To quote James in the opening of this video: “I’m back.” That’s right, I’m back to continue my insane project of reviewing every Angry Video Game Nerd episode and next up on the list is a video focusing on games based on films starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.
This was the first episode to come after the filming of the AVGN Movie, so James’ starting with his “I’m back” comment was very appropriate. The choice in subject matter also was, as at this time (2012) Schwarzenegger was starring in a new film, making this episodes subject matter oddly topical. It also sticks to the roots of AVGN and focuses on a few titles for the Nintendo Entertainment System – Total Recall, Last Action Hero, Conan and Predator.
Following the introduction we get right in to Total Recall. It’s a pretty typical action platformer for the NES that follows the movie pretty well, save for a few odd aspects. It’s actually somewhat impressive how well it follows the movie, but it’s not the greatest experience. James recalls renting the game as a child and it “ruining his whole Goddamn weekend.” Much like most NES titles, it’s not terrible, but it isn’t a good game by any means.
After taking a moment to recap Terminator and Terminator 2 the Nerd moves on to Last Action Hero. This one is way worse than Total Recall. It looks worse, it plays worse and while it follows the film well enough it doesn’t actually change in gameplay. Not enough to really be worthwhile.
Next up is Conan. This one is actually a port of a Commodore 64 game and, as such, has quite odd controls which make zero sense on the NES. You press down to jump forward, with up being a “normal” jump. Yep, you press down to do the most common jump in any platforming game! Again, this works on the C64, but on the NES is just insanity. Many 8-bit computer game ports have this kind of control flaw when they made the move to the NES.
The game is a bit of a cryptic mess, at least for the first level – you have to do a specific set of tasks to get the item you need to kill the first level boss, but then following that the game actually goes more straightforward, thus making the first level a bit of a mess.
After messing around with Commando for a bit, as a response to the fact that the Conan game wasn’t actually based on the Conan the Barbarian film we get to the meat of the episode – Predator.
First point in the game and we already have something to complain about – the graphics. Beyond Arnold’s character wearing pink, everything else is incredibly drab. At the same time, they took way too many liberties, having all kinds of crazy enemies for you to fight which, quite simply, are not in any way part of the film.
This is when the Nerd brings up a very unique, but very dangerous element to the game design – pressing the Select button while the game is paused causes you to “self destruct.” While this is useful in some situations, it takes a life and can quickly result in a game over if you accidentally press it.
What’s worse, the continue screen is poorly coded, meaning, if you aren’t careful, you can accidentally restart the game rather than continue from the last level. It’s a mess if you’re really trying to complete the game only to accidentally restart than continue in a late game area.
Level design is also a mess, not just layout wise but in the actual way it conveys information – it’s hard to tell sometimes what you can stand on and what’s just decoration. Still, the Nerd gets through a few levels only to discover “Big Mode” where everything in the game changes, and it becomes a kind of on-rails shooter! It’s pretty crazy and does break up the gameplay, but it just seems strange. Needless to say, it’s quite a surprise to the Nerd when he sees it for the first time!
As he progresses, the Nerd discovers more and more problems with the game, this culminating in him accidentally restarting, rather than continuing, and in a rage he forces his way through the game again, successfully completing it but not before a classic AVGN monologue of hilarious absurdity!
Final Rating: 4.0/5
A solid episode, and a good length one – 20 minutes. It’s funny and while it covers quite a few games it spends just the right amount of time on each one. I don’t have too much to say – after many months away it was a nice return for the Nerd, and began the “Post Movie” episode set which, while it contains some of my favorite episodes and moments it also marks the end of when the Nerd still felt “fresh.”
I’ll have more on that in the future. For now, the episode. Enjoy!