203 · The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Tom Sawyer's famous literary exploits come to life in this adventure where you play Tom Sawyer (or Huck Finn in a 2 player game). The adventure begins in Tom's dream while he sleeps in school.
SHOW NOTES
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer Longplay
Huckleberry Finn
Square's Tom Sawyer (warning racist depictions in this game)
- Join Tom on a Journey of Action Packed Adventure
- NES Longplay
- Introductions
- The old lady pulled her spectacles down and looked over them about the room; then she put them up and looked out under them. She seldom or never looked through them for so small a thing as a boy; they were her state pair, the pride of her heart, and were built for “style,” not service—she could have seen through a pair of stove-lids just as well. She looked perplexed for a moment, and then said, not fiercely, but still loud enough for the furniture to hear
- The appeal of games like this and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Do they think they are fooling parents with acclaimed literature?
- Overview
- Platforming game (Tom is player 1 and Huck is player 2), travel through 6 levels
- Tom Sawyer is dreaming, and in this dream he must save Becky from Injun Joe, traveling through six stages to get to her.
- Gameplay
- Platforming
- What sets Tom Sawyer apart
- Sequels and Spinoffs
- Square's Tom Sawyer
- Players control Tom Sawyer and his friends as they join the party, such as Jim and Huck, and they each have RPG like stats but no experience level up system - it’s done similar to FF2 and SaGa games
- The game features an enemy that triggers the reset button on a players controller bringing them back to the title screen.
- In 2010, UGO ranked it as the #4 most racist video game in history.
- The blackface is bad
- Square's Tom Sawyer
- EGL
- Next week - Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Auto-generated transcript. Each paragraph starts with its timestamp. Speakers are not identified.
Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Join Tom on a journey of action-packed adventure.
And welcome to NEStalgia, a chronological exploration of every NES game released in North America. I'm Mike. I'm Sean. And I'm Joe. The old lady pulled her spectacles down and looked over them about the room. Then she put them up and looked out under them. She seldom or never looked through them for a so small a thing as a boy. They were her state pair, the pride of her heart, and were built for style, not service.
She could have seen them through a pair of stove lids just as well. She looked perplexed for a moment and then said, not fiercely, but still loud enough for the furniture to hear. And that is the first chapter of Tom Sawyer, the book by Mark Twain. Twain gang. Did that end on, like, she said and then not finishing what she said? I think it was like a she said, like, to end a sentence. Oh, okay. You know. I guess I drifted out of that for a little bit.
Yeah. I'm not sure, like, what, like, what that means either at the end, though. Like, loud enough for the furniture to hear. But, you know, furniture doesn't have ears. So I guess that's like, you know, crazy book talk. Yeah, literature is bullshit.
But really, though, what is the appeal of these games? Is the appeal of games like this and Dr. Jackal and Mr. Hyde supposed to, like, beat a fool parents into thinking that, like, now their kids can experience acclaimed literature, like, in a new format? Like, do they think that they're just getting the Sparknotes video game version? That's sort of what I'm getting the feel for. Like, I, you know, for some reason, Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn was not a part of our syllabus in middle or high school. So I never actually read these books. I just, like, read about Mark Twain. It was like, oh, yeah, he's, he did stuff.
So I really don't know what any of this is based off. It could just be all bullshit. And, like, he just wears a hat. So therefore, he's Tom Sawyer. But yeah, I guess I'm not the target demographic or ever was.
Yeah, I also never read, never read this in school or anything. So, so, so I'm not super clear on it all either. I didn't think it was, I didn't think just from my, my, like, general knowledge that it was like a fantastical.
Story, unless it is about his, like, imagination or whatever. I don't know. I don't want to make myself stupid by talking about Tom Sawyer and not knowing what I'm talking about. But, but I don't know. I, I, I was thinking the same thing. I was wondering, like, why would they choose, like, literary characters for their video games? And I mean, another option could be that maybe it's just like, okay, here's a generation of people who don't know Tom Sawyer. We don't have to create a character. We already have some elements. We can just, we can just do it again. I mean, I think that works more with, like, movies.
But, like, if you think about something like, like Sherlock Holmes, like, they're still, you know, they're still making Sherlock Holmes stuff now and, like, introducing a new generation to it. Not that I think that the Adventures of Tom Sawyer for the NES was, like, a great way to introduce a new generation to the material. Yeah, we need, like, a dark and gritty reboot about Tom Sawyer, like, the imaginations of, like, Gen Z kids or something. Right, right. And the Adventures of Tom Sawyer, the video game, is not really, like, the book other than you're Tom Sawyer and I guess, like, you're still, um, I forget the name of the girl. Somebody who read the manual would remember. Becky. Becky something. Okay, yeah, you're going to save her.
So, like. So, that's the historic love interest of Tom Sawyer. Well, it's Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, right? Which, technically, you can play as Huckleberry Finn, too, if you're the second player. I think, you know, that's a nice touch. Yeah, I read that. I didn't do that. But. Is Huckleberry Finn, like, an imaginary friend of Tom Sawyer? Does anybody know? I was just hoping we wouldn't talk about the book again so I didn't have to see me ignorant anymore. I haven't thought about the book since eighth grade and I kind of don't want to. So, Mike, you read it. Yeah, well, I did read it, but, you know, mostly I remember the painting the picket fences. I don't remember fighting the giant octopus in chapter one.
