Tennis (1989)

Image shamelessly linked from GameFAQs.

2 out of 5 Game Boy launch titles were sports games.

I'm not sure what that says about Nintendo, but it does

make me wonder why every platform got so many.

So this is Tennis, the final of 5 launch titles for the Nintendo Game Boy.  The 2nd of 2 sports titles in the launch line-up, Nintendo of America must really have been banking on the popularity of sports games, because the launch line-up included 2 games, much like the Japanese launch included Yakuman, a mahjong game.  In the same way that every video game console ever released in Japan has likely seen a mahjong game (or thirty), every game system ever released in North America is generally peppered with sports titles throughout the console's life span.  The Game Boy was no exception, and it received both Baseball and Tennis.

It's a good thing they let you turn off the background

music, because there's only 1 track that repeats forever.

Of the 2 sports titles, I prefer Tennis, in part because it's a more fully realized game.  Baseball suffered from very little replay value, somewhat broken game mechanics, and a touch of unforgiving CPU AI.  Tennis, on the other hand, appears to be more fleshed out, in part because there are 4 different difficulty levels, and the gameplay just "feels" better.  Something about how tightly the game plays makes it a better game.  I realize that's difficult to quantify, but I'll do my best to explain.

There are 4 different difficulty levels. Each successive

level makes the game faster and more difficult. I'm not

sure how human beings can play the game at level 3 or 4,

given how fast the game, you, & your opponent both move.

For the uninitiated, the sport of tennis is fairly simple.  2 players face off on a court with a 3 1/2 foot net that divides the court equally.  Each side has lines painted to designate the entire play field, as well as two smaller sections along the net that show the serving area.  One player serves the ball by hitting it with their tennis racket to the opposite court, on the opposite side of the net horizontally.  In other words, they hit the ball diagonally to the player on the other side.  That player then returns the ball to anywhere in the serving player's side of the court, and they continue to volley the ball back and forth until someone misses a shot, one player hits the ball out of bounds, or the ball hits the net and lands on the side of the returning player.  The 1st and 2nd scores are worth 15 points, the 3rd is worth 10, and the 4th wins the game.  If each player scores 3 times, and they're tied at 40 points, a "deuce" occurs, and the players continue to serve and volley the ball until one player has scored twice in succession against the other player, so that they are 2 strokes or volleys ahead.  This particular tennis game consists of 2 sets, consisting of anywhere from 6 to 12 matches per set, depending on whether the players are winning multiple matches in each set or not.  If the 2nd set results in a tie, a sudden-death round takes place, and players volley until one player has scored 7 times, at which point they win the game.  Clear as mud, right?

As you can see, the view is pretty basic, but is perfect for

the game, because it's not cluttered by scenery or other

background noise that would detract from your ability

to just play the game of tennis, so it fits this game well.

The game's controls make for part of why I mentioned above that the game feels tighter and better than Baseball.  Holding up on the D-pad means you're hitting the ball toward your opponent harder/faster, and holding down means you're hitting it with less force.  Holding right or left on the D-pad when serving or returning a volley will make the ball veer in that direction, but be careful; sometimes you'll end up overshooting and the ball will land out of bounds.  Press A once to toss the ball in the air, and A again to serve.  The A button is your basic, straight-ahead shot, while the B button is a high, arcing shot where you essentially lob the ball up and over toward your opponent.  Start pauses the game, and that can be done at any time during a match.  Other than sometimes overshooting, and occasionally failing to return a volley if you're standing dead-center with the ball as it approaches you, the controls just work, and are pretty intuitive.

After every few matches, you change sides, as per official

tennis rules, though it doesn't really affect play at all.

It's not hard for a game to be more graphically impressive than the original Baseball for Game Boy, but Tennis is relatively impressive, as compared to its launch title sports brethren.  The character sprites animate well, and are reasonably good facsimiles of real people on a court.  The perspective above and behind the player is also just about as good as one could hope for, with enough view of both sides of the court to judge the distance, speed, and trajectory of the tennis ball.  The ball makes a subtle little circle animation on the ground each time it bounces, and the ball's shadow helps make it easier to gauge its relative position.  Mario looks like Mario, in his referee role, and while the crowd is pretty basic, at least there's an audience drawn in.  Overall, the graphics are fitting, and the animations work well.  There's also the nice little touch of your player bouncing the ball on the ground a couple times, if you take too long before serving the ball.  Also of note, all the original launch titles have special color schemes when used in the Super Game Boy, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance, and also the Game Boy Player for the GameCube.  The court is a nice green, the players have different color clothing, and it just looks very sharp.

