Was It Really That Good? The Adventures Of Lolo Trilogy

You know, I once heard that Adventures Of Lolo 3 goes for high prices on eBay. I'm quite sure I had that game as a kid before my parents packed away my Nintendo into storage and then lost it when they couldn't afford the payments. I digress, though.

Ahem.

The Adventures Of Lolo Trilogy is part of the Eggerland franchise and the only games translated into English (although the NES trilogy games contain a lot of reused puzzles). Like all Eggerland games, Adventures Of Lolo is a puzzle-action game. While the games test your brain first you'll also find yourself needing quick reflexes and accurately-timed button presses.

For the most part the trilogy is the same- room after room of block-pushing, enemy slaying, and treasure grabbing fun. The first two games are quite similar. They both share the same graphics and the same enemies and tiles. While the difficulty curve in the first game rises gradually, the second game feels like the Japanese Super Mario Bros 2 (known as the the Lost Levels). It's difficulty level starts higher and the puzzles are real challenging. Now, it's the third game actual feels like a sequel. It has a few new enemies, new gameplay mechanics, and other surprises.

The graphics in all three are rather good, if not repetitive. Standard Nintendo stuff- the third game has a better use of colour than the first two. The music and sound are good too. Despite the games only having one song for every gameplay room, I never found myself annoyed. The song is on your side. It tells you, “You can do this, there is an answer”.

The level design is incredible. You must understand, the game makes use of limited amount of tiles and monsters to produce a large amount of game rooms (about 100 in the first two games alone). However, the game never feels repetitive or sluggish. That's really impressive. And you'll really have to get creative to finish some of these puzzles. One thing I liked was how the games force the player to use half-points between tiles to complete puzzles. The level design makes use of every exploit in the game's system to complete the game. It's truly magnificent.

However, there are a few parts of the gameplay I disliked. First off, the 'B' button is completely unused when there are a few places it could be used for. For example, the game gives you special powerups on many levels that are activated with the same button the egg shot is. Not all the time, but a few times this was a problem. In the third game, one level makes uses of this exploit as part of the level's challenge, but one level making use of how both egg shot and special abilities are configured to the same button doesn't justify the obvious idea of putting special abilities to the 'B' button.

Secondly, this game is really touchy. When you're speeding through block puzzles and you push one block a half a tile in the wrong direction and it screws up your whole level, it can get pretty annoying. Especially since in the first two games the player has a limited amount of lives (the third game gets the right idea to give the player infinite retries). I don't think the Nintendo hardware would be capable of anything really, really advanced, but maybe the 'B' button could have been used for some sort of slow-down feature, or a single step feature.

Thirdly, in Adventures Of Lolo 2, there's a particularly unfair mechanic called “warp holes”. Basically, after any monster has been slain, wait awhile and it'll respawn in it's original spot. However, if there is something in the way, like a block or another monster- the slain monster will instead respawn in a designated spot (if the level was designed that way- otherwise the monster will disappear forever). I don't know if the player's handbook explained this, but to anyone without a guide, it comes out of nowhere and can only be discovered through wild experimentation. This mechanic is in the third game as well, but it's introduced using the tutorial levels, so it doesn't feel so unfair. This mechanic becomes increasingly frustrating since the only way to find out if the level has warp holes and where they are is to experiment with killing enemies and block their spawn points. This can get frustrating when you have limited lives to squander on experimentation, at least in the first two games.

Fourthly(?), there are some problems with water. If the player pushes and egged monster onto the water, that monster will temporarily become a single-tile bridge. However, some levels have currents programmed into their water that pushes these egged monsters along like rafts. The problem? Well, there's no telling if a water tile has a current until you push a monster in there, which makes for some trial-and-error gameplay. You have to experiment a bit to figure it out, just like the warp holes mentioned above.

Finally, some heart pickups reward the player with egg shots, which are used to navigate the puzzle. But there is not telling which heart pickups give shots. Like warp holes and water currents, this is another trial-and-error mechanic, and probably the most notorious. I found myself taxed with figuring out which heart pickups give shots more than warp holes or water currents. I don't know if the game's memory was limited to a certain about of blocks or graphics, but there should have been some sort of marker of the egg shot pickups.

