61 Frames Per Second : shigeru miyamoto

Donkey Kong II’s Revisionist History Rights Old Wrongs

John Constantine — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 21:00:00 GMT

Am I the only person on the internet who didn’t know this existed? Jeff Kulczycki, proprietor of Jeff’s Romhack, made a full on sequel to Donkey Kong entitled Donkey Kong II: Jumpman Returns. The game has a little something for everybody. For the folks out there who just love the original Donkey Kong and don’t love Donkey Kong ’94, Jeff’s made four brand new levels for you to play. For the people who still consider Donkey Kong Jr’s vilification of Mario to be a grave injustice, here’s your chance to engage in soothing revisionist history. If you want to get try out Donkey Kong II, you can head over to the infamous Funspot Arcade in New Hampshire to try and earn a killscreen of your very own. If you actually happen to own a Donkey Kong cabinet, you can actually purchase a ROM upgrade and soup that baby up. If you’re merely curious, here’s a full playthrough.

Kulczycki’s original levels are well made, blending with the original four while providing pleasant upgrades. The orange-yellow color scheme is especially nice. Falling pies don’t strike me as the sort of thing you’d find a giant ape hurling off a construction site, but hey, fireballs aren’t typically sentient.

Hit up Jeff’s Romhack here.

(Link: NeoGAF)

Related links:

Licensing Tragedies: The Donkey Kong Country Cartoon
Alternate Soundtrack - Donkey Kong '94 vs. Les Savy Fav
No Alternate Soundtrack: Donkey Kong Jungle Beat
Fandom Unplugged: '80s Arcades and Hero Worship

Mega64 versus Metal Gear Solid 4's Dad

Nadia Oxford — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:44:00 GMT

Despite these tough times, the sun still rises, and those lovable scamps over at Mega64 are up to their old tricks. I think we'll all be okay.

Mega64 was at GDC this year, because it's important for someone to get all up in the face of video games when they become Serious Business. Sometimes, though, Serious Business bites back. At 2007's GDC, the boys of Mega64 dressed as Mario and Luigi and frolicked through the city streets, harassing attendees and women on cellphones. Everything was fun and games until some guy named “Shee-guyo Me-a-photo” put his hands on his hips and beat down the party with a look that said, “Come on guys, plumbers and mustaches are not joke material.”

Mega64 took the lesson to heart, but got a bit naughty again at 2009's GDC with a parody of Metal Gear Solid 4. Serious Business raised its solemn head once again, but this time the boys were running for their lives.

Kojima fills the role well, as does a certain someone near the end, but nothing can beat Miyamoto's bemused look (and the truncated Link cameo) from the first video.

Related Links:

Mega64 Calls Upon the Elite Beat Agents
10 Years Ago This Week: Silent Hill
True Tales of Thanksgiving Gaming

Shigeru Miyamoto and Blasphemy, A Match Made in Heaven

John Constantine — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 01:30:00 GMT

Every time I think of the happy American families playing Wii Play and Wii Sports, I smile a little inside. I love it that everyone’s playing videogames. It means there will be more of them. I have to laugh a little too, particularly when USA Today or some other milquetoast news outlet does a write up on Nintendo’s family friendliness. Nintendogs! Well we can all enjoy that right? Sure we can.

In another world, Nintendo wouldn’t have stayed in business in the United States past 1984. Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., and Mario Bros. would be their only legacy in the land of the free. One day that year, I imagine the following dialogue took place between Mr. Miyamoto and Nameless Nintendo of America Head:

NNOAH: “"Hey Shigeru, I hear ya gots the latest follow up to Donkey Kong ready! Whatcha got to make us rich, kid?"

Shigeru Miyamoto: “It’s a maze game! We’re going to make some of that proverbial Pac-man cash!”

NNOAH: “Genius! Tell me more.”

SM: “I call it Devil World! You play as a little dinosaur in hell. You push a crucifix around hell to collect dots. Satan sits at the top of the screen, clapping his hands.”

NNOAH: “…”

SM: “I already have an arcade in Oklahoma interested in buying cabinets and…”

NNOAH: “Shut up.”

SM: “But…”

NNOAH: “Shut up. Before you destroy us all!”

Can you imagine the ruckus Devil World would have caused? Satanic imagery in videogames! The blasphemy! The horror. God fearing Americans across the land would have called for Miyamoto’s blood. Donkey Kong machines would have been burned. Mario would never have become the icon he is, his good, mustachioed name sullied by sinful association.

