I kind of enjoyed playing Battletoads on the NES and I found Battletoads on the Game Boy pretty good. As the SNES is a console for which I hold a great deal of nostalgic affection, I was pretty excited to see its Battletoads game.
In some senses, I loved it, in others, I was disappointed – and I think that the disappointed was only due to my own expectations. I was looking forward to seeing a brand new adventure for the toads, but really this game is just a fancy remake of the NES original. The Game Boy version is probably more different from the NES game than this one. I’ll admit that the story is different (the toads go into some kind of virtual reality) and there are a few fancy extra features, but the game is largely the same.
You’ve got a level which is essentially just a remake of the original Turbo Tunnel (with some nicer visuals), you’ve got a level which has you using lots of fast moving snakes as platforms and dodging spikes (just like the original), and a level where you’re racing an enemy downward through a tower (again just like the original) and, most horribly, you’ve got a level which remakes Clinger Winger (an ordeal I hoped never to go through again.)
But I will say that if you go into this expecting a slightly remixed remake, you’ll be delighted. The controls are better than the original, the music is better than the original and the graphics are nicer than the original. It’s also easier than the original, which might be a disappointment to some hardcore fans, but I feel that the first game was too hard and this winding down of the difficulty is a welcome change.
I’d say that if you’re a more casual gamer who always wanted to try Battletoads, then I would certainly recommend this over playing the original. It’s a better experience all round and, unless you really want a challenge, I think most people would prefer this one. I’m surprised it wasn’t included within Rare Replay…
Rating: 7.9/10
