugger. Look at the image above, where Spider-Man is attempting to do some interpretive dance with an enemy; would you say that man is a mugger? The guy in a long jacket whose first instinct when seeing someone is to pull a gun on them, and presumably ‘mug’ and rob them? You’d be wrong, that’s not a mugger.
Apparently it’s the kid on a skateboard who pulls a knife on you, that’s a ‘mugger’ according to The Amazing Spider-Man 3: Invasion of the Spider-Slayers. I don’t know either.
I trudged through the level after running out of time and having to restart once or twice, then got to the appearance of the titular Spider-Slayers which was defeated in two punches.
I didn’t realize Spider-Man fights xenomorphs on a semi-regular basis. That’s comic accurate; that’s what the first few versions of the Spider-Slayers looked like so I can’t fault the game on this one. Damnit, I just sort of defended this game.
The next level saw me having to ascend upwards with two buildings while I guess a bird Spider-Slayer appears on the edges of the screen and shoots at you. I couldn’t figure out how to get up, the time ran out, and once again my time with this game was up.
Don’t play this.
Score
1 Thwip out of 5.
And there you have it, the first 6 games on the early third gen handhelds. It has not gone terribly well, as you've seen. Perhaps some of the later games will change the outcome, as you'll have to see in Part Two. First up on that list; a very strange comic crossover that no one probably really wanted, Iron Man and XO Manowar in Heavy Metal.
Until next time, true believers.
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