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Lynxara already mentioned this week's most worthy Virtual Console download, Axelay, but Blue's Journey is also worth checking out if you're up for an arcade-style platformer with colorful graphics, more depth than you'd expect, and a strangely brutal level of difficulty. If you're the patient type with a taste for the cutesy, you're really weird! And also Blue's Journey might be something you'd enjoy.

Blue's Journey was originally released in arcades and for the Neo Geo home console in 1991, and quickly found success and multiple sequels and...haha, just kidding! Blue's Journey was almost universally despised. The game was a difficult find in arcades, where its relatively slow pace probably didn't win too many quarters. The home version found even fewer fans, given its original price tag of $200 and the fact that it could be finished in about an hour. Now that Blue's Journey has become available on a more widely available format (and at a less ludicrous price), it's easier to appreciate it for what it is.

Think of Blue's Journey as a slightly more sophisticated Super Mario Bros. 2. You control a little guy named Blue. Blue can hop around and collect a variety of weapons to take out enemies. A major gameplay mechanic involves picking up downed opponents and flinging them at other enemies. Blue can also shrink at any time to gain access to hidden passages and shops, where powerups can be found or bought. The game otherwise features all the collectibles and butt-bouncing you'd expect from an early-'90s platformer, and there's a goofy story to complement it all, shakily translated SNKglish and all. Remember to say OKEY to play the LOTTERY DREWING at the end of each level.

The gameplay may be familiar, but it's the little things that make Blue's Journey worth playing. The experience has a lighthearted vibe to it, and shares a similar visual style with Sega's later Monster World games. Despite the cuteness, it's pretty hard in parts. Checkpoints during levels are generous, and you have infinite continues, but the bosses may stump you for a while. None are unfairly difficult, though, and experienced players can expect to beat Blue's Journey in an hour. There's plenty of reason to replay it, though, as branching paths mean that you'll only see half of the game in each playthrough, and you'll definitely want to go back and see its multiple endings (some of which are actually pretty hilarious), along with many fakeout bad endings you can find throughout the levels.

Blue's Journey is an appealing, likeable underdog of a game, and given that it's one of the few titles in the Neo Geo's catalog that isn't a generic 2D fighter (uh oh, my biases are showing!), it makes for a perfect introduction to the Neo Geo hardware for anyone scared away by the similar but incredibly difficult Magician Lord.

This video gives some idea of how Blue's Journey plays, though it's easier than the author makes it look. He can't even beat the first level!

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