Pesterminator: The Western Exterminator
System: NES
Release Date: 1990
Developer: Color Dreams
Publisher: Color Dreams
Genre: Action
Oh look, an advertisement as basis for a game with Pesterminator: The Western Exterminator. Though Western Exterminator has since become a new company, the main character Kernal Kleanup or Mr. Little, or whatever his moniker happened to be at the time, was once an iconic character on the west coast of the US. Color Dreams never met a terrible idea that they wouldn’t turn into a horrible game. Ronnie the super rat, and his friends are multiplying and looking to infest every building they can. It’s up to Kernel Kleanup to exterminate them and save the people from icky bugs and other pests.
Mr. Little jumps with the B Button and swings his hammer with the A Button. The goal of each level is to smash each pest. Each screen can only hold up to five enemies on it at once, but may want to spawn many more. This requires you entering and exiting through doors many times to get them all. There are eight levels of pests to eradicate. Though two house and sewer levels mainly repeat themselves, the typical gameplay morphs slightly in levels 5 and 7 when you fly a helicopter and dive into the sea. They still involve killing everything, though.
The last level puts you on the moon and is the toughest of them all. Rock throwers do a lot of damage, especially when nothing seems to hurt you in the first half of the game. If you destroy the enemies on the surface, you head to Ronnie’s Lair. This is a small maze that requires you to kill all the enemies and collect a key card. Once everyone else is dead, you fight Ronnie behind the locked door. He’s killed easily by jumping his projectile and attacking. Do this several times and he raises the white flag signaling your victory.
Graphics: 2.0
Honestly, the graphics aren’t bad. I think there’s a lack of colors, but it could be way worse.
Sound: 1.5
If the sound effects didn’t annoy me so much, I kind of enjoyed the music on the levels, despite them repeating rather quickly and not being very deep.
Gameplay: 1.5
The hammer takes too long to reset after a swing and forces you to take damage. Platform jumping is really weird. You magnet in place to platforms, which I guess is helpful so you don’t accidentally run off an edge.
Difficulty: 1.5
There’s no growth in your abilities. The levels don’t progress in difficulty other than enemies doing more damage.
Fun Factor: 0.5
I got bored with this one rather quickly, but wanted to see if it got any better. It didn’t.
Overall Grade: 1.4
Pesterminator: The Western Exterminator earns a D+. I’m incredibly generous with this grade. There’s not much that I see as redeeming or a reason to play this, unless you like unlicensed games.