356 · The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout

• Help Bugs Hip Hop to a Happy Birthday
• THE????
• Bugs Bunny is celebrating his 50th birthday, but his friends, who weren’t invited, feel jealous and set out to stop him from reaching his party. He now has to go through multiple levels keeping his enemies at bay. When Bugs finally arrives home, he discovers that their mischievous antics were all a ruse to keep him delayed while they prepared a surprise party for him.
• What is the Gameplay Loop?
• Core Mechanics: Players guide Bugs Bunny through side-scrolling levels, navigating platforms, avoiding enemies, and collecting carrots for points.
• Objectives: Each stage ends with a boss fight against another classic Looney Tunes character, requiring players to learn patterns and find opportunities to strike.
• Power-ups and Items: Bugs can pick up mallets for attacking enemies and collect hearts to refill health, adding a layer of strategy.
• Loop Structure: The gameplay focuses on moving from left to right, defeating enemies, and timing jumps, repeating across the game's six areas, each with multiple stages.
• What are Some Key Features of the Game?
• Familiar Characters: Bugs Bunny faces off against Looney Tunes favorites like Daffy Duck, Elmer Fudd, and Yosemite Sam in boss encounters.
• Shameful WB advertisements everywhere
• Mini-Games: Between levels, players can participate in bonus mini-games to earn extra lives, breaking up the platforming action.
• Simplified Combat: Bugs uses a mallet to bop enemies, emphasizing evasion and timing rather than complex combat.
• What Makes it Unique/Different from Other NES Games?
• License Appeal: The game stands out by featuring a well-known cartoon character, which wasn’t as common for high-profile platformers on the NES.
• Surprise Boss Encounters: Having familiar Looney Tunes characters as bosses was a draw for fans of the franchise, adding charm and nostalgia.
• Lighthearted Tone: The game’s humor and cartoonish presentation contrast with many NES titles that were more serious or action-focused.
• Casual-Friendly Difficulty: It’s generally less punishing than other NES platformers, making it more accessible to younger players and fans of Looney Tunes.
• What are Some of the More Frustrating Parts of the Game?
• Repetitive Gameplay: The core mechanics don’t evolve significantly, leading to a sense of repetition as the game progresses.
• Questionable Hit Detection: Players often experience issues with hitboxes, making combat and enemy avoidance feel inconsistent.
• Platforming Challenges: Some jumps and obstacles feel unnecessarily precise, leading to frustration, especially in later levels.
• Enemy Placement: Certain enemies are placed to surprise or ambush the player, which can feel unfair and add to the challenge.
• Any Similar Games Released on the NES?
• Mickey Mousecapade: Another platformer based on a beloved cartoon character, known for simple gameplay but memorable visuals and design.
• Tiny Toon Adventures: A more advanced platformer with similar cartoon appeal, offering more refined mechanics and a multi-character system.
• Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers: Features cooperative play and a similar side-scrolling platformer experience, with a focus on teamwork and strategic item use.
• Yo! Noid: A promotional tie-in game with quirky levels and lighthearted themes that shares some design similarities with The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout.

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

00:00 The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout. Help Bugs hip hop to a happy birthday.

00:22 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.

00:34 The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout? That's like, why is the the on the title? It sounds like it's a dance move or something. Like, oh, do the Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout. I don't know. Unless it's the Bugs Bunny. Like, this is the Bugs Bunny. He's achieved that level of fame. When you got married, Mike, I called it the Michael Esposito marriage extravaganza. Right, right.

00:58 No, I think it's like... Shit, I said your... Hold on, I said your full name. You can say my full name. My full name is on the podcast. It's on the podcast. I think actually... Oh shit, you're right. The podcast doesn't say it's owned by Nostalgia. It says it's owned by me. That's true. I take that back. I'm prepping for a lawsuit against you guys. I'm just like, nope, I've always had ownership over the podcast. I guess. No.

01:20 The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout is like... The the means that it's like... It's something. Like, the Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout episode? Like, I just don't know where the the is coming from in this. Because like, I get what you're saying, Joe. It's the Bugs Bunny and this is his birthday blowout. But it's not really... The order of the words isn't phrased in such a way that would make me think that that's what they were going for. Instead, they're just referring to this...

01:46 What order would it have to be... It would otherwise have to be Bugs Bunny's birthday blowout. And I think that that doesn't quite roll off the tongue quite as well. Well, no. But what I'm saying is what order would it the words have to be to make you think it was talking about the Bugs Bunny? Same order, but with a comma, yeah. Okay. Like, the Bugs Bunny's birthday... The Bugs Bunny, birthday blowout. The Bugs Bunny?