Which is something that happens in the game. Yes. You know, but this is a platforming game, again, where you play as Tom Sawyer, and if you're a player, too, you play as Huckleberry Finn. And you travel through just six levels, but they're pretty, you know, giant in size.
And Tom Sawyer is, you know, from the cutscene that we get in the beginning of the game, he's in, like, school or something, and he's dreaming. And in this dream, he has to save, as Sean mentioned, Becky from Injun Joe, which I think I'm allowed to say because that's the character's name. I think you're allowed to say it. Yeah, yeah. I know it's not the best, but this is what we got to deal with. This is the material we've been given. And, yeah, so you're going to travel in this platforming game through six stages to get to rescue her. I'm not quite sure what sets Tom Sawyer apart from other platforming games. So, Joe, Sean, is there anything specifically that you want to call out in regards to being or controlling Tom Sawyer?
I'll say that... Yeah, go, Joe. I'll say I was pretty surprised, maybe just because of my, like, extremely low expectations for a game about The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, that it controls really nicely as a platformer on the NES. Like, it's kind of how, before we started this whole nostalgia experiment, kind of how I expected most NES games to control. You know, it's no Super Mario Bros., but it feels good in a way that even, like, some games that we rate really highly don't feel as good to control, for the most part. It's not without its control, like, fluidity flaws. But I don't know if you guys felt the same way.
I think it's got a relatively intuitive, like, physics system. Like, obviously there's no physics system. But when I say that, I just mean, like, does the jump feel like something that you can do? And it's not as expressive as a Mario game. But it at least, like, allows for some wiggle room. Like, there is some post-jump input. But, like, this is all very, like, nitty-gritty. I don't think, like, the controls of this game were particularly great. But I think that's sort of what you're saying. It's just, like, it was passable.
Because that's really, like, all there is going on in terms of, like, the platforming levels of this game. And you're kind of like Mario with the Fire Flower at all times, right? Like, you have this, I guess you're throwing rocks at first. And then you have the ability to get the slingshot.
But unlike Mario's Fire Flower, the arc of these rock throws seems to be purposefully designed to go around the enemies. Unless you, like, hit them in the perfect spot. There's something about the arch, you know, of the way they throw. That the enemy sprites are either, like, small enough that they'll go over them. Or they, like, fly in an area where it won't be able to quite hit them unless you jump in time to hit as well.
I found that to be a little interesting of a control device. Instead of squashing enemies like how you would in Super Mario Bros., you're stuck with just having your rock to throw at these guys. The enemies just sort of appear very close to you, too, on screen. So there's not much of a warning. You kind of have to, this is another one of those games where, and we've had these early on, where you have to play a little cautiously if you want to live long, just because you're not sure of the speed at which the enemies approach you once you do see them. Yeah, the first, my first continue, and it wasn't really a continue. I just had to restart the whole game. Lasted maybe, like, half of the first level. I just kept dying.
But then I just realized, like, I have to play this game at a different pace than I'm used to. And I was able to, you know, pretty handily continue on as long as I was playing a little bit slower. Yeah, it's not, like, an overly difficult game, but it is, like, it does surprise you sometimes with the enemies.
Like, there's a lot of enemy variety, and a lot of them do different things. Like, even later in the game, suddenly an enemy will start doing something that you haven't seen done before. Coming at you at a different angle or at a different speed, or circling you in a way where you have to think about how you're going to catch them, because, like you said, Mike, they're too close to you for you to hit them with the irregular rocks because of the arc of your throw.
Which could be seen as annoying and could also be seen as part of the game design of trying to really gauge how you're going to hit each of these enemies. And that would be a good thing, right? Like, if the enemies constantly change, I mean, we don't see that in every game, right? A lot of times you're introduced to the different enemy types throughout the beginning of the game, and then they either just get stronger or they have more health. You know, like, either they do more damage to you or they have more health to retain more damage from you.
But in this game, the problem comes from the fact that there's a weird size to everything, like, and a weird control to everything that you are. Like, with Tom going up and down ladders, there's this thing where, like, you almost think you're done climbing the ladder, but if you aren't at the very tippy-tippy top, you fall all the way back down to the beginning.
And I can't help but feel like that's the actual problem. It's not the enemies. It's the way you move within the space that makes everything a little extra challenging for this game. And if there was a way to fix that, I don't know if it's, like, just making everything a little more zoomed out so you can have more screen real estate to, you know, like, just so this way you can see yourself
and see what's coming at you from further away. I think that's, like, what Super Mario Bros. does, right? Like, you always see the Goombas just kind of slowly marching towards you. They never just, like, pop up. But there are things in Super Mario Bros. that pop up, like, say, piranha plants out of warp pipes. Like, so there just has to be a balance. And this game didn't exactly figure out that balance and made it more just about
the actual traversal of the stages is the challenge rather than the types of enemies. Yeah. Well, to sort of help kind of illustrate that, too, one thing I noticed, if everybody's, I'm assuming, maybe not, but I'm assuming a lot of people in our audience have played Super Mario Bros. 3. I would assume so. And if you remember in that game, they're the Cheap Cheaps. Or any Super Mario Bros. games, but they're the Cheap Cheaps. There are some levels, the Cheap Cheaps are the little fish that jump out of the water. There are some levels where they just, when you hit a certain spot on, you know, the platform you're on, a fish will jump out of the water in your direction at you. And it's pretty well designed.