I had completely forgotten Devil World existed until last week, hence the post. The game’s innocuous; its derivative play is a great example of Miyamoto’s growing pains as a designer. I’d never really thought about how strange it is, though. I can’t confirm this, but I’d bet good money that this game had something to do with Nintendo of America’s censorship policies in the 80s. They did refuse to have crosses in games, after all.

Related links:

Great Moments in Design: Kuribo's Shoe Rising
Wii Music: A Rare Miss For Miyamoto?
Shigeru Miyamoto, the Heartbreak...Man
Videogame, Non-Game, Old Game, New Game: The Miyamoto Rule

GameTrailers' Top Ten Game Creators. Bonus: Remembering Yokoi

Nadia Oxford — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 23:02:00 GMT

GameTrailers posted a countdown of the Top Ten Game Creators. It's a heartening list, even if there's some hardcore exclusions going on (Sid Meier? 'lo?), because it contains equal parts Japanese and non-Japanese developers. It's a strong testament to how gaming has become revered worldwide and is no longer just some loser hobby that once made frightened parents write to newspapers about Japanese mind control.

As gamers, we appreciate why this kind of diversity is important for the industry we love.

Fore666 said: sid meier, tim schafer, gabe newell,some of them should been on the list insted of all this japanese jerks

Well, I'm excited. I'm especially happy to see the inclusion of Gunpei Yokoi, whose contributions to gaming are nearly as significant as those of Miyamoto himself. Yokoi's death was early, extremely unfortunate and unfairly tainted by the Virtual Boy's crash and burn.

I often wonder what Yokoi would have had to contribute to the handheld community if he were still alive. Yokoi usually advocated simplicity over advanced technology. It didn't always send Nintendo where it needed to go, but the philosophy has served the company well in the handheld race. The gaming world initially made faces at the Nintendo DS' dual screens, and when the PSP was unveiled, the two side by side looked like a Pomeranian next to a Doberman. A few years later, someone's having the last laugh, and it isn't Sony.

It's interesting when you think about how much we value game designers now. When we were kids, we cared less who put together Super Mario Bros. We just knew it existed, and it was good enough for us. When I was eight years old, I never thought I'd ever put a face to “Inafking.”

Related Links:

Kid Icarus on Game Boy: Did Anyone Get To Play This?
Many Colors in the Hardcore Rainbow
Why God Why: More Saga Games on the Way

Videogame, Non-Game, Old Game, New Game: The Miyamoto Rule

John Constantine — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 00:45:00 GMT

To the internet-list aficionado, the end of the calendar year is the time of greatest bounty. You like lists, chances are you like pop culture, and nothing gets the pop junkie going like ranking all the crap that came out in the past twelve months. Top ten movies, top ten books, top ten celebrity nip-slips, top ten Billy Mays products, and, yeah, top ten games of the year. We are no stranger to the list here at 61FPS, as you well know from reading our scintillating, thought provoking top tens, and you can imagine how we’re gearing up to deliver all sorts of meaningless judgments on the year known broadly as 2008 (4706, 4705, or 4645 to the Chinese. They seem to be confused.) Over the past few weeks, Derrick and I have had a number of conversations about our mutual contenders, but these dialogues have always ended in a conundrum: what counts as a videogame? Derrick’s smitten with Wii Fit, but is it anything more than a Nintendo-upped Sweatin’ to the Oldies that comes with a snazzy scale? We’re both fans of the Korg DS-10, but, even though you play it on a videogame system, it is an actual musical instrument, not a new sequel-ready game franchise. Does an instrument go on a top ten games list?

My personal definition of a videogame has been a work of interactive digital media wherein you follow a set of rules to achieve a goal. Wii Fit, Korg DS-10, and the many other games like them belong in the broader videogame discussion at this point and this is making me re-evaluate just what a game is.

Leave it to Shigeru Miyamoto to lay down the single best definition of videogame I’ve heard to date. When asked about Wii Music as a facilitator for creativity, Miyamoto replied:

Videogames are a unique form of entertainment called interactive entertainment. Players are given the opportunity to make their own decisions and plans, and that’s how this interactive nature can generate circumstances in which players can become creative.

And just like that, the noun “game” is removed from the equation leaving “videogame” to properly become its own thing. As the coming decade looms and all of the unknown factors, like casual gamings’ growth and the standardization of user-generated content, continue to change discussion of the medium, I’m sure that definition will keep changing. But for now, gaming’s godfather has laid down, accidentally, a good rule of thumb.

