329 · Rocket Ranger

• The 21st Century needs you!
• NES Longplay
• Manual
• The 21st century needs us
• Rocket Ranger is the rocketeer
• Cinemaware
  • Defender of the crown
  • Three stooges
  • They’ll go bankrupt next year in 1991
• Aliens have invaded earth and they’ve brought their own moon
• They have the technology to bring their moon to the earth, but their military capabilities are stuck in WW2
  • They traveled through space on zeppelins?
• Okay so clearly this is a censored game. It was Nazi germany and hitler was all over the original Amiga version of the game
  • So it’s still science fiction but loses some of the steampunk?
  • Aliens do show up in the OG game though. Turns out there’s a galactic federation of fascists
• Strategy Action game
  • The war room shows the world map and who controls what territories
  • You can assign agents to areas for recon
    • Find items required to get to the moon or help delay the US invasion
  • You can’t stay in the US for more than a year or you will be arrested for cowardice
  • As much as it is a territory control game, it also winds up being a resource management game (You need Lunarium)
    • Fuel Depot to transfer
    • Rocket Lab to keep track of what pieces you’re missing
    • Take Off to other destinations requires lunarium
• Combat with the aliens
• Sequels and spinoffs
  • A kickstarter remake was fully funded in 2014 and fully canceled in 2015
  • Malibu comics published 5 issues of a comic based on the game in 1991, but it ends on a cliffhanger. Never finished
• EGL
• Next week - Shingen the Ruler
• NEStalgia Byte

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

00:00 Rocket Ranger, the 21st century needs you!

00:19 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. And the year is 1990 is the first thing you see in this game. So what is the 21st century involved in that? Well, it's right around the corner. I guess. There's going to be a lot of questions like that, right, though? Like, as we continue to explore this game, we're going to have a lot of time period questions. Yeah? Yes, for sure. And probably questions that are pretty easy to answer, too. Yeah, that's true, too. But, you know, in 1990, they probably weren't that easy to answer and a lot of kids were probably scratching their heads. Yeah. True. Or just not even thinking about it, right?

01:04 Right? Because we'll get into it. But Rocket Ranger, it's kind of like, it's kind of like the Rocketeer, right? That movie? I never saw that movie. But just even look at the pose of the box and everything and, like, the pose on the Rocketeer. You know, do it on your own time, your own homework.

01:22 I'm not saying that there's, like, a plot similarity. I guess I'm just thinking, like, CinemaWare, which is the company that made this game, made a lot of games that, like, were also inspired by different movie genres. And so I wouldn't be surprised if, like, yeah, this is, like, a science fiction war drama game. But, like, I wouldn't be surprised if it also was just a, we saw the Rocketeer and decided to make this because of how cool that was. The vibes I got was of an old Xbox game from days of yore called Crimson Skies, which was, like, you know, kind of steampunky. But then I realized what this game was actually doing, and it wasn't really that anymore.

02:13 CinemaWare, you may remember, they are the development team behind Defender of the Crown. Do we remember that game? Yeah, that was the Nobunaga's Ambition-like. Yes, Nobunaga's Ambition-like. Did I not play that one? I didn't play that one. Yeah, I don't think you played that one, but I will say this. I was very favorable towards it. It didn't get an Essential Games list vote, but I liked it, I beat it, and I was happy. It was cute. Because, yeah, it was Nobunaga for kids, the way that these games should have always been, essentially.

02:45 And they also made the Three Stooges game that we played. And that's weird. That's really weird, right? Like... They had to rebuild the... What was it? It was an orphanage? Yes, that was the goal of the game. Okay, good. They had to raise enough money to do it. However, it's clear now between Rocket Ranger and Defender of the Crown that, like, strategy games are their thing. And the Three Stooges was more of like a, we'll give you this license if you guys want to make a game about the Three Stooges. And they were like, yeah, guys, the Three Stooges is going to be so hot right now.

03:25 The other games in between that, just to fill in the gap, they did not come to the NES, but there was a game called The King of Chicago, which, following the whole, like, movie theme, that's like, you know, mob movies and everything. And, you know, you're, like, in Al Capone's ranks and everything and trying to rise up and stop New York from taking over, you know? I'm walking here. Were there, like, turf wars between the Chicago mob and the Five Families in New York? Even just the idea that they would get to Chicago, right? Like, they'd have to take all the land between before they get to Chicago.

04:04 You know, was the government aware? I don't know. Then there's another game called SDI, which is, like, Cold War era, you know, United States versus Russia. Star Wars. Yeah. Absolutely.

