Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

I remember getting Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom on the nes for Easter back in 1989. Man, talk about a gift I wish that I could have given back. To be honest, as a kid, I stuck with it and ended up having a little bit of enjoyment with the game all be it, an enjoyment that I had to force myself to have. I decided to look back at this game and see if it is as bad as I remember it being and as bad as the “internet” says.

Saving The Kids

I know that the movie Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is looked at as the weakest of the series, well until The Crystal Skull came along. However, I always liked it and this game in NES fashion follows the story to a degree. Basically, you are trying to save kids and get out of the place in one piece. It is about as story driven as you would imagine a licensed NES game from the late 80s would be.

Like A 70 Year Old Harrison Ford

The main problem that this game has is how it plays and when you think about it, that is a pretty damn big problem for a game to have now isn’t it. Let's start with Indy himself, rather than being an athletic badass dude like in the movies, he moves like Harrison Ford does now. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom has a very awkward kind of feel to the controls, but this is just in regards to moving around. The levels make no sense and they can loop so if you leave the screen, you may just be restarting at a screen you have already been on, it is very confusing stuff and as a kid, this was the kind of game I would make a map for!

Going Down?

The confusing layout and not knowing where you are going to made even harder by the look of the game. To be fair, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is not a horrible looking NES game. The problem is the perspective, it looks like a game that is being played down from a top down perspective, but it is actually side on. So when you jump gravity pulls you down, you always feel like you are fighting it, and more often than not when you try to jump over a gap, you end up on whatever is down below. It is very, very frustrating and in all honesty the major thing that ruins this game!

I Said Whip It

Some games that let you play as Indy have nailed it when it comes to the whip, Indiana Jones, and the Temple of Doom on the NES is not one of those games. The whip can be used to kill smaller enemies, but the bigger ones it just staggers them, you can knock them off the edge to get them away from you and you can use it to swing across certain gaps, but that is it. Thankfully, you can get a sword and a gun, but to use these you have to hold select and then press a direction on the d-pad, it is very hard to do when you are being attacked and it is impossible to do on one of the many conveyor belts that the game has.

Pros:

• It has the Indiana Jones theme music
• You can swing with the whip
• The backstory about there being two versions of the same game for the NES is interesting
• This is not even the worst version of this game! The ZX Spectrum is even worse!

Cons:

• The controls are freaking horrible due to the perspective
• The jumping is some of the worst on the NES!