Overall 8.1 Graphics 6 Sound 6 Addictive 8 Story 5.5 Depth 7 Difficulty 7
7.2
Max Payne might be.. The Punisher. A remorseless killing spree. endings
The Punisher is a comic book anti-hero. His family was killed by the mob, and he lives only to make criminals pay, shooting as many as he can. His future and outlook is dark, and so is this game. This was published by LJN, who oftentimes produced inferior product for Acclaim, a somewhat shoddy video game developer. The Punisher for NES however, is one of those rare few that escaped their meatgrinder of bad liscening and turned out pretty true to source and not bad to play. Its not pretty, to the ear or the eye, but I actually found myself liking this game.
This is a auto-scrolling shooter, but not with a light gun. You use controller for the aiming recticle with your d-pad or keyboard, which also move our hero left or right on the screen depending on how far you are pointing, and the two buttons shoot your gun or your wide-area grenades. I have played a few games like this, and its usually a clunky situation. This game would seem destined to be played on pc, but yet the NES functions very well here.
Graphics: 5
The graphics are really dark and moody, starting with the title screen and moving to the narrative. He discusses each boss while cloaked in semi-darkness. The many stages you play on take place at night. The city streets you travel down (I think its supposed to be New York) are sometimes lit, but all the streets that branch off past your horizon lead to pitch black. Its a stylish choice, but also an easy way not have to draw too much busy background. In other games this would be a serious detriment, but when you are literally walking a shooting gallery of bad guys, the less distractions the better, actually.
Despite the weak background elements, the foreground is done well. The Punisher is always on screen, life-sized. Its an over-the-shoulder view you take, and the badguys can come out from all sorts of places. Most things you see can be shot, from storefronts and awnings, cars and crates - all these thing show limited battle damage- and it helps immerse you. These items will tear apart or break and sometimes contain power ups for you.
Compared to the gloomy scrolling stages, the boss encounters are single screen stark contrast events. The background is always a solid color, and the boss moves along it. There is no hiding behind cover for these bosses, this is an honest to goodness shootout. Some keep one pattern as the fire at you, otheres alternate between far away attacks and jumping to a close quarters hand to hand mode. You must fight them off with fists and kicks until they move back to the background again.
The enemies, and bosses are not well detailed, some look a bit crude. This is perhaps best detailed in the ninja boss, and the assassin, who are both feature little to no shading (black/red) and have almost no definition to them. I am tempted to see a bit of this as artistic liscence - perhaps the revenge-obsessed punisher sees his world in the muted details, the taste of vengance so strong he can see nothing but the evil boss he must defeat. But I also know LJN was not a great publisher for graphics, so this the real issue is probably just budgetary reasons.
Sound: 4
The sound unfortunately is a misfire, and I can't score it too high. Nothing is actually wrong with the music in the game, its just there is so little of it. The title music, the stage
select, the overview from our anti-hero of the boss' crimes, all have somber, appropriate tunes. But the actual levels you play on, there is no music. The stages are multi-part levels, and are marked by short stretches of silence, marked by hails of gunfire. There is a bit of music, but it only lasts for about ten seconds, a saxophone player who appears once a level (its always the same guy, same short tune). You can shoot this over-zealous musical enthusianst and stop the music - but there is no other penalty.
Since the gunfire becomes your only source of sound, how does it stack up? Pretty well actually. The difference between the uzi and your assualt rifle is as different to the eyes as it is to the ears, the bullets fly fast and loud. Grenades are tossed and have a decent explosion sound. I would knock the game for not having broken glass or hit metal sound effects. Those should have been included as there are many windows you can shoot out, and cars, trashcans, manholes and other objects to hit.
Addictiveness: 8
The game may have limited graphics and sound, but the gameplay is really tight. The key to this game's fun is the perfect pacing. By allowing periods of short rest, the timing of the enemy appearances never feels unfair. The general speed of the cursor, scrolling, and enemy shots allow flexbility that could be hobbling if done poorly like in a lesser game. The Punisher showed me the controls are excellent, and while it doesn't try to do anything else but be a decent shooter, its focus allows it to make these elements a lot of fun. Having each stage have a boss and those bosses relevant is also a large plus.
Story: 7
This game does not have much story, but then neither does its source material. You play as Frank Castle, a former military man driven to become a self-stylized angel of vengance on violent criminals after his family was slain by the mafia. He does not want to capture, or incapacitate his targets like say, Batman or superhero would do. Frank Castle has become a cold-blooded, ruthless man, and fights any kind of criminals - not just the ones that went after his family, and with his iconic skull-faced shirt, he calls himself the Punisher.
The game makes use of the Punishers skills sets, his large assortment of automatic weapons and explosives, the remorseless way he deals with his targets, and also features many of the comic series' villians, such as Kingpin and Jigsaw (his wanted poster in game looks weird because his face is destroyed in the comic). The Kingpin was always the #1 target of the Punisher, so its fitting he's the last boss.
Even when you beat the game, the ending seems to fit the Punishers bleak outlook. His celebrations will always be temporary.
Depth: 7
For a shooting gallery type game, I am pleasantly surprised here. Many of the random items and enemies can drop power ups. These white outlined boxes do not offer anything groundbreaking, but very nice; two kinds of guns, one shoots a lot faster than the other. You can get health and armor (which extends your life bar), ammo and a bazooka upgrade for your greandes.