04:19 And then Sinbad and the Throne of the Falcon. Okay, now, I don't really know much about the Arabian, 1001 Tales of Arabian Nights or whatever, but, like, apparently that's what that's based on. Not based on, like, Sinbad, the guy? No, no. Yeah. And nor his genie movie that never existed. Cedric the Entertainer? Cedric the Entertainer the First. Sorry. Go on, Mike. Yeah, I'm not even, that's a tangent I don't even want to explore, okay? I don't even know what the heck that could be. But what I do know is that in Rocket Ranger, aliens are invading the Earth, and they've brought their own moon.

05:05 Yeah, literally, I never thought about that. That is true. It's their moon. They brought their own moon. They were, you know, they fought a land war, and now they have their own country. They do respect international borders for the most part.

05:22 They have biplanes. They look kind of like humans. Sean, they have the technology to bring their moon to the Earth, but their military capabilities are stuck in World War II. Well, they wasted all the technology towing the moon. Yeah. So you don't think that they traveled through space on Zeppelins, they just took the Zeppelins that were available on Earth? Well, they held them on the moon. Like, they built all the Zeppelins, they just hung out on the moon, and then they tugged the moon to our, you know, solar system, and then they prime-shipped the Zeppelins onto Earth,

06:04 where they established their nation state. I think they were just the Nazis. Oh, it could just be the Nazis. It could just be that this is a censored game, and it was actually Nazi Germany all along, which would have been a great twist, honestly, right? Like, if the aliens were just the Nazis. Nazi Germany pretending to be an alien invasion, and they're, like, way overboard with this plan.

06:32 Well, yeah, they figured it's like, you know, they failed the first time, now they have to, like, go to outer space, come back, and it's like, nope, it was just the rest of us, the ones you didn't get the first time, were the second time even, because they tried it twice. Third time's a charm. No, this is a World War II strategy game with just some steampunk elements with the Rocket Ranger, and for whatever reason, you know, we know that Nintendo apparently has a thing against, you know, the Nazi stuff, but meanwhile, I keep referring to the Bionic Commando Hitler exploding face.

07:12 So I don't know what... That wasn't him. That was just a guy with a weird mustache. Yeah. I guess you're right. That was Groucho Marx. Right, right. So this is a censored game, and the original version was on the Amiga, but it's still, like, so it's science fiction, but does it lose the steampunk, or does the steampunk stay? Is there, like, a word for steampunk, but in the space race? Was it steampunk? Was that, like... Well, I just figured the Rocket Ranger himself, like, running on the... I'd say that this is a mix between, as a, as somebody that dabbles in the punk genres,

07:50 I'd say this is, like, a cross between steampunk and diesel punk, which is, like, less Victorian influenced and more, like, you know, World War influenced. I gotcha. Yeah. See, from me, like, just playing with, like, the sprite on screen, he just looked... I mean, I know that he's, like, running off of this fuel, so, like, it's a little different. But he looks so, like, Cyberman, you know? He looks so, like, futuristic compared to everything else in this game. Yeah, it's also kind of, like, ray gun gothic stuff. Yeah. It's got a lot of weird influences that we have weird genre names for.

08:27 So, the original game had, you know, the US versus Germany, and you gotta try to make sure that you stop the invasion before they get to the United States, because then they'll take over the White House. And that still happens with the aliens. But here's a weird thing, a weird development. Aliens do show up in the original game. Oh, they do. Okay, so, whether it takes place in 1942 or 1990, it doesn't matter, because aliens show up. Turns out there's a galactic federation of fascists that are just ready to help.

09:03 I wish I was making it all up, but... So, I guess they figured, eh, we have aliens in the game. What if we just made them the whole enemy, and that's how we can get ourselves on the Nintendo? I hated saying that, but I had to finish the thought.

09:18 I mean, I guess, like, because... And it's something that I think is pretty common knowledge, but, like, Japan... Not Japan. Germany. I'm not sure if it's still ongoing, but for a very long time, like, wouldn't allow even, like, modern Wolfenstein games to show Nazi imagery. So, I think they just already had, like, a German translation lying around, and they just used that, right?

09:44 Yep, that's exactly what happened. Um, I like my story better, that they just said, like, oh, well, we had aliens in the game, so let's just strip everything else out. Um, but that's obviously not what we got, because it's the full game otherwise. They didn't change any, um, any of the mechanics or the way that the game works. And it's a strategy action game, because it's not just, um, you know, the risk board game style of, like, putting pawns on territories and, uh, you know, commanding attacks and watching things just play out over simulation.

