Joe and Mac/Weihenstephaner

Game: Joe and Mac, Data East, 1991, SNES
Beer: Weihenstephaner, 11.2 fl. oz., 5.4% abv
# of beers consumed during play: 3
Level Reached: Level 4
Level of Intoxication: Woozy

Game
Joe and Mac is a charming little platformer brought to us from Data East, a company which unfortunately went belly up in 2003. They're responsible for a game called Bad Dudes vs. Dragonninja which must have won some award for the most 80's game ever made. Data East was also well known as a pinball manufacturer and created some of the most innovative tables in the pinball industry. As further example of their presence in the arcade arena, this game was in fact a home port of an arcade game known as Cave Ninja (which is a much cooler title in my opinion). By the time they created this game, they had long since been entrenched firmly in the home console market and actually released the arcade and home versions simultaneously. This was obviously a bolster to both Sega and Nintendo, as they were able to claim with full honesty that their machines could run arcade caliber games. The versions were radically different, particularly the SNES iteration, since it added a huge emphasis on more console-centric elements such as a map screen and bonus games.

Gameplay
Joe and Mac is played from a side-scrolling perspective. Two players can team up and run, jump, and club the ever living daylights out of neanderthals and dinosaurs alike. Along the way, health can be picked up in the form of steaks and dino-chops, and powerups come in many forms, such as hatchets, boomerangs, and the extremely powerful fire and wheel weapons. Neanderthals aren't just primitive schlubs though, they have various weapons of their own such as boulders, and they employ tactics such as jumping at you and striking before running away, complete with comical cartoon spinning feet. Dinos come in a range of shapes and sizes, from the annoying pterodactyls that drop rocks to the alarmingly quick T-Rex Jr's that thankfully will drop a steak or two upon defeat. Dinosaurs--or at least the artistically creative version seen here--also comprise the boss scenarios. These bosses range from a giant T-Rex at the end of the first level, to giant dinosaur heads on the end of a string of balls to--and this is my favorite by far--a wooly mammoth that loses his tusks and trunk in a gruesome display of damage. The boss fights all entail a certain balance of pattern memorization and improvisation, bringing some of the greatest examples of classic 16-bit boss fights from the era.

The levels themselves are busy and full of secrets and goodies as well as scads of fast moving, unpredictable foes. There's always something to do, whether that means chasing after a powerup, laying the smackdown on some fools, or battle a caveman-spitting behemoth for the right to get a kiss from a cavegirl. The backdrops have a fun and variety filled mix, including a waterfall, an ice cave, a volcanic mountain range, and even a dinosaur boneyard. Each level presents unique challenges, and levels share many hallmarks such as bottomless pits, precise ledge jumping for powerups, and blitzkriegs of manic enemies. True magic begins to form when the player learns how to ride these waves of conflict and level design, and with even a short amount of practice, can be careening through levels as a Cro-Magnon death machine. The aforementioned powerups are frequent, and the more enemies killed means the more life replenishing steaks are consequentially dropped. This encourages a bold playstyle as few things can really derail you if you're operating off a steady stream of weapons and health upgrades. Unfortunately, one such thing is getting hit by enemy attacks in mid-air. While you do have a fair degree of control of your character while aloft, if a foe happens to land an attack, you'll be knocked back and will have no control over where you land. Seeing as how this game heavily features instant death pits, losing control during a jump can, and most often does, have serious consequences.


I mentioned the differences in versions of this game between the different platforms at launch, which were Arcade, Sega Genesis and SNES. The Genesis and Arcade versions have the most in common, including a rudimentary Ghosts 'N Goblins style linear map, a longer life bar, and fades to black upon death. The SNES version, however, has been significantly retooled, thanks to the addition of a more fully featured map screen, complete with branching paths, bonus levels, and instant regeneration on death. Unfortunately, many things were changed or trimmed in the SNES version, including having a different final boss, and featuring only one ending. One minor issue that is universal across all the versions is the fact that hitboxes are spotty, especially in the middle of a fracas, and all too often, the computer controlled enemies get the benefit of the doubt during any clashes. This will leave some cavedudes a bit battered and searching for help. In later levels, when things get especially frantic, this frequently spells death for all but the most seasoned of Stone Age vigilantes. One somewhat unfortunate occurrence is the fact that any weapon you acquire, you can only fire straight forward or straight up, but enemies invariably attack from odd angles, making it more difficult than it should be to dispatch the plentiful legions in your way. All of this adds up to a "easy to learn/hard to master" dynamic, albeit from arguably the wrong approach.

