Please note that this page contains assumptions as well as peoples memories of what happened a long time ago. Therefore it may be incorrect in some areas.

Krazy Kreatures, you might not have heard of it and there might be a very good reason why. It was not an official Nintendo release, but instead it was brought to market by American Video Entertainment, a manufacturer of unlicensed Nintendo cartridges and also a company born off previous work experiences at Tengen and Sharedata by Richard Frick.

When you run a game publishing business you of course need games, and when an old friend from the Tengen days, Franz Lanzinger reached out about a game he had prototyped while working at Tengen, but was allowed to take with him when he left, was now a potential release candidate for American Video Entertainment.

Both Dave O'Riva and I left Tengen to form Bitmasters in mid 1990. Krazy Kreatures was our first game. I wanted to do an original game after porting Toobin' and Ms. Pacman. I always liked puzzle games, especially Tetris, so it seemed like it would be fun to invent a new one. It paid our bills for a few months while we got started. Soon after we got a contract to port Rampart for the NES, later published by Jaleco. Franz Lanzinger

It’s a little difficult to review a game that came out some 25+ years ago, it has been out done several times over the years, but Krazy Kreatures was and is actually a quite good game. I guess it probably could be viewed as a 25 years old version of Candy Crush – highly addictive, some good level layouts and just overall an enjoyment. Sure the graphics are nothing crazy, they were not even such at the time the game was released if you ask me, but great gameplay does not always require great graphics.

And there they go. Creatures from all over the universe are overrunning the screen, and they just keep coming. You gotta line 'em up to move 'em out, and hope you can keep 'em moving out faster then they come in, 'cause if the room fills, that's it. The entire system shuts down. It's so casy. Just pick 'em up, move 'em and put 'em down, three, four or more in row, and watch the entire klump of kritters transport away. When the foot starts tapping you're running out of time. You have only a few more seconds to clear out as many clumps of kritters as you can. So go for the BIG bonus points. Now you are warmed up and ready for the next round. Here they come, but there are more of 'em, and they're flying at you faster. Dogs, cats, chatter teeth, and wait a minute, Pink Elephants? You're not imagining this, they really are there! Game Manual

So in Krazy Kreatures you need to complete 32 levels, called Waves, in order to beat the game. Your objective is to clear the screen of animals (creatures) populating it, by creating a line of them. While the initial levels only requires you to line up 3 or 4 creatures, it later on in the game gets more intense as lines increase to 6 or 7 creatures while the screen fills faster with creatures to clear – if animals fill the screen before the animal counter goes to zero, you’re game over.

It’s a very basic game really, it’s not a difficult game to learn how to play. Once you reach the later levels though, you have to be fast on those buttons.

Speaking of the graphics and a little spoiler alert, if you manage to complete the 32 waves/levels, you are presented with a few screens of text, congratulating you on winning the game and telling you that the ending in the next Krazy Kreatures game might be better, but…

We wanted to design and develop a sequel but American Video Entertainment had trouble selling their games in large quantities and soon went under. Franz Lanzinger

So unfortunately we never got a sequel, it would have been interesting to see how they could take the game to the next level.

As mentioned, a prototype was already made while Franz Lanzinger worked at Tengen, but the company decided it was not a game for them and he was given the “okay” to take it with him when he left Tengen.

Below you can see a few screenshots from the prototype, it has a very basic titlescreen and the game actually only features one level, and there is no music, only very basic sound within the game which is actually a never ending gamescreen, just progressing in speed and the difference in creatures as you progress, something that changed quite a bit for the final game.

One thing that also changed from the prototype to the final game was the option to play a 2 player co-operative or competitive game as well as 3 options for game difficulty – and the option to skip the first 12 “easier” levels.

Krazy Kreatures is well worth a try, even today and while American Video Entertainment is known for some quite mediocre NES releases, this game might actually be the very best of the lot.

Thanks for reading and a special thanks to the Video Game History Foundation. 

If you would like to check out the Krazy Kreatures prototype, it can now be found over at Hidden Palace.