Hidden Gems: Bonk's Adventure

Bonk's Adventure is a platform game released on the TurboGrafx-16 in 1990,

Set in prehistoric times, dinosaurs wearing propeller caps and shades rule the earth...naturally.
It's about a boy-caveman with an abnormally large noggin called Bonk.
He attacks by 'bonking' enemies with his head, either headbutting or doing an aerial slam with it.
The 'Power Mushrooms' of the game are hunks of Meat, you eat one, steam'll burst from Bonk's ears and he'll get mad, momentarily freezing enemies if he does a head stomp, eat another and he'll turn invincible charging through everything in sight and will freeze enemies for much longer.

You play through 5 worlds, each containing various amounts of levels, to beat King Drool (A large green dinosaur) and rescue Princess Za (a cute pink plesiosaurus)

So all in all a storyline that everyone will be familiar with.

It's an easy enough game to get to grips with, simple to get through, and in general very fun

the levels are bright, colourful, vivid and most, creative (one level has you going through a dinosaurs insides!)

Others though are pretty stereotypical for prehistoric times, (jungles, caves and savannas)

but this doesn't mean to say that they aren't great looking levels!

The music, in my opinion, is absolutely fantastic.
They suit the levels and feel of the game perfectly and are very memorable,
one of my personal favourites is the Swamp theme, which I am listening to now actually!
It's always a pleasure to listen to and sometimes I stop in the middle of the game just to listen to it.

At the end of every world there's a cool looking Dino-bones elevator that takes you to a boss stage (music kicks ass there too!)
The bosses are all Dinosaurs full of character that have been brainwashed by King Drool via an egg shell on their head, the main idea is the same, keep smashing their head till the shell and the spell breaks.
After the fight, you have a little cutscene where the brainwashed Dino introduces himself and thanks you for breaking Drool's hold over them it's pretty cool.

Wrapping things up Bonk's Adventure is an awesome game that was sadly ignored because people at the time were fussing over Mario and Sonic instead, so to you people that bought Bonk when it originally came out.. I bet you got hours of enjoyment outta the game!
Bonk went on to have many sequels (which I may review in the future)
and a couple of Spinoffs (which I may buy in the future)
I'm not surprised at all, because after beating this wonderful game, you'll be hungry for lots more!

Hidden Gems: Do-Re-Mi Fantasy: Milons Doki Doki Adventure

I'd be surprised if you'd played this game before, I'd be surprised if you've even heard of it.

Due to the fact that Do-Re-Mi Fantasy: Milon's Doki Doki Adventure was never released outside of Japan.

The reason I got to play it was because of it's release on Wii's Virtual Console.

One look at the game and you may think this game is for children, while it's true that this game has got a child-like look to it, but I'd love to see a 6 year old beat this game.

The games gorgeous visuals, happy creatures and cheerful backgrounds all disguise how devilishly hard this game can get, at first the game is simple, if a little too easy, then my god does the frustration kick in..

Now don't get me wrong, I love the game to pieces but it's easy to become angered at it.

However, if anything the frustration compels you to keep going in this game, that and the aforementioned cheeriness of the game.

The story, which I am assuming since I cannot read japanese, seems to start off with Milon and his friend playing in the woods when a dark force captures his fairy friend and takes her away, now it's Milon's job to rescue her.

The gameplay is fairly simple too, it's a straight forwards platformer where you have to blow bubbles at enemies and then walk into the bubbles to get rid of them, either that or you can jump on an enemy to turn it into a temporary platform, though this will not kill it.

