 Here we have another Konamibell-developed title for the NES, this one being The Lone Ranger. And it's actually based on the original TV series, which is maybe… odd. I guess they got the rights for it? Pretty cheap? One major thing about this game you'll notice right away is that it's compatible with the NintendoZapper. Yeah that's right. But bear in mind it works in these first person shooter stages. The Lone Ranger takes place in the 1880s in Texas, where you, as the Lone Ranger, attempt to bring justice to the evil Butch Cavendish, who murdered his brother and the Texas Rangers. No, not those Texas Rangers. Butch is up to no good again, this time kidnapping the president? So in other words, is the Lone Ranger a bad enough dude to rescue the president? You'll see right away that this game is laid out like an RPG or an adventure style game, with an overworld map where you go from location to location, visiting towns, heading into battles, and talking to NPCs who have nothing to say. Well alright, some of them are okay and give you clues and stuff, but still, it's one of those games where you have to talk to everyone. Look this guy even says so, so in the process you run into idiots like this person. Gee thanks. But yeah, the layout here is like a cross between Zelda 2 and a Goemon game, only with the action taking place both from a side scrolling and top down perspective. And along the way, there's also shops to upgrade your weapons and ammo, train stations to help you get around faster, and this is a surprisingly big world that you have to travel through, and doctors that can restore health for a price. There's 8 total missions, so to speak, where you have to complete a different objective for each area. The game starts out with you talking to your friend Tonto, who says get yourself a horse for your quest. You get a clue saying your horse Silver is hanging out across the river, but you can't get over there yet because the bridge is rolled up. You talk to the dude in charge of the bridge and he says he'll let you cross if you get a letter from the sheriff, and to get a letter from the sheriff you have to go kill some outlaws in the west mountains, and so on and so forth. You get the idea, it's a daisy chain of stuff. One event unlocks the next event, and in the meantime, you run into random battles where you have to gun down enemies. What's interesting here is that there's three different gameplay modes. There's the random battles, there's these side scrolling missions that usually end with a boss fight, and there's eventually these first person shooter segments where you have to navigate a maze, where like I said, you can use the zapper, but the controller works just fine as well. There's also these really tough stages where you ride Silver and take out enemies while dodging stuff coming from all over. The controls are pretty intuitive, and you can flip between weapons using the select button. However, if your aim sucks, like mine does, you'll waste a lot of ammo, and you could be down to just using your fists, and that doesn't usually go well. There's also upgrades to your bullets available as well, but they're pretty dang expensive, so use them wisely, or just save them for boss fights. You can also buy TNT, as well as upgrade your gun with a short, medium, or long barrel, which will increase your range. That's pretty cool. Money is the name of the game here, though. You gotta consistently keep a decent stash of ammo and keep upgrading your weapon, or you'll find yourself underleveled, so to speak. You earn money just by gunning down bad guys throughout towns, but if you accidentally hit some townsfolk, you'll be penalized half of your money. The towns offer alternatives to earn money, though, in the form of minigames. Very similar to another Wild West NES game I looked at a couple months ago, Cowboy Kid. But where Lone Ranger separates itself from Cowboy Kid is that this game feels a lot more polished. Cowboy Kid had some issues with hit detection, and it just felt a little loose at times, and plus you could cheese the game to get unlimited money. Lone Ranger, on the other hand, is a lot more balanced and a lot more polished. This game is more challenging in a good way, and the hit detection and controls feel very solid. However, there are a few instances where Lone Ranger definitely shows its age. The presentation can be extremely cumbersome. Like each time you talk to certain people, for example, you have to wait for the text to scroll as they ask once again, would you like to hear what I have to say? Yes, I wouldn't be here otherwise. Jeez. Who are you? Screw you, buddy. Thanks for wasting my time. Also, as solid as the gameplay is here, this is a long playthrough, and it gets repetitive. I appreciate the gameplay variety, but sometimes the top down battles really get old after a while, and unlike RPGs, there's no item that you can take that'll help you avoid these battles, so that sucks. I should mention that there is a password system here as well, so at least this isn't a case where you have to sit through this long ass game in one playthrough. However, there's no checkpoints, so if you die, you start all the way back at the beginning of each mission, and that's really a bummer. But still, Lone Ranger is a very good game. Yeah, it drags a bit, and the fact that you have to talk to everyone kinda sucks, but the action is well done. The first person stages are pretty impressive, the music is spot on, and the visual presentation is top notch. Plus, this game really gets tough toward the end without getting ridiculously unfair, and I appreciate that. I also appreciate the gameplay variety here with four different gameplay modes, plus a couple different minigames you can play in town. This is another pricey NES cartridge that can go from anywhere between $30 and $40, and it's not available anywhere else, so this is one where you'll want to, and say it with me, play it any way you can. All right, I wanna thank you for watching, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.