There’s a new Alex Kidd remake out today. Once upon a time, Sega needed a mascot platformer and Sonic didn’t exist yet. So they turned to a platformer that began as a Dragon Ball licensed game, switched things around, got a little weird with it, and Alex Kidd born. Not Goku, Alex Kidd. And now, Goku’s non-union equivalent’s most well-known game has a new remake out in the form of Alex Kidd in Miracle World DX. You can now adventure through levels as a ludicrously fragile monkey/boy/elf/martial artist with redrawn art and a reorchestrated score.
The fans who now make up the aptly named Jenken Team (Jenkenpon = Rock Paper Scissors, which is an oddly major part of Miracle World) have made a lot of tweaks, even if they didn’t do much to alter the floaty, slide-y platforming and shitty hitboxes of the original. If anything, some of the new art makes it more difficult to know if Alex Kidd’s punch will connect with enemies. You’ve got to get right up against them to hit, but if any part of any enemy or many obstacles touch you, prepare to watch Alex’s soul leave the screen.
But fear not, as they’ve included a toggle to turn on infinite lives and have also included new in-level checkpoints. As at least one dev has gotten salty on twitter about people declaring that the game is overly difficult, with poor controls, I have the impression that they might think turning the toggle on amounts to cheating. Kind of like when you would have to input a code to get infinite lives in a game like this back in the day.
Thankfully, a lot has happened to platformer design since 1986. One thing is that games have broadly dispensed with lives. For the most part, they’re arbitrary and time-wasting, especially for games that require precision and where death comes swiftly. Taking lives and full-level or game restarts out of the equation frees up a lot of design possibilities and difficulty, too. If people want to restart a game each time they die, they can always fire up a roguelike.
Alex Kidd in Miracle World DX requires precision (even with imprecise controls) and death sure comes easily, so those boxes are checked. The checkpoints that Jenken have introduced even correspond with challenges within each level, more or less recognizing where different “screens” start and stop along the side-scrolling action. With infinite lives turned on, it’s possible to treat the DX remake a little more like a contemporary platformer, where players can bash their heads against a screen until they finally clear it.
It strikes me that this is kind of similar to how I might use a save state in this game, if that was an included feature. It should be, along with a bunch of other emulation tools, but I guess that infinite lives were as much of a concession as Jenken Team were willing to concede. Anyway, if you give this one a spin, I’d recommend playing until you see this screen:
Don’t worry, it’ll happen quickly. At that point, whether you’re finding the game “too hard” or not, I’d recommend switching that toggle for infinite lives. It’ll make the game that much more playable.
**Talk Amongst Yourselves**
- What do you think about lives/extra lives/infinite lives as a mechanic?
- What’s your favorite retro platformer?
- Would you like a remake of that favorite? Or is it better that it lives in the past?
Get involved!
Comments
I don't mind having the option if I want a more hardcore, oldschool experience, but I can live without it.
I love it. I play games to have fun and relax, not to get stressed out. It's the reason I play most things on easy mode now. I just want to have fun and not do the same thing over and over because I keep dying.
**What’s your favorite retro platformer?**
Tough choice. Mario or Metroid probably. I grew up with a SNES so played a lot of those.
**Would you like a remake of that favorite? Or is it better that it lives in the past?**
I'd say better in the past. Super Metroid is one of the best games ever made really. And we get new updates to Mario and Metroid so no reason to remake those really.