is a

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

produced by

Konami , is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company, video game and entertainment company headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, Chūō, Tokyo, it also produces and distributes trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, pachinko machin ...

. It is the second game in the ''

Ganbare Goemon , known as ''Goemon'' and ''Mystical Ninja'' internationally, is a video game series created and produced by Konami. Etsunobu Ebisu is the joint producer of the franchise. These games revolve around the main character, Goemon a ...

'' series (sometimes known in English as ''Mystical Ninja'') and the first to be released on a video game console and home computer. It was initially released for the

Family Computer The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit Third generation of video game consoles, third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the commonly known as the The NES, a redes ...

on July 30, 1986 and later released for the

MSX2 MSX is a standardized home computer architecture, announced by Microsoft and ASCII Corporation on June 16, 1983. It was initially conceived by Microsoft as a product for the Eastern sector, and jointly marketed by Kazuhiko Nishi, then vice- ...

a year later. The Famicom version was re-released in

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

only for the

Game Boy Advance The (GBA) is a 32-bit handheld game console developed, manufactured and marketed by Nintendo as the successor to the Game Boy Color. It was released in Japan on March 21, 2001, in North America on June 11, 2001, in the PAL region on June 22, 2 ...

under the

Famicom Mini This is a list of games that are part of the ''Classic NES Series'' in North America, in Japan, and ''NES Classics'' in Europe and Australia. The series consists of emulated Nintendo Entertainment System, Nintendo Entertainment System#Regional ...

label and for the

Wii The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America and in December 2006 for most other Regional lockout, regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major ho ...

Nintendo 3DS The is a handheld game console produced by Nintendo. It was announced in March 2010 and unveiled at E3 2010 as the successor to the Nintendo DS. The system features backward compatibility with Nintendo DS video games. As an eighth-generatio ...

and

Wii U The Wii U ( ) is a home video game console developed by Nintendo as the successor to the Wii. Released in late 2012, it is the first eighth-generation video game console and competed with Microsoft's Xbox One and Sony's PlayStation 4. The W ...

under the

Virtual Console A virtual console (VC) – also known as a virtual terminal (VT) – is a conceptual combination of the keyboard and display for a computer user interface. It is a feature of some Unix-like operating systems such as Linux, BSD, illumos, Unix ...

service. A direct sequel, ''Ganbare Goemon 2'', was released for the Famicom on January 4, 1989.

Gameplay

The game revolves around the main character, Goemon, and his exploits. As the name suggests, his character was based on

Ishikawa Goemon was a legendary Japanese outlaw hero who stole gold and other valuables to give to the poor. He and his son were boiled alive in public after their failed assassination attempt on the Sengoku period warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi. His legend lives ...

, the noble thief of Japanese folklore. Unlike its sequels, this game still doesn't feature the comic situation and strange characters that define the series, and Goemon is portrayed as a noble thief rather than a plain hero. The game plays as a top view action/adventure game (similar to ''

The Legend of Zelda ''The Legend of Zelda'' is an action-adventure game franchise created by the Japanese game designers Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. It is primarily developed and published by Nintendo, although some portable installments and re-rele ...

'') though it is separated by stages. In each level Goemon must find three passes in order to advance. Some of these passes are found in boxes, secret passages or can be bought. After finishing all the stages, the game will present the player with a new Japanese province (eight in total), but all the levels will remain the same. The ending, however, will be different. Like the rest of the series, Goemon can be powered-up if certain items are found and/or bought, which can be lost after a few hits. The MSX version has the option to be played in turns by two players, with the second player playing as a ninja named

Nezumi Kozō is the nickname of , a Japanese thief and folk hero who lived in Edo (present-day Tokyo) during the Edo period.Goodman, David G. (1986). Pg 256-257. "After Apocalypse: Four Japanese Plays of Hiroshima and Nagasaki", New York: Columbia Universit ...

, which is the basis of Goemon's sidekick Ebisumaru. In addition, unlike the Family Computer version, the game has six more provinces with completely new levels after finishing the game once.

References

External links

''Ganbare Goemon! Karakuri Dōchū''
at

MobyGames MobyGames is a commercial website that catalogs information on video games and the people and companies behind them via crowdsourcing. This includes nearly 300,000 games for hundreds of platforms. The site is supported by banner ads and a small ...

''Ganbare Goemon 2''
at

1986 video games Game Boy Advance games Ganbare Goemon games Japan-exclusive video games MSX2 games Nintendo Entertainment System games Mobile games Single-player video games Video games based on Japanese mythology Video games developed in Japan Video games set in Japan Video games scored by Michiru Yamane Virtual Console games for Nintendo 3DS Virtual Console games for Wii Virtual Console games for Wii U {{konami-stub