Depending on the difficulty level, gameplay can get quite

fast and frenetic, with you and the CPU trading volleys in

rapid succession until someone makes a mistake.

Sound design is basic and utilitarian, but it works.  There's a basic ball bounce sound you'll hear a lot, as well as the sound when the ball hits the racket.  When a ball is hit high, it makes a familiar "arc" kind of sound, and when the ball smacks into the net, it's a good approximation of what that might sound like, at least as far what the Game Boy can produce.  The sound that plays between matches is goofy, and seems more like filler, but the "crowd noise" sound is decent, giving that sense of the audience cheering you on.  Music is basic, and like Baseball, the presence of only 1 music track means you'll get tired of it really quickly, but at least it's reasonably bouncy, catchy, and inoffensive, so until you tire of it, it won't completely bore you.  Once again, Nintendo gets the job done without the "wow" factor.

With enough practice, you can begin to get a leg up on

the CPU.  Also, you should win, because you have the

awesome, 80's-inspired headband on your player's head.

When I first started playing, I felt as though the game was quite difficult, because I found myself trying to beat the CPU by tricking it, using the right and left angled shots to send the ball where the computer couldn't reach it, only to be flabbergasted when it actually returned the ball in the same fashion I was attempting to do, and beating me handily in the process.  When I started to change up my strategy, alternating between fast and slow shots, and occasionally throwing in a "lob" shot, I started improving.  However, I found that there's a way to game the system, and give yourself a very good chance of winning.  If you stand at the back of the court, and hit the ball with a slow shot (hold down on the D-pad and hit A, just as the ball is reaching the back court line, you can shoot it just far enough to hit the top of the net and barely bounce over.  The CPU will not be able to return these shots, and usually won't try.  Occasionally, it will attempt to volley it back to you, but the ball will always hit the net on those occasions.  Of course, this technique becomes harder as you move up in difficulty level, so your level of precision needs to tighten alongside that shift.  There are other techniques more advanced that you can read about on GameFAQs, though strangely, none of the hosted FAQs mentioned this particular technique.  However, they all mention a bug in the game, whereby you swing your racket at the peak of your serve, then move your player so the ball bounces on your head and you win the point.  I can confirm their findings as well, as I tried it, and sure enough; it works like a charm!

It's good to know that, even after taking such a beating,

my CPU opponent isn't a poor sport, and will still shake

my hand.  Nintendo obviously didn't program in any John

McEnroe-esque temper tantrums in the game.

Unfortunately, since I don't know anyone else locally who owns a Game Boy, let alone someone who owns a copy of Tennis for the handheld, I was unable to test the 2-player mode at this time.  Based on what I've read, it's pretty fun, and you even have the opportunity to play doubles.  I would love to be able to try that, as well as competitive play against another person.  I quite enjoyed 2-player action on the Game Boy as a kid, and I still think it would be fun to have that kind of interaction today.  I suppose I could cheat, and try to play against someone online via an emulator, but I prefer the real thing.  There's nothing like hooking up a link cable, or lining up your Game Boy Color units for infrared to go head-to-head in a game like this.  Sadly, I can't test that side of the experience at the moment.

Ah yes, the triumphant walk to bask in the glory of victory,

as the audience cheers you on, feeding your narcissism.

Overall, Tennis on the Game Boy is a great little game, and one that I see myself going back to.  There are other tennis games on the platform, as well as titles that came out later on the Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance, so it will be interesting to see how those compare with this.  As it stands, I would say this ranks behind Tetris and Super Mario Land as a decent 3rd place contender within the launch line-up.  It has more replay value than either Alleyway or Baseball, has better control and game mechanics than the latter, and is just fun to play.  Even if you're like me, and not much of a sports (or sports game) fan, this is a solid, fun game that, given some time, might just suck you in and get you addicted to it.  Recommended.

The painful sting of loss is too much for your player when

you lose - he just walks off the court crying after the match.

