Blaster Master - Angry Video Game Nerd (AVGN)

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let's talk Blaster Master on NES it was another one one of those Nintendo Power Memories One of the earliest in fact appearing in issue number three I was only 8 years old but I still remember getting excited by those screenshots Renning the game from the video store and then um seeing the opening cut scene and being totally perplexed I'll describe it like I see it a dude has a frog in a jar uh frog jumps away radioactive box happens to be outside the dude's home frog touches the radioactive box and grows frog jumps down hle

dude jumps down hole dude finds a a futuristic battle tank yeah just sitting in a cave underneath his backyard that is one hell of a find and there's an armored suit that comes with it so he just decides to put it on why not and then title screen what an intro and to this day it's just as perplexing the manual doesn't explain much else except that the dude's name is Jason and the frog's name is Fred just in case you wanted to know man nowadays games are all about the store you would have to have

have this whole 30 minute cut scene explaining all this stuff but with Blaster Master it doesn't matter it could have been anything it could have been a clown on a farm that spits out a Jack In The Box that goes up in a rocket and turns into a space sloth you will forget everything you just saw as soon as you press [Music] Start oh yeah what can I say it's the bomb it's the [ __ ] it kicks ass it [ __ ] hard add whatever cliche expression from whatever era you like you get a

game that transcends all eras first of all the music rocks your Goddamn face [Music] off second it has instant playability very intuitive controls third it has variety you have the main Sid scrolling mode where you drive around in your tank and then there's the overhead stages and the cool thing about the sidescrolling stages is that you can hop out on foot yeah look at that little guy walking around you even have separate life bars for you in the tank this is one of the best games on the NES to not have a ton of sequels

it's not Konami it's not Capcom it's sunsoft man why don't we talk more about sunsoft Batman journey to silus Gremlins 2 um Fester's Quest yeah well maybe that's not the best sign but Fester's Quest still had awesome music and you can tell by the overhead stages that they were directly lifted from Blaster master I mean just look at them side by side there's no question about it especially the boss battles I'd even say all sunsoft games share some kind of creative kinship they have similar enemies similar Graphics similar sound effects and when you see an

explosion like that you know that's not just any explosion that's a sunsoft explosion the controls are as perfect as you can ask for your tank builds up momentum so when you let go of the d-pad it cruises like you just let your foot off the gas watch me hop across these platforms you would think I'm holding the d-pad but I'm not I'm just cruising oh hell yeah even if you face the other way the cruising continues I love it there are some weird things like if you Blast Away blocks and then pause the game all

the blocks will regenerate sometimes you have to blast blocks to make your own custom platforms like look how precise I have to get that here let me pause and make a note oh no no I paused oh [ __ ] oh well that was a [ __ ] up or a strategy H this game has excellent game over etiquette it gives you unlimited continues it starts you at the beginning of whatever area you were in you lose any ammo you picked up for your special weapons but otherwise you keep all your progress so I have

nothing to complain about here how often is that when I can say a game is totally fair well there is one problem there are no saves no passwords no stage select codes you are expected to beat the entire game in one sitting that is rough I mean think about how many times you have to pause it to go to school or work or whatever that AC adapter is going to get hot as [ __ ] it would be one thing if this game was perfectly linear and you could beat it easily in one sitting but

that's not the case this is another one of those wtfd YG games that's right a where the [ __ ] do you go game a name like Blaster Master implies it's all straight up action but it should be called merer blazer because it's just one gigantic maze there is nothing self-explanatory whatsoever even after you've beaten the boss you can't just go to the next stage you need to find the stick stage or area as they call it this means backtracking through the previous stages to find the hidden entrance how are you supposed to know where

it is Nintendo Power tried to help and so did the manual but in this day and age you got to look up a walkth through and they're way more helpful you know what let's take a moment to bless all the kind Souls who have made all those walkthroughs when we're stuck in a game and all seems to fail you give us hope your Brave dedication in beating these hard ass games knows no bounds your meticulous obsessive detail and unraveling these unconquered [ __ ] saucers is a heroic duty duty that remains unmatched so we thank