02:11 Before the comma is the Bugs Bunny. See... I don't like it at all. I almost think that if you have like the Bugs Bunny birthday blowout, it sounds like an event that Bugs Bunny is not at. It is just themed about Bugs Bunny. That's true. It's like the Bugs Bunny parade or something. I agree with Joe here. So what birthday do you think it is for Bugs? 50th. No, canonically though. Not like in the... You know, he's been around forever or whatever, but like how old is Bugs? Doesn't it say 50? It says 50, but I'm just saying like, does that look like a 50 year old rabbit to you?

02:46 I was assuming that they are in some kind of limbo where nobody ages because... But they still celebrate birthdays in numbers? Like, so like, for instance, Toy Story, right? Like those toys are going to live forever. Are they going to celebrate Woody's 12,000th birthday? Well, do they celebrate birthdays? Because like, do they even know when they were born? Yeah, they probably do like a gotcha day, right? Well, you could... Yeah. I think you could still find... Maybe you wouldn't do it every year at 12,000, but like maybe every century,

03:19 you'd be like, oh, this is my 1100th. I just think it feels weird to put Bugs Bunny at 50 years old. Of course, now he's much older than that. But even so, Bugs Bunny to me, it doesn't have an age. But yes, they are celebrating his 50th birthday.

03:36 It sets up that he's celebrating his 50th birthday, but his friends who weren't invited are jealous about the party and they want to make him unable to reach the party. Make him pay. Yeah. Yeah, sure. So now he has to go... Like, that's why he goes through all these levels in the game is that like, what would have been a simple path to his party is now filled with hazards and obstacles. Makes you wonder, did they like destroy the ground too to create these platforms? Are they creating like, just a hazard for everybody, not even just Bugs Bunny? Or is this like, Looney Tunes rules? Who cares, right? I think I'm landing on that. I mean, I feel like it's just video game rules.

04:14 Yeah, but... Oh, yeah, yeah. So yeah, whenever there's platforms, it's like just in our heads. It's just a... Yeah, like floating platinum. We just played... We just played, you know, Back to the Future part two and three and there were a lot more platforms in that than I remember from the movies. Oh, I remember the movies looking like that. Okay. You were actually watching the let's plays when you thought you were watching the movies. Right, right. That's why I hate the third one so much.

04:41 All right. So that's the plot in a nutshell. Well, Bugs Bunny's made some enemies that are sometimes his friends, but also some that you know traditionally as his enemies as well. I mean, I gotta say I was heartbroken when I saw Tweety Bird involved in his enemy. Early in the game too. Involved in his enemy. Yeah, right. What's that? Early in the game, you have to like fight Tweety Bird. I wouldn't think that. Yeah, you gotta smash him, her. You gotta smash her with a hammer. Think it's a him. Is it a him? I don't know. I don't know for certain, but Tweety Bird feels like a him because I get surprised by that stuff often. Yeah.

05:15 But like all the other enemies are like people that are sometimes Bugs Bunny's enemies. Is Tweety Bird ever Bugs Bunny's enemy? No. I think that Tweety Bird is like a true neutral. I don't know if we've ever... Tweety Bird just loves chaos actually. It's not neutral. Tweety Bird just likes to... So chaotic neutral? Yeah, just likes to screw up whoever's involved. Okay, then that tracks.

05:37 Okay. Yeah, fair enough. Um, but going into the game, Bugs Bunny being a bunny, not even just being the character we know him from his Looney Tunes cartoons, being a bunny, uh, you know, lots riding on this jump in a platform game where you play as a bunny. And we already played a Bugs Bunny game like 150 episodes ago actually, um, Bugs Bunny's Crazy Castle. And in that one, the jump sucked. But it wasn't a platforming game necessarily. It was a little bit of like a puzzle platformer. In this one, uh, actually, no, I remember Sean fighting me on the episode and saying it's a platformer. So maybe we'll fight about that again. Um, in this episode though, it's absolutely a platformer. So how's Bugs Bunny's jump in this one?

06:21 Atrocious. Oh, okay. It's, I thought someone was gonna say that. I also watched the angry video game nerd and he said it was terrible. And I've seen things online talking about terrible. I think it's fine. I think it's just like a, it's just like, it's not like a, it's not like an amazing. It's not the jump. Okay. Like specifically. It's, it's the, um, it's, it's just the whole animation cycle. He's like still walking as he's jumping.

06:45 Oh, like the, the, the aesthetically it looks weird. Yes. I'm talking about like frame rate. Um, yeah, the, yeah, everything feels, and especially like hit detection. I'm not talking about just the jump here, but all in all, it just feels like what you're seeing on the screen is just not how things are being registered correctly. Uh, it feels off.

