The Goonies II (1987) NES Game Review

1985’s The Goonies is one of the few beloved 80’s movies that hasn’t gotten an unnecessary sequel or remake in the years since its release. A nostalgia bait-y spinoff series is currently in the works over at Disney, but whether or not it will actually get made remains to be seen – this is far from the first time Hollywood has tried to get a new Goonies project off the ground. Maybe they’re aware that re-capturing the first film’s charm is too tall of an order. Maybe it’s because none of the surviving cast want to return and mar the original’s legacy.

Or maybe…they’re just intimidated by Konami’s wild take on The Goonies II.

Goonies II is called that because it’s a sequel to another Goonies game by Konami for the Famicom, though it was released in North America via Nintendo’s Vs. Systems and Playchoice-10 arcade machines. While that first game is a tough arcade-y platformer, Goonies II is a better fit for home consoles, as it’s a Metroidvania style adventure that would take most players a long while to beat it without guidance. But we’ll get back to that soon enough.

Playing as Mikey, your mission is to save your six nondescript Goonie friends from the dastardly Fratelli gang, and ultimately rescue Annie the Mermaid from captivity. What a mermaid has to do with The Goonies continues to be one of gaming’s oldest and most mystifying mysteries. You can’t save your pals without finding tons of upgrades, uncovering secret passageways, and crying a lot because of how hopelessly lost you are. Or maybe that was just me.

So how is Goonies II? Pretty sweet, actually. The controls are lovely and responsive, as one would expect of Konami. The character and enemy sprites are all great for 1986, with most of them having that cute, charming simplicity that Japan excels at. The music’s excellent as well – most of the game’s original tracks sound like works in progress for Castlevania, but the soundtrack’s highlight has gotta be the 8-bit rendition of “The Goonies ‘R’ Good Enough.” Movie-based NES games actually featuring the film’s soundtracks are rare – the chiptune conversion of the soundtrack actually being good is even rarer.

So let’s talk difficulty. Goonies II is an infamously tough title. Rather than sporting some traditional “NES hard” gameplay, the difficulty lies in navigating the damn thing. As is Metroidvania tradition, the game has the player feeling like a rat in a maze, except this maze was soundtracked by Cyndi Lauper. Even though the map can be accessed at any time via the Start button, it doesn’t keep track of where you’ve been or what door leads where. This is troublesome due to the fact that the game world isn’t as interconnected as something like Metroid; there’s a “front” and a “back” side to the map, and every other door you come across warps you to a far-off area of the opposite side you’re currently on.

Keeping track of all this is one hell of a daunting task, but oh my god did I try. It’s a mind boggling adventure without guidance, and seldom few retro gamers have managed to make their way to the end of this game without the aid of a walkthrough. Did I manage such an impressive feat? Of course not! However, I am pretty proud that I got about 3/4ths of the way through the entire game without having to consult a guide, thanks to obsessive mapping and note taking on graph paper. I’m the kind of person who finds drawing out maps and unravelling puzzles to be tons of fun, so I had a ball tackling this challenge the old fashioned way.

With that being said it wasn’t all mermaids and rainbows. There were moments during my playthrough where I thought I was going to lose my mind thanks to how aggressively stuck I got (mostly thanks to not being able to find the ladder for ages.) A few hours of my time with Goonies II were spent flipping between pages of notes and mumbling to myself while trying to make sense of it all. This aspect of the game can be exceedingly frustrating in spots, but hey, I can’t be too mad at it. Goonies II came out at a time where many home console titles were made with 1980’s school-aged kids who only got one game a year in mind – longevity was a valued design philosophy back then.

For that reason alone, Goonies II won’t be for everyone. Thanks to rigidly following a walkthrough and/or having an interest in manual map making being integral to playing the game, I’d advise everyone but the hardest of the hardcore enthusiasts to stay away. But if you have an appetite for a tough as nails Metroidvania adventure, or you’re a little bit insane, you’ll find that the Goonies ‘R’ plenty good enough to suit your needs.

Final Score: