Hi Jeremy, the smart business reason to name the game けっきょく南極大冒険 was to ride on the coattails of 南極物語 (Nankyoku Monogatari), a.k.a. "Antarctica", the 1983 Japanese movie that became the biggest box office hit behind E.T. that year and sparked the boom in interest for penguins in Japanese pop culture. (Leading to the Papipu Penguins beer commercial, etc.)
One little detail you omitted with arctic adventure is the propeller hat that the rainbow flags give you. If you tap jump a second time you hover for an extra moment or two.
@@JeremyParish Sorry, I has the dumb today :D Yeah, TOSE would be the Probe of Japan! Though saying that, Tiertex really knocked it out the park with Master System ports bizarrely, also, did you know they're called Tiertex as they moved into the offices of a ceiling painting company who had gone bust, and previously used that name. So they even got cheap on not changing the plaque on the front door :D
Whaaaat? I love Ninja-Kun! D: I've only known about the game for about a year or so since I saw the arcade version on the Switch eShop, but I think the Famicom version is a really fun if simple arcade game. And it's really a lot easier to control than Ice Climber. It may not run especially smoothly, but the gameplay underneath is still pretty solid imo. It's kind of like Elevator Action on the Famicom: it doesn't look like much, but the underlying game is still a very decent port of the arcade.
They never converted the improved sequel Penguin Adventure to Famicom. The games were designed to get the best out if the MSX graphics chip. The final part of the trilogy Yume Penguin Monogatari was only on Famicom. That was not released in the USA because it was about fat shaming the now overweight Penguin.
There was an overseas release of Antarctic Adventure.... on the Colecovision. For the NES, my guess is that by the time Konami was releasing games in the US, the moment had passed where an early-arcade style game could be expected to sell.
Because it was already feeling quite ancient by the time the NES was released in the US. It felt like an early Nintendo Black Box game, but since it was a third party game and Konami could only release so much stuff under their license, they probably focused on more popular stuff like Gradius and whatnot.
@@OmegaDez this may be in part, but don't forget that there were also 3rd party publishing limitations at the time. Konami had to be really selective in both what was going to build their brand at home, and be the best representation of their library -and- the NES's overall.
The coin-op Yie Ar Kung-Fu cabinet at the little arcade in my rural Appalachian town was a huge hit in the late 80's. People would stand around watching when somebody played it. The whole room would cheer when you kicked the game's first enemy in the junk, causing him to scream in that muffled voice sample. The main character from the game makes a cameo appearance in the F2P mobile Contra game Konami released this year, so obviously they still care (a little) about it.
Antarctic Adventure is so lovely and so lovely to play still. I think you hit the nail on the head about Yie Ar Kung Fu, the hitboxes. The arcade game already left me with a sour taste at just the second opponent and it felt like an impossible game of artistic dodging which I can only surmount by sharp save-scumming. And I gave the NES version a shot but really didn't want to, and I think I stopped somewhere in the middle because even with save-scumming I think there was an opponent that I literally could not beat. Ninja-Kun seems rather interesting, although I haven't tried it, and I think if you rid of that choppy framerate it'd be much easier to play. The controller quirks you mentioned would use an overhaul too. So this is the origin of all the kusoge that will later follow? Will we see Super Monkey Daibouken?
Yie Ar was the first game I ever saw in an arcade that had a crowd around it. People were cheering on whoever was playing and anyone who could get past the first two or three opponents was rewarding the audience by showing them what lay behind the the difficulty barriers. With no save scumming when every play cost a quarter, everyone was United against a common enemy like American Ninja Warrior.
Yeah, I never knew what Haggleman was based on, until today. That was actually one of my favorite games in RGC/GCCX. ... And now I'm once again sad that RGC flopped in the west. It deserved so much better.
@@jasonblalock4429 It was definitely one of the high points of the DS library for me, no doubt. I bought it on a whim having never heard of it and it was on clearance sale and I was blown away by the entire thing and it's attention to detail, the humor and definitely the collection of games that had all of the charm of old games with none of the jank.
The scaling actually looks pretty good in this one. But can it compete with Binary Land??? How about Yume Penguin Monogatari??? What is the ultimate penguin game for NES/Famicom? Find out on the next Gintendo!
