026 · MACH RIDER

Auto-generated transcript. Each paragraph starts with its timestamp. Speakers are not identified.

00:00 It's a thrilling race to save the planet on a course you can create yourself.

00:20 And welcome to NEStalgia, a chronological exploration of every NES game released in North America. I'm Mike. I'm Sam. I'm Sean. And I am Mockrider. Oh! That is Joe. You cannot pretend you're Mockrider. Yesterday, I was told several times that I am Mockrider. Pretty much at every level. I was told you are Mockrider. Yeah, Joe is Mockrider. Yeah, me. Oh, okay, yeah. Everyone else's copy says you, but Joe's copy says I am Mockrider. So your copy said me? No, it's telling me that I am Mockrider, and I assumed everybody else's copy said Joe is Mockrider. Oh, okay. That's like super weird. It's like, hey, all this stuff is happening in the future. Joe is Mockrider.

01:05 Guys, if you didn't figure it out, we're talking about Mockrider, and I know some of you were probably like really concerned because I didn't say Mockrider at the start. Usually I say the title of the game. This time I just read the back of the box. But hey, welcome to the Mockrider episode. It says it right on the title episode.

01:21 Guys, Mockrider takes place in like the year 2,112. 2112. Yeah, 2112. We're getting very close. Very close to that, and it's starting to look a lot similar. There's just oil drums everywhere. I bring up the 2112 thing real fast because I actually want to talk about our like date system and stuff because people are getting a little concerned here about like the integrity of this chronological order. And I'm just going to throw it out there and like restate this again. I think we did this like a couple episodes back and stuff. There is no way to know the chronological order of these NES games.

01:55 Okay. And I'm sorry if that like ruins the premise of this show for some people. But like just to give you an example, like Nintendo swears that soccer came out in 1987. I found pictures of it in 1985. Fake news. You know, this is considered Mockrider is considered a launch game by Nintendo. But a very like well regarded electronic computer magazine actually has like an issue from 1986 where they say coming in August Mockrider, you know, like they actually like have a release date calendar. And I think like that holds more weight than Nintendo being like, yeah, 1985.

02:31 At least we're trying. Yeah, I think we are trying. And I mean, just Nintendo might be getting their dates confused with the Japanese stuff, too, because this game came out in Japan and like late 84, early 85, something like that. So I just want to get that out of the way. I don't want anybody being like, you're not doing them in order. It's like we're doing them close enough. Okay. If we started reviewing like Flintstones two, then you could be like, something's wrong because we haven't even done Flintstones one yet.

02:53 Again, Mike, just using a straw man against our audience. Like, well, who's yelling at you, Mike? No one is yelling at me, but I'm glad you asked about people because James from Milwaukee wrote into the show just like you can at contact at NostalgiaCast.com. And he writes, guys, what genre of game do you prefer? It doesn't have to be retro. What's your favorite genre? Joe? Well, I know you said it doesn't have to be retro, but if I'm talking about retro, I think it's RPG. Okay. Like JRPG, I guess.

03:25 Otherwise, I don't know. It's tough. I mean, maybe it's still RPG. I don't know. I think you have to go to the answer that you think about, you know, because it's like we all play all different kinds of genres, but the one that springs into your head is probably the one you play the most. And when you step out of retro, I think I have a harder time deciding. But a retro, I think it's definitely RPG.

03:46 I mean, right now I've just been in a really big, like grand strategy kick where I've been playing a lot of like paradox games. I know that has this is a far cry from what we've been doing recently. I can't wait to play a 4X NES game. Yeah, like I've been playing Crusader Kings and Stellaris. And between that and the other thing, I've been playing like Western RPGs. Yeah. Stuff like that. So you're more of a you really like that large scale strategy stuff, but like Civ too, no? Yeah, like Civ. Civ's more board gamey, but I think it's still got the same. It's got it's in the same family tree.

04:22 Same. I feel like I don't know. I kind of like just individual games more than genres. I kind of lean more towards FPS games and racing games, I think. But I mean, I play Smash Bros probably more than anything else. You know, Smash Bros and like going back and playing through the old Halos again are pretty much most of big Halo guy. Like not as big as you think, like not multiplayer because I didn't have Xbox Live when I was growing up. So just kind of just playing through that. Yeah. Just like the solo missions over and over and knowing where everything is. Yeah. My friend, my roommate got Game Pass, Microsoft Game Pass. So I'm playing through Halo 5 right now. Very different, but still enjoyable.

05:05 And for me, there's there's just something about JRPGs that I default to. Like I really like platformers. And that's like something I didn't even recognize until like even just games like Rayman Origins. I was like, I'm really enjoying this game. And it's like, oh, I like platformers. Like it's just something I never said out loud. But like JRPGs is something like I recognize as something that I really, really enjoy.

05:26 And and I'm, you know, I'm not talking about just retro JRPGs, but there's something about like playing one of those older games that you've heard about for a while. And you're finally getting around to because like there's still so many Super Nintendo and PS1 are JRPGs to get to that. I still haven't even touched like Vagrant Story and stuff like that. That I'm just like, you know, I'm hyped to know that those still exist. And it's probably going to be a never ending journey for me.

05:50 Just there's a little bit of a tangent. I really want to play Vagrant Story as well because I just love the aesthetic that I see in it. But I know I'm going to be disappointed because it just looks like it looks like a game I really want to play. I know it's not going to be perfect. I've heard that it's I've heard that it's a lot clunkier playing it today. Yeah. Like the combat system, you know, it's one of those unique ones again. But then again, you're a guy that likes Final Fantasy VIII. So and I'm not saying that that's wrong. I'm just saying like people have a huge problem with that combat system. I see. So I know is a rare.

06:19 Anyway, that's that. Yep. Anyway. But like, thanks. So that's Mach Rider. It was James. OK, James. James from Milwaukee. Thanks for thanks for writing in. Guys, we're going to talk about Mach Rider here. Interestingly enough, an uncredited design team. So I have no idea who made this game. Obviously, Nintendo did like we can imagine Miyamoto in some way was working in this game.

