Battletoads (Too Fucking Hard)

[Wesker]

The arcade version looks badass at least.

That's undoubtedly the best game in the series and one of the best things Rare has ever done.

[jerry coeurl]

I've played the arcade version of Battletoads on one occasion, at my buddy's house right after he picked up the PCB (played it on one of his Ninja Turtle cabinets) and it gave me some pretty intense nausea. To date it is the only game that has ever made me physically ill from playing/watching it. After about ten minutes of play I noticed I had a splitting headache and really felt like I was going to throw up. I excused myself and laid down for about 15 minutes or so, and once I felt better I jumped back in to give it another shot. Again, gnarly nausea hit me like a ton of bricks.

Put another way, I guess you could say that Battletoads makes me sick! Seems like a decent game otherwise, though.

[segaddict]

I just got Battletoads for the Gameboy today. It's an entirely different game than the NES/Genesis version even though it has the same box art and title. Not as challenging, but still a fun play.

I hope I get a chance to play the arcade version sometime. It looks great.

[StarMist]

I still maintain Battletoads on Genesis was a unnecessary port. Everyone and their mother had a NES so they could play Battletoads and the graphics were fine as is and I highly doubt a lot of people were clamouring for the same game with slightly better graphics. Maybe they were hoping a Genesis port would tone down the difficulty significantly but it didnt hence its a unnecessary port.

I actually think the graphical retouches interfere with collision detection...well that can't be absolutely right as some people here seem to have a pretty easy time with this edition, but I prefer the NES game's handling. The flicker elimination is the only improvement I see. For ease, apart from the lives, the racing sections feel a touch slower.
Honestly though this game should've been eased a lot, especially to facilitate 2P so both players wouldn't have to know the game front and back. Being total memorisation just kills it--I don't think even Hard Corps is such a memoriser, Battletoads is more like R Type Final. Once out of the NES era its speed was no longer astonishing = the loss of its selling point = a needless challenge = a pointless port. Adding so little it really just made the Genesis look shabby: one could hardly help thinking is this all we're going to get, recoloured NES ports? Much lower difficulty might've aroused enough new interest to warrant a sequel (a sequel unlike BT&DD, ugh), which they could've designed as hard as they pleased. I don't mind high difficulty but I think this game's really stopped the series in its tracks. And don't compare it to TMNT or anything else with independent commercial momentum.

[vintagegamecrazy]

Battletoads is one of those games that separates gamer men from gamer boys.

I guess this makes me one of the gamer men then as I can beat this game pretty easily. I die several times throughout but don't need any continues though.

A few tips:

Level 9: Down the Tubes
When facing the sharks just kill them instead of avoiding them, they're not that hard to hit and they die pretty easily once you get ahold of them. Three smacks from your Toad's fist and they go down.
When avoiding the rolling gears jump as often as you can to increase speed. When you're in the water and have to hover over a spike pit then start attacking as it will keep you from sinking and hitting a spike.

Level 10 Rat Race

Always run but attack the rat with a head butt if it's in range. More times than not you'll make it bounce over a hole in the floor and it will have to run back and forth again before it descends which will buy you many precious seconds to complete the race.

[j_factor]

So I just beat Battletoads on one credit! This time, I didn't lose a life until Terra Tubes, where I only lost 1. The part that I was stuck at before, I got through on my first try. I'm sure that's partly luck. Then I lost three lives on Rat Race. That left me with 29 lives, as I'd done pretty well on level 2. Then, amazingly, I got through the first section of The Revolution without losing a life. It was downhill from there, though. I got stuck on the last section. The very end is this difficult platform climbing bit. But before that, and after the checkpoint, is the part with the blowing face guys, which also have a good likelihood of killing me. I was down on my LAST life when I finally beat the level. Then there was the final boss, but she's a joke. So what do you get for beating this game? Your friends materialize on screen. The Dark Queen says something, the same way she does before every level, and flies away. Then Professor T. Bird says something really lame, the same way he replies to the Queen before every level. And then... title screen. That's it. Not even a "Congratulations!". A lot of people complain about games that end with a congratulations screen, but this game doesn't even congratulate you. It also does not have the ending text and animation that the NES version had -- which was pretty minimal, so what the hell? Come on, Rare.

[Wesker]

This conversion was not actually done by Rare but by some unknown Japanese contractor by Sega in a very lazy way (except for the music adaptation, which was great). Hence why there are so many scenes missing, especially the intro which was completely cut out. They also did very weird and unnecessary redesigns like turning General Slaughter into some dumb-looking pig.

Rare did develop the Mega Drive version of Battletoads & Double Dragon, and it shows because it's a much better conversion by all means.

[j_factor]

Ah, I see. Well, it may be a lazy port, but it could've been much worse. Just look at the Amiga port.

Are you sure it was a Japanese contractor by Sega? Not Tradewest?

[Wesker]

I can't be sure because the game doesn't credit any programming staff or else, but I'm certain because it uses the SMPS Z80 sound engine, which indicates it's a Japanese development.

The SMPS family of sound engines was only employed by Sega Japan licensed developers (Japanese developers mostly, if not entirely), and the Mega Drive version was copyrighted and published by Sega in Europe and Japan (boot it up in either European or Japanese region and you'll see an additional "©Sega 1993" line in the title screen), which gives a tip that the game was probably handled by Sega and given to a Japanese developer. In North America it was distributed by Tradewest, but probably because of the agreement Sega had with them in order to get the game.

Battletoads & Double Dragon, on the other hand, uses a "Rare custom" sound engine, the same one employed in the other two non-Battletoads Rare games on the system: Championship Pro-Am and Snake Rattle 'n' Roll. This indicates these three games were developed in-house by Rare (and the music probably handled by David Wise himself), but not Battletoads which was licensed to Sega.

[VirtualConsoleGamer]

Yea it's insane.

[Curryman123]

battletoads is overrated IMO.

[CRV]

Are you sure it was a Japanese contractor by Sega? Not Tradewest?

Arc System Works worked on it. Former Arc programmer Makoto Shiozumi lists it here.

Hikoshi Hashimoto did the sound on both the GEN and GG versions, so the latter was also done in Japan.

[Wesker]

Arc System Works worked on it. Former Arc programmer Makoto Shiozumi lists it here.

Hikoshi Hashimoto did the sound on both the GEN and GG versions, so the latter was also done in Japan.

Good to know.

Too bad they did all those bad design choices. Hard to believe considering they do wonders in that department nowadays.

[tisurame]

Actually, I think the Genesis port of Battletoads is a great conversion, mainly the music. There are a few cut-scenes missing, but everything else is fine. It's the best version of the original Battletoads, no doubt.

[Wesker]

The intro is butchered and most of the humor present in the game is missing with the omitted scenes (Continue / Game Over scenes mostly) AND also you have worse looking enemies for some weird reason.

The rest of the game is better, sure, but it definitely could have been much better. Rare itself should have done this, like they did with Battletoads Double Dragon.