GOTD 6/13/2016: Magic Sword (SNES)

[celerystalker]

Capcom sure did love the bejeesus out of the Super Nintendo, seeing fit to port a good chunk of their early '90s arcade library to the thing. Magic Sword fits that mold, and is a side-scrolling hack & slash platformer. As a barbarian named the Brave One (and his twin axe-loving brother in blue in the arcade original), you must enter the Dragon's Tower at Drokmar Keep in order to destroy a powerful relic, the Blackorb. Armed with a sword, shield, and so, so many keys, you must free trapped warriors to fight alongside you, find the most powerful swords, and cut the Blackorb down once and for all. Sounds bitchin'.

I've heard Magic Sword called the spiritual successor to Black Tiger, but I don't see it aside from some similar boss attacks and trap chests. The Dragon's Tower has 51 floors to ascend, each of which is represented by a brief stage. These levels are purely horizontal with absolutely no vertical scrolling at all. The emphasis is around basic platforming and combat over any kind of exploration or mazes. There are secrets to discover like hidden doors to skip levels and chests that can be made to appear by striking the air where they are. These contain such riches as shield upgrades, magic attack items like books and wands, food, and what have you, but more often than not, you'll find keys.

The biggest gameplay hook revolves around those keys, as they are used not only to open the door at the end of each stage, but also to open the myriad cells you'll pass throughout the keep. These can contain traps, monsters, and fairies, but most of the time you'll free one of the king's allies. Dark Sorcerers, White Wizards, Big Men, Ninjas, Thieves, Knights, and if you have a diamond ring with which to bribe them, Lizard Men. These allies automatically follow behind you, attacking when you attack and jumping when you jump like Miles "Tails" Prower. They have their own power-ups to grab as well and their own life bars, and can level up behind you up to level 7, gaining more potent attacks along the way. Each has unique attacks and abilities, like the thief stopping trap chests and the white wizard slaughtering the undead. Bringing the right compatriot with you and leveling them up is a huge part of victory.

The last combat wrinkles are a desperation attack that costs essentially a life (weak) and your magic attack bar, which constantly charges on its own. This works like the classic the Legendary Axe, where your attacks become more powerful with a more full bar. This also effects magic user companions, whose attacks are also more potent with a full bar. It's pretty straight-forward combat that feels good, and the boss fights every few floors look good and offer up a fair challenge.

Graphically, Magic Sword looks outstanding with its bright colors, detailed backgrounds and even some cool heat wave effects. There is noticeable slowdown at times, but not so bad as something like Gradius III. The music is pretty good as well, but Capcom has certainly made some more memorable tracks. It's a fairly lengthly game, taking around an hour for a complete play. The SNES version only supports one player, but allows you to start at different intervals, all the way up to level 33.

I love Magic Sword, and it's in my experience one of the best SNES arcade-style games that can still be had for under $20. If you dig Capcom's style, it's a great title, and the arcade version is on Capcom Classics vol. 2 on Xbox and PS2 as well as one of the PSP compilations.

Played it?

[celerystalker]

[Emperor Megas]

I only played arcade version, and I played it A TON. But I've NEVER understood the mechanics of the gameplay. It always seems like I die for no reason when I do, as if my life bar just 'magically' disappears at random intervals.

Does Magic Sword have one of those Wonderboy like health gauges where you have to keep collecting things to remain alive? It's been a while since I've played it, so I don't recall. You mentioned something about a desperation attack that takes life bar; I never even knew that -- and by knew that, I mean that it had such a move at all. Could I be doing that accidentally and draining my bar?

If the tower has 51 levels, than I can never get through more than a third of the game (at BEST) without said random death occuring, and since I don't ever continue arcade games, I've never gotten any father than that.

[celerystalker]

Yeah, your life gauge can be filled beyond capacity by grabbing food and from a refill every few stages on the score bonus screen. Pressing jump and attack at the same time triggers your desperation attack, which costs a full set of your health gauge, and is totally not worth it.

Edit: there isn't even pronounced animation for the attack, just a quick hazing of the screen and an accompanying sound effect. Very easy to do on accident if you aren't aware of it.

