Bill & Ted’s Excellent Video Game Adventure
System: NES
Release Date: August 1991
Developer: Rocket Science Productions
Publisher: LJN
Genre: Action
Prepare for a most bogus journey in Bill & Ted’s Excellent Video Game Adventure! Rufus is back again with another time hopping exploit for the boys from San Dimas to solve. Some time bandits are looking to create upheaval by misplacing 16 historical dudes and babes throughout the corridors of time. It’s up to you two righteous fellas to jump into Rufus’ phone booth and correct the problems in your way. Will the Wyld Stallyns continue to be excellent?
You begin as Ted and are given 15 coins to make your way to the first historical dude. As I flipped through the phonebook, I saw Rembrandt positioned with an incorrect phone number. You dial the number and are taken to the corridors of time. The phone booth spins in a circle and you need to launch it to the final digit in the number. On the way, you want to avoid skulls, as they will eat your coins. You have a red junction that you can move around to make navigating this level easier. If you stay spinning for too long, the next digit will be automatically dialed for two of your coins. The only time this must be done is when you get to the final digit.
When you make it to your destination, you need to find a bait item to lure the historical dude out. These are hidden in very odd spots throughout the map. You can walk on paths and jump with the A Button. If you jump off the path, you fall down and are unable to move, but must jump out onto the path again. The jump is loaded by running and this mechanic is incredibly annoying to get used to. You are able to run on some grassy areas, typically separated by a fence of some sort.
There are people dotted throughout the landscape, as well. Ones that are standing still might give you an item, they might give you a hint, and they might tell you to buzz off. No matter what, once you talk to them, they begin walking around. If you run into them at this point, they demand one of your coins or threaten jail time. If someone is running after you with their arms outstretched, they’ll take you to jail if you’re caught. You can try to avoid them by using items you have in your inventory. There are pudding cups, that the people on screen will move toward. Firecrackers cause people to run away, or blow up if you can hit them. Textbooks kill everyone on screen at once. The boombox causes everyone on screen to dance.
After you find the proper bait, you need to seek out the historical dude or babe. This requires you to walk around and find buildings with open doors. Sometimes a hint will push you in the right direction, other times you have to brute force it. Once you find the, you have to give them the proper bait, or they’ll run off and you’ll have to find them again. Collecting the historical dude will send you to a Wyld Stallyns concert. You have to do this a lot of times and I bailed because it was most heinous.
Graphics: 1.5
Sprites, animations, backgrounds… all of it is plain and not very good.
Sound: 1.0
Music disappears pretty quickly and then all you hear are the sounds of jumping and crashing.
Gameplay: 1.0
Controls are awful, game design is awful.
Difficulty: 1.0
Finding the baits is total BS as the hints are garbage in quality.
Fun Factor: 0.5
Seeing a digitized George Carlin is the only thing I enjoyed from playing this game.
Overall Rating: 1.0
Bill & Ted’s Excellent Video Game Adventure earns a D. Do you want to play a terrible game from a quite enjoyable movie? Well, steer clear of this one.