Doraemon vs. The Dream Thief and the Seven Gozansu

[Melf]

Often called Japan's Mickey Mouse, Doraemon is an icon of Japanese pop culture that has endured since the late 1970s. He's made the rounds on just about every console imaginable but unfortunately had one appearance on the Genesis. That's a shame too, as Doraemon vs. The Dream Thief and the Seven Gozansu is a wonderful, quirky little platformer that most American gamers sadly missed out on. Luckily for you, we have a complete review (http://www.sega-16.com/2006/12/doraemon-vs-the-dream-thief-and-the-seven-gozansu/) for it, so read on and see why you should pick this one up.

[Joe Redifer]

I don't understand this statement:

There are no advanced graphical effects or even old standbys like parallax – just a foreground and a background.
If there is a foreground and a background, that's your parallax.

I remember illegally downloading the N64 version of Doraemon not too long after the system was released in the US. It was kind of a Super Mario 64 clone except that I could never figure out what to do.

[InternalPrimate]

Parallax would be two seperate planes scrolling at different speeds, so just having a background and a foreground doesn't necessarily equate to parallax. If the scenery behind the character moves at the same rate as the enviroment he can interact with (the ground) then it isn't parallax.

Of course, I'm just assuming this is the case, I've never played this game. It does sound fun though. Great review.

[Joe Redifer]

When someone says "background" and "foreground", to me that sounds like two different planes. For example, in NES games I'd just always refer to the scrolling screen as "the background". I never really refer to anything as the foreground in any game on any system unless it is in front of the player character, but that's just me.

[Flash1087]

Ah, semantics!

But yes, Primate's right. For it to be parallax, the 'background' has to be moving independantly of the player character.

At any rate, this sounds pretty fun, actually. I too had the N64 game and got nowhere in it.

[Genesis Knight]

In my mind - as this is independent of actual definitions - I don't consider a foreground and a background to be legitimate parallax. This is parallax:

http://www.planetemu.net/screenshots/goodgen/Thunder%20Force%20IV.png

[David J.]

Hey Nick... I thought you where anti-roms and emulators?

Not a complaint, but I guess I was wrong...

[Alianger]

It's a pretty good game with a few flaws. Even though it's using a lot of mario mechanics (mostly smb2), the level design and pacing is quite different and it reminds me more of Alex Kidd.
The jumping is really frustrating due to the screen keeping your character centered at all times, just like in Vectorman. So there will be a lot of leaps of faith because you can't look down and there are a lot of bottomless pits with tiny hovering blocks over them.
You use your taser gun to stun enemies, so that they can be picked up and thrown at others. This way you can get powerups from certain chickens wearing shades and handbags. There are also rooms where you play some minigame for extra lives.
I think you should've stressed that the end of level rock paper scissor games are confusing as hell, and there doesn't seem to be any logic behind them :P You'll probably lose a lot of lives on those, but since the game gives you tons of 1ups in the levels, it shouldn't be too hard beating it. I thought it looked pretty good, even better than SMW in some levels that you didn't show here. But some enemies looked terrible.

[Zebbe]

I've always thought parallax to be at least two backgrounds (behind the playground) scrolling at different speeds to make the graphics look deeper.

[Joe Redifer]

Parallax can be one background scrolling at two different speeds (say the clouds scroll slower than the land, but the land never overlaps the clouds).

[retrosega]

Is this game worth the $89+ US dollars sellers are asking for on eBay???

[Genesis Knight]

Read the review! :p

[PHANTOM2040]

Wow this game is fun. I can't believe I just discovered it. It has great style and funny sound effects.