Baseball (1989)

Image shamelessly linked from GameFAQs.

"Take me out to the ballgame, take me out to the crowd..."

I'm not a sports guy.  Truth be told, I never really have been, though I did have some relative interest in sports as a kid.  I was sort of into football, I was sort of into basketball, and I had a passing interest in a couple other sports.  The sport I was most interested in, like many other red-blooded American youth, was Baseball.  Yes, America's pastime was my preferred sport, in part because of the strategy, and in part because that's what my dad was into.  My team was the Kansas City Royals, in part because of their proximity to where we lived, and my favorite player was the pine tar king himself, George Brett.  Needless to say, as a chubby nerd of a kid, I played exactly one summer of little league and played poorly enough that I didn't feel like playing a 2nd year.  Once the player strike happened, I quit collecting baseball cards and pretty much lost all interest in the sport.  I guess I had no sympathy for guys who made more money in a month than my dad made all year, and them whining about not getting paid enough.

I like how the baseballs and bats are incorporated into the title screen.

So while I haven't followed the sport in well over 20 years, I still understand the basics, and have played and enjoyed a handful of baseball games over the years.  The classic RBI Baseball on the NES was a hoot, and I had a little fun with Bottom of the 9th, an arcade classic that had semi-realistic (at the time) graphics and physics.  I even had some fun with Baseball on the Atari 2600, until the joystick stopped working.  But I never purchased a baseball game for any home console, because I'd rather go throw the ball around outside than play the game inside.  My first official baseball game purchase ever is Baseball for the Game Boy, a launch title.

"Swing, batter batter, swing!"

As baseball games go, this is pretty bare bones.  There are only 2 teams in the game, The W-Bears and the R-Eagles, and you choose which team you want to be based upon whether you want to hit or pitch first.  You can also choose between "USA Mode" or "Japan Mode", but as far as I can tell, the only difference between the 2 modes is the names of the players, which are all generic, save for Mario and Luigi.  The brothers don't appear to look like their more famous plumbing counterparts, however, as the player sprites are all quite generic.  The game mechanics are extremely simple as well.  If you're looking for a deep sports game experience, this isn't it.

"That's a mighty fast pitch ya got there, son."

Graphically, it's a pretty simple setup.  The view is the same, whether you're pitching or hitting, which is a view from behind home plate, as if you were the umpire.  When the ball is hit, the view switches to a more overhead perspective, and zooms out quite a bit so you can see more of the field and the players.  As expected, the player sprites are simplistic and have very little animation to them.  The graphics don't have to be fancy, given the need to see the field lines, bases, and players, so one wouldn't have to expect them to be anything more than what they are.  The animations are also a bit goofy at times.  While the pitching and batting animations are solid, and look quite good, the running animation is strange, especially when the pitcher runs to the mound at the beginning of each change-over.  The screen animation following a hit is also very jerky, and can be a tad distracting.

Here's me, throwing to 1st base instead of home because,

even with the game's intuitive controls, I keep wanting to

throw to 1st base for some odd reason...

Sound design is very basic as well.  The little tune that plays at the beginning of the game, as well as the one between rounds, will get stuck in your head, because they're catchy.  The song that plays during the game loops forever, and it's the only long-form track in the whole game, so if you don't choose to turn the music off (thankfully, that's an option), you're a better person than I am.  Sound effects are all appropriate for the game, and only the "pop fly" sound began to grate on me after a while.  At this point in the Game Boy's life, Nintendo wasn't experimenting too much with the sound hardware, and it shows here, because nearly all the sounds are pretty standard high-pitched "boops and beeps", much like what you would hear in early NES titles, before creative developers like Sunsoft started to push the envelope.

Each time you change players on the field, they do this

goofy thing where they all put up their hands when the

pitcher reaches the mound.

