Home Improvement: Power Tool Pursuit

Story-

After many years of faithful service as the accident-prone host of the t.v. series Tool Time, Tim "The Toolman" Taylor has been awarded with his very own line of power tools designed in his honor. Planning a grand reveal on a very special episode, Tim is shocked to find that the tools have been stolen before the show's onset and placed randomly throughout the production set where filming occurs. Eschewing sanity and avoiding proper procedure (such as contacting the local authorities), The Toolman arms himself for aggressive retaliation with a sledgehammer, dynamite and other unnecessarily overpowered objects with the ultimate goal of retrieving his beloved tools as soon as possible.

Overview-

Home Improvement is a side-scrolling action/platform game where you take control of Tim "The Toolman" Taylor and help guide him across 20 levels while utilizing a multitude of power tools to attack enemies and reach new areas. Encapsulating the stages are 4 different worlds populated with unique enemies and backgrounds that Tim must navigate through. While most games of this variety typically require you to simply reach the final goal of a level, Home Improvement takes a little different approach by tasking the player with the retrieval of 6 crates hidden in random locations that must be discovered within a time limit before proceeding.

Several standard platforming obstacles present themselves throughout gameplay (namely enemies who can damage the player, pitfalls, hard to reach ledges, etc.) however The Toolman is armed with a litany of useful power tools with which to help find the missing crates and defeat adversaries. Many of the tools become a requirement at times in the stages as certain parts of a level are only accessible after using an item in it such as breaking a wall down with the sledgehammer to reveal an alternate path or reaching new heights with the grappling hook. Successful completion of the first 4 levels of a world will bring Tim toe-to-toe with a boss battle that must be defeated before progressing further. Help guide The Toolman across all the different stages and defeat the 4 bosses to discover the location of the missing tools and complete the game!

Critical Analysis-

• Gameplay: 1/5 (I hate it)
  Right away, the gameplay is an instant problem for Home Improvement with no direction given as to what you are supposed to do which spirals quickly into a frustration that grows even after learning the nuances of the game. The monotony of the design is a major culprit here as the levels and enemies never change much which is a major problem in comparison to other great platforming titles of the time. Pair that with a brutal and unfair difficulty level brought upon by lackluster quality in item execution and stage creation and you have a game that's as forthcoming as a staple gun shot to the nuts!
• Controls: 1/5 (I hate it)
  Wow do these controls SUCK! Hitting your spot on a tight jump never feels smooth as Tim runs around in what can only be described as ice-skate-shoes which adds to the layer of already present problems in Power Tool Pursuit. Additional frustrations here include the uncomfortable lack of being able to aim your offensive weapons at enemies (why can't every side-scrolling game with projectiles not follow Contra's simple formula), the quirky grappling hook which makes you wish you were playing Bionic Commando and the weak hit detection which inaccurately conveys the direct impact of these power tools as you lightly tap enemies with what should be heavy duty thuds.
• Music/Sound: 1/5 (I hate it)
  Geez... it smells bad enough already! The music is all facets of unacceptable and not even worthy of writing about with its boring drones that fade away quickly into the background without a trace. Meanwhile, the sound effects aren't too much better with nothing but the occasional roars/yelps from adversaries mixed with your own weapon/item noises to fill the air with (could we not get some Tim voice-clips in the game saying "more power" or doing his grunt or SOMETHING).
• Graphics: 4/5 (I like it)
  Finally, a category that doesn't stink! While the backgrounds are a little too simple for my taste, overall I like the graphics in Power Tool Pursuit. The sprites all look the part while the Super Nintendo's impressive color output shows off capably and displays yet another high-quality looking title during the 16-bit era.
• 'Tude Meter: MODERATE (Coolness not guaranteed)
  Who knew The Toolman had such an impressive arsenal of fix-it gadgets to unleash on all of his would-be adversaries? Even if these were t.v. studios or whatever, then how come they're filled up with random animals/insects/monsters that are trying to kill you when all your doing is looking for your stuff that was stolen? While there's definitely enough here to keep the reading from dipping into the minimal range, ultimately the 'Tude Meter is more confused than anything else as it ponders the outside-the-box-concept of a video game based on a fictional house repair show contained within a family sitcom... !!!

Final Verdict: 1/5 (Terrible game)

What can I say... Home Improvement: Power Tool Pursuit is as bad a game that you can find from this period and entirely worthy of my lowest achievable score displaying horrid qualities in too many of its aspects requiring (ironically enough)... improvement in just about every way. From the joke empty instruction manual to the crappy controls to the snore-fest gameplay to the kindergarten quality music and beyond, this game delivers the "dung" in truckloads and begs for your avoidance in all avenues besides meddling curiosity which is sure to be satisfied abruptly by even the staunchest of gaming prudes. Besides that, Power Tool Pursuit offers nothing in the way of novelty towards the television show its based on other than some blink-and-you'll-miss-them scenes at the beginning of and in-between levels which further raises the question of its existence. Seriously though, who really was the target audience for this heap anyways cause I can't imagine anybody from my generation forking over their hard-earned dough unless somehow they were tricked into doing it? If they did/do exist and are reading this now... how did you escape your captivity???

In all seriousness though don't be like Tim, do yourself a favor and heed my personal warning label which fills in all the missing information you need from that barren instruction manual - AVOID THIS GAME AT ALL COSTS! You'll literally have more fun improving your own home doing random chores than you will trying to guide The Toolman through this anxiety-inducing race against the clock with no rewards in sight (now that's bad)! Moreover, if your looking for an unfair challenge that will push your patience to its limits than look no further as Home Improvement will have even the most enlightened of souls cursing the game and ditching it behind for greener pastures (unless your a hardcore masochist that is) with its brutal difficulty and poor design. Plus, how could you miss out on the obvious opportunity for some Smash T.V.-style co-op with Al Borland doubling-down on the nail gunning mayhem? Whatever... time to flush this turd down the proverbial toilet of inferiority FOREVER!

Parting Thoughts-

• Pros-
  *Cool arsenal of items
  *Colorful visuals
  *That's pretty much it
• Cons-
  *Horrible level design
  *Clunky controls
  *Quiet and uninteresting musical score

The 'Tude Dude's Bottom Line-

Utterly devoid of anything worthy of the word "improvement", Power Tool Pursuit hammers its own thumb to oblivion with terrible gameplay centered around abstract platforming that makes the show seem like Shakespeare in comparison.

Thanks for reading!