Kiblitzing: Balloon Fight vs. Joust

[Jess Ragan]

http://kiblitzing.blogspot.com/2015/07/a-whole-lotta-iwata-fight-of-bumblebees.html

 

In honor of the late, great Satoru Iwata, I take a look at two of the games he brought to the NES, Balloon Fight and Joust. Nobody's sure just how involved he was with the latter game, but he IS credited on the Japanese Kirby Wiki for it. It's an amusing coincidence, as the two games are a lot alike!

[Nutsy Doodleheimer]

Great article Jess! Balloon Fight is such a great and fun game. Played that nonstop when I was a kid and actually couldn't figure out who the enemies were. Were they trolls, birdmen, or men with wacky bird helmets? Nonetheless I enjoyed that more than Joust and I do enjoy both. Balloon Fight had such a catchy soundtrack and some of the most memorable tunes out in the NES era. Starting a phase, Bonus Round/Balloon Trip, Game Over, It was all great. Holding the button down to fly was a great move. Love the caption you put on the Balloon Trip photo. You are practically done for sooner or later and flying with precise precision around the stars. Balloon Fight is in my top 15 and one of the top favorite black box games. Can't believe in almost a couple months it will be 30 years the NES was released in North America.

[Jess Ragan]

I actually hacked the NES version of Joust to make it (slightly) more like the arcade game. I was gonna post the IPS in the hacks subforum, but... evidently you can't post those. Not even sure why, honestly.