Finally being able to play Ganbare Goemon 2 on the Super Famicom is kind of a bittersweet experience for me. I grew up with Legend of the Mystical Ninja and absolutely loved that game. Some of my best gaming memories come from it. I always wondered why Konami waited for the next generation to make a sequel. Little did I know that no less than three follow ups were released on the Super Famicom, but in Japan only. I genuinely feel like my kid self missed out big time. After importing and playing through them all I rediscovered my love for the franchise. Today I’m here to highlight what I do and don’t love about Ganbare Goemon 2: Kiteretsu Shogun Magginesu. Let’s get started with our review!
The story here begins with Goemon and his pal Ebisumaru winning the lottery and going on vacation at a place called Ryuuku Island. Things start off well enough until one day Sasuke the mechanical puppet appears before them and informs the ninja buddies that the whole thing was a set up. In their absense Oedo Castle has lifted into the sky, and a new villain named McGuinness is behind it. The three set out to once again restore peace to Japan. All of this is told through a very charming opening sequence complete with rudimentary animations. It’s a pretty standard set up for the franchise, and the off-the-wall humor makes it’s triumphant return here. I had to follow various translations to keep up with what was going on, but honestly this isn’t necessary. Ganbare Goemon 2 is easily playable from start to finish in Japanese.
Ganbare Goemon 2 is sort of a hybrid beat ’em up adventure game with a focus on platforming. The standard stages are strictly two dimensional and have you hopping and bopping your way through a variety of enemies and obstacles. It’s pretty standard fare, but there are a few elements that set it apart from the pack. You can choose between the three characters but they all control and attack in a similar fashion. Each has two weapons by default; a melee strike and a projectile that uses in-game currency (in this case coins). Some stages have mechanical vehicles you can ride such as a fish, mouse, and more. They move faster in different terrain, and feature projectile attacks that don’t drain your money. You can also take more hits while riding one which is nice, and can dismount whenever you choose (even in mid-air).
The level designs are absolutely brilliant. Seriously, these are some of the best crafted stages in any 16-bit title. This is thanks in large part to the variety of obstacles the developers came up with. In some areas you have to dodge motion sensing lasers, others have you dealing with rising water levels, and one even has you riding atop the back of a dragon. One stage I thought was particularly inventive involves riding on the top of a snowball which increases and decreases in size at specific points in the level. The boss battles are also quite well done. One has you battling it out in a small mecha ala rock em sock em robots, while another involves running under umbrellas to avoid laser blasts. When it comes to variety Ganbare Goemon 2 is tough to beat.
Speaking of boss encounters not all is good in the land of Goemon. This is the installment of the franchise that introduces the giant mecha robot Impact to the franchise. Generally the final encounter in any world pits you against a giant enemy. You have to board Impact and do battle in epic fashion against these large enemies. It’s obviously inspired by Zyuuranger, and at first I thought the idea was really neat. The execution is a bit iffy however. You view the action from behind the character you’re playing as from inside the cockpit. You have a limited sort of first person view of the battlefield along with a reticule for aiming. Impact can punch with both it’s left and right hands, block with them, as well as fire projectiles (again, at the cost of coins). These fights are overly difficult and I never really liked them.
Outside of the action stages are town areas, just like in the past installment. Unfortunately these are just less interesting in my opinion. Not only do most of them not feature enemies now but they’re smaller and less interactive. There are some mini-games to be played but several didn’t return. You can participate in the lottery, compete in a card matching game, and a few others. Gone are things like playing the first stage of Gradius or the 3D mazes I loved so much previously. These generally serve now as mere hub areas where you can easily earn coins (by walking into the female characters that wander the streets) heal your characters by staying at the Inn, travel to past worlds via the airport, and purchase items/equipment to make the main quest easier. Honestly I didn’t enjoy exploring these because they’re kind of boring.
So what really sets Ganbare Goemon apart from it’s contemporaries is the fact that it offers two player simultaneous gameplay. You and a friend can work together at every point in the game, and at the same time no less. This is absolutely game changing. It does make the game easier in some cases, but more difficult in others. It kind of balances things out. On one hand you have two characters to contend with enemies. On the other they’re stuck on a single screen that scrolls with your movement. Because of this the other player can easily become trapped, or you can mess someone up by not staying close enough to them. That’s not even to mention the fact that the gameplay area can become absolutely chaotic and hard to follow. Still, there are few co-op experiences that are as well rounded or downright fun as this one.
Ganbare Goemon 2 looks significantly better than the last title. Not only are the characters drawn with more sprites and at higher resolution, but they have more frames of animation. These two factors add a ton of character to an already over the top experience visually. The backgrounds also look quite good and are chock full of detail. The Impact scenes (while not particularly fun) make tremendously good use of scaling and rotation effects. The terrain is however not particularly well rendered here. Regardless Ganbare Goemon 2 is a good looking Super Famicom game. The soundtrack fits the franchise’s themes. It all sounds pretty good, but there aren’t really any standout tracks. The music is not as good as in the previous title despite using remixes of some prior compositions. It’s not really something I cared for overall though.