Gameplay is quite simple, mostly intuitive, but actually quite difficult.  When batting, you can move your player around in the batting box, and hit the A button to swing the bat.  Similarly, when pitching, you can move the pitcher left or right on the mound, press A to take a stance, then A again to throw the pitch.  Holding down on the D-pad makes the ball go faster, holding up makes it go slower, and pressing left or right will make the ball curve in that direction.  Fielding is semi-automatic.  When a ball is hit, your fielders will run in the general direction the ball is travelling.  If it's a pop fly, generally the fielders will run to where they can catch it, assuming it doesn't move too fast for them to catch up.  If it's a ground ball, often the fielders will scramble and run to the ball to try and intercept it before it goes outfield.  If so, you can try and quickly throw the ball to a base to get a runner out.  This is where part of the intuitive nature comes in to play.  If you're pitching, you can press Start to call a timeout, then press Start again to bring up the list of pitchers so you can substitute by selecting a pitcher and hitting the A button.  You hold the direction on the d-pad to the base you want to throw: right for 1st base, up for 2nd, and left for 3rd, as well as down for home.  Then you press the A button to throw in that direction.  Similarly, when you're the hitting team, you use the B button and the corresponding direction to steal a base, or run to one in times when the ball is hit and your on-based players don't automatically run.

Nothing like the satisfaction of catching a pop fly for an easy out.

That brings me to one of the game's somewhat broken mechanics.  There's apparently a trick with stealing bases, documented on GameFAQs, where you can begin to steal a base, as the pitcher is beginning his throw.  If you can pull it off, even if your batter hits a foul, or hits a pop fly, you can often steal the next base.  However, it doesn't always work correctly.  In conjunction with that, there are times you'll hit the ball, and the runner on first won't move, so you'll have to manually advance him to the next base, only to occasionally be thrown out because you didn't notice until your batter was halfway to first base.  Also, if you attempt to steal a base and you're in danger of being thrown out, you're supposed to be able to backtrack to the base you just crossed, but I couldn't ever get that mechanic to work.  On top of that, sometimes when you steal a base, it doesn't count for some reason, and that runner gets thrown out at their previous base.  It doesn't quite track with the rules of the game, and can be frustrating when you're trying to exploit the base stealing mechanic.  The batting mechanics have been documented as well, but I never found any great consistency in where I was going to hit the ball, based on where I connected with it on the bat.  Speaking of connecting, I found the most luck when I moved the batter to the bottom of the batter's box, versus in the middle or top.  Similarly, I struck out batters as much throwing straight pitches as I did trying to throw curve balls and the like, so the game's AI is severely lacking in that respect.

The game also seems highly unbalanced when it comes to the hitting and fielding.  The AI for the semi-automatic fielding seems to work better for the CPU than for you, and because the computer's team doesn't have human hands controlling it, when an infielder catches or fields a ball, they can instantly throw it to the corresponding base, and throw our your runner and/or batter.  I found that I could never react fast enough to throw them out with any consistency.  The computer sometimes seemed to be able to really hit major curve balls and score home runs, and even grand slams, scoring anywhere from 2-4 runs at once.  I could never hit with any kind of consistency.  Thankfully, the game institutes a Little League styled 10-run rule, so if you're losing by 10 points, you automatically lose the game, and don't have to suffer the continued humiliation of being annihilated by the computer.  When you lose the game, and you will, your team lines up on the field so the audience can throw objects at you, which only furthers your sense of shame.  I played some 20-25 games in total for this review.  I lost via the 10-run rule 3 or 4 times, and lasted the 9 innings the rest, but I was never able to win a game - not even close.  The game's somewhat unforgiving AI made it very difficult to get anywhere near enough runs to claim victory.

You'll be seeing this screen a lot, but unless you can get

skilled at the batting & base stealing mechanics, don't

expect it to be you generating this screen much, but the

opposing team will often get a number of these each game.

All in all, it's an interesting period piece.  Baseball was and is America's past time, and in 1989 when this game was released, the sport was at peak popularity, so even a relatively weak game like this would sell, especially given the more powerful nature of the Game Boy hardware, compared to previous LCD or LED-based handheld baseball games of yore.  The game's simplicity is both a strength and a weakness.  There are so few options that you can't get bogged down in them, you just pick up, play a quick game, and you're done.  But for the more serious fan of the sport, there are no other options other than a single game.  No season or campaign mode, no tournaments, nothing to give the game more replay value.  The only way to pause the game is to call a timeout, or substitute a pitcher or hitter.  If you need to walk away when you're pitching, you can - there's no penalty for just standing there on the mound forever.  But when you're batting, you have to sacrifice a timeout if you have to stop for some reason.  It adds an unnecessary, real-world element in a game that throws most of those conventions out the window.  Still, I had fun with it, despite all of its flaws.  There's a weird sort of draw to the game, because I kept going back to it, hoping I would eventually figure out the batting enough to win a game.  I have to believe that subsequent baseball outings on the Game Boy are more full-featured affairs with better AI, so here's hoping.  In the meantime, there are worse ways you can spend $4, but don't pay much more than that for a loose cart, because you probably won't spend much time with it.  For serious baseball nuts and collectors only.