Great synopsis as always, Jeremy. I was hoping you'd explain the Yie Ar Kung Fu title name, though. Since kung fu is Chinese in origin, I wondered if "yie ar" was Konami's transliteration of "1, 2". If that's true, this game in English would be "1, 2, Kung Fu", which sounds cute enough. Although this is all just my speculation.
I had Antarctic Adventure and Ninja-kun on multicart my uncle brought back from Taiwan with a famicom in '89. It had Circus Charlie, Binary Land, Road Fighter, and a few other games none of my friends have heard of. It's not the same one I had as a kid but I still play on an imported famicom in 2021.
The Ninja-kun games seemed like the closest thing to the "Haggle Man" games on the Game Center CX / Retro Games Challenge DS game, and are possibly its initial inspiration, and I've always thought Ninja-kun was kind of a cute character...so I forgive it. I also remember a game mag mentioning that Jajamaru "could have become bigger than Mario." I, uh, doubt that.
@@MrSegmentfault That may be factually valid; but I more meant in the sort of je ne sai quoi of the gamefeel and movement, which was utterly lacking in smoothness.
IMO the control scheme in Antarctic adventure is justified, face buttons are to jump and rotate the propeller hat, so putting speed control on d-pad makes sense, the only alternative is to put jump on a d-pad, which is much less comfortable. BTW great series, really appreciate your work!
Antarctic Adventure has always been a fav on my Coleco. It looks just as good on the NES and the seals look to be just as annoying. Also, thanks for breaking down the Ninja Kun lineage. That always confused me.
It was a really lucky way to get some Bruce Lee footage in there as a tie-in with Yie Ar Kung Fu while still holding true to my rule of using footage from the same month/year as the games in discussion.
@@JeremyParish that’s why your docs are (in my opinion) up there with the likes of the folks that do time ghost history and the WWI & WWII docs some of the best on this here tube
@@JeremyParish nah for a 40 year old man with a family who grew up on games because his 10 year older favorite uncle introduced him to it at 4 and playing every since this is like gold. THANK YOU
My friend had Antarctic Adventure back in the day as part of a multicart bootleg. I played so much of that game. If I remember correctly you don’t actually have to hold up to accelerate (like in Rad Racer), you can just tap up a few times to accelerate or down to reduce the speed, and the speed is maintained. No thumb strains in this game!
I remember playing Yie Ar Kun fu way before double dragon or even renegade. This was afun game in the arcade. It may have been earlier than karate champ or out at the same time.
I know Jajamaru from a 3D Saturn game based on this series, it's a flawed game since back then but it was really enjoyable once learned how to control it. There are bonuses to earn extra lives, these are actually Ninja Jajamaru Kun games, at the time I knew it was from old systems but I only knew it was from arcades and later Nintendo consoles much later.
So the janky kusoge the Famicom would be infamous for starts here with Jaleco, huh. I guess it's fitting for a company that would go on to sign off on a lot of questionable decisions. I've been honestly surprised by how well these terrible games actually sold. Not just Ninja-kun, but things like Moero!! Pro Yakyuu and even Genso Saiyuki Super Monkey Daibouken sold pretty respectably in their initial runs, only to be maligned by history (deservedly) ever since.
I'm most familiar with Antarctic Adventure as a ColecoVision game, and it's one of the system's most polished titles. The sequel, Penguin Adventure, was ported to the ColecoVision, but you've got to have an expansion pack to play it. Apparently, although the ColecoVision shares hardware with the MSX, it wasn't powerful enough to handle the more demanding Penguin Adventure on its own.
I haven't played the original shown here, but I have the cart of the second Ninja Kun game for Famicom (the same one as on Switch NES Online) and I enjoy a quick play of it every so often. The sound isn't much better, though.
Just a correction, UPL didn't create Space Panic or Mr. Do, but their parent company Universal did. They lived in obscurity throughout their lifespan too, eventually going bankrupt in 1992. (Also, AFAIK aside from Universal owning UPL and published a game from them in the US just once, the two didn't even seem to have much of a relationship between each other.)
Maybe I shouldn't admit this, but I find Ninja-Kun more charming than not. To me the primitive graphics are really appealing. Yeah, the gameplay's nothing special, but it's a fun atmosphere in which to play for ten minutes or whatever. So I feel!