Something very similar, almost exactly the same idea as in this game, a fish that jumps out of the water at you, but it jumps out of the water literally, like, at the pixel you're already standing on or that you're jumping towards. And there's no avoiding it unless you, unless you, like, timidly jump a little bit forward and then land back where you started, like, for every jump to see where it's coming from because you don't know where they're coming from. So it's like, it's like, yes, they had, like, that good, that good idea there, but it was implemented in a way where it's, like, just not player friendly.
It makes it so, like, avoiding it is possible, but not fun. It's just, like, a chore to, like, test every step. You know, that's one little tiny part of this game, but, you know, I think that that really is where I felt the most of what you're talking about. Yeah, I get, so one thing about the enemies in this game is a lot of them are based on player input, and I don't really know if it's, like, a one-to-one thing, but even in the first level, one of the standard mobs is, like, a pirate dude,
and it will react to when you throw a rock, and it will dodge the rock, and part of that is cool. Like, it's cool to see that kind of dynamic response to you, and it's not just, like, an enemy that's walking towards you single-mindedly, but other parts of that, it's just kind of annoying because it feels cheap because it's just reading your inputs, and I don't know if it's good or bad, but there were those aspects to these enemies, it seemed,
in the standard levels and even in the raft levels, so it's kind of a mixed bag. Yeah, I had mixed feelings about that specific enemy, too, but the part of me that liked it just to play Devil's Advocate was because it does make, you know, it feels different than all the other enemies that you're running into, and it makes, like, that enemy encounter feel like a moment every time. You know, it makes it feel like, okay, I've got to think about how I can, you know, he's going to jump, so I've got to jump, or I've got to wait until he lands and be far enough away from him. So, like, I like that element of it, but, yeah, it is sort of, I don't know, counterintuitive at times.
And, Sean, you mentioned the raft stage, which, you know, that's not a platforming thing. The game almost becomes a shmup where you now throw your rocks. Almost, yeah. Like, guns, you know? Like, you're shooting your rocks out of a gun or something, and you're going on this raft, and there's something really interesting here, though, with the level design where, as Tom Sawyer, you have this, you know, who cares if it's unrealistic or not?
You have this very large jump that doesn't sync with the raft below you, but you still have freedom of your jump in the air so that even if your raft is being, like, pulled in a specific direction or you're not quite lined up with it, you still get a chance to do that. To correct, yeah. And I almost wonder, like, that's a game in itself, and it's only used for one level. Like, it's never called back to. There's no other additional, like, bonus modes in this game. Why do you think they did that?
So that's one of the most interesting parts of this game is that because, like, by all measures, this, I don't know if we've really made it clear with how we're talking about it so far, but, like, a lot of this game is kind of ho-hum, like, oh, this is just one of those 700 games in the NES. But you can tell that they're trying things, whether it's the enemy design or the platforming or this sort of this raft game design. They are trying things. And the fact that they had it so that you are part of this, you're riding this raft and you have to jump. Like, there are parts that you just have to.
And it's sort of like a complex, a relatively complex mechanic where it's going to just continue with momentum of however you left the raft going when you jumped and you now have to avoid whatever obstacle you were trying to avoid while also landing on the raft. And that is engaging and that is cool, but it just happened so infrequently. It was just that one level for the most part that you have to worry about it.
But, like, that was probably one of the most engaging parts of the game for me was, like, now I have to do these things at the same time. I don't really know how to describe it beyond that, but I like that. Do you guys like that? Yeah, I thought that was a great, you know, and I thought a similar thing about some of the other levels as well, but not to the extent of this raft level, that it was a great, like, format change and it was something we haven't seen before. It made me think differently about it. And it was pretty fun. And, you know, I got to say, I think that your description of it being just another one of the 700 games on the NES is, like, the perfect way to articulate what this game is for me.
But I will say, with things like this raft thing, I think it blends into all, like, yeah, that list of all those other games like that, but it does feel, at least to me, above average because of its ambition and, like, trying new things and not just getting, like, not just getting, doing the same thing over and over again, adding, like, a raft level. Yes, I would have liked more of those, but having the enemy variety and all that stuff, it was kind of cool to me. I mean, yeah, but I do think there's a difference, though, between, like, a game trying a lot of different things or feeling of progression and then also, like, making sure that those things work well. So I feel like a lot of the things that this game introduces
either don't matter because they can be cheesed or they become frustrating because of their design development. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, you know, the boss fights are something that's, like... I accidentally cheesed these boss fights. Right, right. You don't even know you're doing it, but, like, that octopus one we keep talking about, it's just the first boss. There's other cool bosses, too, like a giant water dragon and a gorilla. But, like, the octopus, just as an example, if you just constantly fire at it, before it ever shoots its first attack at you, it will die.
