The Guardian Legend

The Guardian Legend

NES - USA - 1st edition.

Developer Compile Publisher Irem Corp., Brøderbund Software, Inc., Bergsala AB Published 1988-02-05 Platforms NES Genres Action-adventure, Multi-genre, Scrolling shooter Themes Action, Adventure, Science fiction Series Guardic Distribution Commercial

The Guardian Legend is a science fiction-themed multi-genre video game which marries an action-adventure with a scrolling shooter developed by Compile and published in Japan by Irem for the Famicom on 1988-02-05, then in the USA by Brøderbund Software for the NES in April 1989. The game is the sequel to Guardic, and the second and final game in the Guardic series.

The Guardian Legend is set in the distant future where Earth discovers a massive derelict space station on a collision course with the planet. You play as a cyborg woman who must infiltrate the space station and trigger its self-destruct mechanism before it destroys the Earth. Unfortunately, while the initial inhabitants of the space station are long gone, it is now home to a wide variety of hostile and powerful alien lifeforms who won't let you so easily invade their homes.

Personal

Own?	No.
Won?	Yes.
Finished	2024-09-21.

I first came across this game in my late teens while randomly playing unfamiliar NES games in an emulator. It looked pretty interesting, but after getting into the maze with inaccessible doors, I quickly got bored. I would continue to boot up this game over the years, often just to hear the very fine title music, and even tried to play it in earnest once, but, not realizing how the power-up system worked, I was quickly overwhelmed in the scrolling shooter sections. After watching reviews by NES Works and the Hungry Goriya, I became more interested in trying to play it properly.

Review

6	5	6	7	7

Best Version: NES

Good

• This is one of the few video games of the 1980s with a female protagonist.
• I really enjoyed the game's music composed by Masanori Miyamoto and Takeshi Santo.
• The graphics are pretty good. The bosses and mini bosses are particularly well-drawn, as are the larger monsters in the corridors. I also like the Guardian's animation and the smiling red and blue landers.
• The in-game map really helps keep you on track without giving much away.
• The large variety of secondary weapons lets you play the game with a variety of different play styles, and letting the player choose which ones they want to buy (at least a little at the game's onset) lets them choose their own play style.
• I liked how each of the main corridors is locked with a different type of puzzle whose solution to open is hinted at elsewhere in the space station.
• The final boss rush was a welcome sight and it feels nice to see just how powerful you've become.
• The special corridor-only mode was a nice addition to the game.

Bad

• There is a large discrepancy between the difficulty of the levels and the difficulty of the bosses. Not long after you receive a few weapon and armor power-ups the scrolling shooter corridors become particularly easy. For the entire mid-game, these didn't pose even a mild threat and my energy never dipped below half. It was only when I got to the bosses that I actually had difficulties. This became rather annoying as, each time I died to a boss, I would have to trudge all the way back to the corridor and fight my way through the very easy scrolling shooter section just for another attempt to learn the boss's pattern.
• It's pretty easy to fill up on health and chips, and, when you're full, there is no benefit to killing enemies. This means, most of the time when you're exploring in the station, the enemies are just a hindrance to be avoided. Although you do get minor bonuses from acquiring a large score, you have to kill a lot of enemies for it to matter.
• A lot of the general enemies on the surface of Naju are uninspired. They don't look particularly interesting and have boring AI. Invincible discs that move back and forth? No thanks.
• Enemies fully respawn every time you leave a room. This is kind of annoying and makes you appreciate how The Legend of Zelda remembers the number of living monsters per room.
• While the designers let you buy a handful of power-ups of your choosing early in the game, because most are awarded in a fixed order, the optimal weapon per boss is pretty much the same each time you play the game. I think they missed an opportunity by not awarding them at random which would force the player to have to alter their play style with each subsequent attempt.
• Several previous games on the NES had used a battery backup by this point, especially by the time the US release was made, so it would be nice to not have to enter a 32-character password.
• I really don't like the grating sound of the default weapon.
• Despite the bullets of your standard gun becoming more spaced out as it is upgraded, it doesn't have a larger collision box for static targets. In fact, it actually becomes harder to hit boxes when it reaches its maximum power.
• Bad collision detection allows you to walk through the red barriers on the map. You can also walk into the walls in several rooms, but not through them.

Ugly

• Nothing.

Media

Box Art

• 

  Famicom - Japan. A fantastic painting of the cyborg heroine. It blends futuristic machinery with Renaissance style. This is my favorite cover.

• 

  A high-resolution scan of the art, minus some of the border.

• 

  NES - USA. A scary looming face. This art was included on the Japanese poster. Not sure what the intention was as it doesn't apply to any of the bosses.

• 

  I vectorized the USA logo.

• 

  NES - Europe. Looks like a sci-fi painting from the 50's. Not bad.

• 

  I vectorized the European logo.

Documentation

• 

  Manual - NES - USA.

• 

  Poster - Japan. Shows the full art.

• 

  Poster - Japan - Front.

• 

  Poster - Japan - Back.

• 

  Strategy guide - Japan.

Maps

• 

  Naju - With spoilers.

Font

The NES game's font is in the video game font collection.

Fan Art

• 

  Fan art by jotozoto.

Videos

Review - NES Works.

Review - Hungry Goriya.

Longplay - Famicom.

Longplay - NES - Normal mode.

Longplay - NES - TGL mode.

Representation

Strong female character?	Pass	The game's heroine is a woman.
Bechdel test?	Fail	There is only one woman.
Strong person of color character?	Fail	The sole humanoid doesn't look like a person of color.
Queer character?	Fail	There are no queer characters.

Titles

Language	Native	Transliteration	Translation
English	The Guardian Legend
Japanese	ガーディック外伝	Gadikku Daiden	Legend of Goardic

Links