Unsolicited suggestion: once you review Parodius and Yume Penguin Monogatari you should totally upload a compilation of only penguin-based game critiques
Having listened to Retronauts for so many years and finding this channel, it’s weird and cool to put a face to a voice. Great video. Do you always use the VHS old school look? Again, first video so sorry to ask before watching others
Even with its poor performance on famicom, Ninja-kun IMO is a far better game than the first two. I do like the comparison to Ice Climbers, I never looked at it that way. Ninja-Kun is a solid arcade game when going for the highscore was more important than finishing the game.
"One of the all-time heavy-hitting game developers of the 8-bit era makes its Famicom debut here, and video game history is all the better for it." Well, up to a point anyway. Unfortunately that point is long past.
I won't defend Ninja Kun at all, but UPL, I think under the name Universal, made some of my favorite classic era arcade games, particularly Lady Bug and Mr Do (better Dig Dug!). On million sellers on the Famicom, I must admit some fondness for Athena, although it's mostly a huge box full of wasted potential.
Ninja Jajamaru Kun was a much better game than Ninja Kun, but that game looks a lot older than it actually is. In particular, you'd never guess that Ninja Jajamaru Kun came out 2 months after Super Mario Bros, when it looks like a launch title.
Penguins just make things better (Evangelion is an example of this). At least Yie Ar Kung Fu is better than Urban Champion. And Ninja-kun is bad, a herald of other dreck like that MUSCLE NES game and Micronics butchery of Capcom's 1942.
I'm very put out by the fact that none of Penta's games are available on Steam. Terrible. And now I'm sad that Ninja-Kun sucks. The sprites are so frigging cute. It _looks_ like something I'd want to play. But yeah, the backgrounds and score items are eye bleeding.
Something tells me you didn't like Ninja-kun. Also, I'm not usually this critical of a game these days, but Yie Ar Kung Fu is terrible on Famicom. The original arcade version is actually very cool and more fun than the lousy FC & MSX ports. If you have the means, the PS1 has a great conversion in Konami Arcade Classics/80's Arcade Gallery, and the GBA Konami Arcade Advanced has an excellent conversion with the added feature of two player linked head-to-head fights. Also, Antarctic Adventure is a classic.
These games were vey common on Famiclones and bootleg multicarts, usually marked as "Ninja 1" (Ninja-Kun), "Kung Fu" or "Street Fight" (Yie Ar Kung Fu) and...yes, sometimes "Antarctic Adventure" was marked simply as "Antarctic". I've hated Yie Ar Kung Fu particularly as a kid, due to its unfair hit detection and poor animation, too poor even for the standards of the basic 8-bit games. Today, for me they still preserve a weird, fascinating vibe, typical of some "not too crappy" games of the '80s, but eyes still hurt while you're playing Ninja-Kun! What a shameful graphics!
i Love Ninja-Kun :) Ninja-Kun 2 bing the Best on :D And yes the Arcades is better then the Famicom But its in No Way a Bad Game + its Meant to Be Played wit a Joystick ;P ;D And Yes it Not a Easy Game But a Cut and Fun Game u Grumpy Man .
Hi Jeremy, the smart business reason to name the game けっきょく南極大冒険 was to ride on the coattails of 南極物語 (Nankyoku Monogatari), a.k.a. "Antarctica", the 1983 Japanese movie that became the biggest box office hit behind E.T. that year and sparked the boom in interest for penguins in Japanese pop culture. (Leading to the Papipu Penguins beer commercial, etc.)
Great info, thank you!
One little detail you omitted with arctic adventure is the propeller hat that the rainbow flags give you. If you tap jump a second time you hover for an extra moment or two.
No one asked, but the music to Antarctic Adventure is Émile Waldteufel's "The Skaters" Waltz. Thanks for another great video, Jeremy!
Someone did ask, actually
Nice. Good to know
Poor ol' Tose, the Japanese Tiertex :D
Aw, that’s not fair. Micronics is the Tiertex for Japan… sometimes TOSE did some quality work.
@@JeremyParish Sorry, I has the dumb today :D Yeah, TOSE would be the Probe of Japan!
