I'm Finished!
Though this plotline is pretty much unsaid, the game really gives you no direction other than tossing you right into the game scrolling action. The game is many times very unforgiving and harsh, literally, everything that moves wants Pit dead, and it does a good job of killing him too, many, many, many times over. Even the bottom of the screen on the ascension levels kill you once the platforms are scrolled off screen, even if there was a platform there a second before, if you can't see it say your prayers and just take it like a man. As punishment for death you start at the very beginning of the level, which many times is frustrating and can cause even the most patient of gamers to throw their controller across the room in rage.
To combat evil you have your default bow and arrow, which for the most part is the most useful weapon in game and the only one that most players will probably rely on, there's also the hammer which you can toggle to by pressing select, the range of this weapon is poor and seems vastly out of place in this game; it's useful only on enemies that you want to kill in one hit and the Centurion Statues, but other than that, it's really useless.
There's power ups that act as a temporary boost in game, you can shoot fireballs, have a longer range with your arrows and a crystal that protects you from enemy fire and strikes the ones near to you, these power ups are usually found in Zeus' training rooms, otherwise than that, you're not going to get many and a lot of times will die trying to get them, so they are sometimes not worth the effort.
There are a few different items that help you during your quest, but most importantly would be the three treasures that allow you to defeat Medusa, without them you're pretty useless, fortunately you automatically get them after defeating the bosses of each fortress.
The fortresses are often confusing death traps, with many enemies and unfair eggplant wizards, yeah, eggplant wizards, that turn you into a useless vegetable if they hit you with their eggplants. Once you scrape your way through the fortress you meet with the boss, if you've been lucky enough to free the Centurion Statues from their prisons with the pretty much useless mallets you'll have aide in this battle, otherwise it's long, relentless and difficult. However, if you don't die, you'll quickly learn the bosses attack pattern and it's just a matter of pick and doge. There are few instances which you can make the boss loop and get stuck where you can just repeatedly shoot away at his health but surviving to be able to do this comes in first priority and often you'll find yourself in death's throws.
Kicking it to the masses,
The concept is the same as most scrollers that are on the NES, much like Mario and a mixture of other games that were pretty brilliant and continue their trep onward. What was intresting was the elements that allow you to 'level up' by upgrading, which made the game a lot more fun than I initially thought it would be.
Graphics: The levels are a bit fun to look at, the backgrounds for the most part are stark black and none distracting, which is good since you really need to concentrate on the enemies you're trying to slaughter. Everything looks nice and clean and it really works for the 8-bit era. The monsters look nice and some are comical in appearance as well, eggplant!Pit is especially entertaining and made me laugh aloud.
Sound: Some catchy themes that you can't help humming in tune along with, really repetitive but still enjoyable, there's times where I felt that the game was about to break out and bust a move.
Playability: The controls are pretty responsive, at times jumping feels a little off and getting hit by an enemy on certain platforms will knock you through it. Ducking can be hazardous as you'll tend to go suicidal and jump right through the floor into the abyss bellow. Still, even with set backs the game is pretty easy to maneuver through, though the looping from the opposite side of the screen to the other side like Pac Man didn't make sense and left me confused for a while as to how to get to the next platform, many deaths thanks to this.
Entertainment: Mindless killing of enemies is always a good way to pass time, though this game presses for story set up, even if it's minimal, it would be better than nothing. In fact there's no implication to anything until the end, which is a sad way to run your game, backwards does not work well. Although most games of this time place you straight into the adventure, so in a way it's a relief to have a cut the crap and get to the action game.
Replay: There are five different endings, and I suppose if you're a glutton for punishment or an expert at Kid Icarus, you can go ahead and dredge through all the levels again and kill Medusa five times over, or you could go on Youtube to see all the endings.
All in all: This game is alright, pretty short if you're able to just breeze through the levels, it can be done in one short afternoon really; this game is to abusive to want to play through even to the first boss little lone more than once. If you're a collector it's good to have just to say that you have the classic sleeper hit, but really, it doesn't seem worth the punishment since it reaps little reward. Still, even with all the negatives this game was quirky and fun, and it was kind of cool to see what Pit looks like all updated in Brawl. I bet now they could resurrect this game and give it the up to date treatment and pull off a decent game, but for now, Kid Icarus lives in obscurity.
-Ri