It feels like a prudent thing to do in stressful and strange times is to keep to comfortable and familiar haunts, which in my case is playing no end of Indie explormers and writing about them. However, Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap is a rare case of an explormer remaster: there are so few cases of 20th century explormers outside of the requisite Metroids and Castlevanias, and yet French developers Lizardcube found one in the guise of Westone's third (sorta) Wonder Boy game, which originally released on the Sega Master System and Game Gear systems back in 1989.

The Wonder Boy series went through a few evolutions in its lifespan, from simple action games to hybrid RPGs, eventually dropping Wonder Boy himself by the time they got to the last game in the series Monster World IV; however, Dragon's Trap was the first to embrace an open-world format full of secrets to find and progress blockers to overcome with the right tools. "Tools," in this case, is almost exclusively represented as cursed animal forms that the protagonist (who can either be a Wonder Boy or a Wonder Girl in this remake) transmogrifies into after defeating a boss. Each form confers its own unique abilities: for example, Mouse-Man is small enough to fit through narrow passages and walk across checkered blocks; Piranha-Man can swim freely in water; and Hawk-Man is blessed with flight. Equipment that the player can find and purchase will give each form a different amount of defense and offense, with some gear only benefiting specific forms, and most are well-hidden or prohibitively expensive.

The Dragon's Trap (the remake, that is) is a curiosity largely because it doesn't seek to remake the game but simply beautify it, barring only a small handful of seamless modern conveniences. Many of the original game's quirks feel antiquated even when presented in this new form, including a lack of checkpoints (the village hub is fairly central, at least), an emphasis on farming resources to buy everything from stronger gear to health restoration (Medicare-for-all has yet to reach Wonder Boy's kingdom also), and some iffy sprite collision detection that can make combat a bit rough in spots. In fact, that last area is one where the new hand-drawn graphical overhaul - which is otherwise excellent, as are the new orchestral remixes of the original BGM, either or both of which can be switched back to the "retro" originals at any time - can cause a slight bit of visual confusion as to where you need to be to hit or guard against flying bats and fast-moving projectiles. The level design for the dungeons always boils down to a long, linear path full of enemies that acts more like an endurance gauntlet, whittling down your health and limited supply of healing potions before the boss, than something a bit more elaborate with dead-end treasure rooms and puzzles to solve. It's that ever-tricky dilemma with remakes to "over-fix" - rendering the game unrecognizable to long-time fans of the original who might be disappointed with an "in name only" reboot - or to leave too much of the archaic design in place, making it a hard sell to those with many modern, more accommodating alternatives. I don't think there are any quick-and-easy answers here, so I'm reluctant to be too critical about the decisions Lizardcube made.

The Dragon's Trap is ultimately a gorgeously animated and scored game that's otherwise very light in terms of complexity and variety, as might be expected of a faithful retread of a 31-year-old game. However, the simplicity also works in its favor to some degree: there's no immense map (or any map at all, not that it's needed), no overwhelming amount of power-ups and equipment to find though certainly enough secrets to buoy the 5-6 hour runtime, and the combat consists entirely of slashing directly forward and using consumable ranged items whenever you find yourself with a stockpile. It's thus very friendly and uncomplicated to neophytes, unless you're playing on Hard mode where it saps your health every thirty seconds (an early mainstay of the Wonder Boy franchise that was also continued by its "spin-off" Adventure Island), though it can be a bit grindy if you decide you need a full collection of gear. There's something kind of neat (if cheeky) about lifting an ancient, underrated game directly out of relative obscurity rather than obtusely referencing it and the era it hailed from with a new IP. I suspect we won't see the end of "restoration projects" like this any time soon; after all, I'm writing this review the day after the Final Fantasy VII Remake released.

Rating: 4 out of 5.