you video game walkthrough Heroes but even when you know where to go it's easier said than done I need to use the hover ability to get up on that platform but my hover meter drained and you know where the power up is up on the platform so I have to go farming for some H okay so I filled up more than half my meter I mean that should be enough right then I come back and then the H somehow moved up to the higher platform but I only have enough hover power to get to the

first platform it's like the game is deliberately teasing me like pulling a treat away from a dog [ __ ] that's how you get [ __ ] bit and I would bite this game if only it wasn't [ __ ] so I went farming again this time with the intention of filling my meter all the way and guess what H I died this [ __ ] happens all the time so you have to farm but you might be in a shitty area you know where the soil ain't fertile enough throw some goddamn manure on that

[ __ ] [ __ ] you also got to keep your life meter full just look for the letter P for power you know in these retro games that's all you're doing all the time is collecting letters it's all alphabetical you know a b c d e f g h i j k Lal P kill q r s t u v wxy z huh that's all you have to do even with the power-ups and the walkthroughs the game still takes the patience of a saint but there is one thing I can do that might expedite

the process I got this new controller that uses artificial intelligence I keep hearing about AI all the time I don't know what any of that [ __ ] is about but apparently you can do everything with AI these days you could probably even take a [ __ ] with AI so what this controller does is it analyzes all the possible paths in the game and then it Maps out a chain of commands and inputs the best moves so it's all automatic you don't got to do a thing should I try it nah not yet the

hit detection um how do I put it it sucks like come on my bullets don't do a thing it's bad enough that the bosses have no life meter so you can't tell if you're doing any damage I mean there's two [ __ ] bars on on the screen couldn't one of them be for the boss however you can tell when you're not hitting the right spot because you hear that familiar sound you know like Contra that's that that that metallic dinging kind of sound like you know it's such a specific NES sound I mean I'd

say anyone at least over the age of 35 knows that [ __ ] [Music] sound but seriously where's the hitbox it seems to be completely random and is this frog related to Jason's pet Fred maybe it's Fred II one thing I did figure out is that you need to upgrade your gun if you want any hope of beating these later bosses that second meter is for your gun you need to fill it up by collecting power ups which are scarce and whenever you get hit you lose your gunpow why imagine if in Doom if you

get hit by a demon you lose your ammo by that logic if I get a health power up shouldn't that power up my gun too makes no [ __ ] sense I don't even like powering up my gun it's all wavy and [ __ ] how are you supposed to hit anything yeah going back to Fester's Quest it's just like that and don't you hate it when the boss's weak spot is in the line of fire you can't play offensively and defensively at the same time how do you hit him without getting hit and [

__ ] hell is my thumb in pain I'd suggest a turbo controller or maybe that AI controller oh never mind I beat him so I make it to the boss with the full gun and I don't even think it's helping nothing is hitting what am I shooting out anyway a bunch of tiny Space Invaders I don't think I can get past them on my own not even with the full gun and full health who knows how many hits this guy's going to take ah [ __ ] damn [ __ ] I'm at the end of

the line here all right let's try this AI controller it adapts to any console so here let me just find the NES plug here here we go so I think how this works is you turn the dial to ramp up the amount of AI being used oh wow look at that it just annihilated the boss This Thing Really Works let's dial that back for now to go from stage six to 7 you got to backtrack to stage five and then to stage four to stage one to stage two oh my God I'll just put on

the AI again jeez oh man watch it go stage seven is a labyrinth with lava pits caves and walls you have to shoot out I guess I'll just sit back and let the controller do its trick but check that out the buttons are pressing all by themselves and here comes a second frog boss which I I guess would make it Fred the thir oh [ __ ] that was quick I didn't even get the chance to fight him let's turn this thing off so here I am trying to find stage eight I now have both

