Sweatin' the oldies: Mappy Land & Dance Aerobics | NES Works 116
789This is one of those "pleasant surprise" episodes where I went in expecting nothing and came out impressed by both titles under the microscope.
Namco's Mappy-Land (published by Taxan for whatever reason) definitely shows its age, but despite being a 1986 release muddling its way onto NES in 1989, it has strong enough central gameplay and smooth enough controls that it holds up well. The City Connection of ’89, if you will. Although the latter portions of the game do hint at a superior experience that could have been....
And Dance Aerobics, well. It didn't quite invent the rhythm genre, but it certainly prefigured the format. Not especially my cup of chai, but it has a lot more going for it than you might expect from the box art.
Production notes:
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NES footage captured from Analogue Nt Mini. Video upscaled to 720 with xRGB Mini Framemeister. "Before the Storm" courtesy of Jacob Le.