Format: Cartridge
Genre: 2d platformer
Developer: Sega
Publisher: Sega

As the immediate follow-up to the handsome "Castle of Illusion", many of this game's tile art and lavish backgrounds betray that the same team of artists was involved. But where the aforementioned Mickey adventure had inventive settings like a giant library, this release's pyramids and icy hills are disappointingly generic. It's still a splendid looking game, especially its large, superbly-animated sprites-- but it lacks that extra bit of magic as compared to its predecessor.

The same story follows with its music. The melodies are compositionally excellent, as evidenced by the fact this reviewer could recall the "Duckburg" song just shy of thirty years between playthroughs of this game-- but from a programming standpoint, they sound a little more like stock Genesis sound driver output, than the very custom and highly-refined coding which went into the "Castle of Illusion" music. The game's sound effects, however-- some of them even lifted from that aforementioned great-- are top-drawer.

Where "Castle of Illusion" was a linear, traditional point-A to point-B affair, QuackShot's levels are linked via a world map, and their progressions are gated by the need for certain items, which are picked up in other stages. It's cool to see the ambition, but that back-tracking and inventory screen-- needed to switch between different weapon types-- mean that the game's pacing feels a little herky-jerky. That said, and just like this title's predecessor, the jumping and movement physics could not be any more perfect.

QuackShot opens with Donald's massive, torch-bearing sprite lurking through a subterranean layer: it looks like a cartoon in motion! That impression carries through to the first stage, which has an iconic sort of feel to it-- but then the first checkpoint is hit, and the "Metroidvania"-lite aspects start to bear down. This is still a fabulously-designed game, with some text book level design, groovy music, and exquisite art-- but it doesn't quite flow well enough to hit the soaring heights of some other Genesis platformers.