06:44 But there's no like who is the designer? Who is the producer? Just that information just isn't available. There's no like developer commentaries or anything like that. So I can't give you guys all that fun stuff I usually do where I walk you through the game. So we're just going to move right into the plot of this game, because even though there's no story mode, I feel like it's pretty exciting.

07:04 Mach Rider takes place in the year 2112, probably because of Rush. And planet Earth has been invaded by evil forces driving vehicles known as quad runners. The player controls Mach Rider, or if you're Joe, just you.

07:21 Mach Rider travels from sector to sector on a high powered super bike, searching for survivors and destroying any enemies in his path. Gotta say, I haven't seen any survivors. If you did, you shot them. Yeah, it's funny how like in some levels, there's just like those destroyed buildings in the background that you're driving towards. And it's like, it doesn't look great.

07:43 It doesn't look good over there. I don't know if I would be heading in a great direction. Maybe just skip that city. I mean, the good thing about the apocalypse is there's tons of gas on the side of the road, you know, to refill your car. Yeah. And this comes at like, you know, the peak of the 80s blockbuster and that action era. I go right to Mad Max with this. Oh, yeah. But does anybody else feel like any other action movies or allusions to anything else?

08:06 I mean, yeah, kind of just a blend. I think a blend is more of my perception of it. Anyways, I didn't really watch a lot of those movies, but it just feels like. I wonder if like Evil Knievel was big. I think it also like Tron just because of the movie. Yeah, the light bike. I think it's definitely a combination because while it definitely feels like Mad Max, he never rode a motorcycle. You know, which is so funny. That's why I thought this felt like Mad Max the most. Like besides the whole like apocalypse thing and all that stuff. I just thought like. Besides the whole setting.

08:40 Besides the whole setting of that, I could swear I have like this image of Mel Gibson on a super bike or something. Nope. He had the he had that car. And so I thought that was just nice to talk about the plot.

09:10 But I feel like I need to spoil something right away because it's it's in the plot of the game. You'll notice that it says the player controls Mach Rider, you know, on a high powered super bike searching for survivors and destroying any enemies in his path. Oh, that's making a lot of not. So not everyone. Not everyone is Mach Rider. Yeah, not everyone is Mach Rider.

09:41 Mach Rider.

10:06 This incredibly revealing outfit, which has no respect for women, actually. Metroid did that, too, right? Yeah. But I'm saying like Mach Rider actually weird enough did it first. Yeah. Right. Nintendo does it twice in their own R&D team. And I just don't think people know about that. Might have been the same team. It's just. Yeah. And again, it's like this underwear thing doesn't make sense to me. Like, could they do it to Samus, too? Like, well, I mean, I mean, I can understand the the idea that under that that bike suit, you'd probably be wearing underwear.

10:39 You wouldn't be wearing a full layer of clothes. Well, maybe. I don't know. A shirt. Like, it's the future. Yeah. It might be radiation poisoning. So they're obviously just going to, like, try the sex cells point of view. But whatever. Yeah. They've got violence in action. Yeah. I hope I didn't spoil the game for anyone there. But I just had to get that out of the way because it's it's a whole different game when you realize Mach Rider is a woman.

11:03 Is it, though? Well, no. The game plays exactly the same and everything like that. But you just realize that, like, wow, even after all those years of knowing that Samus is a woman and, like, Metroid fooling you the first time, you're like, ah, they'll never get fooled again. I'll know the next time there's a woman in a video game. And it's like, nope. They'll just walk past Mach Rider. They're getting fooled twice. Okay. So that's Mach Rider.

11:25 And just a weird note. Nintendo also made a race car toy in, like, 1972 called Mach Rider. And they were like, hey. But it's a race car? It's a race car toy. Yeah. You know, Nintendo used to make toys before. No, I know. But it's not a motorcycle. It's not a motorcycle. It's like an F1 car, if you can imagine being like that. But, you know, you just just, like, pull it back, rev it up. And then it goes, it goes, like, spinny for a little bit. That sounds sweet. Yeah.

11:49 Nothing really happened. I can't imagine what that retailed for. But remember, that's just a reminder that, like, Nintendo was still thinking about the toys they had made and what they could do with that stuff. Because, you know, Duck Hunt came from there. I'm sure they learned some lessons to make Rob that way. So they're still using those toys. And who knows? Maybe there are still some old toys from Nintendo that are just going to find life in, like, this new Nintendo Labo series or something. Mm-hmm. Great. Yeah. I was hoping somebody would respond. No, I didn't have anything to say about that. All right. So let's move into first impressions. Remember, these are just your initial impressions the first time you played the game.

12:34 Joe, based on what we've seen so far with these NES games, this was pretty impressive, like, the way it looks and feels. You kind of get this, like, on the edge of your seat racing game feel, like, like, you want to lean in the direction you're going. And I think that's, we haven't really had anything that felt like that on the NES yet. So that was my initial impression. And I will later tell you my immediate after, slightly more frustrated impression, followed by my... Better impression. Wow. It's a whole saga. A road map to Joe's ideas. That you make yourself.

13:10 That is awesome. It's a creation mode. Sean. My first impression of this game is, first of all, this is fast as hell. And this is wicked as hell. Like, I am... This game was... If I was born, if I was around at this time, this game would be made for me. I love the aesthetic. I love post-apocalyptic shit. I've been playing, like, three Fallout games at once right now. It's two minutes to midnight on the doomsday clock. North Korea's gonna bomb us. This is for me.

13:40 At this point in our lives. It's just so funny that, like, we've been following your Fallout journey. Just, like, vicariously. Like, throughout multiple episodes. Like, you've been mentioning, like, I was playing Fallout 3. Then you're like, I skipped out. I'm going to Fallout 1. Now you're like, here I am playing... Did I talk about Fallout 1 in the previous episode? Yeah. Last week's episode, you talked about Fallout 1. Well, this is still... This is a good time for me. Because I just love post-apocalyptic. And I like racing games. And I also liked Road Rash on the Sega Genesis. So it's a good combination. Great. Sam?