That thing attacks? I didn't even know it attacks. I thought it was, like, teaching you what boss battles are. I didn't even know I had an attack. But that could have been an exciting thing. That could have been an exciting moment for the game and a nice boss fight where you have to, like, dodge the tentacles or something and hit the weak spots, but it doesn't do that. And yet there are other elements of this game that, whether through, like, platform trickery or through, you know, the way enemies appear on screen,
it becomes a harder game than it has to be. It's almost like the game isn't balanced in a way where, like, any particular level of this game isn't challenging, but there are challenging moments in each level that just become confusing. Yeah. Like, wait, why is this the hard part? Yeah, and, like, when you say that there's a difference between seeing interesting ideas or new ideas and how they execute, like, that's basically, like, that's the story of this game is that, like, I can tell they're trying to do something. Something that isn't, like, because this is a Thomas Sawyer game, and no, it's not, like, a big franchise. Like, they're just making a game and trying to make parts of it unique.
So I see that, and I give them credit for that. But, like, yeah, it's obviously, the execution is flawed. And I think most games that aren't just straight cash grabs, we can see something like that. And it's just odd seeing it in something that is so, what I imagine is so, like, laser-focused and just, like, this is just a game we're going to try and sell to parents as, like, an edutainment thing, and then the game is just nonsense about dragons and throwing rocks. Like, it just, like, it illustrates the history of NES shovelware. And I'm not saying this game is shovelware, but it may as well be with how... Yeah, no. Yeah. Go ahead. I get exactly what you're saying because it's almost like,
you know, the assignment from the publisher was clear, right? Like, oh, we want to take the Tom Sawyer, like, book and make it into a video game. And then you just get a couple of guys who know how to put together a game, almost like tag team in, you know, be like, all right, cool. You did your 30 minutes of programming. You're in, Brian. Now it's my turn. Yeah. Right. And you just, like, take either the elements or whatever. And, Joe, I'm sure you'll disagree, but I don't mean that, like, 100%. I just think, like, at times,
not that the game feels bipolar, but it feels uneven in its own difficulty. There are times in this game, even in later levels, where you could just avoid everything and keep making forward progress and you have, you know, you only have, like, your health as it is. Like, there's no extra health bars or anything to cheese it, but you don't have to make contact with much. And then there's other moments in this game where all of a sudden there's, like, eight enemies and now you're flying on a balloon and you have to dodge thunderclouds
that are shooting, you know, bolts of lightning at you. And it's just, like, when did this take over? Like, I didn't expect this to just happen. Well, so I don't fully disagree, but it does seem like I have a higher opinion on the game overall than you guys might.
But I'll say that, like, for what's... I think part of it is because of my expectations going into it, because of what you're talking about, this being a Tom Sawyer game that someone just said, like, okay, let's just try and see if we can get this out there. But to me, it seems clear that, like, almost against the odds, somebody who developed this game really cared about it.
Like, we've had so many games on the NES that just kind of, like, okay, they just put it out there. This feels like someone was, like, oh, I really want... Like, someone had some ideas and someone was passionate about it, which is what surprised me the most. Like, it feels like they put the effort into making the game feel good. They put the effort into making this enemy variety. I mean, literally every stage has, like, totally different enemies and totally different, like,
ways about it. Structure, yeah. And there's no stage in particular to me that feels bad or just thrown in there. I think that, you know, the flaws that we're talking about, like, they just come up throughout a little bit. And I even think some of them, I mean, I think I have a higher opinion on some of these things we're calling flaws than you guys do, too, because I didn't hate the enemy placement other than really that one... The only one I could think of is the one that I mentioned with the fish.
Like, some of it was definitely not, like... No, no, I don't hate Perfect game design, but, like... What's that? I don't hate the enemy placement. It was more so just, like... No. I'm sorry. Finish your thought. That's all right. Placement was maybe the wrong word, but with what you guys are talking about where it's, like, yeah, the AI being a little cheap sometimes or, like, I know that there are times where, like, an enemy just comes at you and, like, if you didn't think about it ahead of time, you're kind of screwed,
which would suck if it didn't, like... I felt like I sort of learned that stuff pretty early on whenever I met a new enemy and then when I saw them again, I at least had the knowledge to, like, figure out, like, what I should have done even if sometimes I didn't do it and died. I could still be like, well, okay, I guess I screwed that up and I should have done something else.
I'm not fully in that camp either. Like, I definitely think that that element of this game could have been buttoned up and improved, but it just didn't, like... It was nowhere near as bad as some other games that we've had where, like... I think it was, like, was it the Karate Kid or one of those games? Yeah, Karate Kid has a lot of problems that I think, you know, you're right. We're saying this game has those problems. It doesn't have that on that scale, but it is worth highlighting that there are some issues. Yeah, but I don't think that I've been criticizing this game's enemy placement. I think I've... I mean, what I've been saying about this game is that a lot of it is cookie cutter, except for a lot of it, but it's all... None of it really
makes it feel like a cohesive piece. It's just like, oh, it does this thing and that's new, but it only does that for a level. And like, oh, these enemies, like, respond to you in a way. And sometimes it feels cheap, but otherwise, it's actually like... It's kind of an interesting way to build some enemy behaviors, but it's only a few of them. And so a lot of it is just like, oh, it did this well, but it was just... It's just one piece of an otherwise, like, un... And I'm kind of like
telegraphing my opinion, but yeah. You don't take what you've learned and then have to improve it in the next level where it throws, like, the harder version of that at you or anything like that. Like, it's just like... It's just like six
totally different things. And like, I was going to save this for my essential vote, but maybe this will like help clear up kind of how I'm feeling about it. Like, by the end of this, I felt personally like this was the first six levels of what would have been a pretty good game. Like, I felt like it was like... I wanted more of this. I wanted like more levels like this later. Like, you know, like, I felt like it was just like they had a bunch of ideas and they just put them all in here with no, like... Yeah, no through line. Yeah. That is like... We haven't really touched upon it, but for something that's supposed to be based off of a literary,
historic, like, through line of American culture, this makes no sense. And I think even if I knew Tom Sawyer, this would make no sense. Does it make sense? Did anybody read this? We didn't... Well, I mean, I didn't read the manual, but I'll tell you, like, you know, just from playing the game. No, it is a nonsensical adventure here where they just took, you know, the idea... First off, I don't feel like they put any personality traits of Tom Sawyer into his character, right? I mean, he just throws rocks, but give him a paintbrush.