07:08 Yeah. And that's the sentiment that I've seen online. I just, I don't, I had no like aggravation with the movement of this game. Like, it's just like, it just was fine to me. I don't know. I guess it doesn't exist. Obviously, but like, what do you mean it doesn't exist? I'm kidding. In a weird way though.

07:29 Like, and again, I think the jump is, is fine. It's, it's really more like the way it looks as you're jumping and like, like, not that he should have like an actual bunny hop or anything, but the animation is basically just the same as when he's walking.

07:43 Uh, it, I do understand what Sean saying though, about like hit detection and just detection of things in general, though. It does kind of feel like bugs is on like one layer of this game and everything else is on a layer behind that. Because even when you hit enemies with the hammer, like, yes, some have animations that like show them being destroyed or whatever, but other ones just kind of like the hammer can just like barely graze them. Um, and that's fine. Cause usually we have a problem where you have to be like too close to an enemy, but the hammer can just barely graze them and they just like fall off screen or something.

08:16 I don't know what's going on here, but I did feel like bugs was disconnected. Yeah. There's a lack of feedback. Like it is not so much with the jump. It does. Again, there, there have been worse jumps that we've, that we played with, but especially when you are interacting with an enemy, um, you, there are times when you will make contact where you feel like you shouldn't. And there were times where you will lose that. Um, you, you will lose that, like, uh, that rock, paper, scissors game of, Oh, I, I definitely hit them first, but that did not actually happen.

08:56 It, it, yeah, exactly. It kind of like feels like you're floating, uh, sort of agnostic to what's happening around you. The, the hammer thing I 100% agree with. There were plenty of times where it was just like, yeah, unclear if I was going to hit the enemy and then like I swing and I did hit, but then I also took damage and, uh, you know, I'm unclear there, but the rest of it, I, yeah, I guess I aesthetically, I can see it looking bad, but it never hindered my experience, but the hammer thing certainly did.

09:22 Which is odd because it like the first, like the first screen before I started moving, interacting, I was like, Oh wow, this game actually looks pretty nice. Like, like the, the, the graphics and pixel art itself, like in the color palette, I really liked that. It felt very, uh, it, it felt very eye pleasing. Um, so it was odd when you start moving around and it kind of made my, uh, my, my brain kind of rub against itself.

09:50 Now, if you're buying this game, you're buying it because of the license appeal of the Looney Toons franchise, you know, or, or just Bugs Bunny in general, but like, I just wanted a birthday themed game. No, you know what I'm saying? No. It's like, you're all in on the Looney Toons thing.

10:07 What are you expecting though, from a Looney Toons game? Like if you were buying this game, forget what you know is possible on the NES and everything. Just like, is this even like outside of Bugs using a mallet to hit his enemies and like bonk them on the head and stuff, which could have had a funnier animation. But like, other than that, what is going on here that like is Looney Toons that isn't like, I could just put any characters in this game and it would, you know, any non-licensed characters in this game and it would be basically the same thing. The only thing that makes this a Looney Toons game is Looney Toons characters being in it.

10:43 They really did not lean hard enough into like the Acme Corporation. Heck, the only way you really know this is a Looney Toons game is because thankfully every time you eat one of those carrots, which is just a square box with a carrot inside of it, not like just a regular, it could just be a carrot, right? You could just be collecting carrots, but instead you have to collect these square boxes of carrots. And when you collect them, they turn into Warner Brothers logos.

11:07 Thank goodness I'm aware that this is the first example of like shameless advertising we have in the game. I'm glad you got to this because I think that this is the example of the quintessential licensed game where what other game just tells you like the parent company that owns the game and puts their logo everywhere. What else do you need? Do you want stuff from actually in the show or do you just want like the corporate logo? I just, I really just need the logo to know. Yeah, the corporate logo. That's all you need to remind you what game you're playing. And what's up with all the clocks, the clock enemies? Is that just to remind Bug that the clock is ticking? He's 50 years old now.

11:44 Oh, there is a bit more depth here. No, that's not, but that's what I'm saying. Like that's not fun. No, you're right. And there's like salt and pepper enemies or something. Are they salt and pepper? They're like boxes. I thought it was like baking soda or something. Oh, I wasn't sure. I don't know. I really don't know what it was. I don't know what like the bouncing like circle, the bouncing circle snakes are. They turn like green and red. Yeah. Or blue. It's like a, just a wispy fire that falls from the sky sometimes.

12:16 I don't really understand what he's supposed to be fighting when he's not fighting Tweety Bird or the other friends. And the enemies don't change between locations too. So it's like weird. It's like these clocks are in every level, like Daffy Duck, you have to fight like multiple times.

