The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Space Mutants

Moby ID: 4386
DOS Specs
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Description official description

Bart vs. The Space Mutants is a platform game where the player goes into the role of Bart Simpson (from the TV show The Simpsons) and must stop the Space Mutants from invading Springfield.

On each of the five levels, Bart must collect (or get rid of) the ingredients that the Space Mutants are planning to use to build their machine, such as purple objects or balloons. He also has to collect enough "proof" of the aliens existence (brown coins left behind when they are jumped on), so his family members will help him when he meets a boss (characters such as Nelson and Sideshow Bob). This won't be easy since the Space Mutants are "using" human bodies as disguise. In order to discover who are the real Space Mutants, Bart must use his X-ray Specs.

The ways Bart can get rid of those objects sought by the Space Mutants are numerous. For instance, in the first stage, Bart must get rid of purple objects. He can dye them red, cover them, wash them, etc. Some even involve a little puzzle solving, like playing a trick on Moe to make him get out of the bar.

Bart also has some coins that can be used in many ways throughout the game, like buying things, getting devices operating, etc. Those coins are essential to solve some puzzles in the game.

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Credits (DOS version)

12 People

The Simpsons Characters Created by
Game Design by
  • Imagineering Inc.
Original Score by
Story Conceived by
Game Developed by
  • Arc Developments
Game Produced by
Software Engineering by
Visual Engineering by
Audio Engineering by
Additional Sounds by
Additional Graphics by

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 68% (based on 42 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.3 out of 5 (based on 127 ratings with 7 reviews)

Eat My Cartridge, Man!

The Good
The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Space Mutants for the Sega Genesis (or Mega Drive for PAL gamers) is noticeably improved from the original NES Nintendo edition.

Here, the Simpson's characters and the beloved town of Springfield look much closer to the television series.

The famous musical score also sounds much better on the Genesis, in comparison to the original Nintendo edition.

The Bad
Once you get beyond the nice visual and audio improvements, many of the faults with the Nintendo edition have been left intact on the Genesis.

Young Bart can still only take two direct hits before he loses a life and his health is only restored after completing a level. You will need to collect the maximum number of extra lives if you plan on beating this game, without using the Galoob Game Genie device.

Each level requires Bart to accomplish two main tasks -- within a fairly limited amount of time. First, certain objects in each level must be stolen or modified; i.e. balloons, hats, shoes or purple objects so as to prevent them from being used by the evil space aliens.

Originally, prior to the Internet becoming mainstream, it was not always clear what items you needed to collect or where they were in each level.

Even if you knew what type of item needed to be "obtained", you had to content with an fast moving timer and, again, your inability to survive more then two direct hits.

Secondly, it is VERY difficult -- if not impossible -- to defeat the boss at the end of each level, unless you have persuaded a Simpsons family member to help you out.

How do you do what, you may be asking? Well, it is another tedious pain in the you-know-what.

Some of the Springfield residents wandering around the levels are really space aliens. If you carefully, jump on these residents heads then they will drop an icon that spells one letter in a family member's name.

If, you get enough of the icons to spell out a character's name, then they will be on hand to give you some much needed assistance when battling a boss.

On paper this probably sounded like a fun idea. Just like the idea of collecting hats in a indoor shopping mall, may have sounded like a really, really, really, really fun concept for a Simpsons video game....on paper.

Yet, most of the time these objectives are tedious and, because of the cruel timer and the fragile (and rather passive) nature of your character, frustratingly difficult.

True, Bart does get to make a prank call early on in the game and, yes, he can collect various prankster-type items.

However, his character is still amazingly passive because most of these "offensive" and cool items are not used against the army of space aliens plotting to take over the world.

These cool items are used primarily to help you change an object's color or help you collect shoes or hats. What teenager wouldn't love the opportunity to collect cool, juvenile-type items so that you can....collect hats and shoes.

Wait, I have changed my mind. Their is no way such an idea could have looked remotely cool on paper, unless it was written by the Springfield Principal or Mr. Burns.

Last, but not least, it should be noted that the folks at "Flying Edge" (Cool Name....NOT!) had the habit of reversing the standard game play format for Genesis video games.

So along with the flaws found in the original Nintendo edition, this version adds in bad control mechanics. This was not just a one time flaw. Just about EVERY single Flying Edge video game I played, made this same mistake. Hmm.

The Bottom Line
The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Space Mutants for the Sega Genesis looks and sounds better then the original, Nintendo edition of the game.

The game features many of the familiar characters and locations from the TV series and, on paper, the idea of young Bart stopping space aliens with bottle rockets and other such tools does sound cool.

Sadly, the flaws from the original Nintendo edition were brought over to the Genesis edition, along with some new flaws.

Diehard Simpsons fans will want to check out the game. Other gamers, even those that enjoy the TV series, will probably feel like telling the game to go "eat" its-self or something else, less polite.

