Nazo no Kabe for FDS (Crackout)

In the last two days I played a little game called Nazo No Kabe. It is also known as Crackout for the NES.

The cover looks weird but I think it is an alright game. It is made by Konami and is another quality product with good graphics. Too bad there is no music in the game.

The game is a "Breakout clone". I have played Arkanoid and Arkanoid II for the famicom earlier. The problem with those games is that you have no continue as far as I can remember. It's pretty annoying to start over all the time.

I have also played Alleyway and Kirby's Block Ball on the Game Boy. Alleyway is very simplistic and also has no continues. But Kirby's Block Ball is a great game and probably the best Breakout retro game. It has a battery save and several interesting features, such as paddles on the sides on some levels. But I felt it was very long. Someone wrote that it has 100 levels. After a while I just leave games like that and forget them.

In Nazo No Kabe you can also save on each level. If you die your 5 lives and are game over, you can just start with 5 new lives. The level starts over though. To keep the challenge, you have to play some tricky levels, including the one above that may have taken me 10 minutes to beat. After a while I understood the gameplay better and beat the levels faster.

The controls are simple. Move left and right. With the B-button you move faster.

You get some power upgrades sometimes. Most are obvious, but it should be noted  that you may need to activate them with the A button. The rocket will be shot with A. To make it explode press A again. You need to know this to beat one of the levels. The extra ball is activated with A, and can be activated again two times.

The little extra touch for this game is that you need to find the letters... like a crossword where you need to search for the hidden word. In the end you have to input the letters in the correct order to spell a word (or two words). The letters appear on the side. Like this one from one of the later stages:

I read about the game before I finished it, and I already saw the password. I didn't know I should write down the letters so it was a good thing anyways. Don't worry, I'm not going to say what it is.

In the FDS version you can replay the levels you have beaten if you didn't get the letter. Only some levels have letters.

The FDS version has a save function, unlike the NES version that uses passwords. In the start screen you also select what Area to play.

After you beat it successfully you get this crown or whatever it is. Maybe it serves some purpose.

Each world took around 45-60 minutes. There are 4 worlds and each world has 13 levels. The last levels took a little longer though. 

The end. Some music was played.