8/10
A Nice Cartoon From My Childhood
17 March 2022
Captain N: The Game Master is yet another cartoon from my childhood, and while yes, it is not perfect, it was part of a trend where video games adapted into cartoons would change a lot of stuff (Saturday Supercade being one example, as the Donkey Kong shorts changed Pauline from Mario's girlfriend to his niece and made Donkey Kong Jr. Into a Scooby Doo clone, and Pole Position was not really Pole Position due to it being a spy cartoon, but the name was licensed by Namco).

So, the story for this cartoon is in the world of Videoland, where all Nintendo games are connected, Mother Brain, the main antagonist of the original Metroid, and her army is about to storm the Palace of Power, where Princess Lana. A character made exclusively for this show, is with her guardians, Mega Man, Kid Icarus, and Simon Belmont. The three icons are very different, with Mega Man being the green bomber instead of blue and sounding like he has the same voice actor as Popeye, and Simon Belmont getting the worst of the changes, as he's gone from fearless vampire hunter to a romantic and coward who serve as nothing more than comic relief and a rival for Princess Lana's heart). However, Lana's father, who before the first episode, was banished into another dimension by Mother Brain, reveals the Ultimate Warp Zone, which connects to the real world, where it summons teenager Kevin Keene and his dog, Duke to Videoland to become Captain N.

Being a huge video game crossover before Super Smash Bros. Ultimate made it cool, Captain N is basically one big crossover. Other than Mega Man, Kid Icarus, and Castlevania, other video games are involved in this. Serving as Mother Brain's "scratch and grounder", as I like to call this type of idiot duo, is Eggplant Wizard, also from Kid Icarus, and King Hippo, who is from Punch-Out. Also, other characters from other Nintendo video games show up as guest stars (like Bayou Billy, Tetris, Paperboy, even The Legend Of Zelda is featured, which while being a crossover of the cartoon adaptation, it did fix Link to the point where he's not an obnoxious jerk).

However, it does have some flaws, as the video game characters used are not accurate in looks (with some people telling me it was due to rights issues), and behavior (especially with Simon). Also, the third and final season can be the biggest downside of the series, as due to NBC, the network airing the series, deciding to cut the budget for the show due to deciding to end its Saturday Morning cartoon block in favor of a new block aimed at teens, there were only seven new adventures, trimmed down from a half-hour to eleven minutes, pairing it with an older episode that is trimmed down to fit the same run time (hence removing some important plot elements that would confuse those who never saw the episode in the past year), all to package it with Super Mario World (the final Super Mario cartoon). Also, some episodes make errors when it comes to games (when did the original Donkey Kong arcade game have a volcano level?). However, despite the errors in characters and facts, the series still has its charms, featuring various video games (most of them being third party), and having some good stories and voice actors.
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