12:33 What is happening? I don't know. Yeah. And it feels like we've had other games, a lot of other games that are licensed and feel like this could have been any game and they just tacked on a logo and a sprite. But something about Looney Tunes just feels like there's so much opportunity for silliness and wackiness and, you know, like a bouncy fun game. And it's, it's weird because there are a couple of things that are like tacked on, you know, like you mentioned the hammer. There's also like the little like seesaws where you stand on one side and you hammer the other and it launches you up into the air. Like that's a cool little Looney Tunes thing.

13:07 Yeah, that was fun. And felt very, very, yeah, cartoon. Go ahead. Yeah, there should, there should have been, there should have been dozens of things like that, you know, like simple things or, you know, and whatnot. But there were a couple other little, you know, the carrots that you get at the end of the level, like fine, that's Bugs Bunny. But that's, that's the same as a palette swap of like a mushroom or whatever. So yeah, I, I, I do wish that there was something like cartoon stretchy, but this should be the space jam of NES games.

13:35 I, I, I agree that there was a, there's a lot of space to play with here. But I also think that when it comes to licensed games, I think that Looney Tunes is also the one that you could probably phone in the most because it's like, it is so universal and almost kind of lowest common denominator that like, oh, you can just palette swap the game you were working on before and do it. And it'll work just as fine. Like, I think it also, as much space as there is to play with those things, there's also a lot of room to be lazy.

14:10 But if bugs just had like some, if bugs just had some basic power ups, like TNT that he could plant and it would take three seconds and then blow up or even more creatively, he could go up against the side of a wall and draw like a, you know, like this is more of a wild coyote kind of thing. But like, you know, draw that and then enemies actually walk into that instead of through him or just like collect a disguise. Like there are multiple bugs disguised and they all act the same, but it's kind of funny to see him dressed in.

14:41 Yeah, sure, sure. But like, not really. You know what? More like a woman, right? Like bugs does that often. And then it's like now enemies don't know that he's bugs bunny. So they don't hurt you for a little bit. Like while you have that power up, these are all solid ideas. You know what I think like a simple power up that you could like evolve throughout the game would be is just when you walk off a ledge, just let you walk a little further. Like, you know, like a glide ability, but having that like I'm still walking until I realize that I'm going to fall.

15:10 Yeah, like that's like, that's like iconic Looney Tunes. That's, that's a great, that's a great example. And I am just working off memory here. So I could be completely just working on childhood brain. But I recall Gex64, otherwise known as Gex Enter the Gecko on other platforms, had like a Looney Tunes level in it. This is the one where he like, Gex goes into different like TV channels and ones like the Titanic. And then this one, that's weird that one's the Titanic, but I remember that.

15:40 This one was like a Looney Tunes themed thing. And like that is a better like representation of Looney Tunes in a video game than any Looney Tunes video game I've ever played. I honestly can't think of too many other Looney Tunes games that I've played. I played a great Space Jam Looney Tunes game on PC that was basically NBA Jam, but like skinned with Looney Tunes characters. That was pretty good because during the halftime show, you had to go back to Michael Jordan's house to pick up his shoes and other stuff and not get detected by the dog. That's a good idea. It's a great idea. Should have happened before the game though, realistically. Anyway, coming back to the game.

16:21 There's mini games. Those take us out of the, you know, those are like a little sillier. He's doing like whack-a-mole and stuff like that. And slots. Yeah, slots slash bingo. What's the bonus round thing too with like all the numbers all over the place? I think that's like bingo. Yeah, it's like bingo that, yeah, and I think there, it just is bingo. Sorry, I shouldn't have interrupted Joe.

16:47 It's a very complicated way of doing it. I think it is actually the combination of a bingo slot machine. You like spin numbers and whatever it lands on is like what you have on your bingo board. And you get extra lives from that and if you get five in a row with how unlikely that is, you get 15 extra lives, which is insane. Yeah, more than you need in Bugs Bunny Birthday Blow because, you know, not that it's a good or bad thing, but I don't think I lost any lives while playing this game. Like ever. Also, I'm not entirely sure how the hearts work.

17:27 I think they like turn white and that means they get one more hit and then they disappear. So like they're red and then you get hit once, it turns white, then you get hit again, it disappears. And now you only have, now you don't have that heart until you fill it back up. It just, it looks like, yeah, you would, it would be something you fill up, but then they just go away. Yeah, but I mean, if you find another heart, it'll come back. Oh, okay. Got it. So I think it is like filling up. It's just like it doesn't show the empty heart container. Like it just, it's just gone when it's empty.