Read the whole interview here. Because it is great.

Related links:

Wii Music: A Rare Miss For Miyamoto?
Miyamoto Says Something Was "Missing" From Zelda: Twilight Princess. We Know It, Too.
Miyamoto Is Concerned About Excessive Violence in Games
Shigeru Miyamoto, the Heartbreak...Man
Miyamoto Says, "It Would Be Great If Music Education Started With Wii Music."

Shigeru Miyamoto, the Heartbreak...Man

Nadia Oxford — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 04:00:00 GMT

I like Shigeru Miyamoto. He taught me that video games can be more than triangles that shoot peas at cookies (and broken up chunks of cookies). He taught me that video games can be a story with a beginning, a middle and an end. He taught me how to dance and read and sing, and what it means to be a woman--no, you didn't just read that last bit. Mind-melt ray. *zzzt.*

Hello. We were just talking about kittens. I like tortoiseshells, don't you?

There's a new wrestling game or something coming out. I don't know, it's some manner of digital man-wrangling that my husband's been going on about. The most I know about Wrestling is that Hulk Hogan wants me to drink my milk and say my prayers. I also know that wrestling games are pretty famous for their Create-a-Brawler wrestler generators. Here we have a very enthusiastic Shigeru Miyamoto stepping into the ring with plenty of bum-shaking and hip grinding. His theme song is courtesy of the esteemed Game Jew.

And they're not just video games, they're works of ah-art. o/~

Related Links:

Wii Music: A Rare Miss For Miyamoto?
Wii Are Not Amused.
Mario Will Not Retire. He Will Outlive Us All

Miyamoto Is Concerned About Excessive Violence in Games

Nadia Oxford — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 23:02:00 GMT

Are you?

Miyamoto stated that he's troubled by developers' tendency to rely on excessive violence to attract gamers.

"I don't want to curb freedom of expression, but I am concerned many developers focus on excessive violence in order to stimulate people's minds.

"I believe that here are more ways of grabbing players' attention than violence alone."

On one hand, Miyamoto is absolutely right; a game doesn't need to be excessively violent in order to garner interest. On the other hand, just as family-oriented games like Animal Crossing and Super Mario Whatever are for everyone and not just sissies and little girls, "violent" games are not the wretched product of a diseased society. There is nothing wrong with an adult enjoying a Grand Theft Auto game; humans are an aggressive species. It's a bit unfortunate, but natural--and far better to stick to outlets that don't harm others.

When Mortal Kombat got us excited about Fatalities and big red splotches, an army of spine-ripping clone series came to life. The vast majority of these cash-ins were awful and died early, deserved deaths. Games like Grand Theft Auto don't merely succeed because "LOL I KILT A HOOKER," although this is the point papers love to focus on; they're good games. They give the player choices. There is tonnes to see and do. There are awesome radio stations to listen to. It's rare for a violent game to survive merely on hype, media fear and the colour red. Not that it never happens, but people generally look forward to "violent game" sequels because they're excited about gameplay innovation (as well as new and interesting ways to, um, kill hookers?)

Some gamers are cynical about the era we live in, claiming that nothing new has come down the creek in a long time. Maybe that's true, and maybe it's not. I do know that when I look at EB Games' shelves, I see a lot more than "KILL 'EM ALL XVIII." I'm not too worried about my favourite hobby possibly drowning in a sea of gore.

Related Links:

Penn and Teller Will Talk About Game Violence And I'm Not Sure How I Feel About It
Yahtzee Kills The Entire World
Fire and Brimstone: Pastor Advocates Game Burning

Wii Music: A Rare Miss For Miyamoto?

Nadia Oxford — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 22:08:00 GMT

The reviews for Wii Music are trickling in and the verdict overall seems to be "Meh." Wii Music doesn't look like it's on course to become the holiday item worth garroting fellow shoppers over. Most damning is What They Play's test play, featuring real live children. The game apparently didn't go over much better than homework.

I don't often feel bad when a hyped game flatlines, but I kind of feel sadface about Wii Music's lukewarm reception just because Shigeru Miyamoto is so excited about it. I know some gamers put their hands on their hips and say, "Well, it's about time he was taken down a peg" when one of Miyamoto's projects is a notch below stellar, but I still have mad respect for the guy. He is one of my heroes (Nadia Trivia Bonus: another hero is Terry Fox and another is the inventor of cookies).