14:13 So my first impression was that I was a little bit intimidated. Because, I mean... I got a mock writer. First of all, that's pretty cool. And I gotta save all these people. But also, there's... I mean, there's everything. I did the first mode first. What is it? Fight mode first? Yep, fighting. Which is, like, the main story. If you can call it a story. But yeah. I did that mode first. And there's just all this stuff on the road. You know, there's, like... You know, there's every... There's all this stuff on the road. And you have to turn. And there's gas you have to use. And then there's also gear shifting. And there's just all this stuff off the bat. And I was... It's just a lot to take on.

14:53 But I got over that pretty quickly. Cool. But that was my initial impression. And I'm with Sean here. Like, this game is just so... So cool. Like, that's my initial impression. It's just, like... Even the music right when you start up. And that theme when you're driving is just, like, unreal. Great music. This is the first game that... It's the first game I feel like a badass. You know? Like, what other NES game makes you feel like you actually are, like, in control of someone who can, like, do some damage?

15:20 Balloon fight. Right. I... But not. Like, you know? It's like, the thing was that in common. Balloon fight does not. You know what? Ice Climber, it's like, those guys are just, like, random snow-mounted enemies. I guess the closest you could go is Kung Fu? Yeah, but even... Oh, wait. Joe's got something. I think I said in the Duck Hunt episode...

15:38 Quote, that you feel like a badass or something like that. Shooting innocent ducks. I'm sorry, I just love... I'm sorry I just always bring up Duck Hunt, but I think I was talking about the clay discs. Okay. You feel like a badass. No way. I don't know. Somehow... Don't listen to it. Somehow, like, shooting down evil forces known as quadrunners is a little more badass than taking down innocent ducks that just happen to be in your way. Or discs of clay.

16:03 I'm not saying it's more so, I'm just saying that's the last thing I ever said. Yeah, that was the first one that made you understand why Americans like to have guns. Yeah. Right, yeah. I was shoot clay discs. Okay, so that's initial impressions. One thing that Joe and I need to get out of the way, though, real fast, is that, like, the gear thing is something everyone needs to learn, like, quick. Because you might turn off this game before you ever start playing it if you don't learn that. Can I run through my first, like, three minutes in this game? Yeah, doing that, can you work it into the objective a little? Okay, so the objective of Mach Rider, at least the first mode, is to get through a course relatively unscathed

16:46 while also shooting the competitors, the quad runners. Yeah, not competitors. Shooting the quad runners, avoiding obstacles, and going hella fast. But here's the problem. When I first turned on this game, I didn't read the manual, didn't know what those numbers were at the top, so I was just holding the accelerate button. I thought that was as fast as I was going to go. That's the problem me and Joe had, too. And I think this is, like, a problem everyone has. That's why you've got to read the manual. Thank goodness Sam the manual smith is here. Sam, tell us what happens with the gears. You change them. You start in one, and then you only go so fast, but you hear your engine revving, and then you press up and down in the D-pad to change gears,

17:31 and you press up to go, you know, to a higher gear, and you can hear your car shift or your super bike shift, which is really cool, especially when you're going, you downshift to do a curve or something. Right, yeah, yeah. And it goes, boo! It's really cool. I got a nice little... However, what happens to make you realize that you're playing the game wrong is that there will be quad runners that come up behind you and just run into you and you explode. Yeah, if they go faster than you and they touch you, then you die. And that's what I was alluding to before, where after my initial great impression, I was like, wait, this sucks.

18:08 Because you can see them coming in the mirror, but it's still almost impossible to dodge them. It's, like, frightening. It's like you see them, and you're trying to, like, get out of the way, but you just can't move fast enough.

18:17 And then once I realized you could shift gears, I was like, okay, this is great again. But I wish... Yeah, I think reading the manual makes a world of difference, because then you know off the bat that you can do that. So let's talk about the fighting course first. That's the first mode. There's ten sectors, and it starts off really interesting where it, like, shows you your path options, and you choose between path A or path B. It's basically spaghetti, so you can't really tell which path is which. But they are two different courses.

18:48 And what I found interesting, too, is, like, I took, like, both of the introductory paths, and there's not, like, that much difference. Like you said, since it looks like spaghetti, it's just, like, the amount of turns and stuff like that. That's what you're comfortable with, I guess. But there's no way of, like, you know, on your first try, like, knowing, like, oh, this is the easier path. And I don't even know if that's, like, a guaranteed thing. That one's easier than the other. I feel like even when you're playing them, it's hard to tell what the path is doing.

19:17 You know, it's not like, oh, and here comes, like, the big loop thing. It just, you're just kind of taking it section by section. Right. And, you know, when you're in gear four, that's like, you're going so fast that it doesn't, you know, it doesn't even matter. Like, you have to just kind of, when you see a turn coming, it's hard left, hard right.

19:36 I think that, like, for me, the strategy during the fighting course, which is, you know, again, you're just trying to get to the end of the level without losing all your lives, which you cannot do in the first level, which is nice. Like, the very first level, you can't lose all your lives. You don't have lives yet. You get lives in the second level. And then from there, you can immediately lose. But you're just trying to get to the end of the path. And I like that objective. But you're also trying to, like, shoot down cars for points, shoot down barrels, shoot down rocks. I don't even think you can blow up the rocks, though. No, rocks are indestructible. Rocks also aren't in the first level. Oh, okay. That's good.

20:13 Now that you're mentioning this, I think that I went about the fight mode all wrong. Because I played a lot of endurance and solo. And in those, you want to go as fast as you can the whole time. Right. But in fight mode, you just want to finish and you want to survive. So I feel like I went a little bit too fast in fight mode. Especially considering it's lives. Yeah, that's what I mean. I had assumed that fight mode was more about shooting as many things down and getting the points.

