This work, almost entirely the work of Brian Provinciano, is
a blast to play that ultimately yields to all of the worst inspirations it
lovingly adopts. The core game is
inspired by Grand Theft Auto, as realized in an 8-bit engine, and the hook is
the innumerable references it works into it.
The emotions evoked by RCR are joy and a deep satisfying
sense of nostalgia. Generation NES
gamers in particular will get a wry grin from every reference to Super Stomps,
radioactive plumbers, Super Speed Shoes, and Bionic Commando claws. Others who might enjoy this game are those
who get a wry grin from the Go-go Busters, Bif Wayne as Bifman in his battle
against the Jester, and running battles with Green Melee Fighters emerging from
a machinegun-toting van called a Shelley, or wry comments from the T Team. The jokes are fun and entertaining, and
recall the good old eighties just as kids of that age remember them.
Then there’s the bad part.
Arcade gamers may remember the significantly stacked difficulty, and its
use to pad the game length. Even with
this padding, Retro City Rampage comes to about 10 hours of playtime. Some of the later stages are transparent
arcade through backs, and Provinciano expresses a depressing fondness for one
of the worst NES levels of all time with the clearly Turtles inspired water
levels (complete with rotating underwater flamesticks: I’m so conflicted!). I felt more than a little upset that so many
great cameo’s are made so flawlessly integrated as quest givers, and then
silently walking out of the narrative never to offer another quest again! Common Dude from the Paper-Shredder company,
don’t you have other missions for us to get rid of those Turtles? It’s not like the first one could have
worked!
The main aesthetic this game delivers on is challenge, and
there’s a lot of it. RCR rarely leaves you clueless about where to go,
frequently complicating missions in humourous and believable ways: as Player puts
it “A tailing mission? I’m going to have
to drink coffees just to avoid being bored to death.” RCR also delivers on exploration and
narrative, as Player is relentlessly pulled back into the main quest looking
for new quest givers, new rampages and weapons, and new types of exclusive
cars. It includes a sandbox mode for
rampaging and killing cops, but that seems less than satisfying.
The visual and audio aesthetics are sheer joy, complete with
the option to turn off the NES sprite flicker.
New age gamers would be depressed by the poly count being zero, but the
sprite work is top notch and a credit to some of the very best sprite games of
yesteryear. The sounds would likely be
torture to modern gamers, but fondly recalls some of the best again, and the
truest homage is the complete absence of voice work. Actually, I think there is one clip
only. Sega fans rejoice!
For its price of $15, RCR is a good value, and rounds out
its offerings with a series of indie games in the arcades, together with a
variety of features to change the display settings to match classic old school
consoles and computers. I confess tears
of joy with the VBrick settings, despite its 4 shades of green, monotone sound
being near painful.
Its lasting value as art, well that’s trickier. I certainly like the game enough to value
keeping it, but that’s because it hits all of the classic notes for me. It feels timeless for a Gen NES gamer, but I
can see others finding its thrills and spills more like yawns. It also doesn’t really do much to advance the
medium, despite gleefully looking back and shouting “hoorah!” Give it a download it you’re looking for a
cleaned up version of what gaming used to be.
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