WELCO METOT HENEX TLEVEL - Chuck Rock II: Son of Chuck

Publisher: Virgin Interactive Developer: Core Design Release: 1993

When last we saw Chuck, he was busy saving his wife Ophelia from local weirdo Garry Gritter. And according to the intro of Chuck Rock II, once our prehistoric hero had rescued his sweetie, he went on to invent the first automobile, amassing a large fortune in the process.

The only thing that was missing from Chuck and Ophelia's perfect life was an heir to the family fortune. Enter Junior: chip off the ol' Rock and hero of our new story.

Seems Chuck's got a rival in Brick Jagger, a local inventor who has decided that, rather than creating his own line of vehicles, he'll just hire some muscle to kidnap Chuck instead. And while Ophelia loses her mind over the loss of her husband, Junior sets off on his own to save his dad, armed only with a club and the diaper around his bottom.

Chuck Rock was a decent game, and apparently that's all you needed back in the day to warrant a sequel. Son of Chuck plays pretty much the same as the previous game in the series, featuring a series of mostly side-scrolling levels filled with dinosaurs to club, platforms to climb, and bosses to bash.

The first impression I got when firing up Chuck Rock II was how much more refined it seems to be than its predecessor. The voice work is a thousand times better, the animation has lost that strange, Core style and adopted a much more fitting Flintstones motif. The presentation is just generally better by a mile.

The game play has been upgraded slightly, too, thanks mostly to the fact that Junior carries around a big club. In the original game, Chuck had to rely on his beer gut to dole out punishment. While that was fitting for the character, it really didn't offer much in the way of range. Junior's club, on the other hand, lets the little tyke stay a bit further out of harm's way as he smashes his way through the legion of cartoon bad guys standing between him and his dad.

But despite these upgrades, Chuck II still suffers from the same generally mediocre action of the prequel. Dozens of surprisingly short levels make up the game world, and outside of the odd, large-ish creature to fight, there really isn't anything all that exciting going on.

Looking back now, it's amazing to me how much staying power these characters seemed to have. Not only were there two games in the main series (released to all the major consoles), there was also a kart racer, and apparently a regular comic appearing in a popular kids' magazine in the UK - LookIn. Unfortunately, the comic only lasted about a year before the magazine itself went under. The final scene featured Chuck being swept away from his boat. He washed ashore on a tribal island and was revered as a god by the locals.

Weird.

Anyway, this is the end for Chuck in this particular series of articles. I know you'll all miss him as much as I will.