The game's story is... very NES era. It's your typical “save the princess” fare, at least in the first two games. In the third game it's more “save the petrified kingdom” and you get to play with Lolo and Lala. However, in the final few levels, the story takes a stupid turn. Now, I don't usually complain about misogyny, but I think this is a notable case. About three-quarters of the way through the game, the player is faced with an unwinnable boss battle- if you fight the boss with Lala. If the player goes in with Lala, Lala won't be able to beat the boss. Lala must lose. Lolo attempts to rescue her, but she's whisked away by the Great Devil, similar to the first two games. The last few levels of the game must be completed with Lolo alone.

Okay, so what the hell was the point of that? Did the developers think a game with no damsel in distress wouldn't motivate the player? Or maybe they needed a reason to introduce five more levels? I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt and say “excuse plot”. There's also the possibility that if you go in with Lolo first, the boss battle will be unwinnable for him and you'll have to finish the game as Lala. I don't have the time to check that possibility out, but if it's true, then I take back my misogyny argument.

Although I complain a lot, I think this game trilogy is great simply because of the level design. It was a very tough challenge finishing all three of these games with no help, but I feel accomplished. This game pushed it's own gameplay mechanics to their limits, which is always admirable. It definitely holds up a lot better than other Nintendo games like the Legend Of Zelda or Metroid- which both suffer from dated controls and action.

Frankly, I'd say this game holds up. If you like puzzle games, then give this one a shot.

Was It Really That Good? A Look Back At Jill Of The Jungle

It's very fashionable for the internet masses to scrutinize newer games and glorify older ones, but it has been a goal of mine since I started this blog to look back on a lot of these older games and see if they hold up to the praise they get. While a game like Super Mario Bros holds up with great controls and level design, some games aren't as good in hindsight. Today we are going to take a look at the PC game trilogy Jill Of The Jungle.

Jill Of The Jungle is a 2D sidescrolling action platformer from Epic Megagames, the same folks that brought us Solar Winds and Kiloblaster. Their games generally aren't excellent, but they're entertaining if you can look past a few things. Jill Of The Jungle is no exception. While all three episodes contain great level design, they're hindered by touchy action and controls- and in episode 2 and 3- sound problems.

Like most games back then, the level design was inspired and interesting (most of the time). The developers utilized a very basic mapping engine to create some great levels to explore and fight through. In some of the larger levels with bigger rooms, clever little secrets are usually hidden and satisfying to discover.

The controls and action, however, are lackluster. Jill does not move across the map pixel by pixel like on Commander Keen. She moves a half of a game tile with every tick. Combined with a sticky jump height, this becomes a nuisance when doing any tricky platforming. Now sometimes the game uses its stiff jumping mechanics to the level design's advantage, but generally it's a problem.

Fighting isn't that much better. Now, the game is cool in sometimes you'll go an occasional level without a weapon, but trying to use weapons and avoiding traps is often a pain. Some traps are glitchy in that you'll run past a timed flame trap, but will receive damage even as the torch is dormant. The game is prideful in that Jill has infinite lives, but I can't figure out if that's a good or bad thing. It's bad because that makes the game too easy. It's good in that some levels you'll die a lot because of frustrating challenges and you want whatever progress to the level you made to be saved.

When it comes to sound, this is where the game gets interesting. In the first episode, you get great sound and enchanting music. Guitar riffs, bassy thumps, and other genuine sounds make up the sound board. One of my favourite effects is the “Get key” sound, which might be an eighties rock star going “Yeeeeah!” or “Gal!” or a mix of the two. The second and third episodes, however, have terrible sound effects. The first episode only had one or two annoying sounds, but the next two are filled with awkward synths and annoying screechs. My question is, why did they switch the sound effects? The first episode's effects were great. They couldn't have been unaware of how annoying Jill's death sound is in episode 3.

Luckily, the music is consistent throughout the game. The music in the first game, though, is the most atmospherical. The engine they use for music, I believe, is the same engine Epic used for the rest of their games from that era like Kiloblaster and Solar Winds. It's a joy to listen to regardless.

The graphics are okay, but nothing to write home about. While most of the game has a consistent simplistic yet colourful look, every once and awhile you'll come across an enemy that will either look really cartoony or like the artists tried for a 3D rotoscoped look like Donkey Kong Country.

The first episode is easily the strongest of the three. Of course, developers commonly put the best stuff of their games in the shareware episode to trick you into buying the game full and only to be disappointed. If you're up for some older sidescrolling platforming with some great level design, try out the shareware episode. If you really enjoyed yourself with it, you might want to check out the rest of the game. I played through all three parts several times during my childhood and although I loved the game back then, it hasn't aged well for me.