Gaming: Wonderboy Series

A little while back Joshua Smyth and I talked about how Sega never capitalised on their franchises like Nintendo did. When you think Nintendo what are the franchise names comes to mind? Now think Sega. I bet you can only think of two. One of them being Sonic and the other, maybe Alex Kidd.
There was another franchise that Sega had which was popular enough but only lived to the Mega Drive (Genesis). That was Wonderboy.

After just played through the series (except for the first game), I think it's time the series needs to come back from the underground and get a new coat of paint. Wonderboy in Monster Land on the Sega Master System showed RPG elements could be added to a platform game. Wonderboy in Monster World showed that a platform game need not be completely linear either.

Wonderboy III: Dragon's Trap came into a sub genre of its own when they introduced elements that I have not seen in another platform game. It's all based around a central town where things are not accessible until you have a certain shape/ability that you'll obtain as you progress through the game. It's true that each ability you got lets you finish the next part of the game, that's the linear side of it, but there are little pocket/secret places to get the player to change shapes to be able to access them. They expanded on the inventory system by not making all items that's more expensive necessary the better item at a given shape.

Wonderboy in Monster World (IV) bought everything that was good in 2 and 3 and put it all into one game and was gave Wonderboy a name of Shion. I thought it was a shame that they did not have the shape changes like in Monster World. They did make another Wonderboy game after Monster World but that shifted away from the Wonderboy theme of medieval fantasy to an ancient Arabian setting. The gameplay had been dumbed down and it played at times like Sonic. They even replace the boy with a girl named Asha.

What Sega could of done to make these games more memorable was have a more epic storyline. A medieval/ancient Arabian setting needs to have that sort of storyline. I remember watching a video where they had Luigi talking to Tails about whether Sonic rescues a princess. Tails replies, "no he only rescues woodland creatures". It reminds me that a love story always makes a story seem more involved. Compare Slumdog Millionaire to City of God. It's the love interest that makes it. In the Legend of Zelda games, you've got Link rescuing Zelda. Nevermind that he defeats Ganon and saves Hyrule. That's the by-product of rescuing Zelda.

If they were to make another Wonderboy platformer they need to mash what was good in Wonderboy III and Wonderboy in Monster World. Namely: -
- Free roaming worlds with teleporters in the central world to access them.
- Abilities/transformation to access certain areas.
- Equipment/items that are not more expensive is better.
- Diverse landscape and environments for each world.
- Magic (they removed that in the last Wonderboy game).

They could add in: -
- The same menace that's plaguing Monster World and not some generic magical bad guy.
- Co-op gameplay similar to that of the new Super Mario Bros game on the Wii. Have Shion, Asha and maybe Hotta, Shabo.
- Equipment and/or magic that could change the landscape or environment.
- More diverse weapons for certain situations.
- Side quests?

With Nintendo bringing platform games back into the mainstream, it's time for another Wonderboy game. There are more casual gamers now that will enjoy the game and many older gamers that will play it for nostalgia. I wonder if another one will be made and made with Little Big Planet graphics.