Jeremy Parish

NES Works #067: Jaws & The Karate Kid (Patreon)

Published:

2020-03-11 14:00:00

Imported:

2024-04

Tags:

Atlus Jaws LJN The Karate Kid Westone nes nes works

Content

Here at the tail end of 1987, the western licensees have begun to arrive on NES in full force. The material you see here will become far more common once we move along into NES Works 1988. After two years of doing a pretty good job of winnowing out the low-grade kusoge from Japan, Nintendo appears to have shrugged and said, "Well, as long as it's locally sourced kusoge, that's fine. It's fine."

Folks, it's not fine.

Files

Jaws & The Karate Kid retrospective: Let's Just Not | NES Works #067

Following on from Gotcha!, LJN continues plying the same furrow with two more games based on film properties, developed by Atlus. (Or at least someone pretending to be Atlus, anyway.) Two out of LJN's three 1987 releases are pretty decent, if a bit thin in terms of content, and really only The Karate Kid hints at the kind of crap the company would make its stock in trade over the coming years. Jaws might even be considered genuinely good, if only it had been given a little more time in the oven to allow all its concepts to come together... Video Works is funded through Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! And be sure to check out the Retronauts podcast (http://www.retronauts.com), where I (and many others!) tackle a much wider array of classic gaming topics each week.