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C What Went Wrong? — Hydlide (NES)

Rob Hamilton Profile _ Twitter _ E-mail _ Homepage

I admit it. I'm going after an easy target here. Sue me, I'm lazy and it's Friday and I'm gearing up for the weekend. I don't want to spend time trying to think about why some game that should have been at least reasonably good wound up horrible. Therefore, I'm picking a game that is completely horrible in every way, shape and form and having a good laugh, just like roughly one billion writers have done before this particular piece. Hydlide was an interesting attempt to create a clone of Ys. It was an action-RPG where you ran into enemies to kill them, using a button to determine if you were in "attack" or "defend" mode. While "attack" did mean you'd cause more damage, you'd also get destroyed by tough foes if you charged them. The "defend" mode kept you alive a bit longer, but you'd have to use a certain bit of strategy. You'd want to charge foes as they were turned away from you, so you could brutalize them at no risk to yourself. If they faced you, things could go bad in a hurry. There also are a handful of spells that also can be of help So, we have an action-RPG with a simple, easy-to-learn combat system. That's not so bad, is it? Only if it's ugly with a horrible, constantly-repeating soundtrack. And its entire world probably could fit in the final dungeon of The Legend of Zelda. And you realize that most of your time with this short game will be spent grinding out levels. I could go on...for days. In Hydlide, "you" are a brave knight named Jim. Varalys (evil demon) has kidnapped a princess and transformed her into three fairies which have been hidden throughout the world. Jim starts on a screen where various slimes and goblins reside. Kill them until you've reached level three and now have a life bar that can be seen by the naked eye. I'd advise you to keep killing since I've always been a believer in getting as much level-grinding out of the way in one sitting as possible, so you can at least enjoy yourself for an extended period of time when that's taken care of...but Hydlide won't let you do that. When I reached level three, enemies stopped giving experience. I had to do something! "Something" meant finding a source of light and entering a cave containing a vampire and his guardian bats. It was really easy to die here, as you have to dodge the bats and sneak up behind the vampire to (in "defend") whittle away its life. If it turns around while you're in direct proximity, your life pretty much immediately is drained. There are three monsters in this game that had the ability to really annoy me. This is the first. I don't remember all the details, but beating the vampire opens up the game a bit and you're able to gain levels again. So, I went to a screen that had a graveyard to fight off zombies for a good, long time. My memory fails, so I can't say for sure whether I could max out Jim here or there was another temporary "level cap". I think the latter, as Hydlide did seem to be one of those "if something can go wrong, it will" games. Also, by careful exploration of the world and a number of short dungeons, you can get a bunch of items and stuff. And those three fairies that are the princess. The term "careful exploration" may be a bit misleading, as you really have to do things like run into a bunch of trees until you find the one that doesn't release wasps in order to get fairies. The only part of all of this that takes much time is the level-building. You really don't have many places to go (it is only a 25-screen overworld, much of which is used as my art for this piece) and those places aren't particularly large. Varalys' castle, which you get to after recreating the princess and dodging the dragon (second annoying enemy) outside of it, is something like three screens. Yes, a final "dungeon" containing three screens. But you get to do it twice, so that's something! The first trip here leads to you eliminating the water from the land, which completely destroys the dragon's ecosystem (and probably that of everyone else, come to think of it), making him susceptible to damage. After that, you can explore the corridors that used to be rivers for more goodies and it's time to finish the game. Varalys is the third annoying foe, as you might guess. He teleports around his room shooting fireballs at you while you dodge his attacks and those of a handful of regenerating flunkies. If your life gets low, just go to the next room and dodge skeletons while your life meter refills. I have vivid memories of getting really frustrated by this battle as a teenager because it was boring and tedious to stalk the dude around his room hoping I could take off some of his life before retreating. This led to me losing patience and trying to sneak in a hit or two in "attack" mode, which led to me dying. Ah, well...Jim's not that heroic of a name anyway. No big loss. Like many old Nintendo games, Hydlide could be beaten in less than an hour by a player who knew where everything was and what they had to do. The thing is that I have trouble imagining a person who'd spent enough time with this game to have that level of proficiency to EVER want to pick it up again. A few years ago, I did for the purpose of reviewing it. The entire time I was playing it, I just had these feelings of self-loathing going through my mind. That can't be healthy. Never again shall I lower myself for you, Hydlide!

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