Cliffhanger (1993) NES Game Review

I love a good testosterone fuelled popcorn movie, but historically, they make pretty crap video games. Interestingly, the 8 and 16 bit versions of Cliffhanger are drastically different to one another; SNES, Sega and Amiga got a generic beat ’em up with decent graphics, while Game Boy, Game Gear and NES got…THIS.

WHAT IS THIS?

WHAT IS THIS?????

Christ on a cracker, dude. It’d be too easy to rag on this game’s dire presentation, so I will. This isn’t just the ugliest NES game of all, it’s one of the ugliest games I’ve ever had the displeasure of laying eyes upon. Why are these graphics so abysmal? Because Cliffhanger on NES uses the same art assets as Cliffhanger on Game Boy. As a matter of fact, they’re the same gameplay-wise, too. This is obviously a problem, because graphics drawn up for the tiny Game Boy will never be detailed enough to make the leap to a TV screen and look decent without some tweaking. There was no tweaking to be done here, though, and the result is teeny weeny featureless people staggering across a screen that’s far too big for them. This happened with some Game Boy games near the end of the NES’s lifespan – Wayne’s World was one with a similar development story, and similar vomitaceous graphics.

I haven’t even pushed a single button yet, though the NES’s power button looks especially enticing right now. Maybe I’m not being fair to Cliffhanger, but can I really be blamed? The sight of Sylvester Stallone in his mint green psych ward pajamas and his dopey lumbering walk does not instill me with confidence. By the way, that green onesie is a far cry from the, uh, iconic look Sly was sporting in the movie:

Wowie. Shame they didn’t go with this lewk. Maybe with a slightly bigger sprite, Cliffhanger could have been the first NES game to garner a T rating from the ESRB for some light fanservice.

So what’s this game all about? I’ve never seen Cliffhanger, but I managed to track down a terribly stained scan of the official movie novelization. Two pages in, there was this bizarre analogy comparing the Rocky Mountains to a “youthful, seductive” lover that requires great stamina to satisfy. I didn’t really want to keep assaulting my eyes with that, so I’m gonna assume it’s about having sex on – or with – mountains and move on. That’d explain the stripper outfit above.

Let’s talk gameplay. You will be quick to discover that Mr. Stallone has two arch nemesises: snow falling off rooftops, and assy platforming. Assy platforming is a real problem because Cliffhanger is, in fact, a platformer. It’s one of those games where if your jumps don’t land the character smack dab in the middle of a platform, you’ll fall and die. A well-worn and greatly beloved mechanic in all games it is present in. Except not really. It’s never, ever good. Ever.

If you manage to claw your way past the first horrid platforming sequence, you’ll find a pair of shoes that let you run. Why this wasn’t an ability from the off baffles me. Maybe there was a beloved scene in the film where Mr. Stallone is overjoyed to find some sweet kicks buried in a snowbank. How do you run? You hold up on the control pad while you also move left or right, which isn’t the least bit awkward; nor is the warm-up lumber Sly’s gotta take to break into a proper sprint. Anyway, the running ability makes for the worst game of Sonic the Hedgehog you’ve ever played, but it’s when Cliffhanger really…uhh…”comes alive” is too generous. When it becomes slightly less awkward and tedious? Let’s roll with that.

Enemies range from wolves, guys who punch, guys with guns, slightly bigger guys, and birds. Most of them are irritatingly bulky and take several hits to kill. You mean to tell me it takes more than one punch from Rocky Balboa himself to kill a dog?? Once in awhile, there’s a boss fight to really spice things up. Boss enemies take approximately 75,000 hits to kill, but there’s no strategy involved besides “stay still and let the boss run into your fist” so it evens out. As a matter of fact, this whole game is pretty easy once you get used to the funky controls.

People unfortunate enough to suffer through Cliffhanger‘s sorry excuse for combat will be quick to notice that the best way to play the game is to not play it as the developers intended. Taking your time to navigate jumps and defeat enemies is a miserable affair that no self respecting human being should put up with. So with that in mind, hold down the button combination to run and leap over every enemy in sight with a reckless abandon. Aside from stopping for the aforementioned boss fights, you can blitz the entire game this way. Other than getting soft-locked out of being able to beat the final boss on a prior attempt to beat Cliffhanger, clearing it was no sweat. That’s just about the only nice thing I can say about it – its total lack of difficulty and super short length save it from being one of the worst on the system.

So yeah. Cliffhanger. It’s awkward and easy and looks like something the cat yakked up, but you can still manage to do worse on the NES. Like, it’s not good, but I can only say “I’d rather play this over The Addams Family” so many times before it gets stale. I mean it every time, though. That rotten turd of a game will forever be my litmus test for the quality of other titles. Let’s close on a strange little factoid: there’s a new Cliffhanger movie in development right now! Over three decades after the original, Sly’s gonna climb back up that mountain and have sex with it – or on it – at near 80 years old. We can all rest easy in the knowledge that it won’t be getting a tie-in game, if nothing else…

Final Score: