Welcome to another edition of Playing With Power. The review article that looks at all things Nintendo Entertainment System. This week marked the arrival of a video game 2 decades in waiting. The Simpsons Arcade game finally saw home console releases to both Xbox Live Arcade and the Playstation Network. The game is often considered by many as not just one of the best multiplayer beat-em-ups, but one of the best arcade games of all time. It’s too bad that the awesomeness of this game wouldn’t find its way onto the NES. Instead we would get many a poor game from Acclaim starring our favorite yellow skinned humans, mainly the spiky haired hellion of the family. And this week we’re gonna look at the one that started it all.
YEAR OF RELEASE: 1991
PUBLISHER: Acclaim
GENRE: Platformer
Honestly, if I really need to go into detail about The Simpsons and everything it’s achieved, then you have clearly been living under a lemon shaped rock for a quarter century. With it being a massive hit from day one, it obviously wouldn’t take too long for a video game to come out for the hungry masses. And over the years, many a Simpsons game would come out of the woodwork, most being of questionable quality. Especially the ones for the NES.
Early in 1991, Konami would release The Simpsons Arcade Game, and it was a massive success, which to this day is still considered one of the greatest arcade titles ever. So with its popularity, one would hope that Konami would release a version for the NES or SNES similar to how Konami would release their ports of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles games.
But sadly, this would not be the case as Acclaim Entertainment would pick up the exclusive console rights to The Simpsons. And what would follow would be a wave of monsterous mediocrity. Sadly, that meant no Simpsons Arcade for any major console (It did see MS-DOS and Commodore releases, but both ports are known to be very lacking).
The Acclaim Simpsons era started with the best seller of the NES bunch, Bart Vs. The Space Mutants, which was ported to every console under the sun. But we will of course just be looking at the NES version of the game.
COVER STORY
I honestly love this cover. Classic Simpsons art, most of the major characters at the time of the game’s release featured on the cover, and plenty of action all around. I would say however that like Bucky O’hare, I have a bit of an issue that perhaps the cover is a bit too busy, but you can’t hate classic Matt Groening Simpsons art like this, so it is easily forgiven.
STORY
The city of Springfield is unaware that evil space mutants have landed and plan to enslave the planet. Disguised as humans, the aliens are after certain items in order to power their device which will enslave humanity. Only one person knows their terrible secret, and that is Bart Simpson. With his trusty X-Ray specs, Bart must stop the space mutants and save the planet.
GAMEPLAY
Bart Vs. The Space Mutants is a one player platformer game. You control Bart Simpson as he travels through five levels, thwarting the plans of the evil space mutants. You control Bart with the D-Pad. A will make Bart jump, and run when held down. The B button will fire the item you’re currently using in the level, like the spray paint can, the dart gun, and the slingshot. You can also do a longer jump with the A and B button pressed together. But that can cause issues as I’ll explain later. Pressing select will toggle through the items you have in your inventory, as the Start button will use them.
The object of the game is to thwart the evil plans of the space mutants by collecting and getting rid of a certain number of items needed by the space mutants to power their machine. For example, you will need to get rid of a certain amount of purple items in level one, a number of balloons in level 3, and find all the nuclear rods in the final power plant level. This seems like a weird goal since why would a certain number of one thing be a problem? Clearly there are other places you could get a plethora of purple items, right?
There are five levels total. The Streets of Springfield, with shops to buy items, and familiar haunts from the TV show. The mall, with it’s weird floors of moving shoes, floating candy bars, and magic platforms. Krustyland, where you can engage in mini-games for prizes, and deal with carnival related challenges. The Springfield Natural History Museum, which houses plenty of rooms, each with their own unique challenge. And finally the maze that is the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant.
Bart is equipped with his trusty X-Ray specs, which can help Bart discover who are real people, and who are the space mutants. When you see a generic human character, activate the specs in your menu, and if their head is weird, jump on it. Defeating these enemies give Bart a letter, which will add to the name on the left of the menu. If you can find all the letters to spell the name on the left, that corresponding Simpson will help you during the boss battle. A nice touch is that each of the bosses in the game are based on enemies from the first season of the cartoon. Nelson Muntz, The Babysitter Bandit, Sidesshow Bob, and Doctor Marvin Monroe. Each have pretty basic strategies to beat, but the help of your family can be a major plus.
Bart starts with just three lives, and can only take two hits before losing one (Which he will angrily say “Eat my Shorts” when killed). There are no continues, passwords, or save functions, meaning once you get a game over, it’s back to the beginning of the game. And this game can be notoriously difficult. Not so much for the gameplay itself, but its terrible controls. Namely in the jumping department.