Controls are well thought out, if a bit floaty, and the first time you realize your caveman can have a limited number of projectiles onscreen at once, you'll think back to Galaxian and suddenly hate life. If you fire indiscriminately, you will inevitably run out of damage dealing fire/wheels/axes/whatever just as a baddie makes a run for you, and before you know it, he's just served you a club sandwich and didn't bother to stick around for the tip. This means a calculated approach must be used, and you'll soon learn that there are really many more enemies than you have weapons, and the smart caveman (oxymoron? subtle social commentary?) must pick his battles in order to come out on top and get some cavelipping. Yes. Cavelipping. That's a thing now. Deal with it.


If it sounds like having a second player would help through all of this, that's exactly on the money and if you happen to have a friend chilling at your pad when you pimp out the SNES, you and them can romp through the game helping each other kill the various critters and immediately fight over any gifts that appear onscreen. In this regard, Joe and Mac actually displays some of the features that later made the New Super Mario Bros. games simultaneously wildly popular and blindingly infuriating. Nonetheless, multiplying the number of players in this instance most definitely amplifies the fun to be had, and with the right buddy playing alongside you, even death can become an event worthy of discourse. Level design and atmosphere go hand in hand, and the wide variety of stages on offer certainly showcase style and creativity, forcing players to adapt to differing level conditions on the fly, including dealing with reduced mobility in later stages and being expected to perform pitch perfect jumps and leaps of faith. The concept of fairness to all players had yet to see the light of day in games, and the philosophy was--particularly for games which featured in the arcade--an emphasis on an intimidating level of difficulty to encourage the highest turnover on a machine, thus guaranteeing the greatest yield of quarters. Home consoles of the time were not immune to this (indeed, many home console games are so notoriously difficult, an entire sub-genre exists to describe "Nintendo-Hard" games) and so the near brutal level of difficulty in Joe and Mac is easy to appreciate. No one says we have to like it though.

For players with the right degree of perseverance, Joe and Mac offers complex and rewarding gameplay, but a single shaky crutch asks the player to accept flaws in the core game mechanics as conventions to accessibility. While it might have kept the attention of players at the time, the arbitrary inflation in failure conditions doesn't age well against the modern attitude of forgiving gameplay in the name of immersion into a story. While there are certainly gamers nowadays that seek high level challenges to display their prowess, most of them wouldn't be blamed for wanting to demonstrate their skills in a slightly less chaotic arena...Super Smash Bros. Melee players excepted of course.

Graphics/Sound
With the Arcade version of course having the best graphics of all the versions, the SNES port showcases the Super Nintendo's bright colors, smooth shading, and immersive parallax scrolling. Also of note are the large detailed boss sprites and the sheer amount of action on screen at once. While slowdown does strike in extreme cases, the great majority of scenes play out in a fluid and steady manner. Animation for the various critters, heroes, and tiger skin-adorned rapists is varied and comical, including large bug eyes and vivid and hilarous shots of neanderthals leaping into the air. The vision of them, mouths agape and trailing foot stuck straight out behind them is a classic image and one that illustrates the sense of humor the artists had. The levels themselves are bright, beautifully animated, and sharply laid out. Many of the bosses suffer from a hilarious phenomenon where they have a nicely detailed head on top of a disconcerting string of balls, but the limitations of the hardware being what they were, it can be considered more of an artistic choice than a technological one. Special effects are sparsely used in keeping in line with the other versions of the game, but little touches such as eggs containing tools have a detailed and excitement-enhancing cracking animation.