18:14 The boss fights are also kind of weird because I don't even want to call them boss fights, but they're like the only moment where you see other Looney Tunes characters from the show. And like, they're not particularly challenging, but also they don't seem like they're ready to be the boss fight. Like you could, you could just attack them really fast and be done with it. It takes like two or three hits to the mallet on some of these guys.

18:37 But they don't do anything like that. Yeah. That's all that challenging or different. I think this is just a side effect of the, these issues with like game feel that we were talking about earlier where like, you, I can see where, where they're going. Like what they're trying to do with these boss fights. Like Daffy is always somebody that you got to, uh, just outrun. Not interact with at all. Not interact with. Yeah. Classic Bugs Bunny Daffy Duck interaction.

19:06 Tweety. You got kind of got to lure him out and take a hit because you can't hit him in the bush. Um, uh, the Elmer shoots at you and he's actually like, you know, there's actually projectiles. You got to dodge. And, um, I think, and I forgot the other ones, but they all kind of have a thing, but they're, it's all, it all means nothing because all you do is you go and you hit them and then they go away. I think you hit them three times or so and there's no mechanical trick to learn because it's not hard enough to need to know patterns or anything.

19:45 And there's no feedback when you're hitting them until suddenly they just drop right. Yeah. The sprite just turns upside down while it's still in the same position and then falls down through the screen. Like, ah, ah, what the hell is that? I don't want to see Pepe Le Pew upside down. Like he's a dead goldfish. Oh yeah. He farted. That was his thing. I mean, that is kind of his thing in the show. So that's actually one of the few moments in this game where it's working to its benefit. You know, it's a moment where I realized that the game, uh, might not be good. What's that? The ending.

20:18 Oh, and they were all just like, we were just joshing. Yeah, they were just joshing, but also it's like, okay, so it says finally Bugs Bunny arrives at his party and it's got a shot, you know, like that's text. That's a huge text box, way too much text box screen for the amount of text on it. But then there's another box with an image of Bugs opening up a door very strangely. Like he has like one foot in the air and two hands on the doors as if like it takes that kind of strength to get into this house. But he's, he's like, he's in mid motion of it, right? Then it says on another text box after you hit the A button, he enters dot dot dot.

20:53 Couldn't we just get like one more like image of him entering instead of the text box? Like it was easier for them to just put in he enters a stage direction than draw us one more scene. Like that's the kind of level of detail we're talking about here in the game. I thought that the he enters was to be like, cause the only way to show him entering is to show, this doesn't, this is already, as I'm saying it, falling apart my theory here.

21:18 But if they show him entering, it's like he enters, that's the suspenseful moment. And then it's like, surprise, there's his friends are all there, but the next screen doesn't show his friends anyway. So it doesn't really matter. Right, and I'm not saying the next screen should say he enters, he should just be in the next room and it says. He should just have entered? Yeah. Yeah, he should just have entered. Does he just teleport there?

21:39 He just is, the door, we can only assume. I can't, no, no, no. It turned into a comic book now, they don't even want to animate it, they're literally just giving us like four stills. I don't even think they need to animate it, but like he is, the more I'm, the more I'm looking at it, the more I'm seeing your, I was like, why are you hung up on this? But now I'm like indignant that this has happened. Because he's opening the door, he's walking through the door. Yes. We see him entering. It's like they're questioning our intelligence. Who's to say that he isn't just leaning on a door? That's a good point.

22:10 It is a weird way to open a door or to lean, so you never know. And then you see bugs actually, like you guys said, all the boss fights with Taz and Sylvester and... Elmer is shooting a gun at you, by the way. Yeah, yeah, Tweety Bird. Edward, they're all like at the party now and you guys take a picture in front of the Bugs Bunny sign. It doesn't say the there, it just says Bugs Bunny. But you take a picture in front of that sign. Obviously, Daffy must be there. He's the one who took the picture.

22:40 But like... Foghorn? Leghorn wasn't... Yeah, who else is there? That's what I'm saying. Like, who was invited to this party? It seems like only the people who thought they weren't invited wound up at the party.

22:51 So, yeah, I think that just brings into question, like, are we being lied to as the audience? And if so, who's lying to us? Because it sounds like, oh, they were just like trying to, you know, make sure they had enough time to get ready while Bugs Bunny was on their way to the party. Because they obviously knew they were all invited. So, what pretext did they have otherwise to tell us the player? I don't know. Maybe. Were they invited?

