Retro Famicom battle - Holy Diver vs. Moon Crystal

[NeoZeedeater]

The NES had a lot of games that were left in Japan. Holy Diver and Moon Crystal are two action platformers that were initially supposed to get Western releases but didn't. If you had to choose one of these to be localized back in the day, which would you pick?

I'm a fan of both but I would pick Moon Crystal. Holy Diver's Castlevania vibe is cool but just I love Moon Crystal's smooth animation and controls more.

Holy Diver

Moon Crystal

 

[Sander RX]

Can I choose "Nintendo put this shit on NES NSO, do something cool with it for once"?

 

[EggmaniMN]

Moon Crystal can be finished by an average human. Holy Diver is in the top 1% of hardest NES games. I've watched speedruns of Holy Diver, tried to learn it, at least finished the game a few times and it's just unbelievably difficult.

So Moon Crystal would have been a far better US release. It's one of the best looking games on the console and people wouldn't just quit it on level 2.

 

[Raytro]

First screenshot for Holy Diver reminds me of Ninja Gaiden for some reasons.
Never heard about these two games. Might be cool to check them out!

 

[Lordmrw]

Moon Crystal definitely. Holy Diver would be so incredible if it was not so god damn hard.

 

[NeoZeedeater]

Nice to see you here, Lordmrw. I remember you posting on TNL many years ago.

 

[Nabbit]

Both look a bit more muted in palette than I like my Famicom games, but I'm really impressed with those animations you mentioned for Moon Crystal, especially climbing up a ledge. Also, pretty cool that it was one of the rare Famicom games that used kanji.

 

[Lordmrw]

Moon crystal is a great game you should all play. Fluid animation, excellent graphics and cutscenes plus tight gameplay make it a well rounded package.

 

[NeoZeedeater]

Yep. And there's a surprising lack of Famicom talk on this site considering the name.