Can you believe that in this era of HD graphics and ultra-powerful game machines, NES games are still coming out? There’s just something about the pixel-art game that still captures the imagination of gamers everywhere. We still get vintage style games from studios like Inti Creates and thanks to places like Itch.Io and other websites, we still get tiny vintage indie games too! It’s almost enough to make a retro gamer cry. Who’d have thought that the NES style would have endured for all this time?
Thankfully, it has and we’re here today to talk about a brand new NES game! While it’s also available on Itch digitally, Blazing Rangers from developer Karu_Gamo and publisher First Press Games is a surprisingly interesting cartridge-based experience that you’d never expect to have in 2023. Let’s talk about the actual physical game first though!
To start off, Blazing Rangers comes well-packed in a secure box. Inside that box is the game itself, ensconced in an actual old-school NES-style cardboard box! Now if you’re old (like some of us), you’ll have enough experience with NES boxes to feel very subtle differences in the thickness and texture of the box itself, but they’re so minuscule that it’s completely irrelevant. This looks and feels pretty much identical to an original NES box and the art might even look kind of familiar! You see, Karu_Gamo patterned the box art after the original Capcom Challenge Series NES games and the cover artwork looks like a cross between Ghosts N’ Goblins and Mega Man 1. Yeah, the American Mega Man 1 that had ridiculously hideous box art…so ugly it’s awesome! The entire design is a love letter to Capcom!
Looking inside the box we have an incredibly high-quality Game Pak (the NES cart) from First Press and it legitimately looks and feels just like an original NES cart. Honestly, if you didn’t know better, you’d swear it was from the ‘80s! You also get a black cart dust sleeve, a black and white manual, a mail-in warranty card, and a couple of sweet First Press promo inserts. In addition to the box, you also get a neat silver coin (actual metal in a coin case) with Ranger Popo on it, individually numbered!
The manual is the highlight here though, with a ton of vintage-style artwork, tips, tricks, information, and even some old-school Engrish! One of the saddest parts of modern gaming is the complete lack of manuals in new games and Blazing Rangers absolutely nails the manual style of the NES. There are even theme song lyrics to go with the game’s music! You’ll find out more than a few secrets too. It’s worth reading the manual because if you go in cold, you’ll have no idea what any of the power-ups do and they are definitely useful!
Now let’s move on to the game itself. In Blazing Rangers, you have the option of playing one or two players in Game A or Game B. If you play one player, you can choose Popo or Mimi and your choice does matter as they have different strengths and weaknesses which you’ll also find in the manual. Select two players and you and a friend can play both characters simultaneously! That’s right, this one is co-op for two players…no taking turns here!
Regardless of which way you play, the goal is the same. Rescue a bunch of people trapped in burning rooms from a fire while flame monsters, bats, and demons try to burn everything in the room down and take you out along with it! There really aren’t all that many firefighting games and many of them tend to be a bit hokey but Blazing Rangers manages to be remarkably interesting. You start off in an exit area with a length of hose. You can drop and pick up the hose with the B button and spray water with the A button. There’s only one little catch though; your hose is not that long! It’s pretty hard to put out a fire with a hose that won’t reach, but luckily Popo and Mimi have water packs and water guns and they can run ahead into the flames in order to save people without dragging the hose behind them. Phew!
Pick up a couple of people however and suddenly you’re walking slower. The flames are getting higher and your water gun is running out of water. Can you make it back in time? You only have three lives in Blazing Rangers and then its game over. There are a limited number of continues as well, but if you run out, that’s it, time to start over! Walking slow is bad and if you’re carrying people and a hose? Look out! But the more people you bring back at once, the higher your score, so it’s really a bit of a conundrum, isn’t it?
