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Ice Climber: Classic NES Series

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Ice Climber is one of those NES games that wasn't really too popular and until Super Smash Brothers Melee, it was almost forgotten about. But now its been released as a part of Nintendo's Classic NES series. Though I have to wonder how it got here. Ice Climber is a classic based on its age but not so much its popularity. But it is still pretty fun to play even nearly 20 years later.

Ice Climber is a pretty simple game to grasp. You play as two eskimos who climb a mountain. The game has about 32 mountains to climb and you can link up with a friend and scale the mountain alongside him or her. You have to climb the mountain as the level scrolls killing enemies in your way with your hammers. It's a pretty easy concept to grasp just like the other NES classics.

Ice Climber is more worthwhile than other classics. The 32 mountains will keep you busy for a while but the game is really easy to complete just the same.

The Graphics and Sound are no where near the standards of today's GBA game and no gamer should expect them to be. That's what the "Classic NES Series" banner at the top is made to tell us.

The other problem is if you have an E-Reader you can easily buy Ice Climber on that and save yourself some money. Overall though, Ice Climber is a pretty fun game but it isn't as up to scale as the rest of the classic NES series.

Okay ... First off this is a cute simple game that a lot of people will enjoy the heck out of. You climb mountains as an eskimo and you can knock off your enemies from below or hit them with a hammer - classic NES ... simple and addictive. But what I want to know is this any different than the E-READER version which costs about $3? Anyone else notice that EXCITEBIKE, ICE CLIMBER, and DONKEY KONG (and DONKEY KONG JR) were all released as e-reader games at less than $6?!?!? Hmmmmm. Sounds kinda fishy to me that now they are on a cartridge ... alone for $19. Couldn't we have gotten a compilation cart? Just wondering!

"Ice Climer", like "Donkey Kong" and "Mario Bros." before it, is as simple arcade title that stars two Eskimos, Popo and Nana, who must climb vertical scrolling ice levels by shipping away at platforms in order to regain frozen vegetables that were stolen by a giant condor. Nana and Popo are better known to modern games as they appear the wildely popular "Super Smash Bros." franchise. Along the way to regain their vegetables (perhaps a possible source for the vegetable themes in "Super Mario Bros. 2/Doki Doki Panic", as both games had the same programmer, Kazuaki Morita), the two Eskimos fight three main enemies: apolar bear, a Topi (a seal in the Japanese version and a Yeti in the Western version), and the Nitpicker.

Ultimately, the most interesting thing about "Ice Climber" is that the programmer, Kazuaki Morita, considers this game a "programming warm-up" for his next project, which would turn out to be the immortal "Super Mario Bros." Morita went on to be a major programer for the "Super Mario" series, the "Legend of Zelda" series, and "Star Fox. After developing "Ice Climber", Morita was assigned as one of the main programmers for the original "Super Mario Bros." The characters from "Ice Climber" would go on to feature in the "Super Smash Bros." series.

According to Morita, the famous turtle cheat where you can get unlimited lives in "Super Mario Bros." was actually an accident. He is also the principal reason why fishing was introduced into the "Zelda" series, as one of his passions is fishing.

Both "Ice Climber" and "NES Open Tournament Golf" were directed by Kenji Miki, a long time producer for Nintendo.

Although the game worked well if you look at it in the context of arcade games in the early 1980s (with simple titles like "Defender", "Space Invaders", the aforementioned "Mario Bros." and "Donkey Kong", "Pac Man", "Pong", etc), today modern players will find the title rather simplistic. Like several other early games in the video game canon, "Ice Climbers" would be a flash game in today's market. The game does feature 32 levels, which does give some replay value and needed length.

Nintendo also released "Ice Climber" as part of the Classic NES series on the Gameboy Advance. Although the game is undeniably fun, the initial listing price of twenty dollars for an NES game that is this simple is rather steep. There are better titles in the Classic NES series. This game would have been better served to be released in a complation of early NES classics featuring several other titles in conjunction with this, if Nintendo wanted to bring this to newer systems and still give consumers more bang for their buck.

The video game website IGN rated this title as the 79th greatest game on their top 100 NES games of all time.