Genesis · by ETJB (428) · 2014

A good use of a lucrative license - a game worthy of attention

The Good
Arc resisted the temptation to simply do a basic platform game, and came up with an intricately designed game likely to also appeal to non-fans. Each level is significantly different in terms of what needs to be done to change, destroy or conceal the objects the aliens require, and the control system allows a wide number of commands to be executed simply.

A lot of detail from the show was incorporated, with lots of familiar characters and settings, all drawn in the show's subtle style.

The difficulty level was pitched quite well - older players would be open it for a while, while younger players (who made up the bulk of the Simpsons' fanbase in those days) wouldn't get frustrated too soon.

The Bad
One or two objects were unnaturally difficult to remove, often requiring pixel-perfect position.

The Bottom Line
A challenging and well designed platform puzzler in which you play Bart Simpson, who has to convince everyone else that Space Mutants exist and are trying to destroy the earth. Meanwhile he also has to stop them collecting the equipment they need.

Amiga · by Martin Smith (81669) · 2004

A good start for the Simpsons

The Good
Bart vs the Space Mutants is the first major Simpsons videogame licensee that I know of, and as expected with most licensed cash-ins the game was simply a clone of the most popular genre at the time with the particular licensee's characters and locations slapped on... or was it??

Well, yeah it was. But thanks to a series of interesting design choices the game remains an oddity in the world of NES-generation platform games. You see, the evil space mutants (those giant green monsters from space that have become a fixture in the series) have crafted a sinister plot to take over the earth, and good 'ol Bart Simpson is the only one who knows about it and since no one believes him, the only one able to stop the aliens. One would think since this is "one of those games" that Bart's quest involved nothing but having you jump around Springfield while hitting/avoiding the alien freaks lurking around town and collecting coins and similar standard-issue items in your eternal quest to get to the next level... Right? Wrong. The developers while still making a game that appealed to the most kid-friendly genre at the time (a fact worth mentioning considering that the Simpson's fanbase was still pretty young in those days) also managed to inject a series of somewhat deeper gameplay concepts that included collecting evidence to help gather the help of the many familiar Simpsons characters, and also by including the interesting idea of having to foil the alien's plan indirectly.

What does that mean? That you aren't going to win if you kill every baddie around as in most games of these type, what you have to do is defeat the enemy's source of power, which is misteriously related to the color purple. What this means is that you have to explore the levels in detail hunting down these purple blotches and nullify them someway. Sometimes they are obvious and a dose of your trusty spray-can will do the trick, but sometimes they require you to think a little and solve a small jumping puzzle or do some sort of small deduction work in order to find out just how to cover that purple billboard or clean that purple dog...

All in all a challenging and fun twist on a tried and true concept that doesn't boggle the young minds craving for jump-n-run action and which uses the basic control scheme used since Mario Bros to introduce such concepts as inventory and money management (used to buy new and better weapons), to form a nice cocktail between the two.

The Bad
The NES version really didn't do this game justice. Sure, the controls and design seemed fit for the system but the graphics and sounds seemed like crap to me at the time seeing as how the game featured such many large sprites and complex backgrounds that were clearly out of the NES's league. Nowadays, looking at the screenshots of the other versions it becomes quite clear just how much were all of us stuck on the NES missing... Boy just look at those Amiga graphics...

The Bottom Line
A typical platform game based on a lucrative license that nonetheless manages to avoid the usual pitfalls of these adaptations and even manages to include some clever touches that make it worth noticing in the sea of cloned platformers that was the gaming industry in those days. Worth picking up, but while the NES version is playable why neglect the eye candy you can get from any of the other, more powerful versions like the Amiga or Genesis one?

NES · by Zovni (10504) · 2004

[ View all 7 player reviews ]

Trivia

Amiga bundle

The game was bundled with the Amiga for about a year, in a bundle called Cartoon Classics which also included Captain Planet, Lemmings, and Deluxe Paint 3. The pack was unchanged when the Amiga 500 Plus model launched. Because the Amiga didn't come with a joystick at the time, the bundled version was edited to allow for keyboard control.

Amiga version

For the Amiga version, Arc Development decided to include an animated opening sequence in the style of the actual Simpsons show. In order for them to do this they had to send each frame to Matt Groening and he hand drew over each one. Despite this effort, the animation still looks poor in comparison to the show.

Awards

  • Commodore Force
    • December 1993 (Issue 13) – #85 “Readers' Top 100”

Information also contributed by Martin Smith

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Psykax.

Commodore 64 added by Quapil. Game Gear added by chirinea. SEGA Master System added by Sciere. ZX Spectrum added by Martin Smith. Atari ST added by Terok Nor. NES added by Unicorn Lynx. Amiga added by MAT. Amstrad CPC added by Katakis | カタキス. Genesis added by Syed GJ.

Additional contributors: Johnny "ThunderPeel2001" Walker, Alaka, FatherJack.

Game added June 28, 2001. Last modified January 20, 2024.