The Addams Family (Sega Master System Review)

The Addams Family
Developed by Arc Developments
First Released September, 1993
NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED

See those little blue things? They’re soap, and unlike all the other enemies in the game, they’re f’n instakill no matter how much life you have left. There’s no consistency at all in Addams Family.

I was cautiously optimistic for Addams Family. I consider the SNES game to be one of the best licensed games that nobody knows about and a genuine hidden gem. Sadly, my fears that this was going to be closer to the unrelated and inferior NES Addams were confirmed. Which isn’t to say 8-bit Addams is unambitious. There seems to be something about this property that gets a game designer’s creative juices flowing. What really wrecks Addams family is it has some of the most unimaginably terrible collision detection I’ve ever seen in my life. Addams Family on the Master System has Super Mario-style hop ‘n bop combat. Just jump on the enemies. Easy peasy, right? Well, not so fast. Because I was constantly passing right through enemies and taking damage, even though I was CLEARLY, objectively, hitting them dead-center from well above where their sprites were. It was absolutely unbelievable. I actually think it might be the worst collision detection in the history of platform games.

Now mind you, Gomez “blinks” in the literal sense when you take damage, but you don’t blink in the “temporary invincibility” sense. So your life very quickly starts to drain when you take damage. When you’re passing right through enemies, that’s sort of a big deal. But, once again, there’s no consistency to any of it. So, occasionally you have situations like this, where I’m literally standing with a spike up my butthole and not taking any damage at all.

There is literally a spike ON ME here, and I passed harmlessly through it. When you can’t even count on basic gaming rules of what is and isn’t going to hurt you, how can you expect to find enjoyment in a game?

On top of all the collision inconsistency, Addams Family is full of dickhead game design. Things like entering rooms and having enemies literally be right next to the door that rush you, or changing the rules on you and having things be instakills. If a spike through your body isn’t an instakill, why would a bar of soap be? Yea, chances are if you slip on a bar of soap in the shower, you’re going to die. But if you fall off a tree ass-first into razor sharp spikes that go up to the small of your back, you’re not just going to suffer a paper cut. The funny thing is that all the platforming tropes are here and all of them are “worst ever” contenders, including abysmal slipping-and-sliding on ice. Addams Family probably has the worst ice-based physics in gaming history as well. The ice level is where I threw in the towel. The fact that there’s instakill gaps, then nearly unavoidable falling spikes and snowballs was the last straw.

IN THEORY there’s gaps to allow you to avoid the snowballs, but because it takes you several seconds to build up momentum to run forward on the ice, the next snowball will be right there to squash you anyway. This is horrible.

Addams Family on the Sega Master System has to be a contender for the worst game the side scrolling platform genre has ever seen. And I’m really annoyed because the actual concept of rescuing the family members and exploring this vast mansion and landscape can and has worked. On the SNES. Here on the Sega Master System, the actual rooms are all unique and distinguishable from each-other, which is incredible for an 8-bit game. But the mechanics of exploring and interacting with this world fail in so many different ways that I question if any time was allowed for play testing. Because folks, this is as bad as it gets.
Verdict: NO!