Though saying that, Tiertex really knocked it out the park with Master System ports bizarrely, also, did you know they're called Tiertex as they moved into the offices of a ceiling painting company who had gone bust, and previously used that name. So they even got cheap on not changing the plaque on the front door :D
That's a strong anecdote, 10/10
You had a lot fun saying "Kekkyoku Nankyoku Daibouken", didn't you.
I feel like I managed to pull it off without mangling it too terribly, at least
I love how for living in Latin America you got access to all of these games. Piracy is not so bad after all.
piracy owns
Whaaaat? I love Ninja-Kun! D: I've only known about the game for about a year or so since I saw the arcade version on the Switch eShop, but I think the Famicom version is a really fun if simple arcade game. And it's really a lot easier to control than Ice Climber.
It may not run especially smoothly, but the gameplay underneath is still pretty solid imo. It's kind of like Elevator Action on the Famicom: it doesn't look like much, but the underlying game is still a very decent port of the arcade.
I'll never work out why Antarctic Adventure was never brought overseas. It has A PENGUIN!!
They never converted the improved sequel Penguin Adventure to Famicom. The games were designed to get the best out if the MSX graphics chip. The final part of the trilogy Yume Penguin Monogatari was only on Famicom. That was not released in the USA because it was about fat shaming the now overweight Penguin.
There was an overseas release of Antarctic Adventure.... on the Colecovision.
For the NES, my guess is that by the time Konami was releasing games in the US, the moment had passed where an early-arcade style game could be expected to sell.
@@RndStranger This is correct. A handful of Konami's MSX works ended up on ColecoVision - Athletic Land (as Cabbage Patch Kids) is another.
Because it was already feeling quite ancient by the time the NES was released in the US.
It felt like an early Nintendo Black Box game, but since it was a third party game and Konami could only release so much stuff under their license, they probably focused on more popular stuff like Gradius and whatnot.
@@OmegaDez this may be in part, but don't forget that there were also 3rd party publishing limitations at the time. Konami had to be really selective in both what was going to build their brand at home, and be the best representation of their library -and- the NES's overall.
Good. 3 "classics" from the multicarts from my childhood. Antartic Adventure was my favorite.
The music and "voice" from Yie Ar Kung Fu have been echoing in my head for 30+ years.
I love Ninja Kun, defects and all. It´s super nostalgic for me.
Antarctic Adventure's hero is called "Pentaro" though
Pentarou is Penta's son. Looks like you need to freshen up your Konami lore!
@@JeremyParish 😮
The coin-op Yie Ar Kung-Fu cabinet at the little arcade in my rural Appalachian town was a huge hit in the late 80's. People would stand around watching when somebody played it. The whole room would cheer when you kicked the game's first enemy in the junk, causing him to scream in that muffled voice sample.
The main character from the game makes a cameo appearance in the F2P mobile Contra game Konami released this year, so obviously they still care (a little) about it.
I love Yie Ar Kung Fu, I couldn't tell you why, but there's some simple joy I get from it.
I can already hear the AVGN on Ninja-Kun : "You press JUMP to go DOWN ?!"
Love the clip from berry gordys the last dragon at the beginning. Love that movie.
If anyone is after an updated Kung Fu Master try the "One Finger Death Punch" games (1 or 2) as they are absolutely fantastic and deceptively simple.
Antarctic Adventure is so lovely and so lovely to play still.
I think you hit the nail on the head about Yie Ar Kung Fu, the hitboxes. The arcade game already left me with a sour taste at just the second opponent and it felt like an impossible game of artistic dodging which I can only surmount by sharp save-scumming. And I gave the NES version a shot but really didn't want to, and I think I stopped somewhere in the middle because even with save-scumming I think there was an opponent that I literally could not beat.
Ninja-Kun seems rather interesting, although I haven't tried it, and I think if you rid of that choppy framerate it'd be much easier to play. The controller quirks you mentioned would use an overhaul too. So this is the origin of all the kusoge that will later follow? Will we see Super Monkey Daibouken?
The arcade version of Ninja-Kun is on Arcade Archives for PS4 and Switch and is definitely a lot more tolerable than this port.