10:19 It's, uh, it's like twofold. You have the war room where you kind of plan everything out, assign agents, um, decide where you're going to travel to with your rocket, all the normal stuff in war. And then there's the actual, like, stages themselves, which vary on, like, what you do in terms of gameplay. So, now that I've kind of covered the game, uh, how easy was it to understand all of the, uh, actions available to you?

10:49 Um, I'll say it was, it turned out to be a lot easier than I thought it was going to be when I first booted this up. When I first booted this up, I was like, okay, this is a manual game. I definitely need to, like, look into this manual and see what's going on. But first, I'll dabble around in it. And it took me, you know, it took me maybe a couple of cycles through, like, a couple different little missions and back before I'm like, okay, I get what I'm doing here.

11:11 It's, it's, it's, it's surprisingly a pretty straightforward gameplay loop once you kind of give it a chance. Yeah, I had some trouble getting my head wrapped around it. Um, there were several times when I would accidentally trigger the, uh, the road to nowhere scene, which I guess just wastes your time and your, and your very limited fuel resource. And I wasn't really sure how to get fuel.

11:41 And it seemed like there was just so much to do and so many rocket parts to get before, like, I felt like I was going to get to, like, act two or whatever. Um, so it's definitely challenging if you're not using, uh, you know, the resources that would have been available to you at the time.

11:58 And it's really because the game just dumps you in there, right? Uh, there is a manual to refer to, but even so, uh, a manual that explains what all of the systems do isn't helpful to just be thrown in. And, and you wind up, we were talking about Nobunagas earlier, and this game isn't as complicated as that, uh, in terms of like the freedom to just do so much. But because there is just the ability to just say like, okay, well, I'm Rocket Ranger and I'm just going to go travel over, uh, to this country.

12:30 You could really like screw yourself over there, uh, by doing that without doing all the other things that are possible. So it winds up becoming a little bit of information overload. And then as you digest how things work, then it's just like, okay, place these agents here, do the recon, find out where the next stage might be, travel to that area, uh, you know, and continue to progress that way. And I believe it is randomized. So it's not the kind of thing that you can just go on game FAQs and say like, place this agent here, do this, which is nice. Yeah. I appreciate that.

13:08 Um, even though no matter what I did, I felt like I was just getting like very goading messages from the leader of the space Nazis. They're like, oh, I, I arrested your guy. He's like, uh, he's getting tortured right now. Uh, now you have less agents. And I wasn't really sure how to get more agents. So I don't know if I like started a downward spiral or if I was missing something entirely.

13:32 I wonder, so this is something I never really kind of got the answer to while playing, but I wonder if that has to do with, um, whether or not you're putting your agent in high risk or low risk. It definitely matters. What exactly does that do? It just, it, it, as far as I know, right. If they are in high risk, uh, cover, then they are able to potentially gain more information or, or, um, yeah, quickly.

13:58 Uh, and, but then obviously the trade-off is, is that they could be caught and then you get that message from, it's not from your agent anymore. I was doing low risk every time. Yeah, no, I mean, it could happen either way. Right. It's, it's just a dice roll, but like it, right. Don't you get like a message from the, uh, enemy? That's what I was saying. Yeah. See, cause I only got a message like that one time and it was on someone that I had high risk. And then from then on, I just used low risk.

14:21 And the game for me became about how do I time it properly? Where it's like, if I have a couple agents here and it takes whatever, a couple of turns or whatever before they have information, I wanted to always have like somebody cooking of like, okay, now, now by the time I've done another thing, this person will have information on this place and like, and, and have a, you know, like that kind of became the challenge for me, but maybe that would have been less of a challenge if I started doing high risk, but then obviously presumably there'd be more risk. It seems like you're, you're playing a strategy game correctly, uh, the way you were doing it. Yeah.

14:57 Thank you. And I'm not sure if you can get more agents. Uh, I did, I didn't see that covered in the manual and I certainly never found any, so I don't know if you can get more agents. That's a good question. Joe, any answers on that? I didn't get any more agents. Right. Okay. So that's, that's why you might as well just always run roll low risk, but, uh, yes, it's confirmed that it is just the amount of time that, um, it takes them to, uh, get that information over to you. So let's start there, right? Because in the war room, you have the world map and it shows you who controls what territories you're chilling over in the United States.

15:33 Turns out don't chill over there too long because if you stay there for more than a year, you will be arrested on charges of cowardice, uh, which is just, which is just funny in itself, but like never had that happen. That's yeah. Don't do that. It is funny. I did do. I just wanted to see. And unfortunately there's no like additional scene of like you in cuffs or something like the rocket ranger in cuffs. It's just a text box that tells you the game's over and that you failed to act when your country needed you most. But, um, we have those agents. They are placed, but you don't have to keep them there. You can move them to other areas, uh, and choose like, again, the risk stuff and what information they currently have, uh, available.