23:23 So, they just showed up? Yeah, they just showed up. The whole premise... I forgot that the whole premise at the beginning was that they're mad that they weren't invited. And then it's like, surprise, we weren't mad, actually. But it's like, well, what are you doing at my party? And where's everybody else? I think we as the player are being lied to by the narrator. By, no, by, yeah, Chuck Jones. Unreliable narrator. The director. Chuck Jones did not work on this game, but I think that's funny either way. Happy birthday, Bugs Bunny, and congratulations.

23:54 Congratulations on a birthday, right? Well, you know, getting the 50s, nothing to sneeze at. You know, that was all you. I'm surprised it didn't say, like, happy birthday, Bugs Bunny, and congratulations, Warner Brothers. You know, like, one more shot to get WB in there.

24:09 Thank you, Warner Brothers. While we're on the subject, though, of, you know, like, actual Looney Tunes stuff and the director, Chuck Jones, and we could mention other people, too. But, like, one of the most famous composers for Looney Tunes, Carl Stalling, who made most of the, you know, not music that you could instantly recognize, but if you heard it, you'd be like, yeah, that must have been on Looney Tunes.

24:33 That is lacking in this game as well. And, again, it's 8-bit, like, what can they do? But, like, they could have leaned into some of his merry melodies, for lack of a better word. Yeah. And really had fun with that, because that's another iconic part of Looney Tunes. It's in the name. They're silly songs. But silly songs was actually Disney, so.

24:54 I do think that on an 8-bit console, like, one of the few things that just you can do is, like, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Like, it's just, like, not, like, that's made for 8-bit, like, NES music.

25:08 Agreed. Maybe there's some licensing problem. But even then, you could have found something that sounded like it, you know? Or just hired somebody to make something sound like it. I don't know. I thought of another highlight moment in the game. Another great moment for Looney Tunes comedy, and that is those little seesaws that you go on, and you have to hit the mallet to go high in the air. That's the kind of shit we needed, like, times 100 in this game. Yeah, I like that stuff. That's what Joe was getting at, yeah. Yeah, taking credit for my opinion.

25:40 Classic Mike. I was only listening to the part of your other genius idea, which was when you said to run off the platform and just go get, like, another second or so before you die. But, you know, one of the more cartoony things that I noticed in this was the pause animation. It's been a long time since we've done the pause sound, but this one is more, not so much about the sound, which was just a kind of generic pause sound, but the animation. The word pause comes up on the screen and does just countless backflips.

26:10 Yeah. It's probably the most advanced pause graphic in the history of this console. Yeah, and that's where all their, like, Looney Tunes creativity went, was into the pause graphic. We need to find out who made the pause animation and see what other work they did. Get them on the show. That's worth chasing. Tim Follins, I think.

26:34 He should have been doing the music. He should have gotten the hell off the animation. Anybody want to try to explain the carrot boxes instead of just picking up carrots? I think that they had an idea of having the item boxes then become platforms and weren't entirely sure how to do that.

26:54 Yeah. I'm not going to say that it's a great idea, but it is at least something that you can interact with in a different way than just, like, a standard platform. So maybe it was just to keep it the same shape. Yeah, but what it is is that the carrot, when the carrot is on there, it is not a platform. You have to go, you have to move through it once before it becomes a platform.

27:21 So that makes it, like, I mean, yeah, I also don't know if I think this is, like, a good or a bad thing. But I was, I found this interesting. It did make me think about things more often. I feel like I'd have to let it sit longer to see if I like it. I mean, I think it also depends on how the game was designed around it. But there were times where I would have to think, I'm not sure if this is by design, but I would have to think, like, okay, if I jump up through this, then I can land on it because I'll have already transformed it. But I got to make sure I'm not jumping down through it because then I'll just continue falling.

27:49 In Japan, this game is known as Happy Birthday Bugs. Is that a better title? I actually don't think so. I don't either. I mean, sounds like a song you would sing to him.

28:01 Yeah, the Bugs Bunny birthday blowout thing that we were joking about the the at the beginning. But, like, outside of that, that sounds like an extravagant, like, it sounds like, wow, this game is going to be a blast. Yeah, I don't think it's worthy of the blowout, like, moniker. Like, blowout is really, like, oh, and we put everything Bugs Bunny in this game. And it's like, well, I think it's just a misnomer because you don't get to see the party. And you can't really call a party. And blowout usually will refer to a party. And if we don't see the party being a blowout, who's to say it actually was, you know? We did something similar at Nickelodeon with SpongeBob. We had SpongeBob's big birthday blowout, and we also never showed his party.

