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| CORBIE'S BLOG <- REVIEWS <- CONTACT |
| The (Mis)Adventures of Flink Publisher: Vic Tokai Release Date: May 1994 Genre: Platformer      |
 Wicked Wainwright, the evil sorcerer, has attacked Imagica Island. He's also kidnapped the four island leaders, sealed them in stones, and scattered them across the island. Now Flink, a wizard-in-training, has to set out on an adventure to locate and rescue the four leaders and put a stop to Wicked Wainwright's plot to take over the island. Since Flink is a platformer, that's what you'll spend the majority of your time doing. You'll be required to make jumps of all types, normally under durrest from both enemies and platforms that seem to dissapear out from under your feet. Heck, there's even some vine climbing and railcar riding involved. Flink basically takes many of the gameplay ideas from some of the best platformers of the past decade, and rolls them all into one terrific side-scroller. The control is kept simple, you basically have the ability to run, jump, and grab ahold of ropes and vines. Defeating most enemies simply requires the old "Super Mario" technique of jumping on top of them. If the ambush gets too brutal, you can also reach into your bag of magical spells. You can even accumulate items you find throughout the game and whip out your magic cauldron and cook up your own spells, although if you mix the wrong incredients, you're likely to have it blow up in your face. Those who love a good platformer are going to find a lot to like about Flink as this game has just about every type of platforming experience you've ever seen. Luckily, the control is tight enough to make navigating these trouble spots possible with a little practice. The bottom line is the game has a simple enough control scheme for almost anyone to play the game, but it's got enough of a meaty challenge to please even the most veteran of platforming fans. As if you can't tell from the screenshots at the left, Flink is one amazing looking game. I honestly can't think of another Genesis or Sega CD title that looks better than this one. Outstanding use of the slightly limited color palette, not to mention an incredible amount of detail in every single area you visit in the game come together to form one tight visual experience. Even the character and enemy animations are quite well done for sprites, with a couple of the bosses spanning almost the entire screen in size. You'll honestly want to keep playing the game just so you can get to a new area and see how great the next one looks. Heck, Flink is not only one of the best looking Sega CD games, it's also one of the best looking 2-D games period. Since this is a Sega CD game, more cutscenes or cinemas might have been nice, but it's really hard to complain given how great the rest of the game looks. I knocked off a point on the rating for the sound/music category, not because the game's music and sound effects aren't good, but because there's just not a lot of variety to them. What few tunes there are in the game are great, but you'll find that the same tracks will play for several levels, and after awhile, they begin to get a little old. The sound effects themselves are also impressive and ring out in true stereo. If you want a treat, play this game through a great pair of speakers or a set of headphones to hear how great the sound effects truly are. Once again, it's difficult to be too hard on the game as it's so good in just about every other facet. There's really not much in Flink that hasn't been done many times before, but the game manages to take so many different techniques from these other platformers and roll them into one great package that it's difficult not to recommend it. It's got plenty of challenge and a lengthy enough quest to warrant the $15-$20 purchase. And if you're a platforming fan that doesn't mind a little difficulty, this game is one of the best out there that doesn't have Mario or Sonic in the title. Don't let the bad rap this game seems to have on the internet scare you away from one extremely fun platformer and still one of my favorite Sega CDs. ** For those wondering, the Sega Genesis cartridge version is identical graphically to the Sega CD version. Only the soundtrack was updated and the opening cinema added to the Sega CD version. ** |
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