16:17 But as much as the game is a territory control game, it also winds up being a resource management game. You need what is referred to in the game as Lunarium, uh, which is what your, uh, rocket ranger rocket runs on. But you need that for more than just the rockets. You need, you need the rocket lab, uh, to keep track of what pieces you're missing, the fuel depot to transfer, uh, these Lunariums.

16:44 And then, um, the takeoff to other destinations requires a certain amount of Lunarium or else you can't get to, uh, the, the next location, which is, uh, the only other way I think of to travel is the SOS, which can return you back to the United States. I think it's like a one way back to home base free. Like it's free, right? Yep. Yeah. But there's, there's only so much that you start with and it, it, it's like, it takes a while to get more.

17:14 Oh yeah. So you have to be really, you have to be really like good or lucky to even be able to like not soft lock yourself. Yeah. And soft locking was something that I wanted to like, I wasn't sure, I wanted to ask you guys cause I wasn't sure if like I was missing something on how to get out of this, but you know, my first play through, I effectively soft locked myself where it's like, okay, I'm stranded. I don't have fuel and I can't get, I can't leave this place.

17:37 I don't have enough fuel. And I was like, there must be some way to do it. But I eventually just started the game over and like with a little bit of a better understanding and did a little better the next time. But like, yeah, you just like screwed. I mean, yeah, I can SOS back home and then I still don't have any fuel. So I still can't go to it. If you're out of agents, you're out of agents. If you're out of fuel, then you like, and it doesn't like, it doesn't say like, oh, we're going to stop you here. Like it'll let you keep playing.

18:01 Yeah. There's no game over. It's just like, yeah, you're here. This is, you're stuck. Yeah. I guess the only thing you can do is just continue to fast forward the months until you lose, until they get to the United States, which is weird, but probably preferable than having some kind of game over screen.

18:18 Well, I think if there's, if you're in a truly unwinnable situation, I think that should count as a fail state instead of possibly wasting your time. Yeah. Or forcing a restart, like a physical restart. Yeah. There not being a fail state makes me think, okay, there's something I can do. Yeah. I don't want to quit. Like I still think there's something I can do. So I'm still just like, yeah, sitting there. Maybe I'm just not fully understanding the game and maybe there are things you can do, but I didn't understand the game well enough.

18:48 Could be. Well, I am trying to think of that, that next thing you could do. And I don't think I have the answer, but I think that proves that even after spending some time with the game, and granted we didn't spend hours and hours with the game, but after spending some time with the game, it still is hard to get a grasp on like, especially with the resources. That's why I was saying it's more of a resource management game than a territory control game, because I'm just trying to think about like, do I even have enough Lunarium to get to the next, uh, the next, uh, objective?

19:17 Exactly. Yeah. Um, also I wanted to circle back to something you mentioned, Mike, about the, uh, you know, the different, you mentioned like the war room, the fuel depot, the rocket lab, uh, and, and like kind of the way you described it, I felt made it sound like there is like a lot of things to do with this fuel. And there's a lot, I did feel like some of these like home-based things were like kind of overinflated to me. You know, it looks like a lot of things, but like the war room is important. You go there, you can tell, you can, you can assign agents to places, you can tell people what to do. The fuel depot.

19:52 I mean, yeah, you have your reservoir of fuel. And you can allocate that to your jet pack or to your spaceship. You don't need the spaceship until the very last minute. Just put it all in your jet pack all the time.

20:03 Like the fuel depot thing almost doesn't even need to exist. Like it could just be in my jet pack. Then the rocket lab, literally you click on it, it just says, Hey, this is what you got to do. Like, it's like, I'm expecting like the rocket lab. I'm going to go there. I'm going to like have some exposition with, I mean, this game is no stranger to exposition. Have like some exposition with like, like a rocket scientist or something. He's going to tell me like, here's your mission. And like, here's some tips or not. It's literally a sentence on the screen that says like, you still got to get this.

20:29 That's the rocket lab. And then takeoff is like the game. So it does feel like, Oh, this big menu. And it's like, Oh, there's actually really, there's a couple of them that are just like a little overly inflated to feel like bigger things in my opinion.

20:41 Yeah. I was going to say that like at, at first glance, I got like lots of XCOM vibes and yes, I know, I know that this is like aliens and stuff, but just the whole idea of like a base and resource management and, and, uh, control of, uh, uh, land control sectioned off by regions and agents. And like, it felt very like, Oh cool. And then there's going to be like, this isn't the same complaint. And then there's going to be an equally as interesting, like action part of this. But, and this is where I, I get a little off track. It just, it's like the, the, the other stuff that you do is not fun.