Yie Ar was the first game I ever saw in an arcade that had a crowd around it. People were cheering on whoever was playing and anyone who could get past the first two or three opponents was rewarding the audience by showing them what lay behind the the difficulty barriers. With no save scumming when every play cost a quarter, everyone was United against a common enemy like American Ninja Warrior.
The second ninja kun game was parodied on Retro Game Challenge/Game Center CX...just as an aside. Meaning someone liked it over there...
Yeah, I’ll be talking about Haggleman when I get to Jajamaru-kun (and it was already mentioned in the Maru’s Mission episode)
Yeah, I never knew what Haggleman was based on, until today. That was actually one of my favorite games in RGC/GCCX. ... And now I'm once again sad that RGC flopped in the west. It deserved so much better.
@@jasonblalock4429 It was definitely one of the high points of the DS library for me, no doubt. I bought it on a whim having never heard of it and it was on clearance sale and I was blown away by the entire thing and it's attention to detail, the humor and definitely the collection of games that had all of the charm of old games with none of the jank.
@@heavysystemsinc. Second hand copies of Retro Game Challenge have shot up in price. I wish I had gotten it when it was cheaper.
the whole franchise was
Yie Ar Kunh Fu was one of the very first games Ive ever seen....I still get nostalgic when I see it.
The scaling actually looks pretty good in this one. But can it compete with Binary Land??? How about Yume Penguin Monogatari??? What is the ultimate penguin game for NES/Famicom? Find out on the next Gintendo!
The famiclone saga continues
Yie Ar Kung Fu and Mach Rider are my first Nes games.
Great memories from both.
A shame Konami seemed unable to port Yie Ar Kung Fu to home platforms properly. Yet somehow the C64 has a really impressive one.
The ZX Spectrum version is great too. Although I think the home computer versions were all developed by Ocean in the UK under the Imagine label.
yie ar fc is more a port of the msx game then arcade
Not as strong a start for Konami on Famicom as on NES, but it still blows their meagre SG-1000 line-up out of the water.
Eh, it's not necessarily even Konami's own work on the SG-1000.
Great synopsis as always, Jeremy. I was hoping you'd explain the Yie Ar Kung Fu title name, though. Since kung fu is Chinese in origin, I wondered if "yie ar" was Konami's transliteration of "1, 2". If that's true, this game in English would be "1, 2, Kung Fu", which sounds cute enough. Although this is all just my speculation.
Fittingly, "one, two" is all the stages I'm able to see in this version
Excellent, god damn I love this channel.
Yi Ar Kung Fu... a game were i long thought it's just a bootleg since we only saw it on those 500 in one clone NES consoles in a SNES Shell
I had Antarctic Adventure and Ninja-kun on multicart my uncle brought back from Taiwan with a famicom in '89. It had Circus Charlie, Binary Land, Road Fighter, and a few other games none of my friends have heard of. It's not the same one I had as a kid but I still play on an imported famicom in 2021.
Nice Job, as always Jeremey!
The Ninja-kun games seemed like the closest thing to the "Haggle Man" games on the Game Center CX / Retro Games Challenge DS game, and are possibly its initial inspiration, and I've always thought Ninja-kun was kind of a cute character...so I forgive it. I also remember a game mag mentioning that Jajamaru "could have become bigger than Mario." I, uh, doubt that.
they are when haggle man whent jrpg so did jajamaru
Ninja Kun looked more like an MSX1 game than most MSX1 games.
Not at all, msx1 does not support multiple multicolor sprites nor scrolling. It does look a bit like an Msx2 release.
@@MrSegmentfault That may be factually valid; but I more meant in the sort of je ne sai quoi of the gamefeel and movement, which was utterly lacking in smoothness.
IMO the control scheme in Antarctic adventure is justified, face buttons are to jump and rotate the propeller hat, so putting speed control on d-pad makes sense, the only alternative is to put jump on a d-pad, which is much less comfortable.
BTW great series, really appreciate your work!
Antarctic Adventure has always been a fav on my Coleco. It looks just as good on the NES and the seals look to be just as annoying. Also, thanks for breaking down the Ninja Kun lineage. That always confused me.
I grew up with it on coleco as well
I’m lovin the last dragon snippet in the beginning. One of my favorite all time movies growing up.