[Emperor Megas]

I feel like an idiot. I most have played a game of Magic Sword every time I went to the arcade and never realized that there was such an attack. All this time I was accidentally draining my bar and never knew it.

And it MOST be weak. So weak I never even realized that I was doing it!

[celerystalker]

It is weak. It kills minor enemies in one hit, but there usually aren't very many enemies on screen at once in Magic Sword save when bats swarm on bridges. It huts bosses, but not nearly so much as it hurts you. The game would be better without it, but once you know about it, at least you can avoid doing it.

[XYXZYZ]

Magic Sword is one of "my games"... those games I've grown attached to while no one else seems to care about it. At the arcade in the mall I talked about in the Ninja Combat thread, Shortly after the arrival of the Neo Geo there was a new game... a game that everyone was talking about, everyone was playing, and I could never get to play it because the crowd around the machine was so big. It was taking over the arcades! (This was 1991, do you all know what game I'm talking about?) I've always tended to stay away from things that get really big and popular. While everyone and their dog was fawning over the new game, I would wonder off to the now abandoned areas of the arcade, and I came across another new game that wasn't getting any attention, living in the shadow of the other new game from the same company. It was Magic Sword, a sword and sorcery action platformer- my kind of game! I thought was a lot of fun to play, I just loved it's style. But I especially loved the music. Those nice rocking tunes that somehow seemed appropriate for a fantasy setting.

I really loved the sound of Capcom's arcade game music in the early 90s, it used a synthesizer on a chip from Yamaha called the YM2151, which was essentially a scaled down Yamaha DX7 synthesizer. (If you listen to 80s music you've heard the DX7, it was all over the Miami Vice soundtrack, it's bass sound and synthesized electric piano sound was in several 80s pop songs) I have a DX7 and you actually program it to sound exactly like Capcom's arcade sounds, because it used the same synth engine.

Anyway, I would often have Magic Sword's music running through my head outside the arcade, so the game stayed with me in that sense. When it was announced for the SNES, I was thrilled. I couldn't afford it when it came out because I was a broke kid, but I rented it when I got the chance. I was certainly happy with it, but one thing that struck me as disappointing was the "soft" sound of the music compared to the arcade game. I was disappointed this way with every SNES arcade port, actually. The SNES era came and went, and I never actually bought Magic Sword. Not until recently, anyway. When I finished my MAME cabinet years ago, I played Magic Sword that way. But recently I've moved into a new house, and my arcade games would be out of service for a good long while. With no arcade action, what am I to do? Why, I'm back to console ports! With my MAME cabinets, I thought I'd never go back to console ports, but here I am! I was itching for some MS, and I found it for sale at a local shop that sells classic games. It's actually a bit different from the arcade game, but I got my mojo established and within a week, I finished it! And it was one of those close victories, down to the last health bar of the last credit when I jumped over that lightning bolt and struck the final blow to the boss. Don't you love those moments?

Last week I was cleaning out my garage, and I found an old marker board I used to keep next to the MAME machines for logging my scores. Magic Sword was at the top:

1,282,720 Stage 23 3/6/06

Not bad for one credit. I actually got over 1,500,000 once, but didn't write it down...

[celerystalker]

That's awesome! I'm a bit better at the SNES version than the arcade version, mainly just because I've had it longer. I agree, the music is much better from the arcade board. I hope to get a pcb of my own eventually, but I spent my arcade budget for the year so far on pcbs for Gondomania, Black Tiger, and TMNT, as I was a Black Tiger fiend. Right now I have to settle for Capcom Classics vol. 2, but at least it plays spot on with an X-Arcade stick.

I do like the SNES version's credit limit for completion, as it allowed me to have a similar moment like you described. I remember when I first beat it, I cost myself huge at the beginning of the game accidentally doing the special attack twice and burning a credit in the first few floors, but had a massive 35-floor credit afterward that made me feel invincible!

Thanks for your memories!

[XYXZYZ]

... but had a massive 35-floor credit afterward that made me feel invincible!

Damn, that's a good run.

[celerystalker]

It was easily the best credit I have ever played in any version of Magic Sword. I did have a nice 22 floor credit last night when replaying to do the GOTD write up. It's become one of my favorite SNES games over the years, and I think it's only getting better to me with age.