Hamtaro: Rainbow Rescue Part #8 - Slipping back to the SNES.

Part 8: Slipping back to the SNES.

Now that Howdy and Stan have gone to try catching the blue bird on their own again, this troublemaking frog keeps us from backtracking into Sunny Pond.

So for now, let us push onward to Ticky-Ticky Park proper.

Now that Stan isn’t around to keep us from doing so, of course.

Pinecones? You mean, like the one… right behind you?!

The last obstacle between us and the park is whichever jerk is shaking pinecones and dropping rocks out of this tree. Tip-Top Treetop isn’t too difficult if you employ the usual tactic of sticking to the bottom of the screen, thus having more time to react to what’s coming.

There’s ten bits of candy in this game, so it should be a fairly easy 60 sunflower points.

Once we climb up, it’s immediately back down.

Now that we’ve gotten over the hedge, we’re finally inside the park! There also seems to be something stuck in that other tree, but we don’t have enough Ham-Hams to reach it yet.

Today, my children are at the park for the very first time. I feel a bit nervous!

I’m not sure they’re old enough to be able to see, let alone get very far. You should be fine, Mama-Ham.

Heading south from the intersection leads to where the soccer goal is set up, which will make for a nice shortcut if we can get rid of it.

We may need to practice a bit more, though. Heading back and east this time takes us to…

Sandy!

Look over there! On top of the fountain!

It must have flown here after we saw it!

Ah, our inability to swim rears its ugly head again.

Excuse me, but do you Ham-Hams want to get across this puddle? Keep moving forward and you’ll see a swing. A pigeon sits in the next tree over. It can carry you over the puddle! Guide it through a Ham Game to get to the other side. Did you get that?

Yep-P!

OK! Good luck.

He leant a little bit heavily on the fourth wall there, didn’t he? Also, why aren’t we just shoving this other guy aside and walking around the puddle? Taking flight seems like a bit of an extreme solution to this problem.

Then again, who doesn’t want to ride a (comparatively) huge bird?

Okay, time to go north from Mama-Ham then.

If you can’t jump rope, they won’t let you pass.

Why hello there, blatant check to make sure we got Sandy in our party.

Final Fantasy IX is my favourite of the series, and Mario Party 2 was the only one I actually owned. If there’s one thing I can do, it’s jump-rope minigames.

You’re welcome, little guy! Now people can get to the swings without having to ‘prove their worth’ like some kind of hero.

Continuing on, this couple seems to be encouraging their kid to jump off the fence. I assume it’s for the insurance.

Nah, only joking. It’s actually a sidequest prompt. There were a bunch of trampolines back in the hamster-sized playground, but we wouldn’t be able to get one here with that soccer goal in the way. Another one for the backburner, then.

Heading east from the jumping spot brings us to the swings, which someone says we could use to launch ourselves into the sandbox… if that hamster with the sweet sideburns wasn’t using it as a place to read his newspaper.

Of course, it’s actually up this tree that we want to go. Let’s get a look at this pigeon…

...Hmm.

So, do you think they like hemp, black beans or a racing blend?

Regardless, it’s time for Sandy to take to the skies, and…

Experience the glory of Mode 7 style graphics.

Isn’t it glorious?

This minigame just requires moving left and right to pop the red balloons, though some of the bonus candy balloons are occasionally positioned to lure you away from the next one and cause you to fail.

Ah, such a graceful dismount by the guys here.

Now, you can ride the pigeon back to the swings as a separate minigame, one with ten balloons instead of five. Sooo… Enjoy this minigame in motion!

On the slide side of things, we don’t have quite enough Ham-Hams to safely drop onto the slide itself, so we’re going to need to wander around on the ground a bit instead.

The base of the tree has two more carrots for our collection, and this martial arts hamster. How’s it going, buddy?

Wait, what?

What?!

Okay, this is now a JRPG apparently.

So, uh… Yeah. The Karate Ham battle is repeatable, and each Ham-Ham has their own set of abilities to use. Scrit-T and Tack-Q are attack moves (the latter seeming stronger), KrmpKrmp restores health, Zuzuzu wastes your turn… And Goodgo cheers up a party member who has lost all their hearts, reviving them but not giving back the candy bonus for keeping them in action.

The white and brown belts deal two damage if their attacks connect (and they don’t just waste their turns staring into space), but the black belt really means business. This attack deals five damage. He can one-shot four out of five of our available combatants.

So we end up getting our butts kicked pretty hard before managing to take the trio down. You get 30 points plus five for everyone who avoids crying, plus it’s a pretty nifty little experience.

Don’t train too hard. Please, don’t.

The next screen just has someone wondering how far that soccer ball would go if someone went down the slide, but the one after that…

Leads us right to the other side of the puddle, which means we’re right next to the fountain where the blue bird is!

It’s you guys. Oh! And Pashmina, too!

How nice to see you too, Dexter.

What are you doing?

The blue bird is right there! Why haven’t you caught it?