It was a really lucky way to get some Bruce Lee footage in there as a tie-in with Yie Ar Kung Fu while still holding true to my rule of using footage from the same month/year as the games in discussion.
@@JeremyParish that’s why your docs are (in my opinion) up there with the likes of the folks that do time ghost history and the WWI & WWII docs some of the best on this here tube
Well, that's going a little far, but thanks!
@@JeremyParish nah for a 40 year old man with a family who grew up on games because his 10 year older favorite uncle introduced him to it at 4 and playing every since this is like gold. THANK YOU
Ninja Jajamaru-Kun must've inspired the Haggleman Games in Game Center CX (Retro Game Challenge) on DS.
My friend had Antarctic Adventure back in the day as part of a multicart bootleg. I played so much of that game. If I remember correctly you don’t actually have to hold up to accelerate (like in Rad Racer), you can just tap up a few times to accelerate or down to reduce the speed, and the speed is maintained. No thumb strains in this game!
I remember playing Yie Ar Kun fu way before double dragon or even renegade. This was afun game in the arcade. It may have been earlier than karate champ or out at the same time.
I know Jajamaru from a 3D Saturn game based on this series, it's a flawed game since back then but it was really enjoyable once learned how to control it. There are bonuses to earn extra lives, these are actually Ninja Jajamaru Kun games, at the time I knew it was from old systems but I only knew it was from arcades and later Nintendo consoles much later.
"You can flap! And you can tip-tap left and right! At your OOOOOOOOOOWN leisure!"
I remember playing AA and Yie Ar!
So the janky kusoge the Famicom would be infamous for starts here with Jaleco, huh. I guess it's fitting for a company that would go on to sign off on a lot of questionable decisions.
I've been honestly surprised by how well these terrible games actually sold. Not just Ninja-kun, but things like Moero!! Pro Yakyuu and even Genso Saiyuki Super Monkey Daibouken sold pretty respectably in their initial runs, only to be maligned by history (deservedly) ever since.
Didn’t Kojima have a hand in Antarctic Adventure?
Edit: Penguin Adventure. I knew it was related at least.
You say Konami, I say ULTRA.
I'm most familiar with Antarctic Adventure as a ColecoVision game, and it's one of the system's most polished titles. The sequel, Penguin Adventure, was ported to the ColecoVision, but you've got to have an expansion pack to play it. Apparently, although the ColecoVision shares hardware with the MSX, it wasn't powerful enough to handle the more demanding Penguin Adventure on its own.
Yeah, the MSX has more RAM than CV/SG1K.
I haven't played the original shown here, but I have the cart of the second Ninja Kun game for Famicom (the same one as on Switch NES Online) and I enjoy a quick play of it every so often.
The sound isn't much better, though.
Whoa. That first movie clip. I know what they were watching. but what was the film they were from.
I hadn’t thought about it, but it is strange that Konami never did a Yie Ar Kung Fu 2.
I knew Ninja Kun as Ninja Kid in the arcade. my taste in games was so bad that I never thought it was subpar
Just a correction, UPL didn't create Space Panic or Mr. Do, but their parent company Universal did. They lived in obscurity throughout their lifespan too, eventually going bankrupt in 1992.
(Also, AFAIK aside from Universal owning UPL and published a game from them in the US just once, the two didn't even seem to have much of a relationship between each other.)
4:00 It’s all fun and games until you realize this is the same plot as “The Thing.”
'This game might be vaguely enjoyable if you could simply jump straight up. So, naturally, that ability is not included in the design' haha!!
Maybe I shouldn't admit this, but I find Ninja-Kun more charming than not. To me the primitive graphics are really appealing. Yeah, the gameplay's nothing special, but it's a fun atmosphere in which to play for ten minutes or whatever. So I feel!
I think Yie Ar Kung Fu on the famicon is great, very thigh controls and it honestly plays better to most of the fighting games that came out after it
The best thing to come out of the Ninja-Kun legacy was Haggleman
Unsolicited suggestion: once you review Parodius and Yume Penguin Monogatari you should totally upload a compilation of only penguin-based game critiques
Sounds like Antarctic Adventure is an endless runner of its time more than a racer
That concept didn't exist in 1985, and you have full movement over forward scrolling. It's a racer.
a slightly better port of Yie Ar Kung Fu would have sold incredibly well in the US. It was always popular at arcades.