Give him a paintbrush as a weapon or something. I don't know. Isn't he like a con man or something? Like, isn't that his thing? What'd you say? Isn't he like a con man? Yeah, he's a con man. I thought Tom Sawyer was just a little school boy that, like, did his homework but also had some daydreams. He should have been able to bribe the enemies with money. If you have enough cash, they won't attack you. Wow.
Okay. See? No, no, no. What I really mean, though, is I just want to get back to my earlier point because I think this is a little bit of what Sean was saying and a little bit of what Joe was saying is that this game didn't need to be these six levels. It definitely needed to be more fleshed out, but even if you broke up these levels a little more based on the design mechanics that we experience for mere moments of gameplay and instead flush those out as their own levels,
similar to what happens with the Raft, right? Like, if there was a whole level, not just 15 seconds, where you're riding a cloud, I could get on board with that. Yes, it's nonsensical, but aren't most of these NES games? I think that's a cooler idea is just elongating your ideas and doing it the usual Nintendo approach where first you learn the new concept,
then you introduce the enemies, then it gets a little harder, then you take on a boss. Like, if they would have done that for each moment of these games, rather than make these little sweet spots in each level where something cool happens, I think you would have gotten a better game. Yeah, for sure. Absolutely. So you guys hadn't looked through the manual, right? I skinned the back flat. Okay, well, what I think is interesting about this manual is, like,
it just steps you through the entire game, which I know, like, okay, that sounds like a walkthrough, but no, it steps you through, like, it steps you through, like, this is where your journey begins. Here are all the levels. Here are all the enemies. These are each two levels. Great. Here's how the game ends. Yeah, like, oh, also there's this part, like, the wake-up Tom part. You know, it's like, it just tells you exactly, it's a text description of, like, the final scene of the game.
Like, it's literally exactly what happens. It's very quirky. Like, it's strange because it puts it as a section as if it's, like, something that you're going to need guidance on. It's literally just a, it's just an end screen with a little cinematic image of Tom doing his thing and, like, realizing that, was this a dream or was it not? And it, like, tells you that in the manual. So I just felt like something about this manual makes me feel like this is,
this would have been, like, I don't know, a game designed for, like, little kids, which is it when you play it. This is also, Joe, this is the moment where I was talking about a couple episodes ago where, like, the manual lets you experience the full game, something you might not do in the game itself. So if you're a kid who's unfortunate enough to not be able to get past the sky level or even the haunted house level, right, you can go to the manual and find out how it ends. We need to, we gotta teach these kids to get better at video games. Well, that's another thing. With the manual, like, I do remember now, it, like, describes the,
like, why you're fighting these, not why you're fighting these bosses because they're all, they're all nonsensical, but, like, it says that, like, oh, you'll fight a giant gorilla that's made up of all of these other tiny monkeys and then you see in the game all these tiny monkeys get together into, like, a cheer pyramid and then they turn into a giant gorilla. and I'm like, like, why do I need, why do I need deep lore on why this, this gorilla exists? Like, why can't you just show the giant gorilla? I will buy a giant gorilla in the jungle. You don't have to describe to me that it's made up of these tinier monkeys that will coalesce into, it, it doesn't make any sense, like, it makes less sense.
It's also funny because, like, in the game, it's very clear that that's how the gorilla appears. Yeah. Like, it's just funny to me that in the manual it has to say, like, it'll, like, this is how it appears.
Like, I don't know, it's just funny because, like, you don't need either of them, though. Like, just have a gorilla appear. But, like, you know, it's a, it's a, in the game, I get it. It's like a, it's just like a fun way that they wanted to design it. Like, whatever. It's it. It adds to the game's lore regardless of what Tom Sawyer's lore is. I just thought it was funny of, like, the manual to say,
like, to, like, literally describe everything that happens in the game, not just the hints, but, like, here's all, you can just read the manual and you'll, you know the whole game. Yeah. And in the manual, they name the giant gorilla too, Sarudan. And I just think, like, in the prequel to the Adventures of Tom Sawyer video game, they'll give him his explanation for why he got that name.
Good stuff about the manual, Joe. I did not, I did not realize how entertaining this could be. It's a shame. It reminds me that, you know, the complete experience of playing these older games is literally, like, you have to have the full package. Like, you have to look at the crazy box art and think about what they were trying to sell kids, right? Because so many kids just looked at the box art and thought that was the game. But most of the time the box arts don't even match up.
