Godzilla NES and it's love for the obscure characters

Long ago, there was a game on the NES called Godzilla: Monster of Monsters. The plot is this, Planet X wants to conquer the universe with their ships and monsters. The people of Earth sends Godzilla and Mothra to protect their world.

The game's opening

The game is a sidescroller as your characters are transported on other planets in the solar system. At the end of the planet is a boss battle. The game seems cool at first but it gets very repetitive real quick. The boss fights are at least a little more fun than the sidescroller section.

I should give you guys a quick rundown on Godzilla movies.

• Godzilla had a dozen films from 1954 to 1975. This is called the Showa era. 
• Godzilla made a comeback in 1984 and ran till 1995. This is called Heisei era. 
• America made their own movie in 1998 and nearly everyone hated it. 
• Toho wanted to quickly get Godzilla out of retirement after the American movie and made movies from 1999 to 2004. This is called the Millennium era. 
• In recent years, America did another movie and it was a million times better received than the 1998 one. Even if America is planning to make Godzilla sequels and a showdown with King Kong in a few years, Japan still plans to make their own Godzilla movies, separate from the American ones. The American ones are called Monsterverse while the Japanese ones are called The Reiwa era.

The Classic/Showa era of Godzilla has this "expanded universe". The 5th Godzilla movie called, "Ghidorah: The Three-Headed Monster" and it was basically the "Avengers" of the Godzilla series. The end of that movie had Godzilla, Rodan, and Mothra teaming up together as they fight the bigger threat called King Ghidorah. Both Rodan and Mothra had their own solo movies beforehand. Kinda like how Iron Man was having his series while Thor and Captain America were having their own solo adventures before joining up in Avengers.

Over the years in the Showa era, Toho has made alot giant monster/kaiju movies outside of Godzilla as well as alien invasion ones. Alot of them can be seen in the same universe, however there are people who argue that they are simply standalone movies that these characters randomly cameoed in later films with no connection.

Enough talking about the film series and on to the actual game. The 1st boss you fight is the giant squid, Gezora.

Now most of you are wondering, who is Gezora? Well he came from a movie called "Space Amobia" or by another name, "Yog, Monster from Space" from 1970.

The movie is about an alien entity who possesses critters on an island in Pacific and turn them into giant monsters and attack humans. The movie had nothing to do with Godzilla or anywhere else from the universe. So the 1st boss of the game is about a giant monster/kaiju from a non-Godzilla movie. What a weird choice.

The 2nd boss is the giant alien robo-mole, Mogera

Mogera was an actual Godzilla character that appears in Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla in 1994. He was built by humans to fight Godzilla but was force to fight the far more eviler Godzilla clone at the end.

However the game came out in 1988. Long before Mogera made an appearance. The thing is that the giant robot mole is actually a re-imagined character from a 1957 alien invasion movie call "The Mysterians."

Yes, the alien invaders look like Power Rangers. Mogera was their own weapon against the humans. It's funny how the human built one from the 90s looks more advanced and more sleek than the the alien built one. Just like the different MechaGodzillas in other movies.

The Mysterians has no reference to Godzilla and other monsters. You can say that the reason Earth in the Showa universe is more advance than our own timeline is due to studying the alien tech. The Markalite cannons are sort of an early prototype of the Maser cannons you see often in the Godzilla series. However like Gezora, another weird character to be in a Godzilla game.

The 3rd boss gliding lizard, Varan The Unbelievable.

He was in his own solo movie in a 1958 film called, "Varan the Unbelievable." The movie is about explorers going into sacred forbidden land which happens to be Varan's sleeping grounds and havoc happens right after.

I greatly advised you watch the Japanese version instead of the English one. I'm not against people choosing between the English and Japanese versions but the English version of Varan has a completely radically different story all together.

Well Varan actually does matter within the pre-1988 Godzilla movies (sort of). He was one of the many monsters in 1968 movie called "Destroy All Monsters." However he was only in the movie for barely half-a-minute and only seen on the sidelines. The reason he had limited screentime in Destroy All Monsters is because his prop was the same from his solo movie from 10 years earlier and it was in very bad condition.

So yes, the boss character is some guy on the sidelines you saw for a half-a-minute..

4th boss is Hedorah.