21:25 That's a pretty, uh, objectively true statement. But Sean, what is the other stuff that you do? So you either, uh, play like a really bad version of punch out. Um, sorry. It's a, it's a very simplified version of punch out trying to use less qualitative statements here. Um, or a very hard to aim like slow mo shmup, um, from behind you as you're on your rocket pack. Uh, these are the action sequences. And as far as I know, those are the only action sequence.

22:05 Uh, there are more. Yeah. There's a couple more, but they're all, they're all similar. Like, yeah, but I, I, I want to say that the first thing, when I first got into the, the, the, like the shmup part you're talking about, where you are, you are this man in his rocket, his rocket suit. First of all, I was like, whoa, like I, after the first couple minutes of this game playing, like looking at the, at the war room and stuff, I did not expect to ever be taking control of somebody in the sky shooting things. So I was like, like, I actually, I think I gasped out loud for a moment.

22:36 And then the second thing I noticed was that like, it feels kind of cool to fly around in this. It's, there's something about it feels like floatier and smoother than a lot of things that we play. Uh, and then the third thing I noticed about it is that, so yeah, it's very, it's a very bad shmup in the way you have to shoot things.

22:51 Yeah. It's the way you have to shoot them. That becomes the problem. If they just would have made it that if at any point your bullet intersects the, with the person that they get hit, it's the fact you have to like arc this trajectory. But there's no actual feedback as to where it ends aside from like, oh, I guess like four inches up the screen. Right. Yeah. That's the issue. It's a lot about timing, which isn't like, isn't inherently bad. I mean, I will say that of the mini games, this was my favorite one or the ones that involved shooting things while flying were my favorite ones. It just wasn't that good. Although fully voice acted, which was cool.

23:25 Oh, I like to be, I like the temple. The one where the guys are shooting at you from inside the temple. And I guess that's on the shmup. That's like a, like a, what do you call it? That's like a contra behind the levels.

23:43 It's more of a. I just think of it as like space invaders. Yeah. It's like space invaders. You're at the bottom. They're at the top. You're just shooting them as they become available. And it was very simple. I think maybe that's what I liked about it. It was like satisfying to take out these guys that are shooting at you while you're deep in the trenches and you just slowly take them all down. And then for whatever reason, it just says, fill it up, alien scum. It's like, are you, are you demanding they fill up your tank for, of Lumerium? Like, why don't you just like also just take them prisoner too? I don't know. I don't know how, I don't know what the rules are of an intergalactic.

24:20 Yeah. Well, another one that, another one that wasn't horrible. You know, I feel like I'm walking back. Like how bad all these were. Like they, they, they weren't terrible. They were weird. They were just weird. But like the other one that like I didn't hate was the, um, you're like shooting at like boats on the water and you're kind of arcing.

24:36 And the reason I, I liked this a little better was because it like, it hits the water and leaves like a ripple. And that gives like that explosion of a ripple. Oh, feedback. There's some feedback. Well, feedback. But also, I mean, like while that ripple's happening, the ship, even if you missed it, can still drive, can still float into it and you'll still get it. So it gives you like a little bit of extra, like, oh, I can hit this here and time it. So it's like, I don't have to time it exactly. So it's going to land on the boat. I just know the boat's about to be there. You're using, okay. So you're saying that you like the parts that work properly. Uh, yes. Controversial statement, but I do like that part.

25:15 But, uh, yeah, like that wasn't, that wasn't terrible either. It's just, they're just like a little, there's something lacking to them, but not the voice acting. That is great.

25:29 Thank you.

25:58 It's, but it's weird that they're saying that they're aliens and they're humans, right? Like, I mean, I'm sure that aliens can be, uh, bipedal, but like they look exactly like Star Trek. Sorry. Star Trek aliens. They might have like a third eyebrow or something. Yeah. And what's going on with the Star Trek aliens on the moon? The girls who are like barely dressed, but are ready to take you down, uh, on the moon. That was strange. But the game references that the game says like, and you weren't sure why they all looked human. Like, I feel like, did you wait, did we just friendly fire a bunch of humans? Like, like it says it like that.

26:37 Um, so at least it's like, oh, it's aware enough to be like, how are we going to fix that? They're all human. Should we change the sprite? Like, no, let's just put one sentence where you're like, wow, that's weird. They're all human. Yeah. You're right, Joe. It says you have won. You pause for a moment. Curious at how much the aliens looked like humans, especially their eyes. Could it have been a disguise? No matter though.