Oh, yes, I see.

but there’s no way I can lift it alone.

Alright, let’s take a look at this fancy toy boat.

It’s heavy.

Looks like we can’t lift it even with all of us.

Why Stan?

Pashmina, even a favor like that is too…

Oh, what could possibly be going wrong now?

The eyepatch chicken is back, and he has reinforcements! Hopefully not all five of the Chicky-Chickies are here to harass the Ham-Hams.

CHEEP CHEEP, CHEEP CHEEP

...Everyone. Did you all get that?

How are we supposed to know what that meant? It’s clear they’re angry about something.

CHEEP CHEEP, CHEEP CHEEP

Uh-ohhhh.

What could it be? They look really angry.

We didn’t do anything wrong! Did we…?

What’s he doing that for?

We haven’t done anything!

Wh-what did you do, Oxnard?!

We can’t use the boat, but we can work together.

You’re right! Let’s go look for Howdy and Stan!

Well, before we go and stop that brawl, let’s take a quick peek down at the proper park entrance.

Ticky-Ticky Park is once again peaceful today.

Sadly, I believe you’re mistaken. We can’t rely on the park guard in this instance, so let’s head back toward our wayward friends.

...After some more minor diversions. I’m sure the blue bird will be fine; it can fight off a lone chick, right?

Getting up on the slide lets us play Slip and Dodge, which is basically like those slippery hills back on Flower Ranch, only with more obstacles to watch out for. Seems the guy at the top has about twenty identical brothers.

Well, the ball didn’t get that much distance from just Hamtaro bumping into it. But it did get us a shortcut!

That’s probably all the water that just sprayed over your lazy butt.

Now, I believe we know someone who might be interested in having this…

Please! You’ve got to let me borrow that ball!

You got it, bud! We’ll just stand over here and watch…

That’s called strategy, my friend.

Besides, we wanted to get through that net.

We can’t get a trampoline for that one kid to land on yet, but the Hopscotch hamsters have a third version to play.

The third course kicks the difficulty up a few notches by making Pashmina jump faster, giving you less time to react. The bugs are also present, so it’s definitely not as forgiving as before.

When we move onto the next screen…

Big Brother!

How did he get there?

I’m sure he got there by climbing inside that tree.

Let’s go…

Well, it’s not like it’s surprising that Stan is flirting with girls at the first opportunity.

The hopscotch course to the west also has a new set-up, and it’s a doozy. Hopscotch 4 was the absolute bane of my first playthrough, partially because I was tired while trying to play this bit.

Not only is Pashmina jumping quite swiftly, but the course is guaranteed to have this little set-up on it. It took me entirely too many tries to navigate the course successfully the first time around.

This time, it only took two.

Hey, didn’t we see you hanging out at the school?

Anyway, now that Dexter is with us, let’s test his powers of observation.

...This isn’t exactly the hardest minigame out there. Anyway, enough dilly-dallying! Let’s get Stan and Howdy back in the party.

Can’t quite reach…

It looks like we need to find Howdy first.

Fortunately, we already know exactly where Howdy is.

We saw him right at the start of the update, remember?

The blue bird is in trouble!

What! You found the blue bird?! And the blue bird’s in a heap of trouble? Isn’t that some bad news?

Let’s quit fighting and work together!

They may have their differences, but the Ham-Hams know when to set them aside and get things done.

So, all we need now is Stan. Let’s get going!

The game actually fade-cuts back to where Stan is, because it’s nice like that.

Wow, looks like the stairs weren’t the only thing in need of repairs. This place needs some serious patching up.

I said no! Go away!

Big Brother!

I’ve been looking all around, but the blue bird is…

The blue bird is in trouble!

What! You found the blue bird! And the blue bird’s in trouble?!

If that’s so, there’s no point in fighting. Let’s put our differences aside and work together!

Anyone else get a sense of deja vu just now?

Thanks, AlphaDream. Keep being awesome.

Alright, time to see how the blue bird fared against the Chicky-Chickies.

...How did it manage to tie the other bird up?

I don’t think he wants to chat.

That’s not true! If we try hard, I’m sure we can connect with him!

Hm. I see. So that’s what it was.

Well, don’t sweat the small things!

It’s not much, but I’ll give you this. See. Here you are.

…

H-H-Howdy, what were you thinking?!

Where did you two come from? And does that minigame name means what I think it does?

Yep, time for a boss battle! Our team is fixed this time, but we have probably the strongest Ham-Hams for this fight. Stan has an extra command to Fend-D, which lets him cover whoever has the least amount of health.

Marly, the little chick in the middle, can deal either two or four damage with his attacks. Jack (on the left) does the same, plus he can glare at a Ham-Ham to attempt an instant kill.

Mike (on the right) also can deal two or four damage, but his extra attack is to try and deal two damage to everybody on our team.

Since we’re dealing with a boss here, let’s have a video. During the first playthough, I got the full 50 points for keeping everyone fighting fit. How about this time?