Kid Chameleon

I thought I was done posting games in 2014, but then I realized I had 63 posts and, hey, come on, 64 just felt like a much cooler number to end the year on. You know, for the sake of my year-end video game tournament.

So, get a load of this guy! Ain't he just the bee's fucking tits? Leather jacket, slicked back hair, big ass sneakers. And check out the fine print on the cover, advertising not just that there are over 100 levels, but also that there are over 1850 screens. That's 18.5 screens per level, and hot damn, those sound like huge levels!

Dated marketing aside, this was a fine game. Yet another platformer, of course, and in this one the central gameplay gimmick is that you can put on different masks and helmets and get different power-ups. The knight's helmet gives you more health. The samurai helmet gives you a long pointy sword. It keeps things interesting, at least. Oh, and here's the game's plot from Wikipedia, because I just can't get enough of these:

A new virtual reality arcade game called "WildSide" arrived in town and every kid played it. The arcade made holograms to create a world not their own. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary until kids began to disappear. The game's boss, Heady Metal, had freed himself from his scripted AI. He was using his new freedom to kidnap every kid who could not beat the game, which was all of them, until now. A boy named Casey who calls himself "Kid Chameleon" enters the game and must defeat every level, every boss and Heady Metal himself if he wants to save the others.

That's right. In order to beat this video game, you need to beat the video game within the video game. How delightfully meta!

Ecco: The Tides of Time
Ecco the Dolphin
Arrow Flash
Golden Axe
Alien Storm
Virtua Fighter 2
Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master
Streets of Rage 3
Gain Ground
Streets of Rage 2
Golden Axe II
Kid Chameleon
DecapAttack
Comix Zone
Vectorman 2
Vectorman
Streets of Rage
Chakan: The Forever Man
Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle
The Ooze
Columns III
Columns
Crack Down
Golden Axe III
Altered Beast
Bonanza Brothers