Overall 9.1 Graphics 7 Sound 5 Addictive 5 Story 7 Depth 6 Difficulty 9
6.5
The Hunt for a Good Game Ghostbear1111
"On November 12th, 1984, approximately four months before Mikhail Gorbachev took power in the Soviet
Union, a Russian Typhoon class submarine surfaced briefly in the Atlantic Ocean just north or Bermuda. It subsequently sank in deep water after suffering massive radiation leakage. Unconfirmed reports indicated some of the crew were rescued.
According to repeated statements by both Soviet and American governments, none of what you are about to see...
EVER HAPPENED."
Alec Baldwin and Sean Connery put out one of the greatest movies of the 90s. It was a thriller based on Tom Clancy's outstanding novel. The movie is suspenseful, entertaining, and keeps you on the edge of your seat.
The game does not.
Beam Software (who?) put out the game in early 1991. It is a sea combat side-scroller that features perhaps some of the most obstacle-intense video game sequences for Nintendo. You play as Captain Marko Ramius as you try to defect from the Soviet
Union and take your ultra-silent submarine technology to the United States.
Along the way, you battle terrorists, outlaws, Russians, and maze-style obstacles that make Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle unwater levels look like Super Mario, level 1-1. The expenditure of ammunition sent to destroy you rivals the United States and Russian arsenals combined in 2017.
The other challenge is everything you touch takes damage away from you. Debris floating everywhere destroys submarines and you are almost too busy trying to evade walls, moving tunnels, chains, ice, and more, you can't focus on destroying enemies working to sink you.
The game is an average, at best, side-scrolling adventure. Two interesting elements are the 'silent drive' portion of the game. YOu have limited amount of Caterpiller drive (the movie's plot is predicated on a new Russian technology being able to make a submarine completely silent) where enemies can't see or shoot at you. it's limited in time and you can find power-ups in the game to extend that time. You also have ECMs, or Electronic Counter Measures, that destroy all the enemy bombs, depth charges, torpedos, and other weapons in the game. They are limited as well.
The Red October has both torpedoes which fire horizontally and missiles which fire vertically. You have a limited number that can be increased and upgraded by picking up power-ups as you go. Both weapons start as short range, are advanced to long range, and are advanced again to seek out targets instead of firing straight. The upgrades are everywhere since you need all the help you can get to clear the maps.
The music is lifted from the movie and the cut scenes, however brief, are taken from the movie as well. The in-game music is horrendous and repetitive and does nothing to inspire the game. They tried for heavy, forbidding music and it ended up being a series of bleeps and blips. It doesn't work at all. The same goes for the explosion sound effects. It's like you're really underwater and everything just sounds the same.
All in all, The Hunt for Red October is an extremely average game that is an exercise in frustration. It's insanely difficult, the controls aren't responsive, and you think you're dodging threats when they make contact and do more damage. I have seen better games for the NES in the action category. Play through once or twice but after ten minutes, you get the idea.
Graphics 7 Sound 5 Addictive 5 Story 7 Depth 6 Difficulty 9
Review Rating: 4/5
Submitted: 04-18-17
Review Replies: 0
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