The Goonies (Famicom video game)

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The Goonies is a 1986 platform game from Konami for the Family Computer, based on the 1985 movie The Goonies. A separate Japanese MSX version was also made. The game started on cartridge and was later released for the Famicom Disk System in 1988. In North America there was no retail Famicom release; instead, Nintendo published an arcade version for the VS. System called The Goonies and a PlayChoice-10 version for arcades.

A sequel, The Goonies II, came out in 1987 worldwide.

In most versions the game uses a chiptune version of Cyndi Lauper’s “The Goonies ’R’ Good Enough.” On computer versions you play as Sloth; on the Famicom and arcade versions the main character is unnamed. You defend yourself with kicks, bombs (explosions kill you if you’re hit), and a slingshot you can find behind doors. Collecting eight diamonds fully restores your health, and you can find upgrades like a firesuit (protection from flames) and earmuffs (protection from music notes).

The computer versions take place mostly in caverns and have 25 interconnected levels. The Famicom version follows the film more closely, with stages resembling a restaurant, caverns, and a pirate ship, and its ending recreates a beach scene as The Inferno ship sails away. In each level you must find three keys and one Goonie. Bombs are used to blow open doors hiding them. You can advance after getting the keys, but to finish the game you must free all the Goonies to reach the final level, the Pirate Ship; otherwise you restart from the first level.

Enemies include an army of rats in red, yellow, and white. Red and white rats take one hit; yellow rats take two. White rats drop a cross that gives temporary invincibility. A Fratelli appears and shoots music notes at you; they can’t be killed by bombs, only stunned. If a stunned Fratelli is over a pit, they fall in.

The theme “The Goonies ’R’ Good Enough” remains, though it’s remixed in some versions. Hidden items named Konami Man, Vic Viper, and TwinBee appear as 5,000-point pickups, and these items later reappear in Castlevania titles such as Portrait of Ruin and Order of Ecclesia.