Re: Aaron's classic audiogame reviews
Review and retrospective of Tarzan Junior
Developer: pb-games
Release 2004 ish
platform: windows
I remember the first ever time playing Tarzan Junior, it was the concept demo of the game. This one had you using the numpad to walk left and right, and the spacebar for your spear. YOu could also press w to change to slingshot.
This was also how I was first introduced to Sean Randal, as he created audio tutorials for the game.
Quite some time later, there was a review of an updated beta of the game posted publicly on pb-game's website, also by Sean Randal. This one showed off levels 1 to 5.
A few months later, the game was released, but back then, I didn't have a credit card or PayPal. So I ended up going on to the ACB Radio's SpeakEasy voice chat server here and there, ebcause people would talk about the game and would stream some of the levels.
Eventually, pb-games added PayPal, and by this time, I had my own, so was able to buy the game.
My review:
Now, it's hard to believe this game is a decade old, at least. It is primarily a side scrolling experience, but is a bit different too.
Firstly, here's a criticism. In the manual, there's seemingly no mention of the w key for switching weapons between the spear and the slingshot, although the slingshot itself is mentioned several times.
Apart from that, the manual is fairly well written.
As I said in my earlier post, I chose medium as the difficulty for my run, and I think that was a wise decision, as it was quite the challenge.
I always found it funny how in level 1 for the final version, you could literally only walk forward. Interestingly as well, whenever you encountered an event, you can not move until the event is finished, such as battling an enemy.
It's also amusing how every time you walked forward, you'd hear your footstep on your right, and the bonus object grabbing was essentially bop it whereby you pressed the space bar as quick as possible.
What I find so interesting is how each level really seems different from the last. Level 2, Tiger Fight, definitely feels like a chase. The first bonus round has you collecting coconuts with the arrow keys, but the thing that always surprised me was if you had more than 4 lives, you wouldn't be taken there. I don't really know if that's fair or not, I'm on the fence about that decision. Level 3 really made me feel like Tarzan, leaping from vine to vine and sometimes having to do the odd swim. Or get killed by a pesky monkey. Although, saying that, it's also very untarzan like because I thought Tarzan always wanted to help the animals?
The alpha monkey is essentially a puzzle, very easy to figure out, but still fun when it happens.
Level 4 Honey Hunt has a fourth wall break that still made me laugh even now, and is very different to level 2. By this point, you can now walk forwards and backwards, as walking backwards gets unlocked in the boss of this level.
I was able to remember around 11 numbers on the second bonus round.
I really enjoyed level 5. It felt the most, well, audiogame like, your footsteps were in the center and there was always a lot of action.
Level 6 is essentially a Tarzan version of Troopanum, although this time there's the rail shooter element where you shoot the enemies and then reload, which brings back memories of my time in the arcades. Plus there's the insane blaster to contend with. I also really like the callback to the music in this level, as it's the music heard in level 5's cutscene.
Level 7, the final fight, that leader fight is just hilarious and whimsicle. I'll come back to that in a sec.
Level 8 took me a little while to figure out again. I actually thought I wouldn't make it. You need to time your jumps very well.
Now, onto the leader. This game has a fun feature where you can play each level by itself, so I ended up doing essentially a speedrun on easy of this battle. I think I got down to around 12 seconds as I got very lucky with my shots.
Overall, I still think this game holds up, even now. The sounds have a charm of their own, the levels are varied, and as a result, the gameplay is a fun way to spend half an hour or so if you were to beat it all at once. However, the insane difficulty is just that: insane, I'm struggling with level 1.
So, if you can't tell already, I still enjoyed this game even after all this time. I'm still a bit surprised that the w key no longer seems to be in the manual, anywhere.
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