Fire 'N Ice (NES) review "Hello, once again, and welcome to another review by yours truly, RoyalRanger, here to give you an honest opinion on the late but great 1993 Tecmo game, Fire 'n Ice. In light of the differences of opinion of games, evident between different gamers, I have decided to bring in a professional game character, Error (From Zelda 2), in here to co-author the review, providing their perspective at a few intervals during my review writing. "

Hello, once again, and welcome to another review by yours truly, RoyalRanger, here to give you an honest opinion on the late but great 1993 Tecmo game, Fire 'n Ice. In light of the differences of opinion of games, evident between different gamers, I have decided to bring in a professional game character, Error (From Zelda 2), in here to co-author the review, providing their perspective at a few intervals during my review writing.

RR:Hello, Error, and how are you?
Error: I am Error!
RR: I know that.
Error: I am Error!
RR: Yes. I know.
Error: I am Error!
RR: Forget it.

As it seems, a far away and once peaceful land of ice, Coolmint Island, has been invaded by flames sent by the evil monster named Druidle. To take care of the situation before the island melts away, the island queen selected a wizard, Dana, to put out all the flames on the island. The queen gave Dana some special ice magic to help extinguish the fires and bring Coolmint Island back to peace again.

Dana will start his quest on a map of nine worlds, each containing nine regular levels and one castle level, with the ability to choose any regular level you wish to play, instead of being forced to play in a specific level order. The setting of each normal level is a one-screen side-view puzzle, where there will be regular (unmovable, unchangable) blocks, ice blocks, flames of fire, and of course, Dana. Dana can't jump, but he can move around and climb up any blocks (one at a time). He (Dana) is able to push ice blocks, which will slide continually in one direction until stopped by another block or a wall; and Dana can also create and remove ice blocks below him by waving his wand whenever he wants or needs to. All this is needed to put out each flame with a block of ice, either by sliding an ice block into a flame, or by dropping an ice cube onto a flame from above. And no, you can't eliminate flames by tapping them with your wand.

Those are the regular levels. The castle levels are very similar, but are usually much more difficult than the regular levels. Castle levels can only be played when all the other levels in that world are complete. Once they are done, the castle will open and a boss inside will challenge you to a difficult level of extinguishing flames. Unlike regular levels, castle levels may not always take up one screen. For instance, in some castles, you'll have to extinguish all the flames before a rising pit of fire eats you up, all while the screen scrolls upwards little by little. If you can meet the challenge and put out all the flames, the castle boss will flee and you will have successfully completed a whole world of levels.

Of course, completing each task requires a bit of precision control. If you have to face the opposite direction of where you are facing at the moment, you'll want to make sure you only turn around in the same spot, not move forward a bit as well. This is where some loose control comes in handy. The controls in the game are very precise, but not so precise as to move your character a mile when all you want him to do is turn around. The controls aren't perfect, just a tad too much on the looser side, but they are still very good anyway.

RR: Any comments, Error?
Error: I am Error!
RR Okay..

You may be a little impressed by the audio-visuals when you first start up the game, but don't leave your jaw dropped for too long. The graphics during the opening story are quite good, but the quality comes down after that. The map is pretty dull-looking, and some of the items (volcano, bones, star, etc.) representing each world are ugly and plain. During the game, Dana looks very good, as do the animated flames of fire and the ice blocks. Even the ''regular'' blocks, which surround the play area and make up the walls, are pretty good. The problem is the design of the levels. If a world is represented by a tree on the map, you might expect each area to look like some kind of forest, but it doesn't. Same with all the other worlds, the level designs are too plain and repetitive. Why not some original backgrounds at least?

Unfortunately, as it is with graphics, it is the same with sound. The opening story music is impressive, but all the other songs afterwards are short tunes that keep playing over and over and over. I'm not saying the songs are bad, but they definitely could have been more nicely done and less repetitive. Not much to comment on sound effects, because they aren't many, but they make good use of some high-pitched dings to recreate the sound of Dana when appearing, disappearing, and using his wand.

RR: Error, any thoughts?
Error: I am Error!
RR: Okay..

Fire 'n Ice's challenge is almost perfect for the game. The earlier worlds and levels will be extremely simple, for those beginners at the game. As you progress, they will gradually get tougher and tougher at a nice, steady pace. Other items, like pipes you can slide through, that will be used in the game, will appear later on, so that each player will get enough practice with just the basic abilities alone before moving on to the more difficult and complicated stuff. When you finally get to the end, you'll be faced with quite a challenge, but hopefully the practice you acquired earlier on will help very much here. And in addition, due to the game's length, you are offered a password system so you don't have to complete the whole entire game at one time.

Of course there won't be much thrill of discovery, but the game provides hours of enjoyment anyway. Once you start it will be hard to stop, so much so that you may have to be pried from the controller (or not). Since most players are very libel to quickly forget the strategy of many of the levels, there will be a consistent challenge many of the times you play, offering a decent replay factor. The fun stays within the game as you return to it and realize you have to rethink everything again.

It's a bit sad that you can't rent NES games anymore, as there would be many that could be recommended, including Fire 'n Ice. What's even sadder is that if you would like to get a hold of this game, you'll have to do an awful lot of looking. In addition to being a great game, this cartridge is also a rarity, and you may be quite lucky if you can get a hold of it for a good price, or if you can even get a hold of it at all. But if you ever do find this game at a reasonable price, and if you do own a NES system, take my advice and do not pass this cartridge up!

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Story (4/10): Enemies attack for no reason in old games. Nothing very original here either.
Gameplay (8/10): This game was designed very well as quite a brain basher.
Control (8/10): Not perfect, but the control is very adequate for the game.
Graphics (6/10): The opening graphics are quite impressive, but uniqueness stops there.
Music & Sound (6/10): You see what I said about graphics? Same for music and sound.
Challenge (7/10): The challenge is almost perfect, gradually changing from easy to very hard.
Thrill (8/10): Fire 'n Ice is quite an entertaining game when playing first time.
Replay (7/10): With a frequent challenge, the game will be quite fun with every play.

Overall (8/10): It's a good thing Tecmo didn't cancel this game due to a late release.

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RR: Error, you got anything to say?
Error: I am Error!
RR: I guess not...

Community review by royalranger (Date unavailable) A bio for this contributor is currently unavailable, but check back soon to see if that changes. If you are the author of this review, you can update your bio from the Settings page.