4-F: Gameboyzmania!

Super Nintendo, NES & GameBoy tomfoolery;

This week's 4-F article relates to an odd phenomenon: when the SNES version of a game is completely different from a NES or Gameboy game of the same title.

#1: Perhaps you remember this ~~frisky fellow~~ game:

Taz-Mania, for the SNES.

If you don't remember it, the basic idea was, "Hey, you know how the SNES's Mode-7 scrolling lead to a bunch of racing games? Why not have our latest middling Looney Toons cash-in game just use a racing engine for running down the street?"

#2: Well, there's another '90s Nintendo system that has a game called Taz-Mania...

...and TAZ HIMSELF is playing it on the Gameboy!

"TAZ HATES LOW BATTERY LIFE!"

#3: Sadly though...

...it's just a bland Looney Toons platformer.

Sure, they pay lip-service to Taz's taz-y-ness: you get a limited number of "Spins" (short periods of invulnerability to enemies) per life. But when most of your challenges involve jumping over pits, it's not a game-changer.

Also, the odd thing is, I think you CAN stomp enemies; but only during the downward-arc of your jump. This is quite noticeable: at first I thought any enemy contact was fatal, even during a jump...because you and your enemies are relatively large, and the Gameboy screen is rather small, it's more of a challenge than you'd think to safely stomp them as you fall, rather than belly-bumping them on your way up.

#4: Though its completely different from SNES Taz-Mania...

Ironically, it's actually more in the SNES tradition of lousy Looney Toons licensed games:

While the SNES's color palette was great at recreating the drawings of Bugs, Daffey and Porky, they almost always threw them in to horrible platformers (except Porky). Meanwhile on the Gameboy, the Looney Toons banner was represented by several quite reasonable Tiny Toons games...which featured a lot more game depth (multiple playable characters, for instance).

Anyway; if there's one thing we can be sure of...