20:36 Because I deliberately didn't do that. Because I was like, I just want to see what each level is. So I was like, I'll just try and get through this. Yeah. I would also like to note, we keep saying shooting, but that's not the only way to take down the quad runners. You can block them, make them run into the barrels. And I think that's so cool. I'm glad you said that because I think a bad version of this game, especially because it's such an early NES game too. No, but a bad version of this game also would have been any collision with an enemy of any kind blows you up. You know? Even if you get them from the side,

21:07 your car will be destroyed because it's just two collision objects being detected. But Mog Rider took the time to be like, hey, if you're on the side and you bump in hard enough, they'll skid over to the right, hit the barrel, and blow up. You get the points. The energy as well. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So I think that that aspect, like that mechanic of a vehicular battle just by bumping into each other. Yeah. Yeah, road rage. Even like, not aspects, maybe some aspects of Twisted Metal,

21:37 of just like bumping into each other is what made me feel like a cool guy. Like a pretty cool guy. Nice. Yeah. I definitely liked bumping them into stuff more than just shooting them down. But I do think like shooting them down is pretty cool. I mean, let's be real. Even the way you die in this game is like badass. Yeah, you just explode slowly. You explode and then reanimate. I'm fine. Yeah, whatever.

22:03 But then you just come back to life. It's not like in most games you would just like pop back in, but they actually took the time to reverse animate the explosion, putting you back together. Yeah. It's great particle effects. So just to wrap up the fighting course here, every time every level gets a little harder than the ones before it. The quad runners don't become any like more interesting. They just change colors so that like instead of one shot, it's two shots, three shots. And then finally, the last one requires four shots. And those are the black cars. But I think that they take six. Six. Okay. I don't know where I came up with four, to be honest. Maybe I was just like, hey, four.

22:42 Anyway, so you go through the 10 sectors. Does anybody know what happens after you get through the first 10? Can I also say, before we talk about that, can I just mention too that in every beginning of every level, there's like one short sentence about what it is, followed by you are mock writer. Like it was kind of funny to me because it was like, I get a mock writer 10 times. It's like your hype song. Honestly, I want a coach to like go in and like, you know, like there's always like, you know, clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose from Friday Night Lights. It's like, I want someone to just like, you know, give like an awesome speech. And then at the end, just be like, remember kids,

23:20 you are mock writer. And everyone just charges out like, I want that to be like what I hear in the morning when I wake up. I just open my eyes and then I hear you are mock writer. It's actually sad that there is no like voice synthesis in this that says you are mock writer. Cause I would have appreciated that. But Mike, I don't know what happens at the end because I'm not good enough at this game. Yeah, I did not make it that far. So after, after you get through the first 10 sectors, you get 10 new sectors.

23:48 Oh, okay. No, no, no. But I think that is kind of cool. It's not just like, Hey, do these 10 again. You know, it's not like at the end of the 10 sectors, it's like, aha, I've kidnapped your daughter, your only daughter. But later that same day, later that same day, the apocalypse is back and everything. So you get 10 new sectors and then you go back to the original 10. So unfortunately for mock writer enthusiasts, there is no like a wrap up. There's no warm feeling inside when you finish the game of like, you've stopped the apocalypse or anything.

24:21 And each one has an A and a B also. Yes. That's, that's a lot. Yeah. That's a lot of courses. What happens at the end of the next 10? Do they make it? Oh yeah. You just go back to the, no, you just go back to the first 10 again. I thought there was like a very quick, like. I don't know who gets that far. Yeah. I have no idea who gets to the 30, but that's pretty cool. If you do. I saw one guy had like maxed out his high score thing. So that was cool. Wow. So that's, that's fighting course. Any last thoughts on that? I did the worst on this one. Great. Yeah. Proud of you. Thanks.

24:53 All right. So we're going to move right on into endurance mode. Now this one plays a little differently because instead of a finish line, there's a, you know, like a, you have to get to a certain amount of kilometers in a certain amount of time. However, there's still enemies. There's still obstacles. So while the objective is speed in this one, you do have to make sure that you don't continue to get killed. Otherwise you won't be able to make it to the end in the distance that they actually do. How do people feel about endurance? I had a lot more fun in endurance because, um, I could never stay alive that long.

25:29 Um, but I think that since endurance is a little bit more forgiving, like you're going to make it through a few levels. Uh, even if you blow up a few times because they give you ample time. Um, and also if, um, at the end of time you can still inch forward a bit at, at the, at, when it's a, once the time hits zero, you just can't hit the gas anymore. It just, you can still shoot stuff. You can also still shoot stuff. So you slowly, and like there was one point at like the last level that I finally cleared, um, where I wasn't there yet and it hit zero. And during that, um, that slow down, I finally cracked that cam.

26:07 That's cool. I didn't know that that was, uh, the way it worked. Yeah. That slow down feeling though is like, it's, it's gut wrenching a little bit when you start to just slow down and you're holding down that accelerator because you never let off of it. You know, you're like, Oh, I need to like, if anything, I will, I will ramp up to gear four, cruise through that as much as I can.

26:27 And then if I see like a turn coming up or something, I'll attempt to go down to three, but I can't, you can't do one and two. Like it's, it's just not worth it. I think those are there just to, to get up to speed. Right. But not only just to get up to that speed too though, but also to like prevent someone from just going top speed so quickly. Like if there was only a two gear thing, you just go right back up. I did. I kind of wish it wrapped. I kind of wish that you could go up again to get to one from four.

26:53 Okay. You know what I mean? That'd be bad for your bike. Yeah. I mean, I know that's not how, like how, but on a bike you could easily, you could like, I mean, I don't know how to ride a motorcycle, but you could, you could just switch to one. You don't have to like, you're not out of control. You switch and go, but you do, if you want to have a good time, even though you can change from like fourth back into first. Joe, just because you are the Mach Rider doesn't mean you can decide how the motorcycles work. Well, this is a super bike. It's not a magic bike. It took the plunger, the whole plunger. One other quick aspect of this game that I think pertains to what we're talking about with the gears.

27:31 Once you go through parts of the course, it will immediately freeze over. You just go into an ice storm and you have to be a lot more careful or you will just end up in the shoulder. I love how that slippery works too. It's a little better than the oil and stuff like that.

