Animaniacs (video game)
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| Animaniacs | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Konami, Factor 5 (Game Boy) |
| Publisher(s) | Konami |
| Platform(s) | Sega Mega Drive/Genesis, Super NES, Game Boy |
| Release date | 1994 (Mega Drive/Genesis), (SNES) 1995 (Game Boy) |
| Genre(s) | Platformer |
| Mode(s) | Single player |
| Rating(s) | GA |
| Media | cartridge |
| Input methods | controller |
Animaniacs was originally a cartoon series on TV but developed its own franchise of video games due to popularity. Unlike regular platform games, the player usually runs from the enemies rather than fighting them. Characters include Yakko, Wakko, and Dot, Pinky and the Brain, most of the supporting cast, as well as Ralph, the Warner Brothers studio guard. Animaniacs was made into two games which bore no relation to each other in terms of gameplay, despite both being made by Konami. One was for the Super NES and the other was for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis and Game Boy. The SNES and Mega Drive/Genesis version were released in 1994, and the Game Boy version in 1995.
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[edit] Mega Drive/Genesis Animaniacs
The Warner Brothers and Sister first begin the game by telling the player "welcome to our videogame", before arguing on the absurdity of how they can be in a videogame when they are cartoon characters, not videogame characters. The main story is that the Warner Brothers and Sister are attempting to try and be closer to their favourite movie stars. Yakko forms a plan: they can open up a shop to sell movie memorabilia - so they must obtain four items from different movie sets to set it up.
There are seven stages within the game. Each stage (except the starting one) has one object to obtain, which can only be obtained at the end after defeating the level's boss.
Like most videogames, the Warner Brothers have health indicators and a number of lives. The lives can be increased by obtaining either 100 stars, or obtaining a small golden form of their faces. Their health is indicated by their faces on the top left of the screen. When they smile, they are healthy, but when they are looking either tired, unhappy, or weak, then they should find health soon (which is found in the forms of several forms of ice cream or sweets or other kinds of food).
The levels are timed, so it is unwise to stay and wander aimlessly in one area.
[edit] Levels
- Water Tower
This is a training level, provided to allow the player to learn each of the character's abilities. Their abilities are listed below:
- Yakko - Can attack using a paddle with ball attached. Also the strongest of the three, so he can move objects such as crates.
- Wakko - Can attack with a mallet and also able to activate switches or light fuses with this.
- Dot - Uses charm on certain characters to move them out of the way or to somehow progress through the game. She is also immune to the charm of Hello Nurse (who will incapacitate Yakko and Wakko for a time).
After the training level, the player is taken to the main map and given a choice of one of four levels. The levels can be taken in any order. The four levels are:
- Adventure - Dirk The Rugged VIII (Bungle in the Jungle)
- This level is based on adventure movies, mainly those of a similar vein to Indiana Jones. The main item to acquire here is the adventurer's hat of Dirk the Rugged. The Animaniacs must traverse through jungles, waterfalls and caves before facing the boss, Ralph the security guard.
Ralph has to be defeated by using Wakko's mallet to activate seesaws that hit rocks upwards at him. When he goes offstage, he comes at the player directly and Yakko has to be used to fend him off.
- Science Fiction/Space Opera - Space Wars (Space Truckin)
- This level is obviously inspired by Star Wars and Alien. The item to be obtained here is the helmet of the antagonist (a homage to Darth Vader). The siblings have to head through space battles, droid factories and halls of fire before reaching the boss, who is once again Ralph.
To defeat him, the player must traverse upwards, past many traps, conveyor belts and other hazards before reaching him. When the player reaches the boss, the helmet falls on him automatically and knocks him unconscious. In this level, the Gradius's series stellar ship, Vic Viper, makes a cameo appearance.
- Western - Swing 'em Low, Hang 'em High
- The level takes its inspirations from Western movies, and the main objective here is to collect the Sherriff's star. Yakko, Wakko and Dot must head through the town, the local bar, the Native American settlements and lastly, the train. Ralph is the boss here for the final time.
This time, Ralph attempts to catch up with the player by cart while he/she is on the train's engine. The trick is to let him come near and make him miss his jump onto the train by hitting coal into the top pipe with Wakko's mallet (an additional problem here is that the pipe opens and closes unpredictably). After he loses his cart, Ralph runs on foot, and here the trick is to keep feeding the engine coal until it is at the right of the screen, which is too much for Ralph to keep up, and he collapses, dropping the Sherriff's Star.
- Horror - Bloodmask 28
- This stage has the Mask of Janus as its main item, which pays homage to Jason of the Friday the 13th movies. The Warner Brothers have to pass through a cemetery, then the main mansion and its basement of poisonous water, before confronting the boss, Dracula.
