Functional simultaneous co-op is, or at least was, tricky business. Even the flagship Nintendo games of the Super Nintendo era, Super Mario World and Donkey Kong Country, could not manage simultaneous co-op, instead forcing players to take turns. This weakness on the part of Nintendo was a boon for third party developers like Data East which came up with titles like Joe & Mac, also known as Caveman Ninja. With a new collection of the three Caveman Ninja coming out next week, I recently played through the title I remember best, Joe & Mac 2: Lost in the Tropics.
It’s easy to see how this colorful game could make a strong impression on me as a child. This isn’t the world of cavemen as seen through the dinosaurvision of fifties-era sitcoms like the Flintstones. No, Joe & Mac is the world of cavemen as seen through the dinosaurvision of children who love dinosaurs, with epic boss fights against screen-filling beasts and big oafish cavemen smacking each other with clubs. This doesn’t just go for the bad guys. The game is called Joe & Mac, and not just Joe, because you and your partner can engage in a little friendly fire. Just, preferably not in a room loaded with enemies.
The core mechanics of the game are quite solid. This being a later Super Nintendo title, there are attempts to move past simple side scrolling arcade style gameplay. These elements are…mostly pointless. No real power-ups, some food, and flowers to I guess try and marry a cavewoman? The “mostly” caveat is in there because if you think like a kid, not in terms of efficient gameplaying but just general roleplaying, these are all fun things to do. The Caveman Ninja world is more like a playground than it is a clear gameplay aesthetic.
I doubt very much I actually finished the game as a kid, as the final level is a boss rush that I wouldn’t quite describe as unfair, but it is rather tedious since all the dinosaur themed bosses have very simple patterns. And they have to be beaten largely flawlessly for the player to even have a shot at beating the caveman Gork, first in his normal form and then his final one. Gork was a tough enough boss the first time around the player was allowed to fight him without even having to go through a full platforming level first.
Fortunately, his final form isn’t as tough as it looks. Lots of hit points, to be sure, but he can almost always be attacked safely. Round 1 of Gork is a problem mainly because he sucker punches you if you time your attack wrong. Which I have to say, I have always found to be a far more satisfying means of upping difficulty than just arbitrarily granting bosses temporary invincibility!
Overall, Joe & Mac 2: Lost in the Tropics succeeds in being more-or-less exactly what I remember it being. A bright, colorful game about cavemen and dinosaurs. All things considered, I think it’s aged quite well.
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