Balloon Kid

It's always a joy just to go through the Metal Gear series for a combination of gameplay and story.

Say what you will for the balance between control and cutscene, Metal Gear is the second of two current on-going video game series to keep me entertained by their mix of gameplay, their polished production values and being emotionally invested in their characters. Playing as Solid Snake, then Raiden under Snake's guidance, then Snake's father, then a jaded Old Snake, then back to Big Boss forming Outer Heaven has given me a special story few series can even match in my heart.

Hopefully Kojima can return to grace us with the next Metal Gear. We need more Snake!

And I obviously mean Big Boss though I wouldn't mind a cameo or two with Snake.

Next up, a happy little arcade game:

No bigger size, I'm afraid.

Alright, so Balloon Kid isn't an arcade game, it's a Game Boy sequel to an NES launch title, but it plays like one in terms of control. I don't mean that in a negative way, it's just very simple mechanics working on an auto-scrolling level. It's a much-improved-upon sequel that tends to happen to games when they get their second shot, and it gives Balloon Kid a lot more variety and replayability (yeah, auto-correct, I know it's not a real word - I just don't give a damn) than the admittedly-fun-in-short-bursts Balloon Fighter.

Pencilvania! Geddit?

It still has its predecessor's basic gameplay as its Balloon Trip mode: an auto-scrolling semi-platformer that named-protagonist Alice must navigate to collect balloons left from her brother Jim (good name) and save him from flying off. Along the way, foes will attempt to pop Alice's progress.

Among the new features are the varied themed levels (including a whale!) and actual bosses. They require strategic use of Balloon Kid's main new feature: detaching her balloons. You're able to drop to the ground at any time, which might save you from an aerial threat as long as there's some footing beneath you to inflate up to two balloons to take flight again. The game works again on a point system, so the incentive for high-scores are defeating enemies and, more importantly, collecting Jim's balloons across the stages. Consecutive successful collections allow the balloons to double, as well as an invincibility-granting P-Balloon to blaze through all obstacles with no fear.

There's also a 2-Player mode that I cannot access, as I own this game via the eShop's Virtual Console, but it's basically Balloon Fight's 2-Player mode, so it's prolly competitive and friendship-breaking, haha.

I didn't mention Samm, cuz he's the 2-Player I can't play as.

All in all, Balloon Kid is the video game definition of a good sequel: improved features on the basic concept for a more robust experience, albeit a repetitive one. Go into this one prepared for an arcade-style experience and you might enjoy the challenge to collect all balloons for each stage's Perfect reward. Recommended if you liked Balloon Fight, especially the Balloon Trip mode, enough to want it expanded on for a decent pick-up-and-play handheld experience.

Balloon Series
1. Balloon Kid
2. Balloon Fight

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The Restore Point feature was helpful when I tried to see how high the difference is between a normal play score via an assisted 'perfect' one. There's quite the difference! Glad the obscure and forgotten sequels are being released on the Virtual Console, for the popular ones will no doubt overtake them soon enough. You see how many request Gen I of Pokémon?

You know how much that'd sell? Like gangbusters, man.

Ciao!