28:48 So it can happen. But it was all Nickelodeon logos all around. Yeah, SpongeBob and Patrick were collecting Nickelodeon logos. Yeah. Also, in Europe, it's just the Bugs Bunny blowout. They dropped the birthday part. Oh. I doubt they dropped it throughout the entirety of the game, though. So now that makes, that's worse. Maybe it's like, maybe it was trying to be like the Bugs Bunny anniversary blowout. Because that's really what this is. It's not his birthday. It's his anniversary of, like. Yeah, yeah. I guess, I guess we're, let's get in the weeds of what's canonically Bugs' birthday. Because we still have so many interesting things to talk about. Bugs Bunny, though. Just thinking about it. Bugs Bunny. First appearance. 1938. Steamboat Willie.

29:37 1938, right? So this is actually like his 52nd anniversary? Like, you can't celebrate it. The game's 1990. But the game takes place in 88. The game takes place. There's so many signs. Why didn't I notice? You gotta have an open eye. It's a period piece, really. Yeah. So much more of America was a desert wasteland or a cave back then. We didn't talk about that enough when we were reviewing the 88 games. Just how much of America happened in caves. Yeah. America happened in caves.

30:16 But that's another thing. Not America happening in caves. But the locations, that desert area, that felt distinctly Looney Tunes to me. Maybe the first area. But then after that, it was just like, where are we now? Like, is this Looney Tunes anymore? Like, I did feel like at first they were going for like, let's keep it in the Looney Tunes universe.

30:37 And like, yeah, even that grassland, but with the like grass on top of the like dirt. Yeah, that's where you'd see like the rabbit season, duck season stuff, it'd be in the woods. Yeah, but that's what it needed. It needed the Bugs Bunny iconic episodes to be the location. So you're in an opera house for one. You're at a baseball stadium for another one. It's like, do the best Bugs moments and then blow them up. But it almost felt like at first that they were going through what you guys are saying. Because then, yeah, you've got like the Southwest background for Wile E. Coyote and Roadrunner. But then you realize that, no, this is a coincidence.

31:13 Because you've got sphinxes. So like, obviously that's not the case. They weren't trying to do that. Yeah. Also, those sphinxes and their pulsating stomachs. Really upsetting. Like they're stone, but they have this like organic pulsating belly.

31:34 And they're very... You know what I'm talking about. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. They're just getting comfortable. And while there are many other crazy castles for Bugs Bunny to explore, he won't have another birthday video game. That's fine. No 60th, no 70th, no 80th. There were all chances for them. Maybe they do every 50. Every 50. So there'll be a 100th. Yeah, on like the PS7 or something, there'll be like a 100th birthday blowout. It's going to be like, huh? There's only going to be two games. The 50th and the 100th. No, I meant there's only going to be two new PlayStations.

32:11 Yeah, yeah. It's going to be a lot. Well, because we're already at what, like 85 or something? 85 PlayStations? 85 birthdays of Bugs Bunny? Oh, you're right. You're right. I forgot how old I am. Yeah, I don't know how to do the math. I think 86. Anyway, real fast. Oh, no, wait, wait, wait, wait. No. Big update. Real slow. I was really looking forward to ending. I know, but we have to do something else that's very important. But Porky's Hair Hunt is an episode that features like Bugs Bunny, but not like in the way that we see him now. What? And so a wild hair features the like Bugs Bunny that like looks like the Bugs Bunny that's in this game. And that, not episode because it was, these were shorts in front of movies.

33:05 That short debuted in 1940. So that would have been 50 years ago. So actually, it's all fine now. What I said earlier isn't true. We are celebrating the 50th. What I'm looking at right here, which is just a YouTube title, tells me it was 1938. No, I know. That's what I'm saying. I'm saying like they might be arguing that like the official look of Bugs Bunny because he was like significantly shorter in the other one. Like the first official appearance of Bugs Bunny wasn't until 1940, which I, you know, I don't really care one way or the other. I'm not sure why you brought it up. Well, because I wanted to correct a wrong because people expect this podcast to be right.

33:46 That's true. We can't, we can't fail them now after all, after everything we've done to steer them in the right direction. Yes. In the past. Yeah. We're working on this very important list of video games and we can't make any mistakes. And thankfully we haven't yet. Every game that's on the essential games list is supposed to be there. And speaking of, I think it's time to add potentially another game to the essential games list.

34:23 We are not going to add the Bugs Bunny's birthday blah. I see. I did. I added the S. The Bugs Bunny birthday blah. Something about it just doesn't feel right about me right from the title. But here's the thing about the game. It's actually like not, it's not terrible. It's not hard. It's not, like it's totally doable. It's totally serviceable as a platformer on the NES. If you bought it, I wouldn't say that you like wasted your money. You would spend some time with this probably. Play through it. Maybe even beat it. Who knows? You wouldn't be frustrated. This isn't the kind of game where like enemies just suck and you die a lot. But if we're comparing it to another animated, you know, licensed franchise that also has an NES game.