Then you have the manual, which is something that you are supposed to read before you ever even play the game, but will probably read after you get stuck in a certain way. Some people like to go in blind and then check it back. But, like, you're doing yourself a disservice, like I just did here, when you don't check all of these things out. And, like, if you play with the sound off, right? So you don't hear the music. Like, yeah, the music gets annoying, but, like, it's part of the whole design.
So even if you're only going to play these games nowadays for, like, 20 minutes or an hour, right? It's like you owe it to yourself to get fully immersed in it for the little time that you have it. Yeah. That's a good point. On the sequels and spinoffs side, I would be remiss to tell you that The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a book that is a sequel to The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,
which is not a video game, and I don't think it's ever been turned into a video game. However, there is another Tom Sawyer video game, and I believe it's the only other one of its kind. It is the Famicom exclusive Squares Tom Sawyer. It's the company Square, the RPG makers. Oh, my God. But it's called Squares Tom Sawyer. It's not just called Tom Sawyer developed by Square. Nostalgia Bite, I feel like. It might have to be. However, the game has never been translated into English.
Players control Tom Sawyer and his friends as they join the party. You know, the party being the party of role players such as Jim and Huck. And they each have RPG-like stats, but there is no experience level-up system. It's done just like Final Fantasy 2, the game that Square made just before making Square's Tom Sawyer, but afterwards they would make Final Fantasy 3. So this element has the Final Fantasy 2 saga style of games where if you take damage, you get stronger. If you use this weapon, you're better at this weapon.
The game features lots of different enemies and lots of different things that try to more or less stick to the story of the book a little closer than this game does, but it also features weird things like one particular enemy that can trigger the reset button on the player's controller, bringing them back to the title screen without saving. What? That's some Hideo Kojima shit right there. Yeah, I mean, they were thinking about it all the way back then. In 2010,
Yu-Gi-Oh!, the site, ranked it as the fourth most racist video game in history. Racist? Yes, racist. And I will just tell you that I saw one screenshot, which I will never share on our Twitter. Oh, no. But the blackface is bad in this game. Like, really bad. And Square ought to be ashamed of themselves for doing this. But at the same time, it's just like, why does this even exist? You think about all the games that are on your wish list of Square to make, right? And you never would think Tom Sawyer, an RPG on Tom Sawyer would be one of the games. Yeah, when you said that, I thought this must have been like pre-Final Fantasy Square. But you're telling me that they made Final Fantasy 2
with all these new systems based on life. Let's make some fucking Huckleberry shit. Yeah, they were like, oh, we got this new system that everyone's gonna love. Spoiler alert, that nobody really likes that system apparently in Final Fantasy 2. I've never played it. But then they're like, oh, you know, how do we get the Tom Sawyer fans? We gotta adapt this for the Tom Sawyer fans. Very, very strange. Especially because it only came out in Japan. So it's like, was Tom Sawyer Here's some American culture for only Japan.
Yeah, maybe they were like dodging copyright laws. Like, we were like, oh, we don't have to pay this because we're a Japanese company and this is American. Well, I feel like, I mean, it's also, it's in the public. I think it's in the... It is. I'm pretty sure it is, too. I mean, how do you think I got the first chapter of this book for a reason?
Yeah, we could be sued, actually. I didn't think about that. The Mark Twain estate. I read only the first paragraph of the first chapter for what it's worth and I cut it off mid-seam. That's under fair use, bro.
Yeah, there you go. So, that's really all I have, though, for the sequels and spinoffs. I just feel like if anybody ever wants to try and translate Square's Tom Sawyer, a lot of people in this world are probably looking for it. Itching for it. Now that we've mentioned it. Yeah, itching it. We are itching to do one last thing on this show, although that's not necessarily true because we do have a little fun thing after this as well, a little fun section to start the new year. So fun. But first, we've got to do the little thing that we call the Essential Games List.
Sean, we're going to go first with you. All right. Yeah, I feel like everything that I've set up to this point was foreshadowing that, again, like, for a game that sounds like no one should ever play this or everyone will have forgotten about this game by now, like, it is pleasantly surprising how well it plays. Like, it's not unpolished, but it was just not a great idea in the first place if they weren't going to try and work into some story beats of Tom Sawyer or just have the levels.
Like, the game should have been a different genre, I think. If this was like an adventure game in, like, the Goonies style or something, it might make a bit more sense. But it did have some ideas, and usually when I say that, that means that they weren't executed well. But obviously, this game is not essential. It's Tom Sawyer.
All right, all right. I'll go next. Pretty much echoing a lot of what Sean said, but one thing that I would like to throw out there as a bone to the people who do like The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, the game. The super fans. Yeah, you know, but like, this could be considered a game that you did not play during the original, like, time of owning an NES, and then you go back and you're looking for, like, another new platformer. And like, this makes that list, right, of a platforming game that you might not have heard of, and you try it out.