At his strongest Milon has 3 hit points recognised by the colour tunic he is wearing,

(Green -3   Blue -2   Red -1)

You can pick up spare tunics which will give you a hit point for everyone you find, you can also pick up musical notes which serve no other function but to give you a life when you get 100 of them
(there is no point system in the game)

As I said before, when you first lay eyes on this game and it's levels you will love it.....or be sick from all the cuteness. Seriously though, every level has been well worked on, even the little touches add to the charm, in one level a towere of wine glasses fill up, overflowing into one another, it really is a cool thing to see

The music in the levels really adds to the excitement too, for instance in the first world there is a really calm woodsy track playing in the background, but 3 levels into that world, there's a section where the wind is blowing tremendously, enemies are flying across the screen at you and the music is real dramatic and very fitting, in other worlds there are always 'Haunted house' levels which all have the same song but it's really fun to listen to, the kind of song you'd hear at a spooky amusement park or something similar to that.

At the end of each world there is a boss to fight too, first one being a giant woodman
(similar to that guy from Tekken)
and others consisting of, Fairytale Women to Giant Snowmen, it really is great stuff seeing the ultra inventive and original touches they've added to the bosses

Believe it or not this is a boss, hit her and she'll turn ugly, literally!

Wrapping things up, Milon's Doki Doki Adventure, is a great game
and very visually appealing, I love this game to bits... but I've yet to complete it!

Hidden Gems: Rocket: Robot on Wheels

I'm going to review games that not many people have played, 

'Hidden Gems' 'Unsung Heroes' whatever you want to call them.

I'm going to start off this series with a game I hadn't even heard of until a week ago!

Rocket: Robot on Wheels is an N64 game published by Ubisoft in 1999, it follows the story of a robot called Rocket, around an amusement park called Whoopie World.

The story goes: The day before the grand opening of the new amusement park 'Whoopie World', 

The creator of the park, Dr.Gavin, leaves Rocket (a robot created by him) and the two mascots

(Whoopie, a large purple walrus and his sidekick Jojo, a Raccoon) to look after the park while he's gone.

The problem is, Jojo is sick of being just a sidekick to Whoopie and so he steals the tokens and tickets to the park and hides himself within the park, shutting down most of the areas, or worlds in the park.

It's Rocket's job to collect Tickets (which unlock new worlds) and Tokens (which buy new powerups) and defeat Jojo before Dr.Gavin returns.

This criminally ignored game has it all, a great soundtrack, brilliant control, very clever puzzles and lots of collectables (if you find that stuff fun)

There is A LOT to do in the huge game! Staring things off, you have 7 massive worlds in the game that are all located within a large Hub-World, you don't even realise how big the worlds truly are at first, it's only after you complete certain tasks that unlock a door to go to an even BIGGER place than the location you were at before that you stop and say 'Woah, I've got alot of work to do!' There are even sub worlds!

In each of those seven worlds there 12 Tickets (similar to Stars in Mario 64),

200 Tokens and about 7 machine parts to collect

The machine parts, once all have been collected will unlock yet another section to the world which usually leads you to a Ticket.

Within each world there is a vehicle that you can plug yourself into and drive about the world. (7 in total)
These include, A dolphin-bot, A hot-dog car and a Paint-spitting cannon.
Each of these is as fun as the next, though it's pretty hard to controll the Hot-dog car IMO.

A subworld in the first world

Like games that make you feel smart? Same here, The second world in Rocket involves painting things
they give no instruction what-so-ever so you have to use a bit of common sense, I'm not going to spoil anything for those of you who plan to play this game but there's a bit involving pools of paint and a guard, that was probably one of my favourite parts of the game.

I could go on about this game for ages as it's such a wonderful game, the graphics aren't as good as, say Banjo-Kazooie (another game I shall be reviewing soon) but that doesn't mean that it doesn't have as much charm!
The only bad things I have to say about this game are related to the camera and the level in the sky... (god I hated that one..)
The camera can be VERY frustrating so someone who isn't used to it,
it catches in corridors (just like in Mario) but the annoying thing is, if you press Left on the C-Pad twice it will keep switching between places and I find it very irritating.
Other than those, there is nothing, in my opinion, that take the fun out of this game at all.
Rocket: Robot on Wheels did not get the attention it deserved and it's such a shame.

I totally reccommend this game to ANYONE (Y)