Super Godzilla (GBA)
Super Godzilla
GBA, Toho (1993)
It’s Godzilla against the world in Super Godzilla, a game that pits the giant green monster against everything from other giant monsters to tanks, aliens, and UFOs. The future of the world lies in Godzilla’s success.
The 16-bit Super Nintendo (SNES) was light years ahead of its predecessor, the 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The Super Nintendo boasted huge improvements in both graphics and sound, which games like Super Godzilla brilliantly demonstrated. Unfortunately all that newfound crunching power didn’t always guarantee better game play, to which Super Godzilla is a testament. It’s a great looking game that wasn’t much fun to play.
Super Godzilla is presented in a split-screen fashion, with animations of Godzilla’s actions shown on the top half and a map of the city shown below. The map is a square grid that shows players the locations of water, buildings, tanks, and enemies. As Godzilla makes his way across the map, the top half of the screen shows colorful animations of the big green guy walking through the city. The animated sequences look very nice, which is fortunate as you’re forced to watch them for long stretches of time as Godzilla lumbers his way from one side of the map to the other.
It appears that great efforts were taken to ensure that anything remotely fun about videogames was removed before Super Godzilla hit store shelves. Compared to other fighting games of the era, Super Godzilla’s fighting engine is incredibly primitive. Godzilla only has four attacks, all of them made less-than-fun by the game’s awkward battle system.
The goal of each level is ultimately to defeat a boss while avoiding army attacks. There are six levels full of enemies, power-ups and bosses to work your way through, but chances are you’ll fall asleep long before you make it to the end. Super Godzilla isn’t as bad as it is boring, which is amazing for any game based on a giant, fire-breathing monster. Worth checking out for Godzilla fans, but those looking for the same levels of action found in the movies will be crushed.