And like, I just don't think you're going to have a great time with it. That's the problem, is like, yeah, it's offering up some new stuff every now and again, and it's not, like, it's not a glitchy mess. It's not terribly hard. It is one of those games that you can probably beat if you just, like, keep with it. So,
yeah, like, it probably would wind up on at least a few people's hidden gems list. But I think to be an actual hidden gem, you don't just have to find a game that you never heard of that's, like, somewhat decent. A hidden gem is a game that actually, like, is surprising because of the route it takes that other games did not take, you know, or how closely it follows other great games. I wouldn't think of any game on the essential games list that, like, also reminds me of Adventures of Tom Sawyer. We've referenced a few during this episode, but mostly to talk about how Tom Sawyer executes those ideas poorly in comparison.
So, I don't think it even gets, like, hidden gem status for me. I think it just kind of gets, like, this video game was made and was sold under Adventures of Tom Sawyer license. It's on our official list of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's our official list. I'll create another section of the website just for that. Joe, your thoughts? I thought that this game,
I think, first of all, I've said it a couple times already, but my low expectations going in really helped color my, you know, the positive feelings I had about this game. I thought that it actually played pretty well, and I had some fun with it. I did. To talk about what I was saying before about the length,
I think that, you know, the way that you guys then addressed that, I agree with, that it needs to, instead of doing a bunch of, a ton of small, interesting new things, focus on one for a little while. Let that become the game for a little bit. And I think that that's where I was kind of going with the idea of it being a longer game.
Because I think you could have taken a lot of these things and, you know, again, to reference like Super Mario Bros. 3, you have, I think it's like the fourth level in that is like a sky level where you're jumping around on things in the sky. And then a few levels later, there's another one where it's a little harder. And then like later on in the game, there's more of those. And I feel like we could have done more of that. I would have liked a more challenging raft level now that I got the hang of it. And, you know, some of these other elements that come back in come later. I really feel like this is like just like a sampling of what could have been a much larger and, you know,
game that could end up being considered a hidden gem. But it doesn't quite reach that. I see the idea that it is like sort of a shovelware thing. It sort of just, it sort of just falls into like the background of all these other games like this we've played. And I'll say, if you want to, if you want to find like one of those random platformers, kind of like what you said, Mike, one of those random platformers that are just everywhere on the NES, this is a good choice, I think. If you want to find something that you've probably never played and no one really ever talks about. I think this is a good choice because it was still fun and it controlled well.
It just, it's just the whole thing is weird. Like, like its existence. Like if you, if you, if you separate it from its, from its like connection to Tom Sawyer, maybe you're like, oh, okay, like it's, it's an interesting little experiment. If you, if you then start considering that this is a Tom Sawyer game, you're probably like, what the, what is this? Why is this, you know,
granted I didn't read the book. Maybe this is exactly what the book is like. Maybe this is everything. Maybe, you know, there's, they really were really faithful to it. But overall, rambling a little bit, but not essential. I think I'll put it on my could have been a really good game list, but wasn't. Yeah. That's, that's a great list that we will also make a whole nother section of the website for. Add that list. Yeah. Now you have to remember, I'm talking about the website because if you haven't been paying attention, it's back, baby. We got the website back thanks to the patrons over at patreon.com slash nostalgia.
It just contributing even a dollar a month will get you a little special thank you on the thank you page, which is the homepage right now for the website. So if you ever wanted your name on the homepage of a website, similar to what Homer, yeah, I think Homer Simpson did that like back in 2000. He was the front page of the internet or something like that before Reddit. You could also be the front page of the... Kim Kardashian.
Oh, there you go. Yeah, she broke the internet. Oh, I see. Yeah, yeah. We're going to break the internet though too because the number of support that we have gotten is just, you know, we really want to thank everybody who's supported us so far and it's never too late to jump in too because at the $5 a month level, you get access to Nostalgia Bites and our first episode, Nuts and Milk, which I have to say like that every single time. I'm always going to laugh.
Yep, that game, it's coming up soon that episode so if you want to see what Nostalgia Bites is all about, remember it's a look through the Famicom library but with no Japanese language skills required. We're playing the Famicom games that you can play without knowing anything, without having eyes. No, that's not true. You need eyes. You also need ears to hear the podcast so I just feel like full disclosure.
One thing that we're going to do now that has nothing to do with giving us any kind of money or support or tweeting nice things at us is we're going to take a look at 2021 in an unfamiliar way for us. We are going to talk about each of us is going to give our favorite NES game that we played in 2021 according to the show obviously. We can't go ahead. We can't skip. And we're also going to talk about our favorite game of 2021. The ones that came out in 2021. So, Sean, I don't know if it's a good or a bad idea but I kind of want to start with you. It's a terrible idea, Mike. I don't know what you think I'm going to say. But,
no, I mean, for the podcast, I think that the game that I liked the most was, it's a pretty common answer I would say, is like Ninja Gaiden. that was just a game that we all really appreciated and it was put together well and we had a lot of fun with it. I don't really have much to say that wasn't said in the episode.
But that's my answer for that. But the more interesting answer since we don't really talk about this on the podcast is, you know, my favorite game that was released in 2021. 2021. And I actually had to go back and look because I'm really bad with dates and like time scales all messed up. So, I looked back and I saw what was released recently and it's a game that I actually played pretty recently and it's a game called Forgotten City.
