"Earthworm Jim is on the Virtual Console today!" exclaims a message board thread somewhere in Gamer Town. In seconds, nostalgia draws traffic to the post like a purring queen draws kittens to the teat. "Oh, this game was so awesome," a poster named Billy declares. "They don't make games like this anymore."
That's right, little Billy. They don't. I'm sort of glad about that because I don't think my heart can endure mass doses of disappointment anymore.
Though Japanese games ruled the sixteen bit era, American developers were finding their legs as well. And oh, what a pair of legs they found. Games like Aladdin on the Genesis, The Lion King and Earthworm Jim looked and sounded brilliant. They are, in my opinion, still some of the best-looking games out there in spite of running on 24 megs of memory as opposed to today's standard of a hojillion gigabytes. I still love watching people play Earthworm Jim because the title has so much love and personality in every frame of animation.
There's the rub: I like to watch (tee hee). I don't actually like to play Earthworm Jim--or Aladdin--or The Lion King--because the games are consistently and unfairly difficult, sometimes for the most baffling reasons. When Earthworm Jim fires his standard weapon, you can't see the spray of bullets. Even the lowliest of crows will dodge your invisible fire half the time despite being directly above you, but there's no possible way to correct your aim because you can't see where you're aiming.
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