This animation is accompanied by a satisfying crack sound, making the opening of an egg an event that draws the attention of any humans holding game pads. Other sound effects in the game are also well conceived and implemented, such as the surprised squawks of a dinosaur that is getting a lesson in how early humans resolved disputes. The music is light and airy, a universally cheerful mix that impels a player (or two) to forge a path through the country in front of them, even if that country is an active lava flow guarded by horrifying prehistoric nightmares. Any good stuff that gets collected along the way is announced with a triumphant little bleepity-bloopity jingle, and the victory song that plays at the end of the level is goofy and makes a player feel appropriately accomplished. Other versions *coughGenesiscough* had sound that suffered, though granted not as much as one would assume, but the Super Nintendo version has their typically fantastic audio, complete with crisp samples and full stereo sound.

Story
The story is succinctly told in a series of cut-scenes during the attract mode. As the game goes, Joe and Mac are two cavedudes who are minding their own business when a bunch of rival cavemen come and kidnap their babes. This is of course unacceptable, and Joe and Mac set out to smash some steeply sloping foreheads and reclaim their women, who are absolutely real people with complex feelings and not just property to be beaten over the head and dragged away by the hair.

Misogyny and objectification aside--to which Anita Sarkeesian would like to discuss further and which the majority of "GamerGate" shitheels would like to plug their ears and scream no, no, no until they passed out--the story is a simple early 90's convention that was never intended to be fleshed out beyond an abstract reason for conflict to exist. The mere existence of engaging with obstacles and enemies was justification enough to program a game and put a coin slot on it. The charming thing about Joe and Mac is the playful marriage of prehistoric cavemen and "righteous dudes" that turns the entire game into a quiet comment on late 80's/early 90's culture, and the unusual combinations in popular entertainment that were earmarks of the time. Considering Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (which has seen a resurgence in recent years), Sonic the Hedgehog, and even The Ren and Stimpy Show as close pop-culture neighbors, a tale of two radical cavebros going to save their girlfriends (harem? property? prisoners?) is right at home.

Beer
Weihenstephaner. Seriously? I mean, I'm no stranger to the German way of making new words by just slapping some more consonants onto an already unwieldy word, but this is approaching parody. I've had ample time to study this word, and after careful analysis and a measured degree of research, my official opinion on this beer's name is that it's complete and utter bullshit. Try ordering this beer in any non-German bar in the world. I guarantee you'll have the bartender's attention until right after that spelling-bee trainwreck of a word falls out of your mouth, after which they'll roll their eyes, tell you their only imports are Molsen Ice and Dos Equis and leave you drinkless and alone. This will be wholly your fault. Perhaps one of these days you'll settle your ass down and learn to order drinks like a normal alcoholic. As it stands, tragic folly at the local pub is probably going to be a bit difficult owing to the fact that most bars/taverns/pubs/whatever are going to stock beer that sells, and only the hardest of the hardcore will go out of their way to stock this in any appreciable quantities. Of course, as a person who makes poor choices, you can always keep that social awkwardness alive by hitting on the hot chick in the corner as soon as her boyfriend goes to the bathroom. If he subsequently beats you to death, GnB will be happy to attend your funeral.

Smell
"Way-hen-stef-on-er"...That's how I've decided to pronounce this atrocity. I really don't care if I'm wrong, so if you have an alternate or "correct" pronunciation, please feel free to stuff your face full of something that prevents you from communicating with me. Whether that's chicken nuggets or quick-set concrete is up to you. As to the smell of this brew, it's actually rather distinctive. First and foremost it is most certainly high on the grainy, beery baselayer which does nothing to excite, but does give a nice first impression. In a very welcome change from the status quo, there is a very meaty and hoppy bouquet, something that I've rarely ever detected in the beers that commonly fill the shelves at the local piggly-wiggly. Indeed, an odor such as this only generally appears in a beverage so self-assured that its absence would be notably missed. In fact, considering the other brews I've tried that have carried with them a "designer smell", I'm beginning to think that the more syllables that a beer name has, the greater the odds that it will smell like a French whore. I was going to launch into an extended metaphor regarding French whores and World War II in an attempt to bring my point full circle and package it in a succinct and entertaining punchline, but I think calling a German beer a French whore within the loose context of WWII is insult enough.

