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ワードナの森
©Taito Corp. 1988
Release: 1988-03-25 (¥3300)
DiskCard TFD-WAD
Platform/Action game
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Wardner no Mori is a side scrolling platform game
by Toaplan and published by Taito. This is a port
of an arcade game originally released
in 1987 (see the info section). The evil Mr. Wardner's minions
have turned the prince's girlfriend into a crystal ball and the
poor young man embarks on a perilous journey to save her. Wardner no Mori
features five long stages and before each level begins, a map is
displayed on screen showing the player what's around the corner.
Our chubby hero has a lot more stamina than it looks and the incredibly
ability to shoot fireballs directly in front of him. He starts his journey
with only one fireball but yellow orbs scattered throughout the game help
him increase his powers and he will soon be able to fire a bunch of them at once. He
also collects money along the way to purchase special items from local
shops located at the end of each stage. Among the various items (time clock,
bombs and health potions), shops also provide new attack powers - they come in
three flavors (Star, Moon and Sun) and allow our hero
to change his fireball's attack pattern, from zig-zag to loop
or straight line. Other important items are the golden statues
that bring him fairies as companions - they are indestructible and
damage enemies upon contact. The young prince must complete each stage within a
time limit and only magic clocks can slow it down...
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Wardner no Mori was a Japanese arcade game by Taito
and Toaplan and originally released in 1987 (picture on the left). The game is known
in the west as Wardner and Pyros. It was ported to the
Famicom Disk system in 1988 and to the Megadrive in 1991 as
Wardner no Mori Special (aka Wardner in the US).
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There are obvious differences between the original arcade game and this
Famicom Disk version. The graphics are of course superior with a
nice parallax scrolling unsurprisingly missing from the Famicom
conversion. Another major difference is the life bar and unlike the
original arcade game (which features a one-hit kill) Dover can he
hit several times before dying. The life bar doesn't refill at the
end of each stage though and it is up to the player to buy health potions.
Because of it, other items have disappeared such as the blue cloak
that allows Dover to be hit without losing a life in the arcade game.
Finally, the Ocarina can still be purchased to skip most of
stage 3 - however, it doesn't call a large bird anymore but a yellow
floating balloon.
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Click on picture to enlarge |
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Add your Pov here !
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I must warn you, I may be a bit biased about Wardner no Mori.
I remember playing the arcade version when I was a kid and really
enjoyed it (which is odd as it doesn't look like the arcade was
officially available in Europe). I personally think the original
game was great and this Famicom Disk is surprisingly close
to its arcade counterpart, and this despite the obvious hardware
limitations. The game plays really well and everything seems to fit
together rather nicely. It can be difficult at first though (you can
only shoot one fireball at the time) but the game becomes really
fun as soon as you crank up Dover's powers. All in all
Wardner no Mori is a slick platform game, full of secrets,
surprises and cleverly-designed stages that die-hard fans of the
platform genre should add to their Famicom Disk collection.
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