Blades of Steel - NES

Ah, old sport games, long gone is the era where one could make a sport game that ignores almost every rule contained in the original sport.

Because the title "Hockey" was not 'X-treme' enough

Blades of Steel was Konami’s port of its hockey arcade series to the NES. The first sound you hear when you pop this game into your NES is the horrifying, robotic, scratchy voice telling you that you are, in fact, playing “Blades of Steel” just in case you could not read the gigantic metallic text.

Seriously, what is with all the misleading here? Giant metallic action movie font and robotic voices; it makes this look more like an action game as opposed to a sports game, that or that there is some hidden back story to this game. The one that I came up with is that a race of evil metal humanoids from planet Narptune have taken over Earth, and now forces the remaining human population to play hockey for their amusement.

The survivors of Minnesota City are my favorite team

Anyway, while we are still sort of on the topic of sound effects, it should be made known that our strange robotic announcer was not a one time thing. Nope, this bastard is here to stay, transforming him into one of the most annoying things I have heard all week. Seriously, this guy is always talking. At the only point in the game when he stops talking, we are greeted with the sound of people whistling and cheering, almost like they are glad that their oppressive overlord has stopped commenting. Well, that or the clapping sound is actually an earthquake warning us to keep playing or face extinction, I can never tell the difference in old video games.

Wait, is that a Konami brand zamboni?

The game play for this game is actually pretty good. Personally I hate sport games, and even I found it enjoyable. You control one character at a time, out of a team of five plus a goalie. The other players are AI controlled, taking only minimal direction from the controller, and will go to areas that the game thinks is the best location for them to be, often checking the movement of the other teams players. The game will auto switch the player you control if, for instance, the puck moves closer to another player. This is all very streamlined, and works perfectly for the player. The only problem with it is that it can get a little chaotic at times; making it easy to lose what player you are controlling allowing the other team to score. This is because both the computer controlled player, and the one you control are both flashing. As such you are not sure which one you are. 

I like how the referee is a giant compared to the people in the stands

The only strange thing is when you get into a fight, and trust me, you will get into fights all the time in this game. You get into fights whenever you ram an opponent several times. The game will then quickly cut to a boxing mini game, and honestly, I have no idea how to control it. It’s just best to avoid the conflict all together because when you lose, that player is penalized with a two minute time out... Wait what?

Fighting: it’s sometimes never the answer

The last cool thing I noticed is that in the half time marker, it will sometimes play advertisements for old Konami games like Gradius, Contra and Jackal.

You remember Jackal, don’t you?

Overall, this is a pretty fun game. Like I said before, not being a fan of sport games, I was surprised by how much I liked it. Being both single and multiplayer, I would suggest that you go out and try this game if you can.

Robot announcer: Now for the Losers from the Chicago Junior league, it is off to the salt mines with you!