(For those looking for great unknown NES/Famicom games, you simply MUST play "Moon Crystal", a criminally unknown Famicom exclusive. The graphics are astounding with cutscenes that even outdo "Ninja Gaiden", amazing music, in depth gameplay, and a fantastic storyline. Absolutely amazing! Had this been released in the US for the NES, I feel it would be as revered as the other heavy hitters in the NES canon)
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As bonus content to the review proper, here is a portion of an interview with Morita from the official "Zelda" website from Nintendo around the time "The Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess" came about:

"The programming behind Nintendo's games, and my own approach to it, has changed vastly since the mid 1980s. The first game that I programmed, Ice Climber, was my warm-up on the NES, then I dove into the fascinating task of working on the code for 'Super Mario Bros'. And I had a real scare related to that project, which really taught me the importance of flawless code. Ever hear of the "unlimited Mario" cheat? The exact way to do it is a little complicated, but it involved the player setting up a scenario that allows Mario to bounce up and down on the same Koopa shell again and again and again. Points go up and up, leading to a steady flow of 1-Ups. I remember when we first heard about that cheat. We got a phone call from some kid, and Mr. Miyamoto and I both thought the call was a hoax--that such a thing was impossible! The programming was perfect . . . wasn't it? Well, we verified that the cheat worked. Fortunately, very fortunately, the "unlimited Mario" cheat had a ton of PR value as word spread, because I sweated bullets over what might happen!"

"Speaking of other groundbreaking projects, I still fondly recall how games like 'Doki Doki Panic'--the foundation for 'Super Mario Bros. 2' in North America--really stimulated my imagination as a programmer. That game was released for the Famicon Disk System in Japan, which--back in the day--was a truly fascinating system from a programming point of view. Of course, disk systems are common now, but then we were just exploring how the disk worked as an immense memory reservoir, which let me toy with many programming methods that I couldn't do with ROM. Working with my design partner, and getting very little guidance from others, we developed 'Doki Doki Panic' in ways that really pushed my skills. I really matured as a programmer during that time. Very interesting work.

Looking back, I'm very fortunate to have been one of the main programmers working on almost every game in the 'Zelda' series since it first began, since my programming has helped make 'Zelda' such a part of history. Now it's interesting to see how things have changed. While I used to do all of the programming for NES games, now I supervise a whole programming team, though I still do code myself, too, since I believe that staying very close to the art of programming is extremely important. Sometimes I feel myself thinking--when I see what some of the newer faces around Nintendo are conceiving--that such-and-such concept isn't true 'Zelda'! Listen to me! I have 20 years of experience here! But, really, having the fresh thoughts of young talents working on 'Twilight Princess' has really opened my eyes, and that makes me remember those first days working with Mr. Miyamoto on the first 'Zelda'. It's always essential to keep your mind open and learn from new ideas. I've known Mr. Miyamoto for many, many years. It's fascinating to watch him work now. On the surface, he looks like a perfectly pleasant middle-aged guy. But watch him make decisions! His words are extremely precise. His explanations carry a lot of weight. I never fail to be impressed by how he helps people grow and learn about game development. Which brings us back to 'Twilight Princess'. As I prepare to cook in the kitchen, I'm seeing extraordinary ingredients coming my way. If our programming can bring all of these flavors together, and with our help also add a touch of light-world zest and dark-world grit as needed, you can bet that 'Twilight Princess' will be the kind of memorable dish that will live up to the entire history of 'Zelda'."

Now u can have ice climber on the go. This was the original nes series so when this came out it got more popular. Since there is only one ice climber it was not very popular. But as soon as this came out and super smash bros melle and brawl they became very popular. It is the same everything as the original, graphics, story, sound, and controls. Now u can have ice climbing on the go.

Alright, for those of you who are big fans of the Super Smash Bros. series, you should know about the Ice Climbers. They are 2 eskimo kids who are paired up together as one fighter to kick the butts of anyone in the arena.

With their introduction in Melee, several people wondered where they were from in the first place. This is the Gameboy Advance port of their very first NES game, part of the NES Classics series. It is title, what else? Ice Climber.