Taste
I know what you want me to say...you want me to say this beer tastes like a French whore, because that would be funny and titillating and you could text all your friends in 6th grade and tell them the new joke you made up all by yourself. I'm not going to do that, because you're not actually in 6th grade and we're all more grown up than that. Point in fact, Weihenstephanie actually tastes grown up, due to the fact that it has a deep complexity that will actually catch veteran drinkers off guard. The first thing one will taste is the well known and all too common wave of grain, although this time its much bolder and much more proudly presented. While lesser beers such as Bud and Miller Lite lean almost exclusively on a version of this highly pedestrian taste, Weihenblahblahblah only uses it as it's opening salvo. Once that taste begins to wane on the tongue, the palette begins to shift to a strangely bitter-sweet roasted brown sugar flavor that quickly broadens out into a wooden, grassy aftertaste that satisfies immensely. I must admit that when I first spied this beer in the cooler at my local store, my head immediately filled with half-finished, ten-cent jokes in regards to the "oldest brewery" tag and what that must taste like. I must further admit that the six-pack I'm reviewing now wasn't the first six-pack of this stuff that I bought. These two admissions should tell you, dear reader, that my initial impressions of this beer were not only mislaid, but that I had suffered from a sort of intentionally biased misgiving. So eager was I to craft an interesting mythos around this beer and its sight-unseen trappings that the first Weihenengarblewot I drank was so different from expectation that it completely derailed all thought in that direction. Now, in spite of the comedically overly-German nature of this beer, I find myself craving it. Any beer that engenders cravings is worthy of my time.

Intoxication
The world's oldest brewery was apparently founded in 1040 AD. This is approximately the same year movable type was invented. In other words, while some linguists in ancient China were figuring out how to make concert fliers easier to hand out, some German guys were figuring out how to successfully meld the concepts of God and reckless inebriation. I'm convinced they picked God and beer because at the time, video games hadn't been invented. I'm further convinced that had Weihenstephan Abbey been a game development house as opposed to a house of worship, the history of the world as we know it would have been radically different. As for the way this beer works its terrible magic on your brain? There aren't many surprises, although the 5.4% alcohol content will make its presence known within the first beer, and will slowly creep into more and more crevices of the drinker's brain until grinning and falling down will be the only reactions available to them. As any career drinker knows, these two activities are central to any proper drunkard's evening, and thankfully, with enough imbibed, Weihenfarfegnugen delivers those two abilities in mass quantities. Thankfully, the road to get there is wide with an easy upward slope, so if you as a drinker have what we might diplomatically refer to as a "goddamn problem", know that it'll take a few of these things before the rest of us are carrying you out to a cab. Lucky you.

Feel
Weihenagainandagain is very full-bodied, with a rather thick feeling in the mouth and a very bubbly fizz. When you hold this stuff up against a light, the reason for this "BBW-esque" mouthfeel is because this beer is made the old way, without too much of that pesky "filtering" that makes other beers taste like a urinalysis sample. This beer is cloudy and sweetly golden, making one think of exotic honey or some highly regarded reserve of aged brandy. The way this beer tumbles down the throat and fans out in the gut further reinforces the notion that this is a property that exists far above the mainstream, and that drinking it should be as much of an action of self-fulfillment as any other luxury. Hand-in-hand with that ideal, anyone who drinks this with the simple aim of getting drunk should maybe rethink their choices, as this is not exactly the best beer to get wasted on. Point in fact, if you are looking for a beer to just get shithoused with, may I recommend a few cans of Four Loko? The inexpensive price will save you money and the higher than average probability that you'll pass out and swallow your tongue will help to stave off any concerns of global overcrowding. Win-win.

The Matchup
Waitoogermaneren and Joe and Mac are both very interesting. While neither one will ever be accused of being too popular, both have qualities that have been slowly refined as a result of their creators having been in the industry for a while. Weihendeutschland has of course been around for pretty much longer than anything aside from Christianity, but when you're working with that long of a timeline, you can get away with a few cardinal sins (heh, heh). As a pairing, these two properties go together well, although I can't help but think this beer would have been better served with a slightly more accessible game, as a beer with this type of rarefied pedigree would probably match up better with something like Super Metroid or Sonic CD. As it stands, the game and beer in question offer many highlights, some shortfalls, and enough reasons to fill a weekend with both, with very few regrets.

Cheers/Game on.