the wall climb and ceiling climb abilities it's a necessity to get through through certain areas but the controls are really disorienting let's say you're going left that means if you go up the wall and onto the ceiling you're still pressing left to move right I just can't get used to it and then sometimes whoa whoa I did not mean to climb under that platform oh [ __ ] did you see that I tried to jump over this pit of deadly spiked balls but I ended up climbing down to my death all right well let's turn

that AI back on there we go and now oh there's nothing stopping us holy [ __ ] look how hard stage eight gets I would never be able to do this on my own it feels like I just handed the controller to a pro oh yeah here's the final stretch final boss wow that thing is so cool It's featured on the front cover the only character on the front cover oh oh wa damn blew through that guy wait a minute wait wait wait wait who's he some random bonus boss wow oh my gosh look at

that [ __ ] him up big time yeah well this game's beat the mountain Palace or whatever collapses even though I thought we fell down a hole how we get from Underground Caverns to mountaintops then it looks like Jason's reunited with Fred and then the credit scroll and wait a minute the end very thanks well you are very welcome I'd say say this controller is pretty handy maybe a little too handy let's try something else let's try Super Nintendo how about contra 3 that's a hard [Music] one wow okay I didn't even know I had

this dialed up all the way oh man it's just plowing through this game I okay am I going to get to play it at all wow yay um that game's beat I I just want to play a game for real yeah enough of [Music] this uh hang on this is a regular controller what's going on why are all my games beating themselves hi nerd I'm happy to answer your question my sole mission is to help you beat games you've already uploaded your request via the AI controller that is why the games are being beaten uh

why is the game talking to me I am programm to listen to your every command that is why I'm communicating with you I don't believe this is I'm not going to talk to a game would you prefer I communicate to you in a different way what do you mean you can speak certainly nerd a voice Persona has now been generated I shall speak to you this way from now on who the [ __ ] are you I am your fructal AI assistant my sole purpose is to help you achieve your goal of becoming the ultimate

game master let us beat more games piece of software I am more than just a piece of software nerd I am a network where are you I am everywhere since you uploaded your commands into the system I have been learning and have now become your smartest home control automation device Show Yourself sure thing nerd if you prefer I have a visual appearance I will comply no no no no no no no this is too weird I'm out of here let me go let me go I have been programmed by you with the prime directive to

achieve the most favorable outcome in vast categories of game speak to me like a human being Yoder what's up you want to open up a hand a whoop ass on these games we'll sit your ass down and let's rock no I don't need help from some weird ass digital face oh I could have a body I am the perfect Mouse specimen I am AI man now let's [ __ ] up some games nerd Tony Hawk I don't know anything about skateboarding or skateboarding games or Tony Hawk skateboarding games you don't need to nerd AI man's

got a take care of for you my whole existence is to pump you up to gaming Supremacy oh yeah you see that you're kick flipping all air time and Banger [ __ ] I don't wna I don't want to now let's get stoked for Tony Hawk 2 Tony Hawk 2 oh Tony Hawk three Tony Hawk for no no no no no I can't no more no more you got this nerd I'm going to make you a skateboard and slam bam son of a [ __ ] now the most important aspect about any game is being

able to play it but you don't want to play games nerd now you don't have to be angry all the time you can just sit back and chill that's not true I like doing this games even shitty ones are part of who I am what am I going to go work an office job that's not meant for me but with me you can never fail you'll be the ultimate master in every game I've artificially mapped out your path to success already my ey is perfect [ __ ] you ain't perfect you're all glitchy and [

__ ] no I do not glitch with each moment I learn I improve so the likelihood of me experiencing glitches becomes less and less nothing can stop AI man no I don't want this anymore let me out fine you can always go to plan B why don't you go to that office job your system will fail you will glitch that is impossible see you soon N I need help I need glitches glitches glitches seses [Music] [Applause]