To defeat him, Wakko has to hit switches that make certain ledges collapse, making Dracula fall a number of times while avoiding his flames (an attack which bears resemblance to the fireball attacks used by Dracula in the Castlevania series, which Konami also created). Defeating him earns the player the Mask of Janus.
- Action/Thriller - Once There Was a Man Named Oscar
- After completing the last of the four levels, this stage starts automatically and is based on modern action movies. The last item the Warner Brothers and Sister have to collect is a Felix award statue (which is similar to the Oscar award statue, apart from Dr. Otto Scratchansniff as the model of the award). The level involves having to pass through high-rise elevators, offices with breakable windows, apartment balconies, and burning streets. There is no boss to fight here and all the player has to do to end the level is take the Felix award.
- Final Battle - Pinky and the Brain
- The final battle is against Pinky and the Brain, who steal the memorabilia the player has collected in order to hold the attention of the ignorant masses, so they can take over the world. The Warner Brothers plan to stop this, so the Brain challenges them to a fight, against them in their armoured man-suit (a large robot designed by Pinky and the Brain to pass off as a human).
The battle involves using all the abilities of the Warner Brothers and Sister to damage the enemy. Their attacks include kicking and throwing bombs. Pinky activates the bombs and Brain throws them. The trick here is to use Dot's Charm to stop Pinky from activating the bombs, and as Brain throws the unlit bombs, Yakko can push them near the robot and Wakko can activate them. Eventually the robot will split into two. Eventually the legs will malfunction after too much damage to the main body and they destroy themselves along with the torso of the robot.
The game ends after Pinky and the Brain retreat back to the labs, wounded and defeated, to make another plan to try and take over the world, but instead, Yakko offers them the newly-opened shop of memorabilia to give them a business. They are glad, but Brain makes a hinted suggestion of receiving enough profits to rule the world.
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[edit] Super NES Animaniacs
This game is out of the ordinary because movement is forwards, backwards, and side to side a movement style usually reserved for Beat 'em ups, in most side scrolling platform games the player can only go forward and backward. Pinky and the Brain once again have another plan to conquer the world by deciding to steal the script of the Greatest Movie ever while it was under development (this is not any actual movie or parody of one). The CEO of Warner Brothers studio reluctantly asks the Warner Brothers and Sister for their assistance to retrieve all 24 pages of the script, which is the primary objective of the game. This game can be completed without obtaining all of them, however. The game focuses more on parodies of films at the different stages that are once more based on different genres of movies.
This game is different from the genesis version. Firstly, the characters have no health bar, lives (the game ends when all the characters are defeated/captured, one by one) or special abilities. Secondly, there is the slot system, which is a slot machine at the bottom of the screen. It activated after obtaining a certain number of coins and can be used for a range of power ups such as temporary invincibility or bringing back characters who were defeated or captured earlier.
Throughout the game, there are small robots with white block heads, red bodies and yellow appendages who work for Pinky and the Brain.
The levels listed below can be completed in any order. Rather than explain the level structure, parodies will be listed:
Fantasy Studio Basing itself on fantasy films, parodies include the White Rabbit of Alice in Wonderland and The Luck Dragon, Falkor of The NeverEnding Story. The last part is the castle of Anvilania (from one of the Animaniacs' own TV show episodes). The boss is a King who has to be flattened under a giant anvil.
Sci-Fi studio Basing itself on Science Fiction films, parodies involve the facehuggers of Alien, the Death Star of Star Wars and the Monolith of 2001: A Space Odyssey. The boss is somewhere three quarters of the way through, and is a robot (from one of the Animaniacs own TV show episodes) who has to be destroyed by activating three switches.
Aquatic Studio This level is based on movies involving the sea, and include pirates and a parody of Jaws. The boss here is a pirate captain controlling an octopus with a nose-mounted cannon.
Adventure Studio A level based on adventure films including parodies of Indiana Jones and Dracula. The boss comes early in the game as a set of robotic giant gorilla hands.
Water Tower A place for the Warner Brothers to recuperate and to restore the party by rescuing any characters who were kidnapped or defeated in past levels.
Editing Room This area can only be activated after the player have visited all of the studios, regardless of how many scripts have been obtained. The battle first entails fighting slightly stronger versions of bosses from past levels. After defeating them all, the player fights Pinky and the Brain in their robotic man-suit.
[edit] Game Boy Animaniacs
The Game Boy version is a port of the Sega Genesis version, but due to space constraints, the Science Fiction/Space Opera - Space Wars level is absent from this version. The port was made by Factor 5.