27:49 Yeah. There's even, after you get to the, I think it's after two levels where there's a little bit of ice, there's one level that's just the entire level is ice. Really? Yeah. I think I got there on solo mode. Okay. But I just wish that there was an option to choose to go immediately into an all ice level from the beginning. Because I think that being able to practice on an all ice level would be really convenient. Because I found some things that I think help out a lot. You do need to just, when you're going into a curve on an ice level, you've got to downshift and I was even letting go of the gas. And I was trying a trick that I learned from F0, which is when you go around a sharp turn, you just tap A instead of...

28:33 Just to get a little bit of a throttle. Yeah, just a little bit. So I was doing that a little bit, letting go sometimes and downshifting. And using your balloon fight skills too. Yeah, of course.

28:43 But yeah, endurance mode was my favorite mode. I'm going to speak out against the, like, being able to select ice levels though, because I just think, like, you know, in a way that's kind of like, I wish there was a way to just get to 8-4 in Super Mario Bros. so that I could practice that level. Well, they got the warp pipes. I wouldn't want them to... They got the warp zone. I know, I know. But it's like, you know, it's only four levels into it. That's fair. I just, like, wish for me that I could...

29:05 No, I know, I know. Because I think that is frustrating when you get up to a certain point. I'll say this for the endurance mode. There is, like, you know, to Sean's point, it's a little forgiving at first, but I'll say that once you get to, like, 45 kilometers... Yeah, you gotta be trucking. You gotta be it. You gotta be doing pretty good. And you gotta have minimal deaths. Mm-hmm. I also found that if you spend more time in endurance mode trying to shoot things than trying to finish the course, you'll get a higher score.

29:32 Like, I went through a couple times. Sometimes... Oh, yeah, because you're getting so many points just for the distance you go. Yeah. But you don't get more for, like, finishing faster or anything, or additional distance. You don't get, like, leftover time. Yeah. Right, right. I played it a couple different ways. I played it once where I was just trying to avoid everyone and get to the finish as fast as I could. And then I played one where I was trying to shoot everything. And I got, like, triple the score when I was shooting everything.

30:02 We'll move away from endurance course and talk about solo course very fast because it's not much to talk about. It's the same mode. It's the same as endurance, but without any enemies. Without any enemies. But, uh, Sam, you seem to have liked this one the most. Well, not the most. I think I liked endurance the most. Oh, okay. But, uh, solo I felt was really good when I was trying to come to grips with the game.

30:20 You know, when I was trying to figure out how to, how it works, really. I think you really learn from solo more than anything else. It's like, I think solo was where I felt more in control of my bike. Like, you were talking about tapping A and stuff like that and figuring out about downshifting. That's like where you learn how to drive. Yeah, exactly. That's, if only there was like a, uh, you know, a driving test for, you know.

30:43 I don't know. No one actually wishes for that stuff. Like, I remember in Gran Turismo, like, four, you have to get your driver's license before you can even drive a car in that game. And it's so annoying, some of the tasks. So, thank goodness in Mach Rider, it's like, there are no laws. So, you both, like, left the modes that you were playing and then moved over to solo for a bit? I don't, I wouldn't say I left him. I think I tried each one of them. And then in solo, I was like, I'm doing pretty good in this because there's not a lot going on. Yeah. So, I did that one. I think the interesting thing about that is Nintendo usually structures these early games with, like, mode A, easy.

31:17 Mode B, challenging version of easy. Mode C, totally different version that's a lot harder. You know? If there is a mode C. But for me, it's like, this last mode is almost like what should have been at the top. Just like a training wheels kind of thing. But what I think is really cool is kind of like that. Like, I feel like in a lot of the games that we've been playing, A and B have been kind of similar, but ones like the hard mode, like you just said. But this, I felt like these were distinct modes, you know, with different objectives. I'd say A and B are distinct.

31:47 I mean, yeah, I think that... Well, I would just say that, like, to me, that's the point I was making is, like, mode C, the solo course, is actually just, like, the game A version of mode B, the endurance course. Yeah, yeah. Right. It's almost upside down. Right, yeah. Sorry it's confusing to anyone at home, but, like, basically it's like, you know, mode A, mode B, mode C, and in this one it's mode C, mode B, mode A. But the picture that you clicked on to listen to this is probably the screen that we're talking about. Hopefully. I might make it that woman.

32:19 Okay. Yeah, I mean, I basically just went from, I played all three modes to try them, and then I actually just went back to, what's the first one called, fighting? Fighting, yeah. So that's the one I played the most, so really the second and third mode I just played enough to, like, get an idea of it. But the first one was the one that I really was, like, trying to see how far can I get in this. How'd you do in the first one? Just curious. Okay.

32:43 I mean, I got, I think, like, to round nine or something. I wasn't willing. Oh, wow. Hey, very nice. This was after a lot of trying. That's still pretty good, though. And I did not have a very high score. What was your tactics? Did you go fast? Did you go slow and then speed up when there were guys or something? I was going relatively slow until, like, people started coming up, which is pretty quick. Yeah. And I would go, I think, gear four as much as I could. But it's, like, fair two.

33:08 It did take me a while, though. I definitely had to restart several times. But, yeah, I think it was just kind of shifting between fast and slow and, like, not worrying as much about time and just worrying about, like, being careful. Yeah. Yeah, I got to, like, round six, I think, or sector six. But I think I would have kept going in that if there was even just, like, the slightest bit of story. Because, again, like, this world is so cool. I would have loved some lore or something like that. Like, just anything. Like, on the screen, it's like you arrive out of town. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's no one there. Exactly. Like, something super small. I don't need anything in the mode itself. Like, I didn't need a boss or anything.

