Number Five!

Alex Kidd In Miracle World
Released in 1986 for the Sega Master System, re-released for Wii’s Virtual Console in 2008

 
Simple yet challenging. As were most platform games of the 80s and 90s.

The first game in this feature is none other than Sega’s answer to Super Mario, Alex Kidd in Miracle World. Incidentally this great little piece of history was also the first game I had ever played, back in 1991 on my little Sega Master System II. It took me seventeen years to finish this game, and even then it required the use of an emulator and save states, but every time I play this game I feel three years old again. As mentioned earlier, Miracle World was only one of Sega’s attempts at competing against the immense popularity of the Super Mario franchise during the Nintendo vs Sega days of old. Alex Kidd went on to inspire various sequels throughout the Master System’s lifetime and eventually onto the Sega MegaDrive/Genesis.

Those freakin’ dragons used to scare the hell out of me.

Though the levels were never particularly long, they became increasingly challenging. Add to this the lack of a save system – which was the norm for platformers up until perhaps the mid-90s – and you have yourself a means to play games with immense precision. See before save systems were incorporated to games gamers had to play using this thing called “skills”. Mind you, it took me a few years to finally develop these as I could never seem to pass the third or fourth level. And even then when it came to the rock-paper-scissors (or “janken” in Japanese) boss battles I would usually have to get one of my uncles or parents to figure it out for me since it was way above my comprehension.

Despite this though, I always loved returning to Miracle World knowing full-well I will eventually get a game over and start again. Either the level design was immensely compelling and the art made the game look great, or I was just a weird kid who lived a life of repetition. Hmm.

In all seriousness though, Alex Kidd in Miracle World is a fantastic little platform game and is highly regarded as one of the best titles for the system. The graphics were great, the gameplay was simple yet challenging, and the sound/music is memorable. Fun fact: For Aussies who watch Hey Hey! It’s Saturday! on Channel 9, the “fail sound” from their celebrity trivia/game segments is the death chime from this game.