Wrestling
June 1986 (TOSE/Bandai)
Let’s go ahead and give M.U.S.C.L.E. credit for 2 things. First, it had a different box style. Wahoo for that. Second it has music playing through the title screen. A lot of the Nintendo games didn’t do that.
That’s where my praise ends. I don’t know what TOSE thought while they were making this. I really don’t know what Bandai thought when they agreed to release it.
The game is based on a Japanese manga1. At least to me, the characters might as well be the same. They look like a 4 year old made them in one of those creepy crawler things and finished them off in an easy bake oven.
The worst part is that the wrestling ring is in 3D. Except you can’t attack in 3D. I know this would probably have been difficult to pull off this early in the NES’s life, but it still bothers me.
Your jump kick move is about worthless. There’s no way to tell if you’re on the same plane with the other guy. I spent most of my fights jumping past my opponent as he jumped past me. Rather annoying.
I’m also still not sure what that ball did that I grabbed when it was thrown in the ring besides making my guy flash. I think someone forgot to tell TOSS and Bandai that flashing characters in video games means you’ve been hurt and you’re in “I can’t get hurt right now so I have a chance to get away before I get hurt again” mode.
The game also has a two player mode. I feel sorry for the unlucky soul who got suckered into playing. I feel worse for the person who actually spent money on the game.
I think I’m going to go cry now.
- Get ready for more of those. And for me to have no idea what’s going on with the game since I don’t read them. [↩]
This is truly a terrible, terrible game… although surprisingly not the worst wrestling game for NES as you’ll soon see. Just have two things to add to the conversation here:
1) Unlike other games based on Japanese manga/anime series, this one actually would have been known at the time. M.U.S.C.L.E. figures were all the rage in the 80s for a little while. This site is one of the better resources for them: http://nathansmuscleblog.blogspot.com/
2) Whoever gets the ball (and blinks) has the ability to pull off their devastating special move. Most of them are unique and ridiculously funny to watch the animations for. If you can pull a couple of these off, your opponent is pretty much done for.
Why did you have to tell me that, now I’ll need to play it again. I doubt it will be much better though.
That’s the problem of refusing to look anything up though. I’m worried that if I try to learn about the game I’ll inevitably read about how much it sucks.