27:00 You have seen the last of the Lutonians. You could have just been lied to by your government to commit genocide. And you're just like, no matter though. Right. So that's what's even, it gets even crazier though, Sean, right? So they're saying that like, oh, they look like humans. They have, especially their eyes. Could it have been a disguise? You've seen the last of these guys. And then you immediately see. Ooh, that's a beautiful poem. You see a freaky alien, full screen spray, like no backdrop or whatever. It's pretty metal.

27:30 And all you have to do is shoot out its giant eyes, which is not really a tough task. But it like vomits. And it seems like it's kind of easy to dodge that. But it does move its eyes. So that's a little bit annoying. But you hit those eyes. What do you have to say about its size? The size of its eyes are a nice prize.

27:51 Surprise. There you go. Thank you. But what I meant to say is that like, so that confirms that the aliens do look different than the humans that you've been firing at all game. Well, he alluded to it being a disguise. They can't. This guy's gigantic. They can't disguise themselves like that. That's true. Also, this is the first ever NES jump scare that there's been in any of our games. I mean, this thing was just like, oh, no matter. I guess you beat the game. And then it's like, it literally makes like a noise like that. This giant creepy ass thing on a red background. Like, and it's actually a pretty creepy looking sprite just is there, like with a loud noise.

28:29 So you're like, oh my God, I got to fight more? I would argue Jason popping up on screen in Friday the 13th is just as uncomfortable because you know that you can't take him yet. That's true. I don't remember any games passed two weeks ago. Right, right, right.

28:47 Or, you know, for a Nostalgia Bites reference, our other podcast on Patreon.com. When the chairs fall out. Yeah, when the chairs just fly out at you in Sweet Home. We promise it's worth an episode. It's actually a great game, but that's a little silly thing that happens that I would count as a jump scare. Yeah, that's fair. But this one, like, I guess I'm saying this one kind of got me. It jumped me. Well, if it scared you. Is this one written by John Steinbeck?

29:12 If it scared you with the alien, then surely it warmed your heart when you saw the romantic kiss that you shared with. No, it was even scarier. Why is he looking at me like that? Close your eyes, you're kissing someone. You don't open your eyes and keep looking at the guy over the girl's shoulder. Not if, I mean, not unless you're trying to make a statement. Like, his statement is like, eh? Like, you see this? You see this? Yeah, check it out.

29:38 And I will, I just, I can't let this one go, dude. It's just like, it's like the highest fidelity, like, sprite work and, like, motion in this game. It's like that guy's eyelids opening up and looking at you while he's just making out with this woman. Just making sure you know who's Top Dog.

29:55 So what do you guys make? That's like the end of the game, right? Well, yeah, at the end of the game is the very end of the game. But I was going to ask, what does that make of the actual adventure, right? I didn't beat the game, so I found this out after the fact. But I mean, the actual adventure of, or even the juxtaposition between the war room and the strategy parts and then them trying to, you know, introduce more traditional video game elements with the shooter stages and the hand-to-hand combat and stuff. Like, do you think that they are telling, even if it is repetitive, they're telling a

30:31 story worth adventuring for? I will say that I appreciated the lengths that this game went to to actually give you context, at least, about, like, the plot. Like, you're getting, and, you know, some might say that this is actually, like, bad. But as opposed to many NES games which just have, like, nonsense in the manual and the game is just a bunch of action, like, front to back. Like, the fact that this one kind of gave you some information so that you're in the know between each level, like an actual block of text, sort of, I appreciated that. It gave me the idea that they're actually trying to tell some kind of story.

31:23 And I don't know if that answers your question. I forgot what your question was. Okay. Yeah. I thought that it had a consistent tone to it, if that makes sense. Like, it felt like, and I've never seen one of these, but I use this term as if I know what it is because I've heard it enough. It felt like a Saturday morning cereal. Yes. I'd say that's correct. I think that's what it felt like, you know, because it's what everyone always references, like, what Star Wars was based on. And, like, you know, what's it called?

31:56 What's the big one with, like, the quarterback that goes to space? The Flash Gordon kind of thing. Oh, yeah. Quarterback that goes to space is a better title. Yeah. That's what it should have been called. But, you know, at first I was a little, like, put off by, like, the wall of text between every thing, which we, you know, we didn't talk so much about. But, yeah, it's like a significant paragraph story, like, for everywhere you go. And I did grow to appreciate that because they weren't, I mean, yeah, there were some repetitive ones and stuff.