Finally we got an actual Godzilla foe from 1971's Godzilla vs. Hedorah(Or Godzilla vs. The Smog Monster) He was an alien parasite that absorbs smog and pollution. Yes, the movie was going all Captain Planet on us at one point.

5th boss is tunneling dinosaur, Baragon.

Like Varan, he was on the sidelines in Destroy All Monsters because of his badly damaged prop. 

He was of the three foes in 2001's Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidora: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack. (Yes, that's a long name) However again, this game was made long before the movie.

Before being a side character in Destory All Monsters, he was in Frankenstein Conquers The World. Yes, I'm not joking, the Godzilla universe has both King Kong and Frankenstein in them.

Frankenstein was a dude who was blame for death of humans when it was really Baragon.  They fought in the end.

The movie had a sequel called War of the Gargantuans where leftover pieces of Frankenstein grew into two different monsters. The English version removed all the references to the Frankenstein like the Gargantuans were somehow regulars baby monsters that scientists found. The movie is the 1st one that actually introduce the Maser cannons which were seen in later movies.

Fun Fact: War of the Gargantuans inspire Brad Pitt to be an actor and also one of Tim Burton's top fav movies.

6th boss is Gigan. One of Godzilla nemeses . He's an alien cyborg uhh..bird fish thing with buzzsaws

                                      

2nd last boss is MechaGodzilla. Another one of Godzilla nemeses. Evil robo Godzilla clone built by space monkeys. Seeing this game was in 1988, the later human built ones won't be available in this game.

The last boss is King Ghidora. Another one of Godzilla nemeses. He is a three-headed alien dragon that usually takes multiple monsters to defeat.

That's all the bosses of the games

Here is the recurring enemy on the sidescroller.  This is Manda.

He was one of the many monsters in Destroy All Monsters. Like Baragon and Varan, he stand on the sidelines during the final battle. However he did a little more as he was destroying train systems midway in the film.

He's from the 1963 movie, called Atragon. It about the lost continent of Mu (Pacific's version of Atlantis) wages war on the world and the good guys must find a forgotten super sub that Japan was going to use in WWII to stop Mu.

Now with the Mid-Bosses

This is a Matango. The movie is about people stranded on an island full of weird mushrooms. The movie isn't a kaiju flick but a regular horror movie.

This is Dogera. An alien jellyfish that wants to absorb all the planet's diamonds from a non-Godzilla film.

This is Goten from War In Space from 1977. Goten is is a sort of redesign of Atragon. War In Space is about humans uses the super ship to save Earth from aliens.

The game also has a random list of enemy ships. They are Atragons, Black Sharks(from Latitude Zero, another Toho movie with Cesar Romero), Killaak Saucers(from Destroy All Monsters), Xillian Saucers(from Invasion of Astro-Monster), Natal ships(from Battle in Outer Space, a non-Godzilla alien invasion flick), Super-X(From Godzilla 1984, the only thing from the Heisei series. Plus it the only movie at the time when this game was out.)

As you guys see, the NES game has an obsession of the expanded universe. Enemies pulled from Toho's non-Godzilla films. This be like playing an Avengers game but the half the bosses and enemies won't be Loki, Ultron, Winter Solider, Crossbones, Ronan, Abomination, or Mandarin(both of them). No you be facing lesser enemies from Daredevil, Jessica Jones, or Agents of Shield. The TV shows that take place in the same universe but doesn't get major focus like the movies.

Back then, when I was watching Destroy All Monsters, I wondered if I was missed any Godzilla movies when I saw all these monsters? Well I didn't miss any, it just Toho threw in everything in the movie. This was before the age of the fast running internet, so how was I suppose to know.

Heck, I honesty thought the Godzilla timeline was changed due to the time travel events from the 1991 film, thus explaining why Godzilla had to re-fight Mothra, fight a different MechaGodzilla, and Godzilla's son being born all over again. However, TV stations never did aired the 84 movie and I was not aware the series went through a reboot at the time.

Baragon and Varan were in the video game Godzilla Unleashed. However, the game is 3rd in the series after Destroy All Monsters Melee and Save The Earth. By then, nearly every monster from the entire series were a playable character and Baragon and Varan were more like extra treats than weird choice of limited amount of characters.