Super Mario Land (1989)

Image shamelessly linked from Museum Of Play.

Just look at all the cool stuff on the front cover - Mario is

obviously in for a big adventure this time around!

It's quite timely that the 2015 edition of Review a Great Game Day is happening as I begin to cover the Game Boy library, especially since I'm trying to get the 5 North American launch titles out of the way in relatively short order.  Not that there's anything inherently wrong with them; far from it.  In general, the launch library was a demonstration of the baseline for what the Game Boy hardware could do.  Ultimately, many subsequent games released for the Game Boy would far and away eclipse the launch titles in terms of scope, size, graphics, sound and gameplay, as we'll discover together through this journey.  As most gamers know by now, however, the technical wizardry is only window dressing.  If the game isn't fun, it doesn't matter how pretty it looks or sounds.  Super Mario Land is a complete package - it looks good for its time, sounds good, and is loads of fun.

One look at that title screen, 

and you know you're in for a good time.

It's no stretch to say that by 1989, as far as home entertainment goes, Nintendo ruled in North America.  Microcomputers were still the rage in Europe, and Japan had a flurry of competition between Nintendo's Famicom console, Hudson's newer PC Engine console, and the still fledgling Sega Megadrive, the successor to the Mark III (Sega Master System).  In the good old US of A, however, Nintendo dominated the market due to good marketing, and also due to some strong-arm licensing tactics that created difficulty with 3rd party publishers, especially if they wanted to develop software for a competing platform, such as the Master System or the new Genesis system.  Between the popularity of the Super Mario Bros. franchise, 2 installments in (3 in Japan, by this time), plus other popular Konami and Capcom properties, the NES was a force to be reckoned with.  It wasn't the most powerful hardware on the market, but with games as good as what we were getting, that didn't matter, because the final product was high-quality and fun.  Nintendo of Japan wanted to replicate that success with the handheld market, which translated into the Game Boy.  Naturally, Nintendo would want to bring their flagship character, and primary mascot, to the new platform.  It had to be a good game, or the franchise's staying power could be jeopardized.  Thankfully, it turned out to be a great game.

Look at all the shiny coins!

Mario, being the nice guy he is, was somehow informed of the goings-on in Sarasaland, a magical place, not unlike the Mushroom Kingdom.  Apparently, a ruthless alien named Tatanga has run amok throughout the 4 realms, and his minions have taken over.  Princess Daisy, who rules over Sarasaland, has been taken captive, and Mario takes it upon himself to rescue her from the evil alien.  He must traverse all 4 realms, defeat Tatanga's minions, and bring peace to the land once again.  Either Mario is a sucker, or he's just the nicest guy in the universe, because he continues to save princesses and people over and over again.

Image shamelessly linked from Brawl In the Family.

This comic perfectly illustrates the double-take most fans might have

done when first playing the game, due to the unfamiliarity of many

elements in the game's world, Sarasaland, much like they did when

they first played Super Mario Bros. 2, with the new "pull" mechanic, as

well as all the new enemies and locations in the game's world.

"I'll take what's behind door #2, Bob."

Thankfully, Mario has a couple tools at his disposal to help him along the way.  Along for the ride is the usual super mushroom & invincibility star, as well as 1-Ups that come in the form of hearts now, instead of mushrooms, most likely due to the lack of color to distinguish them from the super mushrooms.  Also, there are flowers in this game, but they're not "Fire Flowers".  Instead, they give Mario the ability to throw bouncing "superball" power-ups.  Interestingly, these superballs will bounce off any surface at a 45 degree angle, and will keep bouncing for a short time until they leave the screen, or wear out.  A new element here also is that superballs can collect coins, a gameplay mechanic you'll likely use more than once in the game.  Be aware that only 2 of the superballs can appear on the screen at any given time, so if you jump the gun and fire off 2, and neither hit the enemy you're targeting, you'll have to wait to throw more, and possibly dispatch the foe using the standard stomp method.  Also, if you reach the end of the level and can get to the upper door, you'll participate in a mini game where you can score extra lives, or a superball flower power-up.