32:27 But, like, yeah, it always kind of gave you, like, a different context, like you said, to each mission. So that was kind of cool. Are you more accepting to these giant text boxes because of the kind of game that it's presenting to you? And what I mean by that is, like, knowing that this is kind of a strategy game that requires some thought and involves, like, some recon and stuff like that, are we more

32:51 welcoming of the text boxes? If these kinds of text boxes showed up between scenes in Ninja Gaiden, would we have said, like, oh, that's cool? Yeah, I know what you're saying. And I agree. As somebody that plays a lot of text-heavy strategy games currently, I guess I feel more at home that they're in games like this now.

33:14 I think it's still a little, there's some whiplash when the action sequences are so, like, simple. Like, the actual stuff that you're doing between all these decisions and these story beats are just, like, the simplest action game you can think of.

33:36 But, yeah, I am giving it some leeway because of the kind of game that it's at least pretending to be. Yeah, I think that there's two ways to look at this kind of game where either, one, it is, it is, like, kind of like a poorly done action game that also then makes you sit through a bunch of text. Or, two, it's, like, a very text-heavy strategy game that, like, went the extra mile and added some kind of mediocre mini-games that they didn't even need to include.

34:06 And I feel like that's kind of more, yeah, that's why I'm more forgiving on the text box. The latter, the latter. Yeah, because it's, like, yeah, like, the text box, the text box stuff and, like, that stuff seems like more the game. It's, like, telling this sort of story in that way and, you know, the strategy is front and center. And then they, like, oh, they also added some of these action games. And, you know, your mileage may vary on those, but at least they added them. You know, I see it that way to some extent. On the sequels and spinoff side, a Kickstarter for a remake of Rocket Ranger was fully funded in 2014 and fully canceled in 2015. So, did that mean they just made off with the money?

34:47 They did refund. Oh, okay. That's good. Fantastic. Fully canceled, I think, implied the refund in my terminology. You know? Was there a cancellation trailer? There was no cancellation trailer. We're still waiting on one. For those of you that don't know, Joe and I wish that somebody would cancel the game at E3. And now that E3 is gone, we'll just have to hope that somebody else just does it on YouTube or something, whatever, wherever we go next. I want to press event with a long, beautiful trailer at the game. And then at the end, it says, like, you know, whatever.

35:20 The last Guardian canceled underneath. Yeah, maybe somebody, one of our listeners can help me out with this. I had, like, a recollection. It was probably a fever dream of them doing this with the Final Fantasy XV DLC that they, like, announced in a trailer that they were canceling the remainder of the DLC, but still going to do episode Arden or whatever it was. If anybody can find that for me, really appreciate it. Probably doesn't exist, though, so don't spend too much time.

35:52 Also on the sequels and spinoff side, it's worth mentioning that this was a computer game. I mentioned that originally it was all Nazi Germany stuff. That was on the Amiga version of the game. But this thing got a ton of ports elsewhere. And everything I've read says, play the computer versions. Don't play this NES version. So not sure, like, how much more improved it is. If it's just a graphical difference. If it makes sense to play with a mouse and keyboard. I don't know. Did they even have mouse back then? Yes. Like mice? Yeah.

36:23 On the Amiga? The Amiga was a... I don't even know what the Amiga was. I mean, I don't know about the Amiga, but, I mean, mice were pretty standard. Amiga had mice, so that ends that discussion. Never owned one, but it has, like, 3,000 games on it. So I'm going to have to explore that library eventually. We noticed how many times we say things were on the Amiga and got ported over to the NES. But what do you guys really know about the Amiga?

36:49 I don't even know how many times we've said that. It's more European than American. Yeah. You don't even know how many times he said that is a good one. Amiga is Commodore, though. And when I think of the Commodore, I guess I should be thinking of the Amiga? No, I think of the 64. Right. Okay, cool. That's what I was going to say. Actually, I was going to say I think of the calculators from Commodore. You had a Commodore calculator? Big fan of the SR4190R. That's pretty awesome. Okay, and then Malibu Comics. No, tell me more about it. No, no, no. Malibu Comics published five issues of a comic based on Rocket Ranger in 1991.

37:37 So a little bit further away from the original release of the game, but close to the NES one. Unfortunately, there's only five issues, never finished, and ends on a cliffhanger. Is this based off of something? Like, is this a video game version of a comic book already? No, I think what I was saying was I think they were stealing from the Rocketeer. Oh, okay. But Rocket Ranger itself doesn't exist from anything. And Malibu Comics isn't, you know, it's not exactly one of the premier comic publishers. It's not Marvel. Yeah, it's no Marvel. But Malibu Comics, yeah, let's see. Are they still around? Nah. No, they are not.

38:30 We're done with that. Pick it up with the Essential Games list.