I haven't seen any Wii Music-related scorn directed towards Miyamoto yet, but I'm sure it's out there, or it will be. The Wii has opened up video games for a whole new audience; even though it's easy to get mad and decide that Nintendo has abandoned hardcore gamers, I can't fault Nintendo for thinking Wii Music will be a runaway hit with the Wii Sports/Wii Fit crowd. But if Wii Music fails to sell, what will it mean for Shigeru Miyamoto?

The most logical answer is "Nothing at all;" Nintendo all but keeps that man in a plastic bubble surrounded by armed guards. Still, I can't stop thinking about Gunpei Yokoi, another creative genius who put together the Game Boy (you know, one of the most successful consoles of all time) and stumbled with the Virtual Boy. The subsequent chill he received from Nintendo's higher-ups caused him to resign from the company and then he died on the way to a job interview.

I'm a bit neurotic and prone to snowballing bad thoughts. Can you tell?

I understand that a failed game is far less damaging than a failed system, except, of course, for E.T. Miyamoto will likely be all right, but I feel like a mother whose kid spent weeks on a science project that was laughed at. I want to go to Japan and give Miyamoto chicken soup and a hug.

Related Links:

Miyamoto Says, "It Would Be Great If Music Education Started With Wii Music."
Toys Are Better Than Video Games?
Wii Are Not Amused

Miyamoto Says, "It Would Be Great If Music Education Started With Wii Music."

Nadia Oxford — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 19:56:00 GMT

As if I didn't already have to listen to my father go on about "these goddamn kids today who don't want to learn real guitar 'cause of Guitar Hero," now we have Shigeru Miyamoto himself talking about how awesome the world would be if music education started with Wii Music.

Iwata and Miyamoto discussed Wii Music on "Creator's Voice," a developer session hosted on Nintendo's web site.

Iwata: Well, there, with Wii Music, there's a strong possibility of raising people's basic level of music education.

Miyamoto: Yes. Thus, from now, I've even thought it would it would be great if kindergartens or elementary schools got Wii Music and began kid's music education with that...

My first school-related music experience involved garbage bags stretched over tin cans and held in place with rubber bands. How can we even think of replacing real instruments with such false, plastic alternatives?

Really, I'm kind of curious about Wii Music. Everyone scorned it at E3 2008, but everyone laughed at Wii Fit, too. Now everyone I know, and not just my grandmother, wants Wii Fit. We're talking about men who rock the Halo.

Miyamoto said something else that caught my paltry attention:

"I haven't really felt the happiness from making other games that I've had felt making Wii Music... I wasn't this excited while making Super Mario Bros."

Call me Looney Tunes, but it seems to me that only good things can come from a project that Miyamoto loved working on.

Related Links:

Toys are "Better Than Video Games"?
All Ages: Viva Pinata and Building Games for Children
Mario Will Not Retire. He Will Outlive Us All

Toys are "Better than Video Games"?

Cole Stryker — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 04:00:00 GMT

"Who put this thing together? Me, that's who! Who do I trust? Me!" - Tony Montana

That's what I thought of when I read the following:

Since Wii Music has no discernible scoring system, no goals and little in the way of those squishy innards that makes a game a "game," isn't it just a "musical toy"? That was the question posed by one European journo.

"Yes, that's right," Miyamoto curtly replied "And that's why it's better than a video game."

OK, Miyamoto, you've used up your last "Get out of Jail Free" card with this one. I stuck with you through the turbulent N64/Gamecube years, and I was happy to see you take it to the top with the Wii. But the above quote is so screechingly wrong, so not what I wanted to hear from E3. This quote sounds like the kind of giddy king-of-the-world arrogance that precedes a spectacular fall from grace. I'm not predicting that Wii Music will flop, I just think Miyamoto's burning up a lot of the goodwill he's managed to re-earn. Meanwhile, most of the quirky titles that don't depend on hardware (Flock, N+, Braid) that would be perfect for the Wii are still getting snapped up by XBLA and PSN Network. This is where you're supposed to shine, and yet we're stuck with Epic Fail!

Not a good long-term strategy. Serious gamers are faithful. Casual gamers are fickle. Don't forget where you came from, Miyamoto.

via Kotaku

Game Designers: Rockstars, Auteurs, Dweebs?