Cats have 9 lives, but for Mario, the sky's the limit.

Sarasaland has a bevy of new antagonists.  Goombas (Chibibo) and Piranha plants (Pakkun) have apparently populated Sarasaland under new aliases, but Koopa Troopa's (Nokobon) now explode shortly after stomping them.  There are goofy robots, running Easter Island heads, jumping fish carcasses, strange flying insect hybrids that throw arrows at you, jumping stone statues with wings.  The denizens of Sarasaland are bizarre, indeed.  Somewhat surprisingly, there are more enemy types in this Game Boy adventure than there are in either the original Super Mario Bros. or its sequel. 

"I hope this treasure is worth all 'o the extra effort!"

If you've played the original Super Mario Bros. game, you'll be right at home here with the gameplay.  Mario can jump with the A button, walk, run (holding down the B button), throw superballs with the B button, and duck by pressing down on the D-pad.  Jumping up to a block as Super Mario will break bricks and get coins and other items from question blocks.  Mario's movements are quite similar to those of his first side scroll outing, though gone is the inertia that takes place when you let up on the D-pad while moving left or right.  Mario stops almost dead in his tracks when you let go.  Some folks will find this refreshing, because they disliked the inertia.  Others, like myself, found it a tad jarring, though it doesn't take long to get used to.

Spacecraft in a Mario game well before Super Mario Galaxy!

Graphically, the game was fairly impressive for an early game, and certainly the most visually impressive and appealing launch title.  Despite his diminutive stature on screen, Mario is instantly recognizable as the protagonist.  Nintendo chose wisely to use a very minimalist approach to the backgrounds, with a few trees, pyramids, and various other elements in the background, but not overdo it.  It's quite reminiscent of the first NES title, though perhaps a bit more detailed to make up for the lack of color.  Locales are interesting and varied, as the 4 "worlds" within Sarasaland all have a relatively distinctive look, and some variation within each from one stage to the next.  For example, in the first world, the Birabuto Kingdom, you start out in an overworld, much like the original Super Mario Bros., but progress into an area inside a pyramid-like structure later in the world.  In world 2, the Muda Kingdom, you start again in an overworld scenario, but end up in a submarine underwater in a later stage.  Each stage is well laid out, and the graphical detail is enough to make it interesting, but not overdone so as to make it hard to see what's going on.  Animations are well done, despite being quite sparse.  I never noticed as a kid, but most enemies have only 2 or 3 total frames of animation.  Despite that limitation, it still looks and feels like a Mario platformer.

When did Mario games suddenly become shoot-em-ups?

The sound design in the game is also of equal quality.  The music is super catchy, thanks to composer Hirokazu Tanaka.  His score for the game is indelibly stuck in my head, and I've used the Stage 1-1 music as a ringtone, both on my various mobile phones, as well as my office phone, multiple times in the last 10 years.  The songs all have that Mario-esque vibe to them, though they're a bit more expansive.  By that, I mean that some of the songs have a specific, thematic bent to them.  There's a read Egyptian feel to the music from the Easton Kingdom, and a traditional Oriental feel to the music in the Chai Kingdom.  All the music in the game is interesting, and repeated plays will guarantee that one or more tracks will be on repeat in your subconscious.  Sound effects are also well done, with recognizable sounds for jumping, the transition from regular to Super Mario, grabbing the flower, the coin sound, the block hit & break sounds, etc.  New sounds are also done well, with some interesting effects to simulate voice when pelting bosses with superballs, or some of the enemy deaths.  It makes good use of the Game Boy sound hardware for such an early title, and you can tell that the sound design was as much a work of love as the rest of the game.

Speaking of shoot-em-ups, Nintendo takes a page from

the Konami handbook with the Easter Island heads.

