Not pony tales or cotton tales, but…

WARNING: There will be singing before this LP is done. Enter at your own risk.

Before recording an LP, I always like to do a test play first. The primary reason for this is to make sure my recording and volume levels are good; nothing quite like recording a three-hour game only to find out the stereo mix was turned off, or you were capturing the wrong framerate (both of which I’ve done! sometimes in the same series!).

With DuckTales, though, I had to do several test plays, and for more sinister reasons: I simply was not that familiar with the game. This is one I didn’t have on the shelf as a kid, so I went into it knowing pretty much nothing about it except the underlying mechanics. All of my pogo-jumping, treasure-hoarding experience was gotten, back in the day, through the sequel.

DuckTales 2 is the better game in my opinion. It expands on the core gameplay in a couple of cool ways, but for the most part it’s just more of the same, right down to the sprites and sound effects. This is Capcom we’re talking about after all. Still, when people are talking about their favorite NES games, the original DuckTales is the one everyone mentions. I don’t know if this is because the sequel wasn’t as popular, or as pervasive, or what. Heck, maybe when people say “DuckTales is my favorite NES game!” they’re referring to both titles, collectively.

In the end, though, I decided if I was going to do DuckTales I’d better go back and do the original. What I found was that I quite enjoyed the stark simplicity of it, which is absent in the sequel. There’s no backtracking or powerups, no “clever” boss fights, no shop to waste your money on, no secret level. Stack up treasures and win. I’m down with that!

I wonder if the Game Boy versions were any good…

9 comments to Not pony tales or cotton tales, but…

  • Issun

    Ohshitohshit! Awesommme!

  • narcodis

    Hell yeah! Two LP updates in two days! Brickroad is making my monday worth waking up for.
    I will say the moon level music in Ducktales might be one of my favorite video game songs ever to exist, ever. (Hear the Advantage cover this song for maximum awesome: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OKOAgffd8s )

    Also, I didn’t even know there WAS a Ducktales 2. ~The more you know~

  • ASandoval

    Ducktales 2 was rare even when it was new, which is why it commands a 50 – 80 dollar price tag today.

    Like Narcodis, I haven’t played DT2 myself. But I have played this! Rather recently in fact! Didn’t get very far though; it’s one of Capcom’s more challenging NES license games. Looking forward to this one.

  • Solitayre

    The Gameboy version is what I had as a kid. As far as I can tell, it is completely identical to the NES version.

    • SpoonyBard

      Welp, I guess someday Brick can do a Pea Green installment of DuckTales. It’s not like more of Scrooge is a BAD thing.

    • I remember the Gameboy version as being way easier than the NES. At any rate, I beat the one fairly easily, whereas I find the other bafflingly difficult to this day. Maybe I just suck.

  • QuartzFalcon

    From what I recall, Duck Tales 2 came out at the tail end of the NES’ lifespan (I think sometime between Megaman 6 and Wario’s Woods), so most people probably missed it.

  • Welp, I did a search of your site but nothing came up, so I am going to post on a really old article here. I just finished playing DuckTales remastered, and imagine my surprise and shock to see ‘Ricky “Brickroad” Scibbe’ listed in the Special Thanks section of the credits! Congratulations! I should have screencapped it.

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