"This game was soooooo ahead of its time."
How many times have we heard that before? Hell, how many times have I said it on here myself? Probably a million or so, give or take. While it's always had its reliance on certain genres, from 2D fighters to mascot platformers to open world adventures, the video game industry has never been afraid of a little innovation. It may not seem like it now, but it's true. And it was especially true during the 3rd console generation: make no mistake about it, the late 80's and early 90's were still very much the wild, wild west.
It's not that developers didn't try their best to innovate in the first two generations, but their hands were often tied by extremely limited technology. It's not that they didn't try (and succeed) on the 4th, 5th or even 6th generation consoles, but by that point people were starting to figure out what worked and what didn't in a video game. The NES (and Master System, etc.) were breeding grounds for innovation. While there were tons and tons of 2D platformers, there were also a lot of really serious attempts to try something different. And The Guardian Legend was one of those attempts. If you've been watching my longplays (and I wouldn't blame you if you haven't), you would have seen that TGL is a cross genre game, mixing a 2D vertical shoot 'em up with a top down, Zelda style adventure. Crossing genres is common today, but it wasn't back when this game was released in early 1988. I've heard a ton about how "this game was ahead of its time." But was it any good? Does early reviews were relatively mixed, but TGL has since gained a sort of cult following over the years. Does it deserve it?
First and foremost, the graphics are excellent. This has to be one of the best looking games on the NES, the level of detail here is far greater than what you would see on a standard 8-bit title. The colors are so vibrant and there's a ton of depth to all the backgrounds. It's especially noticeable when enemies come up from the ground, the effects there look great. Overall, the enemy designs are pretty cool and they were all very detailed as well, the flying diamonds are a great example of how much detail they were able to fit in such small amounts of pixels. The bosses especially are graphically impressive, though I really wish there were more variety. That would probably be my biggest complaint about the graphics, they recycle the same enemy sprites over and over again. Some of the enemies appear four or five times, just with different colors. I understand why, but it would have been nice to see a little more variety. Also, there are times when there is so much going on on-screen that the game flickers, which is annoying. Sound is pretty good, its not as memorable as some NES soundtracks but its still solid and the quality is excellent.
The controls are pretty solid, as with any NES game they're pretty simple. The D-pad moves, the A button fires your basic weapon and the B button fires the secondary weapon. Start pauses select brings up the menu, leaving every button on the controller accounted for. Sometimes, this leads to confusing and difficult control schemes, but that wasn't the case here. It's just about perfect during the SHMUP section, the movement of your ship is a little slow but its consistent with the enemy speed and not in any way gamebreaking. It's a little worse in the adventure portion, but that is more due to the fact that it is difficult to move diagonally with a D-pad. It's a little more prevalent here than it is in games like Zelda because the game often has enemies attack you at an angle. But that's more of a nitpick, I can't really find any major complaints.
The biggest selling point here is the variety. The vacillation between the adventure and SHMUP portions is the most obvious, but the variety of weapons and how they behave in each portion of the game makes each play session feel unique. There are tons of weapons, all of which are useful in at least some capacity. Some are more useful in the adventure and others were more useful in the SHMUP, but they all have a very clear and obvious use. Each one can be upgraded a few times, which you will have to do to be successful in the later levels. You have a wave beam, sword, rotating shield, fireball, grenade and screen clear, among other things. If I had one complaint, it would be that its a little difficult to switch weapons on the fly, but we will get to that later.
The SHMUP portions of the game is pretty standard fare for the genre on the NES. You fly on a scrolling background, you shoot hordes of enemies, lather, rinse repeat. Much of the challenge comes from the alternating speeds, some levels are incredibly fast while others are super slow. While the game is far more generous with health than most SHMUPs, you have a substantial life bar and there's no one-hit deaths, its made up for the fact that there are tons of enemies and bullets on screen at once. There are going to be portions where you absolutely have to take a hit. Fortunately, defeating enemies provides powerups to health and weapon energy. The adventure portion plays more like one big, continuous Zelda dungeon that connects each of the corridors. Here, you will fight enemies while searching for weapons, items and upgrades to your health and energy. Each area is unlocked via keys, which are earned from clearing the SHMUP corridors. You will encounter friendly aliens who will sell you items, as well as 'hint room' to help you unlock new areas. I do like these sections, but I couldn't help but feel they were a unique way to move from SHMUP level to SHMUP level. There were a few mini-bosses, but they weren't a huge deal.
I have two main problems with TGL, one relatively minor and one major. First, the smaller issue: you have to constantly keep opening the menu to switch weapons. This really wrecks the pace of the game and forces you to make switches at inopportune times. I took a lot of hits, especially during the SHMUP portions, when I had to switch weapons on the fly. More of than not, you had to be firing both weapons just to manage the insane amount of enemies on the screen. Taking a finger off one of the buttons to hit select usually will result in you taking damage, but you have to do it, especially at the end when you have enemies that are immune to certain types of damage. But again, the biggest issue is how it impacts the pace of play. If you watch the longplays, you might notice how frequently I opened the menus. Honestly, it was incredibly annoying when I watched them back and downright infuriating when I was actually playing the game. It might not seem like a big deal, but trust me, it was.
The bigger issue though it the difficulty curve. The middle to middle-end portion of TGL is the hardest part of the game by far and some of the early worlds are punishingly difficult. With the exception of the last corridor, the endgame becomes borderline easy for the simple reason that you are incredibly overpowered. This is where the mashup of the two styles causes some issues for gameplay. In a SHMUP, you generally increase the difficulty by adding more enemies and making them stronger and faster. In an adventure game, the difficulty comes more from seeking out new upgrades that provide solutions to old problems. The problem here comes when you get more powerful at a much faster rate than the enemy. You are powering up your weapons, shields, armor and hit points while they only get slightly stronger and faster. However, that also means that the enemies are way stronger than you early in the game before you find these upgrades, meaning the early game is harder than the endgame. Also, when more enemies are added, there's a higher opportunity for powerups to drop. Sometimes in the late game, its better to tank damage and hope a health powerup drops rather than try and actually destroy or avoid enemies. There are difficulty curve issues throughout.
At the end of the day, I had fun with TGL, even if it did wear a little thin by the end. I would certainly agree that it was ahead of its time and while it wasn't a picture perfect marriage of the two, it was far better than any of its contemporaries. Both the adventure and SHMUP portions would have been perfectly serviceable games on their own, but together they form an outstanding NES game. It's far deeper than the average NES games and I put quite a few hours into the game (as evidence by all the longplay videos). I would certainly say it was ahead of its time, though I'm not sure I would quite call it revolutionary as some people have. It definitely profiles as something of a hidden gem, though I don't think it quite breaks into the pantheon of all time great games. Still, I would highly recommend this to SHMUP, adventure or old school gaming fans in general.
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