The biggest drawback of the game is its relatively short length.  I say that, still being a huge fan of the game, but looking at it objectively, it is awful short.  That's especially true, considering the game's relatively meager difficulty.  As a kid, it didn't take me more than a couple weeks to go from just starting to play to actually beating the game.  Despite that, it's still a lot of fun to play, because Mario is adventuring through an entire new set of worlds that are interesting to traverse and look at.  The difference in inertia for Mario, as mentioned before, is a small issue, but worth mentioning.  Looking back at the entire library of Game Boy titles, most point to the sequel, Super Mario Bros. 2: 6 Golden Coins as the superior game, and from a strictly technical aspect, they're probably right.  However, this game remains my favorite of the 2 because of the sheer fun factor, the variation in the levels, enemies, bosses, the great music, and the fact that the game moves along with no slowdown.  This is a bona fide classic, and a must have for any Game Boy collector or aficionado's library.  Essential.

"Finally, I get to face-a the evil Tatanga!"

"Hey, Princess Daisy, why don't-a you take a ride with

me in-a my brand new space-a-ship, huh? Woohoo!"

Tetris (1989)

Image shamelessly linked from GameFAQs.

This was a game even your grandmother could love.

Every video game console has at least one game that defines it.  One title that, above any other, people associate with it.  For modern consoles, it's often a launch title that soars above the rest in quality, or a later game that is exclusive to that system.  Usually, it's a great game that is universally hailed as something special.  For early consoles, that game often happened to be the pack-in title, i.e. the game that came with the system when you bought it.  In the case of the Game Boy, that game was Tetris.

The thing about Tetris, however, is that it's not just a quality pack-in title.  It was a mission statement.  It was the perfect representation of the hardware's untapped potential, and the kind of game that could sell a Game Boy to even the most ardent anti-video game folks out there.  Why, you ask?  The answer is quite simple; Tetris is fun for all ages.  Read that statement again, because I don't say it lightly.  Your parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles may have no interest in blowing up aliens, stomping on walking mushrooms, or other such things, but a game with jigsaw-like puzzle pieces that move, and you have to put them in order to eliminate them from the screen?  Most anyone can get on board with that.  Large numbers of people did.

It's not a stretch to say tens of millions of people

worldwide have seen this title screen many times.

Unless you were alive and invested in video games in the mid-late 1980's, it's hard to truly explain the "mania" surrounding Tetris.  It was a craze, and nearly everyone was affected by it.  The storied battle between Tengen (Atari) and Nintendo over the rights to Tetris on the Nintendo Entertainment System is better documented elsewhere, but suffice to say, history proves that Nintendo won the battle, at least from a legal standpoint.  The game, upon a release on the NES and in the arcades, became a huge hit, and Nintendo, having scored the rights to the game on the NES, scored a major coup on the home console front.  That coup was further cemented by the inclusion of Tetris as the pack-in game for the original Game Boy.  Unfortunately, I haven't been able to get good figures for the sales of the Game Boy with the included Tetris pack-in, because sales of the Game Boy Pocket and Color models are lumped in with the original "white brick" version in all official sales statements, but sales of Tetris itself were upwards of 35 million units.  So of the 118.69 million "Game Boy family" systems sold worldwide from 1989 to 2003, we can link over 1/4 of those sales, in some measure, to the popularity of Tetris.

Playing this game again the last few days in preparation for this write-up, it struck me just how much I enjoyed it.  I recalled dedicating hours mastering the 4-line technique, and feeling a huge sense of victory any time I topped 100,000 points.  As a youth, I worked my way up to being able to start on level 7 or 8, and maximizing my scoring potential.  Having not played Tetris seriously in years, I'm not at that level any longer, but I was surprised that, after a couple practice runs, I was starting at level 5 or 6 and having some success in getting scores upwards of 60,000 or 80,000 points, and toppling the 100,000 mark a few times.  As they say, it's just like riding a bicycle; you never forget how, so just get on and ride.

Like many good arcade or early console games, this screenshot,

taken from the game's "attract mode", demonstrates subtly

how to play the game. A brilliant way to introduce the game

mechanics, and something that is lost in today's world of

overly complex games and 30-minute introductory tutorials.

