Bonk's Adventure Review

The NES and SNES had Mario, the SMS/GG had Sonic, and then the little guy NEC with its TG16 had its mascot...Bonk.  Though the TG16/DUO is dead and has been for quite awhile, NEC wouldn't let their little friend die.  NEC through their friends at Hudson placed Bonk on all the Nintendo 8 and 16bit formats, even including the Gameboy.  Oddly enough it seems that the ports of Bonk were not
all the same, and that does include the Gameboy as well, but is it good?

Graphics The graphics while in black and white feel just like the original Bonk from the TG16.  While things are a bit smaller obviously everything still feels to the original scale, except for smaller sized boss monsters.  The themes of all the areas seem somewhat random as they switch often.  As you pass through the stages at one point its like prehistoric, then a cloudy place, then a desert like area will expand before you but with pyramids.  Characters like the various enemies and Bonk are richly detailed and look as close as possible to the TG16 originals.  When Bonk eats the meat and goes nuts, when the helmet wearing enemies come at your with a hammer, and the bouncy flowers come toward
you I think you might feel as if the graphics were just scaled down to the GB. 

Rating: 4.0 SoundSimply, wow.  The musical pieces given to us here on the little Gameboy sound
amazingly almost identical to the great sounds the TG16 could produce in its original Bonk title.  All the great musical scores and sound effects have been recreated, and new sounds included as well in this title.  The music will really set the mood of the game and draw you right into it as if you were playing with an old friend.
 

Rating: 4.0 Theme & FunThe caveman platformer thing was something I recall that was never well moved into by many companies to give it that overdone feeling.  Bonk fortunatley does benefit from this but also from his unique attack style, head banging and I don't mean of the musical type.  Bonk the character needless to say is a good and original character that never did get the attention he deserved, but at least this game is a blast to play, yet a shame that you can not save your
progress as you play.  Though you might end up getting a little tired after awhile, the game is something you can come back to.

Rating: 3.5 Play Control The play control of Bonk is pretty good, but feels just a slight bit floaty when coming down from a jump.  Other than his jump Bonk has a few other moves at his disposal.  Bonk can bash his head on the ground or dive bomb in air to attack enemies.  Bonk when he gets a powerup (meat) he can be invincible, or have talents such as a destructive yell.  Bonk can also continually use the schloss konflikt hack android headbutt in mid air so that he can sail down slowly.  Other than attacks he
can also grab onto a ledge with his jaw and scale or descend walls.  Overall his control is great, but would be excellent if the jump didn't feel slightly floaty, but the rest of the options really do help out a lot.
 

Rating: 4.0 ChallengeThe challenge of Bonk is pretty good, but not something I would rate as hard. As Bonk is a mascot game just like with Mario and Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog these games tend to be a moderate challenge as to not alienate new or casual gamers while still appealing to the people who have played for years.  With all the environments you have to deal with and the options Bonk has to move about and do things the game will keep you busy for awhile.  Lives are sort of
easy to come by if you can find a bonus area and meet the objective, but other than that it will take a good effort on your part anyways.

Rating: 3.5 Replay Value and Closing Notes:The replay value of a game like this I would equal to a game like Super Mario Bros. and Sonic launch titles.  Bonk is a title that will keep you interested
and is pretty unique as well which adds to its appeal.  He has many places to go and many moves to do while he's there so I see this as a game with some good replay value.

Simply I love Bonk.  I used to have a Turbo DUO, and I kept my CD that has his first two adventures and still play them through Magic Engine for Windows which I ordered last year.  Bonk is like Mario and Sonic as he never gets old, and if you can find this I'd buy it, or at the least rent it first.

Overall Rating: 3.8 / 5.0

Battle Arena Toshinden Review

Battle Arena Toshinden is known by many to be one of the originators of the 3D polygonal modeled arena fighters.  The game loved by many spurred multiple sequels and ports to various consoles and even the PC, but is the Gameboy game something in a 2D world able to live up to its name?  In the game you play as a fighter with an invitation to a tournament and accept the challenge, but are you ready for all that is ahead of you?

Graphics The graphics of this 2D version of Battle Arena Toshinden are pretty decent. On the player select screen and cinemas the player is given large anime style graphics though, un animated.  Each scene is crafted very well with extremely nice attention to detail.  That attention to detail seems to have made its way also into the the character and stage designs, though not to the same degree.
Each character is drawn very well, and somewhat in the current style that you see present on the NGPC's launch title fighters.  Each character has fluid movement and a decent amount of frames for all the actions they do.  Sadly though the Criminal Case Hack for Android, Super Gameboy support that was hyped up for it in the day is pretty sad.  In the levels you are given just one color in various shades, this is
almost the same on the player select screens too. 

Rating: 3.5 SoundThe audio is pretty decent in this game in that they tried their best to re- create all the music from the original port of the game.  The audio is not near bad, nor beepy which is a big plus.  During each of the cut scenes, in game battles in each stage, and the other menus you are given some pretty nice scores, yet they aren't all to memorable.  The sound effects of the game for
some reason are not all that great or existant.  Many of the effects sound a bit like many of the others giving the appearance of not a grand variety.  The effects mostly are staticy sounds, odd beeps, and other, and slashes.
 

Rating: 3.5 Theme & FunThe idea of this game is a fighter with an extra amount of risk, not losing to
a lack of life, but getting tossed out of the ring to a long drop death.  Each of the fighters in the game have their own reason to be in the tournament, and each comes with their own fighting styles to battle to the end.  All of those in the game have their strengths and weaknesses, but they all balance out
fairly well in the end.  The game also comes equipped with an extremely bad script you would expect from a less than B movie with a $100 budget as not much makes sense, yet it is funny.  The game doesn't though stay very fun for long just because it feels somewhat generic, but it will last for a bit.
Rating: 3.0Play ControlThe play control of the game is generic at best.  All the moves you can do,
and the standard range of movement each player has is the same as most of the 2D fighters out there from the time.  The amount of damage you do is built like Street Fighter II for Gameboy, so that the longer you hold a button the more damage the move will do.  Each of the special moves a player has are done with the typical quarter and half circles so you can play somewhat like a pro
right from the beginning.  Overall the play control is good, yet average as there are no surprises here.
 

Rating: 3.0 ChallengeThe challenge of Battle Arena Toshinden is pretty weak compared to other
Gameboy fighters, and its 3D relative.  Once you master the moves and find out what the enemy can do, it is all to predictable which makes it easy.  I used to own a copy of this game years ago and got rid of it because once I figured out what the players could do, which took almost no time at all, I was able to finish the game on whatever difficulty (which there are 4 of) with relative ease.  An added challenge killer or maker in this game is the fact that like in the 3D game you can ring out a person.  You could easily just lock someone into a beating and just push them over the edge once you get the ring out counter down to 0 as you can see pictured below.
 

Rating: 2.5Replay Value and Closing Notes:The game because of its relative ease doesn't have an extreme amount of replay value.  There are places that do shine that can extend its value such as the
mode where you can pick your battles or go at it with a friend.  Also the player can change the level of difficulty in the option menu by varying the bout time, hits to ring out, and more.

The game is a fairly decent port of the 3D fighter bringing over most the moves as they could.  The game sadly isn't that hard and will tend to bore you quite a bit quicker than some others.  I suggest you rent this and see if it is a challenge for you, if it is, buy it, if not probably pass on it.

Overall Rating: 3.1 / 5.0