Monster Party (NES) Playthrough

A playthrough of Bandai's 1989 action-platformer for the NES, Monster Party.

Monster Party is a US-exclusive, Halloween-friendly platformer created by Human Entertainment, the company that brought us stuff like the Clock Tower and Fire Pro Wrestling series. It's a run-of-the-mill but emminently likeable action game packed with popular horror figures, memorable non sequiturs, and a whole lot more blood than you'd expect too see in a game approved by Nintendo.

And it's really weird. Like, inexplicably so.

Here's the basic story: Mark, a young boy, is walking home from a ball game carrying his bat. Mark's eyes suddenly become "moist" at the sight of Bert, a beautiful monster who approaches the boy, plies him with praise, and then "asks" him for a "favor."

Bert was drawn to Mark's bat, you see. Monsters are running amok in the "dark world," and Mark's Louisville Slugger strikes Bert as the perfect weapon for the battle.

Mark is reluctant and scared, but when he voices his concerns, Bert promises the boy companionship and quickly leads him away by the hand. A short while later, Bert spasms as he forcibly becomes one with the child, and lo! "This is how Mark's adventure began!"

That's seriously the plotline. All I did was paraphrase the intro cutscene. Almost enough to make your eye twitch, innit?

Distasteful allegorical interpretations aside, Monster Party is a game that has to be seen to believed.

Each level has three bosses to hunt down in order to win a key that unlocks the door to the next level, and these guys are the runaway stars of the show. You get to fight Castlevania favorites like Medusa and Death, Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors reimagined as a pitcher plant, bouncing fried oden, an outline of a mummy whose legs are asleep, and a guy that reminds me of the camouflaged stalker from the movie When a Stranger Calls Back, among many others.

It's an awesome cast of characters, and their personalities are what elevate Monster Party above the morass of forgotten C-list platformers on the NES. As a means to an end, the gameplay is fine, the graphics are fine, and the sound is fine, but you don't play Monster Party for those things. (Even though I still love the way the background changes in the first stage and you get attacked by dogs with Uncle Fester heads!) It's memorable and fun because it's utterly bonkers... and it's really nice to have a reminder that not all obscure, oddball NES titles are crippled by jank.

(But man, that story is disturbing!)
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No cheats were used during the recording of this video.

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