33:47 I just thought that, like, that would have kept me going back to the premiere mode, the fighting course. Whereas, for me, the game became more of just, like, this is really fun. I'm just working. I worked more on, like, endurance and solo than fighting. I think, like, round six for fighting and I was done. Right. One thing I would like to say, since we're kind of talking about this setting again and the

34:07 story or lack thereof, I want to, I think that Nintendo was kind of self-censoring themselves because this world shouldn't, this isn't an alien invasion world. This is, like, those quad riders, those should be people. Like, I think that the fact that they've made them aliens was so that you aren't just brutally massacring these people on the road and making them something other entirely. But I think that the soul of this game requires them to be other, like, post-apocalyptic wastelanders. Okay. That's just my opinion. Yeah, that's how I played it.

35:22 And so, believe it or not, there is another mode in this game. They are really packing this one in. And this one is what makes this game part of the Black Box Programmable series. This is the last one of the programmable games. If you remember, the other two were Excitebike and Wrecking Crew. We all seemed pretty jazzed about the Excitebike one enough to get us drunk on calling it an essential game at first. Thankfully, no more. And then Wrecking Crew, Joe, made some incredible levels out of that. I'm still blown away by those. They were really well done. I do like course creations, which I was excited about.

35:57 Did you know going in that there would be a course creator? Or did you stumble into the title screen and just be like, oh my gosh. I knew because after, in the weeks after the Excitebike episode, when I was feeling all that guilt, I was looking up and seeing what other course creator racing games there were. And I was like, oh, there's another one, The Fouling Ear.

36:14 So, Joe, since you are the level designer around here, if you will, what were your thoughts on design mode? I thought the course creation was very easy to make, very intuitive and easy to make cool, twisty, turny tracks and whatnot. And basically, just so you have a picture of it, you have two screens, sort of. And on the top screen, it is blank. And you select which tile you want to put something. And you hold B to select on the bottom screen where you have a bunch of different options of what tile to put there. So, it's pretty simple.

36:53 And I was like, oh, this is really cool. Until I went to play my course. And it's kind of disappointing. Like you guys were saying earlier. You can't really tell. Yeah, you can't tell it's your course. And there are all those obstacles. While I was creating the course, I forgot about all the obstacles. You can't add them. They just randomly generate on your course.

37:10 Depending on what level it is. Because that's another thing. It adds, you just keep playing it until, but in the different settings. Like you play in the desert and then you play it in the jungle or the forest or whatever that is. I think the only thing that this game, in general, needs to make it more, like the course being a bigger part of the experience, is it needs a mini-map in the corner. I think there is real estate on the screen to put that there. And I think as long as you have at least a rough approximation of the course in front of you in some way,

37:47 that anticipation of like, oh, there's that hairpin turn. Like I have to get ready for that. That will affect the game for you enough to make it worthwhile. I wonder if that's like a limitation of memory for the mini-map. It probably is. I could imagine that being pretty strenuous. But I think later games might have something like that. Yeah. I do think that's a great idea though, Sean. It's something I didn't ever consider being a problem. In the game. I think just going back to something that we talked about real fast during the beginning, the design mode thing needs to be said again,

38:17 is that, yeah, it's super easy to do this. And I love how like you'll pick like, you know, they give you a bunch of different options for the lengths and turns of your track. And then even after you pick that length, it'll be like, hey, here are the only remaining, it'll only highlight the options that you could possibly use to continue your track. It won't let you try to make like some ridiculous thing that won't be able to be finished.

38:38 It always lets you, it always tells you like, okay, you can use some of these four options now. Like that's cool. However, it's just, even though it's so easy to use, it's so unimpressive at the end of it, just because it, you know, the game, we were talking even about the speed that you go and stuff like that. It doesn't feel like ownership of your own course.

38:56 It just feels like a randomly generated thing when you get out there because yeah, you might remember that you were like, oh yeah, I programmed a left turn and then a hard right turn. It's like, you might remember that, but I think it's different in excite bike when you're like, oh yeah. And then I put the big hill and then there's a strip of grass and there's a booster on the left side followed by the right side. I think they really, it really could have benefited from something where it's like, I'm going to put a piece with rocks here or I'm going to, I'm going to add,

39:24 I'm going to add like lots of barrels over here or this is going to be an ice section over here or something like that. That would definitely be a memory issue. Yeah, but I think like, no, I think I understand what you're saying. I think that the way I would have gone about that, and again, this is someone with no programming knowledge is like you would create the course first and then similar to like how in excite bike, you were actually like in the excite bike mode, placing your stuff. It'd be cool if you then went on the course as mock rider and,

39:52 like drove forward and then like cycled with B to cycle through your things and you would place them where mock rider was. that'd be a pain to drive. That'd take forever. It would, but I mean, you're only, you know, like if you think about it, even the course of Nintendo design, it's not like they were like, and we're going to put the rock here.

40:08 Some of them were though. This is exactly where people will be. There was, there was one level. I don't know if it's only, I only got far in the first mode. I don't know if it's in the other modes, but where there were a bunch of rocks, like diagonally, like down it. And I was thinking like, Oh, when I create a course, I'm going to do this. And then while I was creating my course, I totally forgot that. Like, I'm not adding any of this. Like, I don't have any control over like making a cool obstacle pattern or, or whatnot. I think they just have a couple different patterns that are just like modules or something like that. And then those are randomly picked from as you're driving.

40:42 That's just me speculating, but I, that's what I think it is. Yeah. I do think it's cool that you get scored based on your custom tracks though. I think that's cool. Yeah. It's fun. And again, it's a huge problem here with the NES versions of these games, but you can't save your course because there's no disc system to write it on. And I think that's just funny that Nintendo did that, but at least they let you make them at all.

41:09 Right. But if I'm, if I'm being honest, uh, I really love everything else about mock writer, but if I, as much as I love course creation, I think this one kind of pointless. Yeah. Like, cause once you make it, it's not, unless you're making like a straight line or something. Yeah. I didn't do that, but I should do that. So, so, so,!