Pressing A will make Bart jump as previously stated. This would be fine if the game didn’t have certain platforms to traverse over, and since A also occupies run, a good run jump is next to impossible. Your initial jump is rather small and sloppy, and is horrible in certain areas. Thankfully, there is the A+B super jump, but that too comes with a price. Not only is the jump sometimes tricky to get the hang of, but if you have a weapon like the spray paint or the dart gun, every time you use the super jump, you end up using some of your weapon making for a rather annoying hindrance.
Another issue with the jump is the poor hit detection the game can have when jumping from one spot to another. The museum, for example has an area where you have to cross a giant tar pit by jumping from rock to rock. But since the rocks are so tiny, they can be easy to fall through if not pixel perfect, leading to an instant death. Another example is the T-Rex mini boss at the end of the tar pits. You can actually easily fall completely through him, which is bad since his only weak spot is his head. This all leads to the game’s biggest flaw in its complete and utter frustration due to very poor polish.
There are tons of enemies to deal with, but none you can actually kill save for a few, and the pretending space mutants. With your poor jumping abilities, this can make avoiding some a pain. You can get some items to help however. The head of Jebediah Springfield can give you temporary invincibility, and the game has plenty of Krusty heads which will give you one-ups. There are also coins that can help you buy items in level one, or play some of the carnival games in level three. Other than those items, the ones you get are very specific to getting the target items in certain areas of levels. And it is mandatory to get the set number of items in the level, or else you won’t be able to complete it. That adds more to the nuisance this game can be.
POWER TIPS
Okay, this time around I have a couple tips that can help you get further in the game, and earn you plenty of lives in the process.
First tip can finally give you use for the whistle and key items in level one. Get to the Springfield Retirement Castle at level’s end, and use the whistle at the last window. Grampa Simpson will appear and throw coins at you. You can also use the key at the retirement castle’s door and go back to the first of the stage. This is both a good and bad thing. Good because it can help you find purple items you missed, and bad because you now have to deal with an already depleted clock in order to finish the level.
the next trick is what can earn you tons of lives. As many as you need. In the funhouse of the Krustyland level, there’s an area where you have to travel on pipes that shoot air. Once you can get to a safe spot between the pipes, just hang there and wait for the coins to pop out of the pipes. A certain amount will earn you an extra life. And contrary to the meter below, you can go far beyond the 9 that the lives meter will display, like really far. So, stay there until you feel fit to continue on your quest.
The last trick isn’t for lives, but in case you didn’t know this neat little trick, here it is. When you pass Moe’s Tavern, you’ll see a payphone. Go to it and use a coin to have Bart prank call Moe. After the prank, someone in a purple shirt will leave the bar, giving you a prime opportunity to spray his shirt and earn another completed item in the goal bar below.
GRAPHICS
The graphics are okay at best. The character and enemy sprites are decently designed, and everyone looks close enough to their TV counterparts. The backgrounds, especially in the museum level, are all really well done, and all in all there’s not too much to complain about. It’s nothing ground breaking, but nothing worth complaining about.
MUSIC
The music for the game is also pretty decent. From a really good 8-bit rendition of the Simpsons theme song, to some okay level tunes, there’s nothing here to really give you problems. Nothing that’s really earworm worthy either, but that’s not a problem for an okay soundtrack.
OVERALL THOUGHTS
This is one of those games I played a lot as a kid. But unlike Mickey Mousecapade or Snoopy’s Silly Sports Spectacular, I didn’t have the “it’s good” nostalgia glasses for this one. I’ve always hated it. It just feels so broken in the control department, so lacking in the fun challenge area, and so lacking in stuff to make it really good. There are some neat ideas, but nothing executed perfectly, and everything involved just comes out like a really rushed cash-in. And certainly not the only one the Simpsons franchise would see.
I mean hell, I don’t even think this is Acclaim’s worst Simpsons game. Remember annoyingly challenging crap like Bart Vs. The Juggernauts, or The really dull Krusty’s Super Fun House? Acclaim’s handling of the license could easily go down as one of the worst of all time. And it’s a shame too because as we saw with the arcade game, there was potential there to keep this franchise hot, and filled with classic games. But sometimes you just can’t fight the evils of mediocrity.
Even if you are a Simpsons fan, or a NES fan, I wouldn’t recommend this game, nor any of the other Simpsons games from the 90’s. If you’re looking for the best Simpsons gaming experience, I’d say it’s best to give The Simpsons Hit and Run, an obvious GTA knockoff that’s surprisingly still well done, a try. But as for this one, this poor sap can eat my shorts!
RATING: Thumbs Down