This game started out as I think like a Skyrim mod that was like a total conversion and like there was no Skyrim elements. It was just like you play this mod and then eventually I think that they got some kind of funding and they made their own game out of it. I think in a different engine but basically I'll give a little synopsis. You play a modern person that goes back in time to like ancient Rome and you enter this city that
they all have to follow these rules and not commit a sin or else everybody dies and it turns into this Groundhog Day slash Sherlock Holmes slash murder mystery thing where you're trying to figure out the secret of this little town while also fixing your past mistakes and I just really like the narrative structure of this game and the writing and the
art and all that it's a lot of fun so if you're into that weird shit I'd give the Forgotten City a try. That was a very nice synopsis thank you for that Sean and what an interesting pick too I honestly have not heard anything about that so I'm going to look into that for sure please and you know we'll put a link to it in the show notes absolutely
Joe I'll save you a minute I'm gonna go first just because it seems to be that the order of things that we're doing lately Sean, me, Joe so real fast my favorite NES game of 2021 that we played was Mega Man 2 and that's a surprising answer for me I know it's not a surprising answer for NES fans or anything like that because it's one of the most popular NES games but I was really surprised at the the step up from Mega Man 1 that Mega Man 2 was it wasn't just like you know more creative enemies or a longer game which both of those things it has but it also figured out like some of the more difficult points that Mega Man 1 was doing and found a way to introduce
elements to make the game not easier right because there is an easier mode in there but it's just health is more frequently given out and the new power ups that they give you in terms of movement also help you navigate the platforming sections a little more uniquely and I know we said this all in the episode as well so I don't want to go too much further into it but I was personally surprised because Mega Man 1 was definitely an essential game and Mega Man 2 is a better essential game so that says a lot about that particular game
now my favorite game of 2021 I have to be honest I play a lot of retro games and retro games can mean whatever you want them to mean for me it just means like 10 years prior so anything like 2011 and backwards
but like that's how retro games work if you think about it right like anything that came out on the Wii is now retro well hold on I thought we were talking about games that came out in 2021 exactly so that's what I'm saying I play a lot of these older games I don't play too many 2021 games but when I do play a game in 2021 I often find myself to be pretty frustrated because I'm used to these shorter
more quality because I've been given the time to like let critic responses set in and the narrative you know the canon be set I very rarely play bad games unless they're for nostalgia you know I mostly just play what
what is considered like you know the greatest games of all time and stuff like that so for 2021 I did play a few good games and the one that I want to highlight is Metroid Dread and obviously that's a safe pick because it was even nominated for game of the year and stuff like that but what makes Metroid Dread interesting for me is it is not the highest point in the Metroid series even for the 2D style games obviously like Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion are like the top when it comes to that kind of style of game but Metroid
Dread reintroduced that feeling to me in a way I didn't think anybody other than Nintendo could this was a Mercury Steam game and it was surprising how close they got to the quality of a game like Super Metroid one of the greatest games of all time so I would say if you're at all on the fence about picking up Metroid Dread because you saw like that it's a little more survival horror-y or it's a little more like straightforward that you can't
really skip sequences and stuff like that first off neither one of those things is true so that should help inform your opinion but also at the end of the day it's just a great Metroid game that doesn't rely too much on new unfamiliar mechanics but just relies on the best things that Metroid is so that's why I had a really good time with it because it goes back to that idea that I mostly just play I'm going to go in the reverse order just because there's an interesting situation for my 2021 pick in that when I look through all the games that were released in 2021
or all the games that I played in 2021 none of them were released in 2021 I didn't play any game that was released in 2021 did not realize that until tonight but yeah so I had to kind of go back a little further it's a little cheating I went back to my most recent game before 2021 which was I think in November of 2020 which was Spider-Man Miles Morales which might feel kind of like cheating because just any game that I played the most recently to 2021 would have to fit that category but rest assured that I do love that game it probably is my favorite game of 2020 so I had a blast with that I love that and the original 2018 Spider-Man PS4 I think that they really make you feel like Spider-Man they just
let you I don't know really explore the city which I haven't been to Manhattan since the pandemic so it was really interesting for me to explore as Spider-Man where I used to be every day you're just getting that no way home money right now exactly yes
I might have to re-pick up this game now after seeing Spider-Man No Way Home I'm in the Spider-Man spirit so I loved that game as far as favorite game that we played in 2021 for the podcast
I know no one will be surprised by this and I promise I'm not just trolling like I normally do but it is Zelda 2 which made it in just under the wire getting early on in 2021 and I just can't emphasize enough how much fun I had with that game and how surprised I was because of the bad reputation it has but that game felt like one of the closest to me to being like a modern experience I mean obviously you could tell it's still an NES game but it felt like I was sitting down to start this whole campaign of a story like I do today that you rarely find on the NES and it gave me similar but refreshingly different vibes to the original Legend of Zelda which obviously is way up there as well so I just can't get over how much I love that game and
how it is not on the essential games list I will definitely bring it up in our best of best of 1989 I'll do my best to try and convince you guys otherwise I don't know if I can convince you guys to play it again or whatever but I really want to try and get that on all right and of course there's lots to look forward to in 2022 now that we're in it there's many games coming out in 2022 that I know people are excited about but there's also 51 more episodes of NostalgiaCast happening in 2022 and that's something to be thankful for in fact there's a lot more episodes of NostalgiaCast to come if you think about Nostalgia Bites you know just throwing! ! NostalgiaCast
NostalgiaCast Thank you.