35:10 Chippendale Rescue Rangers is kind of serving up in a weird way the same experience that the Bugs Bunny birthday blah is trying to do here. And it's night and day. Like where Bugs Bunny just feels like an early video game in every sense of what that means. Rescue Rangers feels competent today. Like still feels fun to play. Tight controls. Great enemies. Great level design.

35:41 Can't say the same here. I don't think that Looney Tunes is honestly ever going to be used to its fullest in video game format because it lends itself so much to animation trickery that people just aren't leaning into for its gameplay design. I really wonder, does Bugs Bunny need like his epic Mickey moment or his Kingdom Hearts moment? Probably not. I think Bugs Bunny's fine where he is.

36:09 He's never going to be as popular as Mickey Mouse just because of the way Warner Brothers treats him. And he's not going to be on our essential games list because of the way they treated this game. Sean? Yeah.

36:23 I, what are you talking about the difficulty again? I think that this is a game that, yeah, you're not going to get frustrated with it, but you're also not going to run into much moments of satisfaction. I think that there's probably not too many. If you have the chance, if you have the opportunity to put the game down, like say you aren't a kid with limited funds and this wasn't gifted to you for Christmas or whatever. Um, and that's the only game you can play for a while. Uh, you will put this down before you beat it because it's also too long. We didn't really get into that. Like I wasn't expecting there to be five stages to each world before. And it just feels like it's dragged out for, for much longer than it needs to.

37:08 Um, I do like the, like the actual like art style. Um, I think it's a relatively nice looking game to look at. Um, but there's too much going on with animation and, and what we were talking about at the beginning to, to ever say this is even like a game to just, to just like zone out to. It's not that either. Um, it's just a poor game.

37:35 So it's not on the essential games list. Joe. Mike, when you were, uh, referring to this during your vote as the Bugs Bunny birthday blowout, uh, it finally clicked with me why I was wrong about, uh, it being the, the referring to the Bugs Bunny. Because yeah, it would have to be the Bugs Bunny apostrophe S birthday blowout. The Bugs Bunny birthday blowout. The, the has to be referring to the birthday blowout, which is the Bugs Bunny themed birthday blowout. I didn't realize that was in question here. I think that like, maybe I'm, maybe I didn't even say that out loud, but that's what I was thinking of it like that. Like the, the Bugs Bunny's birthday blowout, but that's not, those aren't the words.

38:20 Anyway, this game, uh, I, I do agree that it's like, it's maybe not like as bad as we're saying or that like we might make it sound when we're, when we're picking apart all its negatives. Um, I, I don't think, I mean, absolutely. This is not essential and I wouldn't even say this is a play it, but I'm also not gonna say this is like jank. So I want to, I want to like, I want to put in like, make a new category that is like, don't, don't intentionally not play it.

38:47 But like, don't feel like you have to play it. So this is on my don't intentionally not play it list. But like, yeah, like if you sit down and play it, you're gonna be like, oh, this is a, this is a, a mediocre game. So you're, okay, let me get rid of the double negative. Sorry to interrupt your, your vote, but I'm just trying to cancel out the negatives.

39:05 Don't not intentionally. So like intentionally play this game. No, don't intentionally not play it. Like don't say I'm, I'm not going to play it and have that be intentional. Like I'm definitely going to avoid playing this at all costs. If you see the cartridge in front of you and you want to give it a try, give it a try and you'll be like, huh, don't avoid it. Yes. Well, yes, but also don't, you don't seek it out either.

39:27 Like if this game falls into your lap and someone else puts it into the, if somebody else puts it into the, the cartridge or the, the console for you. Cause like, it's not worth you doing the work of putting it in. But if you're sitting there and the TV's on, the controller's in your hand and the game is on, don't say like, no, the nostalgia boy is totally not to play this. Just say like, okay, I guess I'll try it. If you truly want to play a game, let it, let it go or something along those lines.

39:57 Yeah. Except in this case, you shouldn't truly want to play this game that if you truly are neutral on this game. What play hard to get with this game. Yes. I think, I think what Joe's trying to say is that if your dentist has the Bugs Bunny birthday blowout, it's okay to play it like there because it's opportunistic. It's on already. You don't, you know, like, no, there wasn't a line for it. Like you can go ahead and play it. Right. And we know because we're dentists.

40:52 I like how we're ending on a joke that's just for us. Nobody else knows what we're talking about. That's the first part of the show. Ha ha ha. Ha ha. Thank you.