Lost Classics: Willow (NES, Arcade)

Before there was Lord of the Rings (the films, not the books) or Harry Potter, there was Willow. Co-produced by George Lucas and Ron Howard, and starring Warwick Davis (who had previously played as one of the Ewoks in Star Wars Episode VI) and Val Kilmer (long before he played his part in the destruction of the Batman film franchise in the mid 90s), Willow told the tale of a dwarf’s quest to rescue a baby from an evil sorceress queen. George had high hopes of Willow becoming Lucas’s fantasy equivalent to Star Wars, but it met low numbers at the box office and mixed reviews from critics. However, enough fans liked it enough for the film to gain cult status, and Capcom was fond enough of the property to release a pair of games based on Willow, one for the NES and the other for arcade.

The NES version was similar to Zelda, and other action role playing games of the period. However, the game had little to do with the movie’s plot, and almost seemed that it was planned to be another game altogether before deciding to make it into Willow. Taking control of Willow, players travel throughout the land to defeat the evil Bavmorda. You gain experience points, levels, magic, and new weaponry like in other action RPGs. There are even a few boss battles. While the game has very little to do with the plot, the game is still enjoyable, and it was head and shoulders above other games based on existing licenses at the time.

The arcade game is a platformer. Unlike the NES version, the arcade game sticks closely to the movie’s plot. The game features six levels, and players alternate between Willow and Madmartigan as they rescue the holy infant from the evil queen Bavmorda. Willow makes use of magic attacks, while Madmartigan uses his sword. You can buy upgrades at a shop. The game recreates several key scenes from the movie, and the CPS1 arcade board the game utilizes creates some pretty impressive visuals for its time.

Along with the NES and Arcade games was also a crappy Amiga game (not developed by Capcom) which contained a series of poorly implemented minigames, so it isn’t worth going over in this article. As for the console and Arcade ports, fantasy fans would do well to check them out, especially if you like games such as Zelda. Even if the movie didn’t do the numbers that Lucas wanted, it was still good enough to gain fans, and the video game tie-ins were a lot better than the typical licensed fare. You’ll have to do a little hunting if you want to check these games out, as there is little chance of either of them showing up on any download service anytime soon Virtual Console or otherwise.