James Bond Jr. (SNES)

James Bond Jr.

Platform: SNES Year: 1992 Developer: Chris Gray Enterprises

For other games in the series, see James Bond 007. For the NES version, see James Bond Jr. (NES).

James Bond Jr. is an action-platformer developed by Gray Matter and published by T*HQ. It is based on the cartoon series of the same name, which in turn is based on the famous James Bond 007 series.

In this game, you control the titular protagonist, James Bond Jr., the nephew of James Bond. At Warfield Academy, Bond Jr. is sent to investigate and put an end to the evil activities of the organization S.C.U.M. (referred to in the game as SCUM). His first task is to travel to Central America and stop Dr. Derange from discovering the Temple of Gold. Next, Bond Jr. must travel to Venice, Italy to stop Maximillion Cortex, who has found documents of Leonardo DaVinci, and plans to use a secret weapon DaVinci invented for his own evil purposes. Here, James starts by using his trusty speedboat to blast through the canals of Venice, and must subsequently travel under the sewers to find and defeat Cortex. Finally, Bond Jr. decides to travel to S.C.U.M. Headquarters to put an end to their evil activities led by SCUM Lord.

The game is broken up in five stages. Each stage can have one to three segments. While most of the stages are action-platformer style, there are also three sub-stages that take a detour from it; a minicopter level, a speedboat level, as well as a plane level. The game also has a four-number password system. Many of these elements make the game similar to another Gray Matter title, Captain Planet and the Planeteers (NES). In each stage, I.Q. provides Bond Jr. with gadgets that are unique to that stage. Examples of these gadgets include shields during the flying missions that can take up to three hits, ice grenades that can allow Bond Jr. to get across water sections, a gas mask for Bond Jr. to use where noxious fumes are found, and rocket shoes that can let Bond Jr. fly around the area to get across obstacles that would otherwise be impenetrable.

The game received mixed-to-negative reviews from gamers and critics alike. In the flying missions, you die in one hit. During the action-platformer segments, because Bond Jr.'s sprite is quite large, it is hard to avoid enemies and obstacles. In addition, Bond Jr. cannot attack in midair, which allows a bunch of cheap shots to be taken by the player.

Screenshots

The title screen. I.Q. briefs Bond Jr. on his mission. Blasting baddies with grenade in Central America! Speeding through the canals of Venice. Freezing the water with ice grenades. Flying around SCUM Headquarters with rocket shoes.

Music

James Bond Jr. has a decent number of tracks for a game released in 1992, but it almost seems the developers put quantity over quality; while most sections of the game have their own music, they are very short compositions (around 20~30 seconds long) and can get quite repetitive after playing for long periods of time. The game contains a 16-bit rendition of the theme song from the cartoon series, which itself is loosely based on the James Bond Theme. This tune also recurs in the track Reveal of SCUM Agent's Weapon. A few of the songs are used in different parts of the game.

The game credits the music to Nick Eastridge and Peter Stone. Because Eastridge was not a composer, it is most likely Stone wrote the music in MIDI format while Eastridge arranged it into his own sound driver. Stone used Dr. T's KCS for the Atari ST with the help of his Ensoniq EPS workstation. It is not currently clear if Stone also arranged the James Bond Jr. theme or if it was solely Eastridge.

There are also two unused songs in the game's code. They sound like they were meant to play either during some of the stages or cutscenes.

The song titles come from the SPC rip of the game.

Recording

#	Title	Composer	Arranger	Length	Listen	Download
01	Main Theme	Dennis C. Brown, Maxine Sellers	Nick Eastridge	0:51		Download
02	Briefing	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:40		Download
03	Theme of SCUM	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:54		Download
04	Minicopter Mission	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:54		Download
05	Temple in South America	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:55		Download
06	Snake Charming	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:24		Download
07	SCUM Agent Defeated	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	1:05		Download
08	Super Speedboat Mission	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:52		Download
09	Sewers of Venice, Italy	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	1:08		Download
10	Reveal of SCUM Agent's Weapon	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:17		Download
11	SCUM Headquarters	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	1:51		Download
12	Ending	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:27		Download
13	Unused Song 1	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:47		Download
14	Unused Song 2	Peter Stone	Nick Eastridge	0:39		Download

Credits

• Rippers: KungFuFurby
• Recorder: Doommaster1994
• Game Credits:
  • Music: Nick Eastridge
  • Music: Peter Stone
  • Title Music by: Dennis C. Brown
  • Title Music by: Maxine Sellers

(Source)

The credits can be viewed by simply waiting at the title screen.

Game Rip

Format	Download
	Download (Info)

SPC dumps are recorded during actual game play. Normally, the game uses the S-SMP hardware in a way where ripping SPC files is impossible. However, KungFuFurby reprogrammed the game's sound code so that SPC files could be dumped.

Releases

USA Title: James Bond Jr. Platform: SNES Released: 1992-10-?? Publisher: T*HQ     Germany Title: James Bond Jr. Platform: SNES Released: 1992-??-?? Publisher: T*HQ

Links

• mobygames.com/game/52210/james-bond-jr/ - MobyGames.
• gamefaqs.gamespot.com/snes/588395-james-bond-jr - GameFAQs.
• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Bond_Jr.#Video_games - Wikipedia.