Amidst the glut of mascot platformers that in many ways helped define the market progression of video games in the mid-nineties, it was almost impossible to keep track of which platformers were actually good and which were crap. Think about it: for every quality Mario or Sonic entry, there were at any given time at least a dozen throwaway third party imitators, from Zool to Alfred Chicken, just waiting to be unleashed on an unsuspecting and arguably gullible gaming public. The result was a market oversaturation nighmare that left the masses jaded about mascots, whether cute and cuddly or straight up badass (for the time). Not unlike the current skewed ratio of good to terrible Wii games, the 16-bit mascot craze also left a lot of good titles hopelessly buried under mounds of garbage.
Case in point: Konami’s Rocket Knight Adventures.
For anyone that remembers spending any time with Rocket Knight Adventures, the memories of playing the game are probably good ones. The game was well designed, with solid platforming and Gradius-style horizontal shooter segments; using Sparkster’s rocket pack was, for the time, innovative; the large, colorful sprites and game world were a visual treat. Maybe most importantly, the game even packed a surprising learning curve—no doubt because to its creator, Nobuya Nakazato, was also responsible for the development of several Contra titles.
Particularly on the Genesis, whose third-party presence appeared somewhat anemic against the SNES’ massive library of great non-Nintendo games, Sparkster’s presence was a godsend - for those that were aware of it. And although Rocket Knight Adventures was popular enough to spawn a sequel, Sparkster himself has been relegated to making sporadic cameos for Konami (and even these have been few and far between) since his last official outing in 1994.
Now, fifteen years later, the heroic opossum knight is set to return to the gaming scene in Rocket Knight, slated to hit PSN, XBLA and Steam early next year courtesy of Konami darling Climax. But just because the game is a retro revival doesn’t mean there’s going to be much reinvention, as in, say, the late Grin’s (surprisingly good) re-imagining of Bionic Commando. Rocket Knight is still as old school as games get, and given the biology of the series’ traditional take-no-prisoners difficulty and mechanics, this can only be good news.
That's not to say that there won’t be any changes to the series formula. Aside from the obvious cartoony facelift (vaguely reminiscent of the latest Vandal Hearts game, only the art direction actually works here) Rocket Knight blends the mechanics of all previous games in the series. Whereas Sparkster’s primary attack varied between throwing energy beams in the original Rocket Knight Adventures and the one-off SNES version of Sparkster versus the melee attacks of the Genesis version of Sparkster (the official sequel to the original) Rocket Knight allows for both, with energy attacks coming at the cost your rocket’s auto-recharging meter. Similarly, Sparkster’s rocket use is more limited than in the Genesis Sparkster, whose meter refilled fast enough to essentially let you fly, but you can still fire a second rocket boost that increases the distance of the your initial rocket boost. Thankfully, the side-scrolling shooter stages are still intact in Rocket Knight, with some camera flourishes that show off a Klonoa-style 2.5-D design.
Interestingly, Rocket Knight takes a road less traveled in its narrative as well. The game is a sequel, for sure, but Sparkster hasn’t been doing much since his last outing. Following the events of the original games, Sparkster moved with his family away from the kingdom of Zephyrus, giving up his position as rocket knight. The adversarial pigs who Sparkster defended the kingdom against in Rocket Knight Adventures settled peaceably there after their defeat. When Sparkster catches wind of another war ravaging Zephyrus, he suits up to once again battle for his former kingdom. Only this time, he finds his old rival, Axel Gear, has taken up the reigns as Zephyrus’ rocket knight, and the pigs are fighting alongside the opossums in an attempt to quell the attacks of a vicious army of wolves. The complicated setup shouldn’t be a deterrent, however—the developers say the game will stick to the series' old-school storytelling techniques, saving players from getting too bogged down in details.
What might be the best news about Rocket Knight is that no matter what generation of gamer you are, Climax has you covered. Used to the lenient checkpoints, liberal saving and continues offered by most of today’s games? You’ll want to check out free play mode. And for the 16-bit purists, arcade mode lets you play level to level, with no saves and (most likely) limited continues. The bottom line is, you should be getting excited for Rocket Knight, whether you’re a Sparkster fan from way back or have only just heard of him for the first time. It’s been too long since this opossum had a turn in the spotlight—let’s hope Climax can keep up the spirit of the original. It looks like they’re on the right track thus far.
