Home renovations: Strider & Willow | Metroidvania Works 19
1,096Two Capcom titles this week—one platformer in the platonic form of the metroidvania, the other a pure action RPG. However, both games share one thing in common: Both bring coin-op titles to NES, and both ignore pretty much all of their original arcade counterparts' content in favor of bringing home consumers bigger, chewier, more time-consuming adventures.
The two roads diverge from there, however. Willow takes the path less traveled by being peak NES action RPG—one of the finest on the system—while Strider feels decidedly, well, janky, like so many other ambitious-but-disastrous NES releases. Although you really didn't see a lot of those high-minded hot messes from Capcom back in the day, so maybe THAT is the road less traveled.
Anyway, I think we can agree that Robert Frost would have enjoyed Willow's inventive stroll through the woods far more than Strider Hiryu's awkward bungle through the jungle.
Production notes:
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NES footage captured from Analogue Nt Mini. Video upscaled to 720 with xRGB Mini Framemeister.