42:04 so,

42:07 so we've been talking a lot about mock rider and i wasn't expecting anybody to mention it but sam talked about it a little bit anybody feel like the reason why there's not any more mock rider games is because that's what f-zero became i don't know that's what i think i said mario kart or something no you were talking about how in f-zero you were pressing a but i just mean like you know f-zero really feels like the evolved form of mock rider you know like being an actual

42:33 racing game taking place in the future and it's a different kind of future and like you play as captain falcon like like an identity kind of thing like i i think it's cool yeah it's a totally different kind of future i just feel like it'd be weird to have a mock rider game and a f-zero game like together what if there are alternate timelines of each other one is post-apocalyptic and the other

42:55 that would be so cool if there was a f-zero rpg and like you know where you team up with mock rider it's like f-zero x mock rider that'd be so cool even just like mock rider and i'm this might exist because i'm not too big on f-zero but like a mock rider character they have like a batman like character in f-zero so why not mock rider like that would be really cool dark smash name shadow

43:20 uh sean wasn't expecting anybody to mention that but yes mock rider was originally considered for smash brothers uh they were gonna trophy in melee yeah they were gonna put him in melee actually uh her in melee and instead they went with ice climber oh that's so disappointing i know well i think like ice climbers is probably a little more unique uh for for the fighting game because they work together in tandem right now i mean i don't think i could tell you what mock rider looks like you just see the back sprite yeah you only really see these full sprite of mock rider in the arcade

43:51 version and then of course her her clothes version right clothes version you think she'd be on the bike the whole time i think it would be so cool if she was on the bike the whole time because that would that would separate her from captain falcon yeah you know because otherwise they are kind of the same and again that's the f-zero parallel i just think like i'm saying that f-zero is a spiritual successor because i want an excuse for why nintendo hasn't made another one of these yeah like mock rider 2 would be really cool especially in today's it could be open world

44:22 i hate this i hate when people like just default to the open world oh i'm just kidding but what if it was open world okay but also like burnout paradise style where like races just happen all of a sudden like you're just driving around in this open world and that's like someone just challenges you to a race and you gotta go yeah okay cool it sounds like no one else wants to talk about mock rider 2 so i'll get off that speaking of 2 did you guys know that there is another racing song in this game no other than the iconic uh one that we all know and has played probably by

44:56 now in the podcast episode there is a second song that only happens in like levels 9 and 10 so you gotta get really late so joe i don't know if you picked up on it when you were on round 9 but it plays really late and it's pretty cool pretty ominous and just nice like it just shows up all of a sudden it's like oh this is this is kind of freaky like i've been hearing this other song for so long i feel like that would mess me up why when i'm playing just because i would hear something different and then just not know what's going on yeah but sam you got to didn't you get

45:29 through 10 levels of uh of the other mode i don't think so please endurance it's impossible really i got to the all ice level i'm not sure what that is that might be like seven or something like that but i didn't get super far okay so before we move into the essential games list anybody want to talk about their high scores uh i feel like we all like this game so we probably were pretty good at it

45:51 uh i finished off endurance mode yeah endurance mode at around 68 000 and i felt pretty good about that that's not actually impressive by any means because i've seen online people easily topping like 300 000 in this but 68 000 for me felt pretty good so um i don't know what you got on fighting i i did not i did not play fighting enough to give a score yeah i think i got like that's why i i'm gonna give

46:19 an estimation i think i got like 28 000 in fighting um but endurance which i played the most i got 85 290 beautiful um on the and i ended i couldn't quite make it to the end of the 48 kilometer level um so i was proud of that i liked it yeah it's funny there's a 20 000 point difference between us but i i think i was also on the 48 kilometer one so i probably should have shot more stuff to sam's point than just continuing to drive yeah yeah so when i played uh endurance like i said before i tried a couple times to just go as fast and as far as i could and then i tried uh just shooting a bunch of stuff and when i tried shooting a bunch of stuff i got my high score which is 108 810 nice that is amazing

47:06 but i also didn't get that far i only got to like the third level or something like that wow yeah you probably if you continued to try with this method you would score a lot higher you think i think so but i think i was more reckless at the same time okay so you weren't able to so i think i actually had the opposite experience i got really really far at a level nine but the point of this one is to the point of fighting mode is i i assume to get a high score but i was like i just want to

47:31 see the levels so i was under 60 000 at level nine because i was just going slow not taking things i was just avoiding things and just trying to get to the fighting course though too especially like the the the quad runners are a lot of points yeah i think it's like a thousand for each one you shoot all right so that was high scores and i think uh that's about covers it so we can do the essential games list all right guys it's time for the essential games list this is where we talk about

48:01 if games are still worth playing today games is a concept uh no no nes games are they still worth playing today you know mock rider came out in 1986 some people like nintendo want to tell you 1985 is just where they can celebrate the anniversary earlier but who are they yeah we're nostalgia yeah they're just nintendo they mean nothing to me anyway so we're going to determine right now if this game is essential the way we do that is we all just vote on it you need uh let's see there's

48:30 four of us here you need at least two to get it into the essentials but we're usually a lot happier if three people do it because then it's like the overwhelming majority so joe take me through your essential game this is a great game uh i think it feels like it's way ahead of its time i don't know if you guys agree with that but i feel like it was from a later time than it actually was not to bring more controversy on the release date but you know what i mean it feels ahead of its time

49:03 um so i think it definitely has a lot of influence on later racing games um and i think i'm adding it to my ever-growing list of games that i would highly recommend but wouldn't say is quite essential and that's because i think first of all there's the course creation mode that doesn't doesn't hold up and i i don't know if it's necessary to come back and play this i think there are a lot of other better racing games out there that build on this a lot more it doesn't

49:34 i think it i think it feels awesome for what the time it is but i don't know if it would necessarily hold up to like a modern game so if you if you could play if you want to play a racing game it doesn't have to be this but i would recommend it okay sean all right i'm gonna list a couple games that you can play and get a similar uh experience uh first you can play road rash which we've mentioned a few times already um for that motorcycle experience you can play super off-road the

49:59 baja which is a pretty good looking super nes game uh that has a similar play style but it's off-road trucks uh then you can play twisted metal if you want some vehicular combat and then you can play mad max on pc or xbox one or whatever is that actually good that is actually a good game wow very cool i would i would play that game um and you can get a similar uh aesthetic experience or gameplay wise um i'm not saying like i i love this game but it is it has been iterated upon enough that there's no

