Balloon Fight ReviewBalloon fight was a game released for the NES back in 1986, yet the copy right in the title screen states 1984. This is because Balloon Fight was once on the arcade, much like Donkey Kong. So I'm here to review this game to see how it fairs. It always seemed a bit of a boring game to me, from what I heard. Just floating around dodging sparky things for high-score. I wanted to play it, but I really couldn't be asked to go and play it. But I have learned not to judge a Jekyll by its Hyde, and figured it might be a fun game to play. Eventually I got around to playing it. How good is it? Well get your balloons and some weird suits as we float over the ocean as we dive into this game.
So the story is....um, I don't think there is one. Your a guy with two balloons strapped to you and want to fly, I guess, but what's the story? You fly around trying to defeat these bird men guys (they have beaks on their heads, what else could they be?) that ate trying to knock you over. Maybe these bird men hate you for flying with just balloons and....oh wait, they have balloons as well -.- Well, what ever the reason, he's doing it. There are three different types of game play. Game A, Game B, and Game C. Game B is just a two-player mode of Game A. Game A features you trying to defeated these bird men. When they are all defeated, you can move to the next level. There seem to be two different types of bird men. white-ish ones and green-ish ones. I can't tell the difference between them. I think the green ones are harder to defeat. To defeat these guys, you need to fly on top of them, or hit their balloon. It will be popped this way. Now it seems like they are defeated, only they will use a parachute to safely land on the ground. You must hit them again by landing on them, or hitting the parachute with your body to finally defeat them. The nice thing is that when they are defeated, they will crash into the water. Then a bubble appears, which you can pop for some extra points. Lovely.
A good thing to remember is that if they land on the ground with their parachute, you just need to simply "walk" into them to defeat them. If you don't, they'll blow up another balloon and continue. I think the colours alternate in between these cycles. Be careful, as they can pop your balloons in exactly the same way as you can pop theirs. The only difference is that you don't have a parachute to save you =( There are some hazards you have to look out for. The giant fish in the water is always hungry and will nom anything that is close to it, but not always. This is an interesting feature. You can take your chances with the water if surrounded, and risk a chance of getting eaten by the giant fish or not. I took this chance once, and I didn't get eaten, and I was around the water for what seemed like forever. But ever time after that, the fish had its eye on me and ate me with every chance =( It also likes the take of bird men. So they can be eaten by the giant fish as well ^^ this is quite a balanced game, even for the CPU. This is a little weird, actually. I'm used to having slightly unfair odds about why that doesn't affect the enemy and what-not. Looks like they made sense of everything here. Oh, and there's a grey cloud. Nothing to worry about.
*grey cloud flashes and shots a thunder spark thing* Oh, looks like if you are in a level long enough, that cloud will get annoyed and try and kill stuff *spark goes through bird man* er, kill me. See, I;m used to this kinda thing. Why doesn't it affect the enemy? Are they made of rubber or something? Well, at least it adds a little challenge. I have nothing wrong with that. *spark hits me and I die* Oh, looks like these sparks instantly kill you....yep, everything seems right now (yay ^^). You have three lives, in case you didn't already know. Every now and then, you come across a bonus stage where you must pop as many green balloons as possible. There are 20 in each stage. pop them all, and you'll receive a "Super Bonus" of 10,000 points. Aww, isn't that sweet? The challenge of this game gets really challenging pretty quickly. I find myself unable to get to a third bonus stage.
Then there is Game C, which is what most people remember of this game. It's basically a survival mode in some respect. You are on a scrolling screen going left (which seems odd, as most side scrolling games go right), and you are met with thousands of sparky spark things. You must pop green balloons and avoid the sparks for as long as possible. That's pretty much it. The fish threat sill applies, so be careful. You also get these "Ranks" as you move on. The further you get, the higher your rank goes. You start at 50, and you slowly decrease to what seems like 01, but the furthest I've ever gotten to is Rank 18, so I'm not sure. This is by far the most addicting part of the game.
Overall, I give this game a 8.4/10 The core game is good. The controls are a little fiddly as you must "flap" in order to turn, not just turn and you do so. It's good for people that are subtle with their movement, as I have found that I have moved way too fast on the first couple of tries. The music, I have to admit, it short, fun, catchy and most importantly, a little weird. Just listen to the Game Over music. Also, the sound for when something gets eaten by the giant fish sounds like it came from Jaws. A good play for people seeking something new and fresh. There wasn't another game like this at the time (apart from the arcade game Joust, but lets just ignore that for now, shall we?) and is worth a play for those who like weird games.
Graphics
7 Sound
8 Addictive
7 Depth
8 Difficulty
9
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