In video games, almost any type of real world activity can become a video game. From sports and cooking to dancing and farming, if it’s a thing you can do in real life it can be transformed into a video game. Even the activity of cave exploring, also known as spelunking, in which a person who does spelunking is called a spelunker, Over the years there have been games about spelunking and one of the oldest ones is Spelunker on the NES and other consoles. And like most retro games that have resurfaced in the past couple of years, it too received an update of an update.
Spelunker HD Deluxe is an update to Spelunker HD, which in itself is an HD update/remaster of the original Spelunker. Gameplay is very simple, you are a spelunker exploring a cave, jumping across pits and cliffs, climbing up and down ropes/ladders to get to various parts of the game, gathering various items along the way to get to the next section of the cave. There are sections of the cave where you have to use bombs to blow up stalagmites that are blocking your path and unlock doors using keys you pick up along the way. There are creatures that you have to avoid while exploring the cave, such as bats dropping poop as they fly around, snakes slithering on the ground and cave ghosts. While the gameplay is simple enough, I do have some issues with the game, namely how easy it is to die trying to make seemingly easy jumps. You could be climbing up a ladder to reach an item and for some reason if you’re not leveled with the platform that the item is on and try to either jump on to it or walk on it, you will die. You will also die in shallow pits, short drops and even getting off a ladder too early. All this is due to the character you control not having an arch to the jump, no momentum control and not being able to control jumps in mid air. You would expect these limitations in the original version, but not in an HD update. You do get used to the controls after a couple of deaths, but after a while (at least for me) I got tired, annoyed and stopped playing. However the game does give you that “now I know what to do” feeling and compels you to try again, which I did.
The graphics and music of Spelunker HD Deluxe comes in two flavors, HD and the original/retro. The original graphics and music from the first game hold up pretty well for being a 30 plus year old game. As for the HD graphics, everything is nicely detailed and rendered in 3D. I really liked how the cave ghosts look in HD as they look much more frightening than in the original graphics.
As for the Deluxe part of Spelunker HD Deluxe, in addition to the base adventure mode, the game also comes with three other modes: Competition, Championship and Endless Cave NEO. Competition has you and up to five other fellow spelunkers (either online or offline) compete to see who can go down the cave the furthest and find the most treasure. Championship mode has you exploring another 100 caves but this time with a set amount of lives. Endless Cave NEO is for experienced spelunkers as all of the caves are randomly generated and the screen is constantly moving.
Out of all the retro releases/remasters that ININ Games has published so far, Spelunker HD Deluxe might be my least favorite. The HD graphics and music do sound nice and the graphics and music from the original do hold up well. It’s also fun being able to compete against other players and cooperate with them, both on and off line. It’s the dying from small and simple jumps that really annoys me. I understand if these deaths were limited to the original retro version, but keeping in the HD update/remaster when there has been at least 30 years of platforming improvements and innovations, a small hop off a very small incline should not kill me. Still its a fun solid game, just not for me. If you’re up for exploring caves and trying your best to not die from bat poop, cave ghosts and small jumps. give Spelunker HD Deluxe a shot.