38:38 I wouldn't say Rocket Ranger is a no because it's hard to grasp. You can understand it and probably get even better than we did at it with enough time. And I worry that if you really learned it, you could eventually just brute force it too and figure out, like, the best use for the agents and getting through the game faster and how to acquire the most Lunarium. And maybe that's fun, but half the adventure here was kind of just, like, fussing around with the agents, watching them get slowly killed off, losing my resources, realizing I was going to be stranded in a foreign country, calling SOS to the States only to find out that they've been taken over by the aliens. And you see those two tanks and the Lunarium symbol, which is totally not a,

39:28 in any way, a reference to Nazi Germany. It's not. It's a Lutonia. Yeah. Not Lunarium. No, Lutonian. Yeah, Lunarium's what we use. Got it. Yes. Totally not something that I confused in the game while I was playing. I definitely knew which was which. And I also know my vote here, and it is a no, but it's mostly because the strategy side was, I don't want to say lacking, but to Joe's point, it made it seem like there was a lot to do. And then once you figured it out, you realized there was actually a lot you couldn't do. And you were essentially using this as, like, a metal detector to find out where the game was, and then when you found the game, it wasn't all that interesting.

40:13 So, Rocket Ranger, you're a no. Sean? Yeah. I mean, it definitely knew what buttons to press to get me interested. Like, if I met this game in a bar, it, like, they'd catch my eyes. Um, because I'm big on XCOM, I'm big on, like, grand strategy, and then what I was met with was, I mean, and I, you know, I play, I play, I play Paradox games. I know when things are kind of, uh, stupidly complex, and you can game it, and you can, uh, lose all your progress because of some stupid random shit. But, like, it was, it was a combination of being bullshit and also not that complex.

41:06 Um, and so that, that's, you know, it, it wasn't, it wasn't my cup of tea. So, it's, I still think it's, it's unique and interesting, but it's not essential. Joe? I really appreciate what this game was trying to do. Uh, it, it, it is, and I, and I'm not as much into these games, um, but it is something that I do always, like, find intriguing.

41:31 And when I first booted this up, I know it's a little bit of, like, a, a little bit of a leap, but, like, I, it, it, I was starting to think of, like, Sid Meier's Pirates. Yeah. Like, it, it's, it's like that kind of, like, what I was expecting, at least, was that kind of, like, oh, I'm, like, building my, myself in this game, and I'm, like, sort of traveling and, like, finding these new little mini-games that happen and everything, but you're really not building much in this game, like, as far as, like, your own strategy. You're, you're doing that one gameplay. The strategy side of it does not get very deep.

42:04 And I know I said that, like, the, the gameplay, like, the action gameplay stuff could just be there to, like, complement or to add to the strategy side of it, but with the strategy side not getting very deep and the action gameplay stuff being mediocre to, to downright bad when it comes to, like, the fistfights and stuff, which are, are just bad and long. Um, I, nothing about it, like, really met the expectation that, that I initially had. And I, and I guess I, I guess I ended up coming to the conclusion that, like, in a world and on a system where I've played Sid Meier's Pirates, this game feels, like, very behind it. So, overall, not that it has to be like that game, but just overall, it, it didn't blow me away. So, uh, I'm gonna say no.

42:47 Keep trying. Okay, keep trying. I like that. Tell Cinemaware who, um, did I mention that they will go bankrupt next year, 1991, not 2020, not 2025? Um, I was about to go, you're like playing the stock market. Yeah, yeah. Did I mention, by the way, uh, no, I just think that's funny because I had it in my nose at the very top and I didn't put it in there, but, like, that just shows you, uh, the journey that they had, that, um, it's 1990 and they're releasing Rocket Ranger on the NES and next year they won't be a company. Uh, that's rough. Poor cats. Yeah.

43:24 Uh, and then next week we are playing Shinjen the Ruler and we'll talk about it on the episode, of course, uh, the other stuff. But one thing I wanted to mention for now is that what I found really interesting, Shinjen the Ruler doesn't have a Wikipedia page.

43:39 Whoa. Like, that's not normal for these, like, Rad Racer 2 was a stub on Rad Racer. I don't think they call them a stub. It's a section. Rad Racer 2 was a section on the Rad Racer Wikipedia, which I thought was, that was like, okay, fine, enough. But to not even have a page, I was like, should we be playing this game? Was it officially released? Um, what's stopping somebody from just taking Shinjen the Ruler from, uh, SamuraiGames.fandom and just porting it over to Wikipedia? No, there has to be some actual, like, Wikipedia night that keeps that safe, I have to believe, or this entire podcast is a lie.

44:29 Thank you.