The basis of the game is simple: You control Popo, a little boy (or adolescent midget, give or take) in a eskimo parka, (Or in the case of player 2, Nana, Popo's GF in the pink parka) as he climbs several mountains (32 to be exact) to reach the top to catch the infamous condor, and along the way, he collects vegetables... magic vegetables with EYES (I'm not joking, why do you think the IC's Emblem, an EGGPLANT looks weird in Melee/Brawl?)

To be blunt, the port of the NES game to the GBA is rather faithful. The graphics and music are proof of that, but unfortunately, that isn't saying much for the gameplay. Each level is breaken up into 8 rows that you must climb to reach the top. You must jump up and hit the cieling to take a chunk of it off and jump up to the next row, and so on and so forth. As you do so, icicles form on certain parts of the cieling, and you must avoid them, and you also run into several enemies, a red bird called the "Nitpicker," the infamous Topi (A yeti thing in the US version, a blue seal in the JP), and a polar bear. The nitpicker, being a bird, flies towards you to collide into you, but it isn't that much trouble; you can also take it down while jumping under it. The topis can walk into you, and sometimes bring Icicles to rebuild broken parts of the floor that an either impede your progress or help you out. The polar bears, when they show up, you better pray that you're not at the bottom of the screen, because they can jump and cause the screen to move upward, and if you're at the bottom when that happens, you DIE. So anyway, if you clear all 8 rows, you're taken to a bonus segment, where you must climb to the top on clouds while getting vegetables, and at the top, there is the condor. If you manage to grab onto the condor, you finish the level with a bonus. If you fall down before doing so during the segment, you just go onto the next level with no bonus.

Now, the controls. Aside from the D-Pad, which controls the Ice Climber, There are 4 buttons. Start, which starts the game at the menu and pauses it; Select, which I believe is only useful for selecting 1/2 player at the menu (meaning, unless you can connect with a player on the GBA with an accessory, it's practically useless); A which is used to jump, and B with is used to club enemies with your mallet. The B button is responsive, and so are the D-Pad, however, the game's true downfall is the JUMPING. Oh god, the JUMPING. Everything else is fine, but it's the JUMPING that's the most abysmal. What to know what I mean? When Popo jumps, he gets great vertical height, in other words, he jumps REALLY high, but at the cost of a GREAT deal of horizontal length. I understand that he's supposed to be climbing mountains, but come on! The awful jumping in this game doesn't really cover that much distance at all, and if you're not that careful in the later levels, there is a great chance that you're gonna fall to the bottom and die. And that is ESPECIALLY a problem when you try to jump on clouds, and in the bonus levels if you try to reach the top. And also, there are more problems besides that. If you jump and happen to hit a wall, Popo goes to the OTHER direction. And there are times where Popo goes through the EDGE of a platform while jumping. This is also just as wack when Popo can jump through the edge of a cloud, but he can't jump on the cloud from DIRECTLY UNDER IT. I defies logic in of itself, and I don't know why clouds are SOLID object when they're not supposed to be, even in real life! I know it may sound crazy, but play it and see for yourself!

Overall, it's a decent game, just not actually enough to get the "cult status" that is claimed to have. It's a good port of the original NES game, and the gameplay and controls are faithful, but it's the JUMPING that carried over from the NES game that brought the score down.

There is one thing that we should be grateful for, is the fact that this game introduces these cute little parka-wearing kids into the world, and that the producers brought them back in Melee and Brawl.

Ice Climber was a classic NES game that I had always heard of but never played. Recently I have had the opportunity to play it and I actually like it a lot. I think if this was one of the games I had 15 years ago I would have been hooked. The concept here is simple. Two eskimos have to go find stolen vegetables and they must get to the top of the mountains to do so. Armed with hammers they must hit yettis, seals, birds, bears and also ice and rock to be able to advance further up to the top. There are 31 mountains to scale in this game, which could have you playing for a little while to beat the game. If I am not mistaken, you can choose which mountain to start on in the beginning. So in closing, while this is no where near an NES masterpiece it is a pretty fun game and those who grew up with it will probably like the idea of playing it on the gameboy advance. This game isnt even a masterpiece of any kind, but a true NES classic with the familiar NES graphics, sound and gameplay. I would recommend that classic NES fans pick this one up when it is released, and I don't think the $19.99 price tag is too much here(unlike Donkey Kong). Not a groundbreaking game, but should keep you entertained if you try to beat all 31 mountains.