Regardless of your approach, saving everyone brings you to the next level and you’ll have to do it all over again. This is a single screen game and each stage has a different layout so things don’t get too complex but they do move awfully quickly! Luckily you’ve got a few tricks to help out. Hold down the A button to spray your hose and a massive stream of water comes out. Use the D-pad at the same time and you can spray in 8 directions, hosing down everything around you rapidly! Take out some enemies with the water (some take more hits than others) and you’ll trigger some power-ups! There are plenty of them around and the manual details them all. You can also pick up lengths of hose to extend your water’s reach a bit, but be careful! Some of those hoses are traps designed to lure you into the depths of the level where the fires will get you.
Some interesting surprises wait for you in Blazing Rangers as well. Find a magnifying glass and you’ll be able to find hidden diamonds and eventually, maybe even some sort of secret ending. Or maybe not. There are also barrels hiding about which can catch fire and explode, killing you as you try to escape the flames with civilians! Walls and doors can even burn off as the fires spread and intensify, leaving you with less and less options if you don’t hurry to suppress the fires and get out quickly. There are even a couple of bosses which are remarkable fun diversions.
There’s more too! If enemies attack y our hose it retracts to where it was attacked, leaving you high and dry. In Game B, that happens a lot more frequently and you’re in real trouble really fast. There’s a lot happening a lot faster in this version of the game since the timer starts a lot shorter and you’ll need to rescue people fast to bump it back up. Add in the more aggressive enemies and this is a mode that’s designed for hardcore players!
What’s interesting about Blazing Rangers isn’t that it’s a retro-style NES game or that it’s about firefighting. Instead it’s how incredibly smoothly it runs on the NES. The game never lags, never stutters, never glitches. Levels are engulfed in flames quickly with tons of movement all around the stage, enemies moving about through the flames and spawning, water spraying in all directions from your hose and pistol, and still the game plays like a dream! The input on the old NES brick controller is perfect as well, and you never feel like you’re fighting the input in any way. The engineering here is nothing short of spectacular and really maximizes this vintage hardware. Blazing Rangers looks and feels like it actually comes from the same era as its design aesthetic and that’s one impressive feat!
Speaking of visuals, this is a unique-looking game that really captures the vibe of early NES games. The sprites are chunky and fun with just a bit of flicker and the color choices are excellent. Sure, there’s a heck of a lot of orange, especially until you get the hang of things, but for an 8-bit game, this looks legitimately amazing. The only real complaint to be had is that the level design does start to feel a bit limited in variety after a while, but honestly, the gameplay is so fun it’s only a minor quibble.
The sound is another story though. Blazing Rangers has a catchy theme song and that’s wonderful, but it’s quite loud and repeats frequently. The track list is pretty darn short here and the music tends to start to feel repetitive a bit more quickly than players might like. It would have been great to have a bit more variety in the music, but hey, not everything can be perfect, right? As far as composition goes though, the tracks you do hear are quite good!
It’s hard not to love Blazing Rangers. With 32 stages, a handful of secrets, two game modes, and a co-op mode for each, there’s a lot of versatility here! The fires aren’t very predictable either so each time you play, things will be just a little bit different, adding an enjoyably unpredictable element to the mix. Blazing Rangers could easily have been designed by a AAA NES-era studio and it would be a highlight in a bunch of rich NES collector’s shelves.
Instead we can buy actual physical copies from First Press Games for 54 Euros each plus shipping. That’s not a bad price considering the quality of the product you’re getting. There are deluxe versions coming as well that’ll cost you a bit more but honestly, they’re worth it if collector’s editions are your thing. This is one great throwback experience that’s well worth your time and even worth sourcing an NES for. Heck, there’s even a Famicom version available if you want to go that route! How cool is that? Regardless of what version you pick, you’re definitely going to want Blazing Rangers in your collection so grab one while they’re still available! You won’t regret it!
This review was based on a physical copy of Blazing Rangers NES US Style Regular Edition provided by the publisher. It was played on an NES toploader using a vintage 27” JVC IArt CRT TV and an original NES brick controller. Blazing Rangers is also available digitally for $13 on itch.io. Both press photos and in-game photos were used for the purposes of this review.