50:33 way this is essential um it's great but people have been making these games for a while and a lot better same so uh i mentioned this before when we got that question from milwaukee uh that i i do enjoy racing games a lot i play play mario kart a lot i was a big need for speed guy for a little bit i didn't mention this before but um played underground 2 you know i played carbon i played some burnout games i like racing games and this game it doesn't feel like a racing game it feels like an arcade game you know and that and i think it feels good and there are mechanics in it that are challenging but things

51:17 that i think that i can improve upon you know and it's it's on my essential list i think that i i really do think this is a special game and i to be fair i didn't play those games that sean was mentioning before but um if you want like a pick it up and play around kind of deal that without getting like stuck into like you know a tournament or like a big kind of racing game i think that this is like this is a great time to do that not great time this is a great game for that kind of opportunity

51:49 very cool so that's one vote i'll say this about mock rider there's you know there's games that came after it uh one that definitely comes to mind is like outrun for sega that's like sega i've got a ton of ports sega genesis sega cd probably sega saturn but the arcade is the notable version i think what's its mock rider apart from those other games is it's it's early roots in the nes it's way to make you feel like a badass you know like turning on that game playing it it feels kind of cool i think this is like a lot of what a retro gamer thinks of when they play games is that they want to feel like this but this game actually emulates it well and i think that if you aren't a retro gamer but you want

52:33 to get in to these older games this is actually one of our you know with the with the exception of probably super mario brothers just because it's a game that's so simple and intuitive that anybody could play i think mock rider is really a game that uh stands up today for the same reasons it did back then and doesn't feel outdated even though the you know like the graphical limitations and the fact that there's no like map or anything like that like i think what's in there is enough to get anybody going even in 2018 i'll say that while we were talking about games like outrunner uh outrun the interesting thing about mock rider is is that there's also like a fighting element to it you

53:12 know you're shooting this gun and you have to take down uh the quad runners and you have to try and avoid obstacles it's it's a little more different than your standard racer uh and for that it's not really a racing game it's it does have arcade feelings but it also is kind of something pretty unique for this time and so to me if you're someone who's looking to get into retro gaming and thinks that like you know it's really cool that these games used to exist i think mock riders like the perfect game to tell you like yeah these old retro games are still cool and so for that i'm putting it in the essential games list there it is wow it's getting a vote in there and so two to two so not

54:03 decisive and who knows what will happen down the road but i definitely feel really good about mock rider being in there if only because when i turn this game on this is the first time i've ever played mock rider i i knew that like wow this is cool like i would love to see more games like this in the nes's lifespan okay wow that's uh i i feel i feel very conflicted right now because i really

54:31 really like this game but i just don't know if it qualifies i don't know yeah i i think i said this about balloon fight or balloon fight i i voted it down but i'm happy with it being in there i think it's okay in there um and this one i feel the same way but for some reason with this one when sam was voting i was like yeah i think this deserves a one out of four like i think this is good but i don't

54:54 i i'm not upset about this being in there but i think i think i put balloon fight closer to it over well i think i if you're asking me for my personal preference i do think balloon fight is a much more unique game to this day but i still think that like mock rider hasn't been emulated in the same way right that it is and granted it's kind of silly for me to compare balloon fight and that's what's interesting i will see that i wasn't taking into account the overall feeling that you get when you play this game when i decided to vote it out because yeah i still got that like

55:29 that power trip of like yeah i'm the i'm the mock rider i'm i'm the one that's gonna clean the post apocalyptic streets um that i was surprised that i got but just because there are so many other games and although i know that you're you're saying that this is still a unique experience i still think it's a great experience i guess i just didn't think it was unique enough okay and i think that's fine i like this open discussion afterwards of how we feel about it and that's the whole thing about the essential games this is that ultimately you know each listener at home is going to take away something

56:03 different from this i think we're all saying that at this point it's definitely worth checking out for yourself yeah to to see if you'll like it but i i guarantee you there will be some people who are very happy hearing mock riders on there and other people who have been playing this since 1986 and saying i can't believe that they think that that's a good game you know and so that's what's really interesting about you know opinions in general the more you know i think uh i think that's all the time we have for this episode of nostalgia join us next time for urban champion

56:34 and be sure to play it yourself if you can for more nostalgia please subscribe to our podcast wherever you listen and be sure to check out nostalgia cast.com that's n-e-s-t-a-l-g-i-a cast.com there you'll find links to the show and show notes as well as our other platforms such as twitch youtube twitter and facebook thank you so much for your support of nostalgia we thank you for spending time with us maybe write in a letter with a question or something to contact that nostalgia cast.com i'm michael esposito you can find me on at esposito film on twitter and i'll talk to you soon

57:06 you do you have any cotton candy do you know about that candy burrito i was just gonna say that wait what the candy burrito no i don't you take a bunch of candy like gummy bears and shit like that yeah and you lay it all down melted take a couple scoops of ice cream and you wrap it in a burrito that's made out of cotton candy before you even eat it just throw up all over it

57:54 oh uh is it a screener clean out season what is it screener clean season it's just the pile of screeners oh yeah you're not allowed to watch them unless you're in the academy okay honor system yeah then you have to snap them in half when you're done watching them i could ask mike if i can snack and then there's like nothing there you can snack anything you want but yeah there's probably nothing left yeah it's all just like american horror story roanoke isn't that like four years old honestly the best one that's what i've heard i've never watched any of me neither i'm just i haven't heard anything i said honestly though i was just being a dick i'll never believe you

58:32 he's rolling you're rolling okay great oh oh that kind of rolling yeah no they see me rolling i thought you meant like yeah you know like like molly yeah little zan no molly can you roll on on zan i am rolling do you roll on zan what are you doing zan i don't know how much trip you don't trip hey good mock writer do you have what it takes to mock all those different people that's not very nice also it's the future that's going at the end of the podcast