Big things sometimes come in small packages and developer Retrotainment Games has delivered just that with their Nintendo Switch port of Haunted: Halloween ‘86 (The Curse of Possum Hollow).
A follow-up to one of the breakthrough modern indie games built with NES hardware, Haunted: Halloween ‘85, this new edition manages to pack variety and challenges unrivaled by its decades-old peers.
Out of Many, One
The premise of Haunted: Halloween ‘86 is simple and relatively modern as a side-scrolling platformer mixed with roguelike challenges. The running and jumping are done in 2D with a fluidity of control becoming of a polished retro platformer.
Between the two main characters, Donny and Tami–who can be swapped out for each other when their HP is low–is a gently unfolding narrative that serves more as a framework than as one of the core appeals of the game.
Despite its lack of innovative narrative, Haunted: Halloween ‘86’s level design and graduated variety of mechanics more than makeup for any of its individual shortcomings.
The wide range of powerups to choose from give each run its own flavor while also ensuring a high level of tactical gameplay required to progress far in a single run. Every time I would lose a pointless life or take silly damage in an area I hadn’t progressed past yet I would die a little on the inside as my avatars died on the outside.
And when I finally pieced together combos on the difficult boss battles I had earned success through repetition memory and mechanical mastery. Well-designed games keep players right in the sweet spot between too easy and too hard, and Haunted: Halloween ‘86 does so impeccably.
Retro Aims, Modern Success
I’m too young to have lived through the glory days of the NES, but with this burgeoning push of contemporary studios and indie developers retrofitting their software to consoles of decades past, I’m able to play upon a new and exciting frontier!
Before playing a few of these NES-Nintendo Switch port games I had never considered game development for discontinued hardware, let alone designing retro code to then fit on modern consoles. An uncanny feeling washes over me when I consider how powerful the memories of NES, 8-bit games are in the gaming community.
There is some unquantifiable homeliness, a cozy quality, to the feeling of 8-bit design for video games and it has led to a renaissance of pixel art games to date. Haunted: Halloween ‘86 combines retro conventions with modern interjections, and are rewarded for the result.
Score: 8.5/10
Check Out the Haunted: Halloween ‘86 Trailer:
For more information, please visit: https://retrotainmentgames.com/
Nintendo Switch Review
Recent Michigan State University grad and current Game Studies researcher who plays fantasy RPG's to escape, Smash to compete, and Stardew to chill. Also have a +1 to rage/toxicity resistance due to the many hours sunk into WoW, R6, and LoL.
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