John Constantine — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 15:00:00 GMT

One crummy thing about living here in the good ol’ U.S. of A. is that we don’t get issues of Britain’s Edge Magazine for a full month after they hit stands in Britain. Yes, I know, it’s a hard life. We’ve been at war with two separate nations for close to a decade, the economy is disintegrating, and our health care system is an atrocity but all that pales in comparison to not getting pretty videogame rags in a timely manner. But I digress. Yesterday, while flipping through their July issue, something stuck out about their Platinum Games cover story: the photo spread of Atsushi Inaba, Hideki Kamiya, Shigenori Nishikawa, Hifumi Kouno, and Tatsuya Minami made them look like a god damn boy band.

I’m conflicted about the emerging designer-as-rockstar image. Once upon a time, it wasn’t unusual for a game to be made by a single person, but in 2008, it’s the rarest exception to the rule. Big games, the vast majority of games the public plays, are made by studios whose collective creative vision makes the game what it is, not one woman or man’s vision. Instead of celebrating and promoting the individual, the rockstar of David Jaffe, Cliffy B, or Shigeru Miyamoto, maybe it should be about the rock band image like in the Platinum Games spread. I’d wear a Valve t-shirt over a Gabe Newell one any day, wouldn’t you?

Related links:

Independent at a Price: Sega and Platinum Games
Clover Returns, Heavy as Platinum

The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels in Gaming History, Part 2

Peter Smith — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 00:31:00 GMT

Super Mario 64

If you'd asked a young me to imagine a three-dimensional Mario Bros. game, I'd have pictured a screenshot from Super Paper Mario — essentially, the point-A-to-point-B linearity of classic side-scrolling Mario, shot from a different camera angle. Instead, Shigeru Miyamoto's first 3D adventure completely rewrote the rules of platforming, replacing the "get to the end" format with a variety of challenges set in one, open physical space. To a generation weaned on linearity, this was pretty overwhelming at first — I remember being plunked down in Bob-Omb Battlefield and wandering around like a chump for an embarrassingly long time. 64 was so different from its precursors that you arguably wouldn't call it a sequel, but bear in mind that no one knew at the time what the next generation of games would look like. Early 32-bit games like Bug and Clockwork Knight dressed 2D gaming in 3D clothes. As usual, that nut Miyamoto had something different in mind. — PS

Castlevania II: Simon's Quest

This game is full of fucking liars. That's the least of its eccentricities but it's worth pointing out up front. Up until the late '80s, Konami's bread and butter was short arcade games, heavy on action and reflex based play as exemplified by well-known staples like Contra and Gradius. The original Castlevania was no different, just six linear stages of unforgiving reaction play that demanded careful attention to the game's weighted attack/jump timing. As home consoles strengthened their grip on players, Konami followed the growing trend of creating longer, deeper play experiences. Castlevania II: Simon's Quest has only superficial similarities to Castlevania. You jump over platforms, whip monsters, and move from left to right. But the world is persistent, requiring you to revisit most locales, and it's littered with towns. Towns are full of non-enemy characters selling items and offering "advice" on how to proceed through the game's barely defined obstacles. Simon's Quest also introduced one of gaming's first night-and-day systems. During the day, towns are safe. At night, everything kills you in two seconds and towns are full of zombie chicks. Konami retreated from Castlevania II's experiments for almost a decade, but the series has never since done anything quite so daring as having its lead die after beating the game. — JC

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

We are aware that this list is populated almost exclusively by games designed by Shigeru Miyamoto. What can we say? He's an adventurous guy. [Shouldn't that be "adventuresome guy?" — PS] The first Legend of Zelda is, arguably, Miyamoto's true masterpiece, the culmination of his first design era. His benchmarks: Donkey Kong created context and narrative, Super Mario Bros. brought speed and an expanding world beyond a single screen, and the Legend of Zelda created an actual world to explore, an organic place peppered with secrets. After its release in 1986, the next decade of Miyamoto's career was one marked more by refinement than creation. But, in 1987, Miyamoto got experimental. Alongside the aforementioned Super Mario Bros. 2 is Zelda's sequel, The Adventure of Link, a sequel so bizarre in its design choices that it's still seen as a blemish on a series considered unimpeachable by gamers and designers alike. While Zelda II doesn't eschew the original's birds-eye-view perspective entirely — travel and world exploration is presented this way, albeit with a much more expansive view — all the action takes place in multi-tiered scrolling stages (not dissimilar to SMB2's.) Items were replaced by spells learned from chatty townspeople, heart containers and swords replaced by role-playing style attribute growth, and link himself grew from a diminutive elf into a teenager with a peculiar, post-lobotomy stare. Unlike some of the other games on this list, very little of Zelda II's design has been used in subsequent adventures. I've found it only gets better with age, a diamond in the rough of a series that's become bloated and stagnant after twenty years of little revision. — JC

Click here for Part 1.
Click here for Part 3.