I'll attempt to succinctly describe the game play.  You control a single, slowly falling geometric shape called a "Tetronimo", and can move it left or right, rotate it to the right or left, and press down on the d-pad to drop the piece to the bottom of the playing field, or atop another piece.  Each of these Tetronimo pieces is made up of 4 smaller squares, and pieces range from a large square to a long/tall line, to pieces where the squares are more "bent" in shape.  The grid you play in is 10 squares wide, and nearly 20 squares high.  As Tetronimo pieces fall, you place them on the play field in any order you wish, with the goal being to create a single, contiguous horizon line made of of Tetronimo pieces.  If you can manage to create a 4-line sequence at one time, using the 4-square tall "line" block, you score a big point bonus.  This 4-line clear, called a "Tetris", is the key to getting a high score in the game, and is also the linchpin to the game's deceptive simplicity.  Each time you complete 10 lines, the game's level increases, and the pieces fall faster.  Each time the level increases, the score multiplier for clearing single lines and "Tetris" clears goes up.  Thus, if you start the game at a higher level to begin with, you start with that level's speed, but also its score multiplier until clearing enough lines to go to the next level up from where you started.

"Rocket man, burning out his fuse up here alone."

Graphically, the game is not, by itself, impressive.  Compare it to the graphics on the NES, and the Game Boy's "4 shades of green" palette didn't impress much, and the sprites themselves were comparable, though obviously scaled back.  Context is important, however, and compare the graphics to what we had become used to in "portable gaming" with Nintendo Game & Watch devices, or the Tiger series of dedicated LCD handhelds, and it was a technical wonder.  Pieces fell and actually animated if you rotated them or fell smoothly when used the d-pad to drop them down to the bottom of the play field.  In addition, the minor animations of Mario and Luigi in 2-player mode, or the taking off of the rocket (if you scored 100,000 points or more in a single play), were something that, up to that point, hadn't been possible in a hand-held gaming device.  The graphics are largely utilitarian, but looking back, they're perfect for what the game is.

The game's sound and music is iconic, so it's hard to talk about it without talking about the game's music tracks.  We all know that "Type-A" sounds like a Russian melody, and that's because it was apparently based upon a Russian folk song.  "Type-C" is based on a piece by Johann Sebastian Bach, which gives it that classical sound.  "Type-B", however, is a wholly original tune, and composer Hirokazu Tanaka managed to also channel that Russian folk vibe to great effect.  Add the bouncy title screen theme, the high score music, and the triumphant music that plays as the rocket launches, and despite its diminutive size, the score is as well composed as one could hope for.  Sounds are also iconic, with the funny block rotation sound, the nice "slap" sound when you drop a piece to the bottom, the subtle single-line clear noise, and the not-so-subtle "Tetris" clear noise, as well as the "I'm dead!" sound that plays when you get a Game Over by filling up the play field.  They're not the best sounds you can produce on the hardware, but for an early title, they're still impressive.

If you're a Tetris perfectionist like me, you'll see this screen

a lot as you throw game after game, searching for that

perfect play through where you can execute Tetris after Tetris.

As I mentioned earlier, the ability to manage your pieces on the play field and line them up to achieve a "Tetris" is truly the technique that needs to be mastered to get the most out of the game.  Based on the pieces that fall, I generally try and choose either the right or left side of the board to leave open, stack up pieces to make a complete, 4-line (or higher) group, and leave the space for the 4-square "line" piece to complete that "Tetris" and score big points.  As pieces fall, and you place them, you have to be cognizant of all 7 pieces available, because you might get 3 big squares in a row, or the "L" and "J" pieces, and have nowhere to put them.  This puzzle piece management is of the utmost importance; otherwise, you'll find yourself expending available lines to clear away ill-placed pieces, rather than making "Tetris" blocks.  To increase the challenge, you can press the Select button during play to turn off the preview of what the next piece will be, which removes your ability to plan ahead by a move.

Starting at a higher level means you can rack up points

faster, and begin to achieve scores upwards of 100,000.

It seems surreal to talk about Tetris on the Game Boy, more than 25 years after its release.  It's difficult to pinpoint what it is about the game that makes it so addictive.  I picked it up a couple days ago, intending to play a round or two, and before I knew it, I had burned over 2 hours playing, without even realizing it.  That's much of what the game has going for it - that deceptive simplicity and addictive game play.  That addictive quality is only part of the game's appeal, and hopefully I've illustrated that above.  Make no mistake - if you own an original Game Boy, Game Boy Pocket, or even a newer Game Boy Color or Advance, you owe it to yourself to play the original Tetris release, because it's just one of those games every gamer should experience.  Essential.