As far as bonuses (besides being able to interrupt the sax player), there is also newspapers you can shoot which give you hints. They appear at the bottom of the screen for a few seconds. And bonus levels, which you go to by shooting the hanging sign declaring where it is. They are both just optional little treats thrown in.
The Punisher has one thing lacking for a shooter - he has no quick defensive manuevers. You are standing in the line of fire at all times. He does move fairly fast, but cannot move at all while shooting. Some projecticles can be shot, but also have to weigh attacking while a bullet storm is headed for you. With no safe dodge implemented, you will have to absorb some hits, and fortunately, the health packs are fairly common.
The Punisher in the comic also has moments where he saves innocent civilians, or spies on his enemies - I wish some of those elements were in this game, but its understandable for the NES game why they are not, and I won't knock the score down for that.
Difficulty: 7
Each boss as at least 2 stages, then you will fight them one on one to the death. I was glad the duels were face-to-face and not a boss hiding behind a wall of endless mooks. I did not find the game very difficult, to me it fels like a high 6, but the length of the stages and having no sure way to prevent damage makes it rely on you finding armor icons to expand your life and health powerups. If you die, Frank falls down, then comes back up ( based on your extra lives) right where you left off. The upgrade to the gun and grenades are nice, but not neccesary to beat the bosses.
Overall: 7.2
This was not the type of game I expected from LJN, it was actually pretty good! The subject is grim, but if you like playing as an anti-hero, and can be forgiving for the graphics and sound, the weakest parts of this game - try the Punisher.
Graphics 5 Sound 4 Addictive 8 Story 7 Depth 7 Difficulty 7
Review Rating: 5/5
Submitted: 10-24-14
Review Replies: 2
6.8
The Punisher LegolasJJH
The Punisher on the NES is one of those games that I feel is an underrated gem of a game. Some people may already be familiar with The Punisher, who originally was a Marvel Comics comic book hero. That is what this game is based on, which I think is appealing because right now we are seeing an explosion in comic book heroes in movies and video games , well this game was doing just that nearly 30 years ago!
The game is primarily a shooting game, with you playing as The Punisher. This game is one of the earliest quality shooting games you can find. The Punisher stands at the bottom front of the screen and strafes side to side while the screen scrolls to the side and your primary goal is to shoot all of the bad guys. I would not recommend this game to a younger audience because it is a very violent and adult themed game. Anyone who is familiar with The Punisher knows this is fitting to the game because The Punisher was always one of Marvels more 'edgy' comics.
Graphics: 7
I gave this game a 7 for the graphics. For me a 7 rating is right around average which is where I feel this game would stand in the graphics department. One of the good things this game does in the graphics is having the environment respond correctly when you shoot things in the background. If you shoot a wall , you will leave a bullet hole, if you shoot a car , it will continuously take more damage , until you leave it a pile of rubble. You are also rewarded for these sorts of things , as you will quickly find, a lot of this games 'secrets' come by way of shooting things in the games background.
Sound: 8
I gave this game an 8 for sound because I think it is one of the things this game does very well. From the sound of your gun as you upgrade it from a hand gun to a machine gun to the ultimate super gun, or the sound of your grenades as they fly through the air and hit your enemy's, to the unforgettable tune of the local saxophone player. (game tip: the saxophone player is the only person in the entire game you don't want to shoot) The boss battles also have a unique soundtrack that adds a lot of intensity to the fights.
Addictiveness: 8
I also scored highly on this game for addictiveness because my family had a cartridge of this game since I was a young child and I've gone back to play this game more times than I can remember. The game nearly requires you to play it over a few times just so you can get a good feel for each stages layout so you are able to beat the entire game eventually. After that , the game contains so many secrets and such a challenge for highscore that it continues to be fun after you've beaten the last boss. One great aspect of this game, is that it has a tremendous amount of potential for highscore competitions on vizzed.
Story: 4
This is where the game suffers a lot in my overall rating of the game. The plot for this game is very brief and only a few paragraphs long. What you do get from those few paragraphs is not all to original either and is a pretty overall bland story. Basically , I'm The Punisher and I must Punish criminals, that's the story! I'm not sure though , that it is fair the games overall score is dropped by the lacking story because it is one of those types of games that is not played for the story. ( like most shooting games)
Depth: 7
I rated this game a 7 for depth because once you beat the last boss , the biggest thing to do after is play for highscore. Once you are pretty good at the game and know the layout of the stages, the entire game doesn't actually take very long to complete , right around 1 hour.
Difficulty: 7
The difficulty of this game is a good balance of not too hard not too easy. If you have never played this game before you probably wont have much trouble beating the first boss or maybe the 2nd but you also probably wont get much further than that. It is a good balance that its not too hard that it is frustrating , but its not so easy that their is no sense of reward or accomplishment for completing it.
Overall: 6.8
The 6.8 overall score is an average from all the above category's. I think the 6.8 overall score is a good indicator that this is a fun game but it's not the end all be all of games. I think most people who enjoy NES and retro games could enjoy this game but it probably would not be very many peoples all time favorite game which is why I score it a 6.8/10
Graphics 7 Sound 8 Addictive 8 Story 4 Depth 7 Difficulty 7
Review Rating: 5/5
Submitted: 09-13-12
Review Replies: 4
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