Game Info
Game Name: NES Remix Pack
Developer(s): Nindendo EAD Tokyo/indieszero
Publisher(s): Nintendo
Platform(s): Wii U/3DS
Genre(s): Compilation/Party
Release Date(s): December 5, 2014
ESRB Rating: E
Welcome back to the NES!
The Nintendo Entertainment System is coming back with a vengeance. The classic games you grew up with are reborn as you face new challenges and new games that push your skill levels to the max…You might be able to challenge Gotham City as Batman and battle through military campaigns in Call of Duty, but can you pull up vegetables in Super Mario Bros. 2 or race the clock in Excitebike?
NES Remix is known as Famicom Remix (ファミコンリミックス or Famikon Rimikkusu) in Japan. The game was released as a download from Nintendo eShop on December 18, 2013 with NES Remix 2 being released on April 25, 2014. Both collections were compiled into NES Remix Pack for the Wii U and the game is also available on the 3DS.
Link might as well take Pauline since Mario dumped her
NES Remix almost feels like a blend of few different things. It feels a bit like a Mario Party game with popular characters doing quick games and it feels a bit like a WarioWare game where the players have to do tasks often while ignoring other goals. Oddly enough, while some might find these tasks challenging, I found most of them pretty mundane.
The reason why I found it mundane is that it focused on games I played into the ground as an owner of the original NES. Pre-internet and pre-story driven games, you spent a lot more time just wandering around and challenging yourself and friends. Here, the challenges are a lot of the same things. It is fun to get to go back and play a lot of the original titles for the NES, but I can say once we get into the NES Remix 2 titles, I find it a bit more challenge…because I didn’t play all those games over and over again.
Toad kicks Octorok ass!
The unfortunate thing about this game is that due to downloadable content, playing little bites of the game are all you get. If this had been a real player game, you would have been able to unlock all these games throughout the course of the gameplay…leading you to want to play more. Instead, Nintendo carries on with its “sticker” quests which are rather weak equivalents of Achievements or Trophies. They don’t carry into the Wii U console and it would have been a fun way to customize your Wii U by having the stickers in games carry over.
The other problem with this game is that it is very playable but it doesn’t have a lot of replay value if that makes sense. Some of the challenges are very challenging and they take you time and time again to finish them (especially if you want three rainbow stars). Once you finally do beat them, you are finished with that challenge and don’t really want to do it again. Fortunately, the game provides enough challenges to keep it interesting.
Anything that brings back Kid Icarus and the dreaded eggplant is good in my book!
NES Remix is a worthwhile purchase since it is on the low end of the NES titles and it could be a great title to school your kids in if you were the owner of the original NES but playing with the Wii U controls might be more of a challenge. The game’s real value is when more “remixing” occurs and Link finds himself in games like Super Mario Bros and Toad is eliminating Octoroks. The game could have done with more of that and incorporated the Wii U touchscreen. I would like to see more Remix games make it to the Wii U like a Super NES or even an original GameBoy Remix. I think I would be more challenged by those Remix games, but playing this game is a nice way to visit the past.
