Level Up: The Little Mermaid

Today I’m talking about a Disney game on NES, and it seems like Disney and Nintendo are a very appropriate match for each other. They’re both known and criticized for their “family friendly” values and for having a certain style in their medium that some have called dull, repetitious and “overrated” over time. They’ve both seem to have been around since the start of their domain and if there’s someone who could challenge Mickey as the most recognizable character, it might be Mario (both their names even start with M!). I guess for these reasons and more, it feels right to play an NES game based on a Disney movie. This week for Femme-Month, we’re hanging out with Ariel in The Little Mermaid for the Nintendo Entertainment System.

Talking about a Disney game on the NES, it should be of no surprise that it’s *Capcom Time*. As previously discussed, they did amazing work with Ducktales and Darkwing Duck. However, those were both series already rooted in action and adventure. While it was obvious for Darkwing to be a Megaman style game and Ducktales would be about adventuring to get rich… how do you make a game out of the Little Mermaid? I think they started by looking at the obvious: where does Ariel live? In the water. Much like the Legendary Starfy, this game is a free roaming platformer (and there are small sections on land, but they are very few and far between).  Much like with Starfy, it makes the game easy, but it does make it much more different that the other games I previously mentioned, and it works within its own world.

What else is notable about Ariel? She’s a mermaid, so she has a tail. Maybe she could use that to attack? However, instead of making it a basic tail whip attack, she launches bubbles which capture enemies. You can then grab those captured enemies to throw at other enemies or whatever needs to be hit. Think of this kind of like using a koopa shell in Mario, or how you could grab enemies and throw them in Disney’s the Magical Quest (actually, this game did come out before that one, so maybe it provided some inspiration?). In what would be an otherwise pretty boring game gameplay wise, this element shines through to make it a bit more complex and provide more of puzzle element.

Being adapted from a Disney movie, it does make sense that this game would have great music, and I have to admit, “Under the sea” was made to be chiptuned. *play segment if it is not background music*. The rest of the music is also pretty good. Appropriately, they tried to have the same type of calypso style for the levels, and it does make it a lot of fun for Ariel to dash through the water to this music. The sound effects mostly seem pulled from the standard Capcom library, but to nitpick, the sound of the bubble popping if you get no one in it is completely wrong.

The graphics are good. Considering the fact that the game takes place under water and on the NES, they actually did a good job. One way this was achieved is that the sprites don’t have a black outline, which gives them that sort of water color effect on them. There’s also the fact that it’s simply Capcom, and they’ve pretty much mastered their sprite style by this point. The size scale (no pun intended) isn’t quite right though, as most fish are half the size of Ariel (which is a TERRFYING concept), but in NES that’s a common thing I suppose. Yeah, all around good quality around the aesthetics, which you should come to expect from the company behind it.

The Little Mermaid is pretty OK game, but there just clearly wasn’t enough put into it. I understand that it was likely made for younger kids at a time when games were already simple enough, but this game can be beaten in less than 30 minutes (and I don’t mean speed running it). Personally I beat it on the second time I played it, and the first time all I did was start it up to make sure things worked right and got a quick feel for the controls. If there was more to the game- more or bigger levels, harder difficulty, and more variety in game play- I’d be more likely to recommend the game. As it is, I certainly can’t tell you to avoid it, as there is fun to be had and the game is of great quality, but it’s very fleeting. I give Disney’s the Little Mermaid on NES 6.5 levels out of 10.