Having listened to Retronauts for so many years and finding this channel, it’s weird and cool to put a face to a voice. Great video. Do you always use the VHS old school look? Again, first video so sorry to ask before watching others
it's a somewhat recent thing so if you watch most of the older videos you won't see the effect, but I assume it'll be a constant going forwards
@@lh_a-spec Thanks
Even with its poor performance on famicom, Ninja-kun IMO is a far better game than the first two. I do like the comparison to Ice Climbers, I never looked at it that way. Ninja-Kun is a solid arcade game when going for the highscore was more important than finishing the game.
What’s the name of the waltz in Antarctic Adventure?
Skaters Waltz
Those three games should have been released in the USA in the first place. 😀👍🎮
Well at least ColecoVision had Antarctic Adventure.
@@ChristopherSobieniak I did not know about that thanks for telling me. 😀👍🎮
"One of the all-time heavy-hitting game developers of the 8-bit era makes its Famicom debut here, and video game history is all the better for it." Well, up to a point anyway. Unfortunately that point is long past.
I won't defend Ninja Kun at all, but UPL, I think under the name Universal, made some of my favorite classic era arcade games, particularly Lady Bug and Mr Do (better Dig Dug!).
On million sellers on the Famicom, I must admit some fondness for Athena, although it's mostly a huge box full of wasted potential.
What movie is that in the opening intro?
The Last Dragon (and Enter the Dragon)
Sho 'Nuff!
Never bring a Wang to a street fight.
Argentina 🇦🇷 🙋♂️🙋♂️🙋♂️🙋♂️
Ninja Jajamaru Kun was a much better game than Ninja Kun, but that game looks a lot older than it actually is. In particular, you'd never guess that Ninja Jajamaru Kun came out 2 months after Super Mario Bros, when it looks like a launch title.
"Like a single player version of Ice Climber that's also really bad."
That second part is redundant. Ice Climber is really bad.
Ice Climber was the best platformer on the NES until Mario showed up with its fancy jump physics.
Yeah, you’ve gotta understand where the bar was at the time.
as basic Yie Ar Kung Fu is, it apparently was important enough to get a spot on the famicom mini
I always loved the arcade of yie ar Kung fu. Martial Champions was originally going to be a direct sequel. It’s a very mediocre fighting game at best
Penguins just make things better (Evangelion is an example of this). At least Yie Ar Kung Fu is better than Urban Champion. And Ninja-kun is bad, a herald of other dreck like that MUSCLE NES game and Micronics butchery of Capcom's 1942.
I'm very put out by the fact that none of Penta's games are available on Steam. Terrible.
And now I'm sad that Ninja-Kun sucks. The sprites are so frigging cute. It _looks_ like something I'd want to play. But yeah, the backgrounds and score items are eye bleeding.
Something tells me you didn't like Ninja-kun.
Also, I'm not usually this critical of a game these days, but Yie Ar Kung Fu is terrible on Famicom. The original arcade version is actually very cool and more fun than the lousy FC & MSX ports. If you have the means, the PS1 has a great conversion in Konami Arcade Classics/80's Arcade Gallery, and the GBA Konami Arcade Advanced has an excellent conversion with the added feature of two player linked head-to-head fights.
Also, Antarctic Adventure is a classic.
These games were vey common on Famiclones and bootleg multicarts, usually marked as "Ninja 1" (Ninja-Kun), "Kung Fu" or "Street Fight" (Yie Ar Kung Fu) and...yes, sometimes "Antarctic Adventure" was marked simply as "Antarctic". I've hated Yie Ar Kung Fu particularly as a kid, due to its unfair hit detection and poor animation, too poor even for the standards of the basic 8-bit games.
Today, for me they still preserve a weird, fascinating vibe, typical of some "not too crappy" games of the '80s, but eyes still hurt while you're playing Ninja-Kun! What a shameful graphics!
i Love Ninja-Kun :)
Ninja-Kun 2 bing the Best on :D
And yes the Arcades is better then the Famicom
But its in No Way a Bad Game
+ its Meant to Be Played wit a Joystick ;P ;D
And Yes it Not a Easy Game
But a Cut and Fun Game
u Grumpy Man
.