NES Games I Beat #39: The Jetsons: Cogswell Caper

    Ladies and gentlemen, one of the great forgotten NES classics! Understandably underrated in its time, this is a gem worth playing despite its rarity and value. It’s not perfect but for all the mistakes made a great number of things were done so well that if you are truly a retro gamer you should be able to overlook some of them. For giving this game the time it deserves to master its game play, you will be rewarded with one of the most solid gaming experiences on the console. Yeah, it’s that good.
Developed by Natsume, who at this point where the developer of the Shatterhand as well as the Powerblade games, it was published by Taito as late as December of 1992. Around this time Taito and Natsume had the NES on lockdown. While most developers had moved on in favor of superior hardware like the SNES, these guys stayed behind to release some of the all time underrated NES games like Kickmaster, Dino and Hoppy, and what I see as the holy trilogy of sorts: Bubble Bobble Part 2, Panic Restaurant, and the highly regarded Little Samson. None of these games did that well and are now some of the rarest and most collectable titles for the system. Like these however I believe Jetsons deserves a spotlight for being a great underrated title. It is a crying shame that to this day this game is either panned or given mediocre scores by those who even bother to look into it.
    Jetsons is a sidescrolling platformer with elements of action that resemble Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers with its mechanic of picking up and throwing boxes. Boxes are generally plentiful but need to be used strategically and with precision timing to be effective. Boxes can be thrown straight up, diagonally up in either direction, and of course left and right. Getting down the arc and timing of the boxes leads to some challenging but satisfying combat. The tough part is enemies have some many variations of patterns which need to be learned. The bosses at the end of each main stage are really neat as well, each being an interesting and memorable experience albeit a bit challenging. While most just take a bunch of hits with boxes, it’s fun to figure out the timing and tensely dodge their attacks. In terms of enemies, they all have a unique flare to them and fit their stages nicely.
     Along the way you’ll pick up tiny pills called power packs which serve as ammo, as well as small hearts which replenish one heart, big hearts which give you an additional hit, and stars which when 10 are collected give you another life. You can have a max of five and you lose one every time you die until your back to 3. The other cool aspect to this game is the weapons. Most are given to you after a boss or a short stage by key characters of the show which is nice to see that they make an appearance. My favorite weapon is a remote control that summons a tiny option looking robot to damage the closest enemy which is very helpful and takes only 5 pills. There’s also magnetic boots that allow you to stick to the ceiling much like in Metal Storm, and like certain switches do in other parts of the game, at the cost of a pill per second. These can be handy in dodging enemies or getting hard to reach items. The rest like the shield, flashlight, and hoverboard are awesome too but most are situational and I barely used them when I got them so late in the game.
     The atmosphere is beyond awesome. Like I said, Natsume and Taito had a really good grasp on the hardware at this point and it shows. The graphics are great with the highlight being the plethora of animations on every single character and motion. There must have been over 50 types of models and a good few animations at least for each. Not only that but given that it’s based on a popular TV show it seems kind of natural that the animation be top notch. The stages all look great too and none feel too similar. I’m not too familiar with the show but I’d wager to say they captured its world’s thememing of a wacky future pretty well. Regardless of the license, the levels are colorful and unique, no two feel the same. There’s factories, gardens, gyms, stadiums, a land of dreams, a blast furnace, the list goes on and it’s all set to space backgrounds when outside, giving the game a distinct cosmic feel which few games of its time could really capture.
     And my God can we get some love for the music? The soundtrack here is brilliant and some of the single most underrated video game music of all time. Composed by Iku Mizutani who did othe Natsume titles including Shatterhand and Kazuko Umino of the band Zuntata who are most well known for doing the music in Ninja Warriors. The three factory themes are endlessly enjoyable, while all of the other tracks doing a great job at not only thememing their stage but also just being damn fine music for standalone listening. Give it a listen sometime here on Youtube, it’s totally worth it.
    To be quite honest this game really didn’t appeal to me at first. Its tough difficulty curve and lack of a password system or save feature are its minor but only downfalls in my opinion. Unlimited continues is a cheap but welcome way to make up for this. It’s another time you’ll just have to leave the NES running until you beat it. This game also suffers from the flaw of not scrolling backwards meaning once an item leaves the screen, you can’t go back for it. The game is built around this though so it’s not a huge issue. The boss of Cosmic World also pissed me off because the game doesn’t give you boxes like the others. Instead you have to use the remote bot which is fine but this means getting every pill on the stage, dying before the boss all your extra lives, getting enough stars to gain a life, and then doing the stage perfect for a fourth time to then fight the boss with at least 60 pills in order to win. None of the other stages are like that and it’s not a difficult stage so again this is a minor complaint. The platforming will take some getting used to thanks in part to the jump but when I went back to play it on emulator versus the Nintendo it seemed smoother so maybe it’s my HDTV that is providing lag or something. At least it’s leagues better than the shitty platforming in Megaman 8. Anyways, while some parts may feel hard, they never feel impossible and I always felt like I could do it once I figured out how. There are some cheap deaths but if Castlevania, Ninja Gaiden, Kid Icarus, and Megaman can all be considered good with their brutal difficulty then I’d argue old school gamers can look past these flaws.
    My point is while the reviewers general never gave this game the time it needs to grow on them probably due to the biased of it being a licensed game or that the NES had a lot of generic platformers, if you can look past these minor flaws , you just might enjoy or even love what’s here. Incredible music and level s coupled with some fun items and combat make this a really solid NES title and criminally under looked TO THIS DAY. Hopefully this review does something to give it its deserved recognition. This is a truly great title that deserves more praise. I’m proud to award this game an 8.6/ 10. A truly must play for the NES.