The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels in Gaming History, Part 1

Peter Smith — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 00:30:00 GMT

More than any other creative medium, videogames rely on sequels. Unlike serial fiction (television, comics) or film franchising focused on continuing narrative and familiar characters, videogame sequels — at their best, mind you — are not just the next chapter of a story or the return of a popular protagonist. The most successful gameplay designs are perfected through revision. Practice, as they say, makes perfect. And while sequel-as-business-model more often than not leads to stagnation, sometimes pandering to the audience reveals a vein of creativity richer than that found in the source material. Sometimes, a good idea needs to be demolished and rebuilt over its original foundation to become great. This week, 61 Frames Per Second takes a look at gaming's ten most adventurous sequels: direct successors that significantly alter the fundamental design, aesthetically and mechanically, of their predecessors. Some of the entries on this list are great successes, others failures. But they all broke the mold to change our ideas about play. — John Constantine

Adventure Island IV

Even as an old-school die-hard I've always been pretty indifferent to the Adventure Island series. Sure, it's solid hop-and-bopping, but without much aesthetic or architectural distinction. Does anyone feel passionately about Adventure Island, really? More people might if Adventure Island IV had come out in the States. IV melds the series's standard run-around-whacking-stuff-with-other-stuff mechanics to an ambitious Metroid-esque superstructure, in which newly acquired items must be used to open previously inaccessible sections of a large, continuous map. (The snowboard you pick up in one area gives you passage through a snowy field, and so forth.) This is a familiar tactic today — see recent Castlevania games, for example — but at the time it was unusual, and certainly not where you'd have expected a staid platforming series to go. — Peter Smith

Super Mario Bros. 2 (Super Mario Bros. USA)

Quiet down. I know Super Mario Bros. 2 is Doki Doki Panic. As soon as those sprites were transplanted into Shigeru Miyamoto's platforming follow-up to Super Mario Bros., it became a Mario game, and SMB's first true sequel. Even Nintendo went on to re-categorize Takashi Tezuka's Japan-only Super Mario Bros. 2 as little more than an expansion of SMB (it was re-released in 1993 as Super Mario Bros: For Super Players in Japan and Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels in the west.) What's remarkable about Super Mario Bros. 2 is not its unorthodox development; it's how it warps the fundamentals of SMB (and even J-SMB2) while maintaining familiarity. The aesthetic shift from SMB risked alienating Nintendo's still-growing fan base but it made Mario and his friends even more recognizable as icons. Play wise, it expands on the multi-character abilities of J-SMB2, and re-defines progression through levels. In SMB, the goal is merely to get to the end of a series of stages and then get past Bowser at the end of castle. In SMB2, the completion of levels is usually tied to items, whether it's procuring keys to get past locked doors or retrieving a magic orb. The game also has multiple antagonists that have to be physically defeated as opposed to just avoided as with Bowser. It was also pretty adventurous to have a transgendered dinosaur in a game for kids. Risky! — JC

Final Fantasy II

The old joke is that, by rights, Final Fantasy II shouldn't even exist. In 1987, Final Fantasy was intended to be a young Hironobu Sakaguchi's swansong, an experiment in the rising role-playing genre made popular by Yuji Horii just a year before. Its success has kept the Gooch making games for two decades now, but the series, and JRPGs broadly, owes many of its enduring characteristics to the sequel that never should have been. Final Fantasy II was designed by Akitoshi Kawazu, best known for the SaGa series. While the first FF, with the exception of a few aesthetic flourishes, was more or less a clone of the first two Dragon Quests, Final Fantasy II placed an emphasis on story and character that was absent from the genre previously. Rudimentary as the tale of empire and resistance was, the story of Firion, Maria, Guy and Leon in Palemecia was a drastic shift from the western-style hero-epics that typified the genre in 1988. Kawazu also made some decidedly ill-advised changes to play. As opposed to the traditional system of gaining experience points through battle to build character's statistical attributes — a foundational aspect of role-playing games, digital and non — each action in the game improved only through use. Increasing defense requires defending against attacks, increasing attack power requires attacking, and so on and so forth. This system of growth was applied to every interactive aspect of the game and quickly became tedious. But it was one more new idea in a game full of them. — JC

Click here for Part 2.
Click here for Part 3.