Climbing Up the Rough Side of the Mountain
A Review of Ice Climber
Genre: Action/Platformer
Number of Players: 1-2 (co-op)
Developer: Nintendo R&D1
Publisher: Nintendo
Release Date: January 30, 1985 (JP), October 18, 1985 (US), September 1, 1986 (EU)
Platform: NES
Available On: Arcade, PC-8801, X1, Famicom Disk System, e-Reader, Game Boy Advance
Ice Climber was one of the 18 launch titles to accompany the official release of the NES on October 18, 1985. This game was one of the less prestigious classics from the NES era that never reached my radar. I had never heard of it until 2004, when I started getting into Super Smash Bros. Melee on the GameCube. The Ice Climbers stood out to me since they were a duo of characters you controlled simultaneously. Their cutesy presentation won me over.
I still didn’t realize they were a deep cut from Nintendo’s past until Ice Climber was re-released on the Game Boy Advance later that same year. Finding myself intrigued, the game was an immediate purchase to add to my [still] paltry GBA library.
The main objective is to guide Popo (P1) and Nana (P2) to the top of the mountain while fending off enemies and avoiding hazards in their way. Each stage is divided into eight floors of ice, which you must break by busting through a section of said floor from below, thereby creating a vertical path upward. Above the 8th floor is a bonus area where you try to rack up additional points by collecting vegetables as you steadily make your way to the top while a timer counts down.
Once at the summit, you must hitch a ride on the flying condor that carries you to the next mountain. If you fall beyond the bottom of the bonus area or run out of time before reaching the condor, you’ll still move on to the next level. You just won’t get there in as much style as riding a big bird, showing everyone how cool you are. Though it does beg the question: if traveling by condor, why do the Ice Climbers always start the next stage at the foot of the next mountain? Do they just lose their grip and come tumbling down each time they grab a hold of the ‘ol bird? I guess some questions don’t have answers.
The two most persistent enemies in the game are the yeti creatures called Topi and the pesky red Nitpicker birds. The yeti constantly patrols the floor you are either on or trying to reach. If it discovers a hole on its current floor, the yeti will go back to its cave and return with a mound of ice to cover the gap (and any others it finds as well). Meanwhile, the avian Nitpickers flap their way across the screen, moving freely between floors.
As expected, both enemies are deadly to Popo and Nana upon contact. However, they can also be thwarted by hitting them with your handy-dandy mallet—the only means of defense against the hostilities of the mountain. Unfortunately, victory is short-lived, as defeated enemies quickly reappear a few seconds later.
The soundtrack is on par with the cheerfully frantic vibe of the early NES releases. The short loops of a few catchy tunes aptly complement the action on screen. I especially enjoy the jaunty rock ‘n’ roll motif in the music on the title screen and in bonus areas. It nicely contrasts the challenges of scaling an icy 8-bit mountain.
Hazards the Ice Climbers must avoid include icy floors that cause them to quickly slide in either direction (think conveyor belt mechanics in similar games). Vertical pillars hamper your freedom of movement, and ice sickles form and fall from the ceilings and moving clouds. Most of these hazards aren’t too difficult to manage around the other dangers Popo and Nana will confront.
However, the vertical pillar is particularly menacing. Any time you jump toward it, instead of bringing your character’s momentum to a stop, they bounce off the pillar in the opposite direction. This creates a problem when trying to coordinate your ascent to the next floor. Bouncing off a wall can easily cause you to fall down a chasm or smack into an enemy you were trying to evade.
If you linger around for too long without advancing the screen upward, you’ll meet the third antagonist, the polar bear. While not physically deadly to you, he serves the unique function of slamming the ground, causing the lowest floor to “collapse,” forcing you to get moving or perish should you still be on the lowest section when he shakes the ground.
These days, the idea of Nintendo ever releasing a first-party platformer with poor jumping mechanics is unfathomable—doubly so if we’re talking about anything that had Shigeru Miyamoto’s touch. But such was the case at the time, as Ice Climber was developed before Super Mario Bros. Miyamoto and crew hadn’t yet nailed down the physics of leaping across an abyss to reach higher ground, and boy does it show here.
Whether you’re trying to reach the next platform or simply cross a gap in the floor, your character jumps in a tight arc. The game doesn’t account for momentum based on the character’s speed at the time of the jump, causing it to feel inelegant and unnatural most of the time. The lack of momentum physics is especially problematic when attempting to leap from a cloud platform that’s moving in the opposite direction of the section you need to reach.
Establishing a firm footing when landing from a jump is particularly difficult if you land near the edge of a platform. It’s especially vexing during the timed bonus sections, where platforms are placed in such a way that players are constantly forced to take risky leaps. It often results in your character missing the higher ground due to what feels like a technicality, more so than a lack of accuracy on the part of the player.
The off-kilter jump mechanics come at a high cost, since they overshadow the other gameplay elements to the game’s detriment. It tends to have a demoralizing effect after the first few levels, and the realization sets in that it’s only going to get more difficult going forward with additional hazards that you won’t feel like navigating due to the frustration of trying to execute what should be a simple maneuver. It’s unfortunate because the game itself is otherwise pleasantly simple and conducive to longer gameplay sessions than the average player is likely to devote to it, thanks to the uneven jump physics.
While it’s true that Donkey Kong—another Nintendo platformer that predated Super Mario Bros.—didn’t have great jump physics either, the game didn’t require much more from you than leaping over barrels and across the occasional moving elevator. Ice Climber, on the other hand, puts a heavier emphasis on aerial platforming, which breeds dissatisfaction when the mechanics for said platforming aren’t equal to the precision demanded of the player.
The unpolished jump physics detract from the cute, quirky presentation and make what could have been a more enjoyable game feel less so. However, if you can look past its shortcomings, Ice Climber can be a fun game in short bursts. If you’ve never played it before but are curious to try, I recommend the Nintendo Switch Online version, since its rewind feature lets you retry those arduous leaps that newcomers will undoubtedly struggle to land. While Ice Climber deserves recognition for its role in ensuring variety for the successful launch of the NES, playing the game is nothing short of an uphill struggle.