Alex Kidd in High-Tech World (Master System, 1989)

This is not a game. It does not qualify.

Okay, first, the story is stupid. There's a new arcade that opened and you have to get there, but how do you get there? The map got torn into 8 pieces. Well, since it's a high-tech world, I'd Mapquest it, but no. You have to find the 8 pieces. This involves going into every room and pressing up on each object in the background to find them.

Now, it won't take you long to get stuck. There are like 4 rooms you can go in and 1 piece to find. But now where do you go? There's a set of stairs and I wanted to go up, but didn't know how. I tried pressing up, down, 1 and 2. Nothing worked, so I went to the manual. It's up, but you have to be standing in the perfect spot. Why can't I push up at the stairs and it walk up them? Why is it so specific? There are also items laying on the floor that look like ladders. I thought, "Do I pick them up and use them?" so I pressed up at them, but it didn't do anything. They aren't ladders, they're stairs, but the worst stairs I've ever seen.

I played this game for 10 minutes and was sick of it. It's so boring, it doesn't count as a game. There's a picture of Alex fighting a ninja on the cover, but that doesn't happen until after you get the map pieces. Until you get there, you're just going into rooms, pressing up on everything to search it, answering boring trivia questions and searching some more. It's boring, redundant and just bad.

I hate when covers are misleading. It'd be great if you just walked around and fought bad guys. That worked with Mario and Sonic. Why was it so difficult to do that for Alex? Whatever. If you liked Who Framed Roger Rabbit for the NES, maybe you will like this, but there's not much appeal.