Video Game Review #596: Hook

Hook

Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis,

Sega CD

Before playing:

Dangeeksout history is being made here: I played through three different versions of the same game and I'm now rolling them together into one big review. Unprecedented times we live in! All jokes aside, I didn't think it made sense to review these games individually when they are all essentially the same thing. Sure, they have some cosmetic differences, which we'll get to in this review, but at its core, all three versions of the game still have the same exact gameplay and the same exact level design.

Before we get too far into the review, I'll give you a little backstory on my history with the game. I knew this game existed when I was a kid, but for some reason my local video stores didn't have it in stock, so I never ended up renting it. If I had heard from friends at school that the game was awesome, I probably would have found a way to get my hands on it. But I heard literally nothing about the game. Complete crickets. No one ever talked about or mentioned the video game version of Hook. I don't even remember reading about it in the video game magazines I was always so glued to back then. As a result, my assumption was that the game wasn't very good. I moved on with my life, never bothering to seek out the game.

Hook came out for home consoles in 1992 on the SNES and 1993 on the Genesis and Sega CD. I would have been about 11 years old at the time. I am just now playing it in 2025 at the age of 43. If you aren't good at math, that's a 32ish year gap between the game coming out and me playing it for the first time. Why now? I have been hearing a lot of things online lately about how this is an underrated gem, so I decided to take the plunge and check it out. I like the Hook movie. I like 2D platformers. I like retro gaming. Why not give it a shot?

So here we are. Let's dive in.

Story:

This game follows the same loose plot as the movie. Peter Pan is called back to Neverland to fight Captain Hook, when his children are taken by the evil pirate. The first level of the game, Peter trains with the Lost Boys as he learns how to fight and to fly. The rest of the game has you making your way towards the bay where Captain Hook's ship is docked. 

Your progress is shown on an overhead map that is displayed in between stages. Each stage you pass, you move one space forward on the map. Although there is a map, there is no backtracking; you move through the stages in a linear progression. There are 11 in total. When you make it to the end of the game, you fight Hook (twice) and rescue your children. There's a quick cutscene and the game ends.

The game's story sequences are a bit slow. The intro of the game drags on forever. I couldn't wait for it to be over so I could just play the darn game already. I do enjoy the faithfulness of the game to the movie, and how the game recreates the world and the magical feel of Hook pretty well. There is a part at the end of the game where the fat kid (Thud) rolls into a ball and knocks down all the enemies right before the final boss. This allows you to pick up all the power ups they left behind so you can come into the battle with Hook at full strength. I thought that was pretty cool.

What are the differences between the versions as far as story goes? Not much. The Sega CD has voice acting during the introduction. There are also some REALLY grainy cutscenes interspersed randomly throughout the game that only last for about 5 seconds. You can barely even tell what is happening in most of these scenes. But aside from these differences, the story is pretty much exactly the same across all three versions of the game.

Gameplay:

This is a fairly standard 2D platformer. I've reviewed the game Skyblazer before, and prior to playing this game, I had heard comparisons made between the two titles. Indeed, I found there to be a lot of similarities. I mean, both games were made by the same team, so this makes sense.

Generally, you start on the left side of the stage and you have to make your way forward to the right. You slash enemies with your sword, you jump, you pick up fairy powder which allows you to fly for a short period of time. Eventually you get to the end of the stage, where you will often (but not always) fight a boss character. 

The first stage, the training stage, you battle Rufio as the boss character. Other bosses you encounter are random Captain Hook cronies, including a skeleton guy who takes off his own head and throws it at you. There's another guy driving a big Robotnik-like flying machine. I don't remember any of them from the movie, but okay. The final battle of the game involves not one, but two boss fights against Captain Hook. For the most part, I enjoyed these boss fights. They all have a simple mechanic or exploit that you must recognize before you can beat them. Once you figure this exploit out, the boss becomes super easy.

The game itself is challenging, but not too overly hard. Every time you make it to a new "screen", you restart there if you die. So you don't have to do the whole level over again. You do have to begin at the start of a level if you run out of lives and have to continue. But that's okay. The stages aren't too terribly long. And the game has unlimited continues, so you can just trial and error your way through everything fairly easily.

There is a bit of a difficulty spike towards the end of the game. There are enemies that fire at you with guns, and their accuracy is startling. Most of the time they are up on ledges or areas that you have to fly to. Your character is very slow in this game, so enemies can often get off multiple shots at you as you make your way towards them. It's almost a miracle if you don't take damage during some of these segments. They are so freaking difficult, especially with their accuracy and their rate of fire. There is knockback/recovery time in this game, so you can't just charge at them, take one hit of damage, and then just kill them easily. You'll often take multiple hits from the same character.

To make things worse, the game often tosses multiple gun shooting characters on the screen at the same time. There is one part where you have to fight about five of them while flying upwards through a narrow chamber. I unashamedly used save states to get my way through this area. There's another area shortly after that has several gun shooting characters AND a boomerang-knife throwing character all bunched up together. It's insanity. Even with save states, I struggled.

And then there is another area where you have to fly through a tight corridor lined with spikes. But your flying power doesn't last long enough to get you through here, so it is inevitable that you are going to take some damage. You essentially have to come into this area with full health, and then make your way through it pixel-perfect to even have a chance at getting through. It sucks.

Aside from this nightmarish fifteen minutes or so of gameplay, the rest of the game is a blast to play. I try to not let this affect my overall thoughts on the game. All in all, I think this is a lot of fun, across all three versions of the game. I'm not going to talk about the differences in gameplay across these three consoles, because I don't think there really is any? It was identical from my experience. There may be some minute differences, but I sure didn't notice them.

SNES:

Genesis:

Graphics:

The graphical quality between the games is the first obvious, glaring difference between the titles. I played the SNES version first. This is easily the best looking version of the game. It's got bright colors, great backgrounds, some very nice sprite work. It is like a cartoon version of the game. It's great.

I played the Sega CD version next. Immediately, you notice the downgrade. Peter himself looks more muted and yellow than green and vibrant. The levels are more dreary. Everything feels less cartoony and alive than the SNES game. It doesn't necessarily look bad, especially if you have never played the SNES version and have no basis for comparison. But it is clearly inferior.

I played the Genesis version last. Woof, this one was the worst looking. Admittedly, I didn't take notes, so I can't really break down exactly how this is different from the Sega CD version. It just feels flatter. It's not as well animated. The colors are flat out bad in certain spots. I remember thinking "this looks like an NES game" on multiple occasions. Again, the game doesn't look necessarily bad, especially if this is the only version of it you've played. But there is a LOT of room for improvement here.

Sound:

The sound is the second most glaring difference between the versions of games. The Sega CD version clearly sounds the best. The music is pulled right from the movie. The sweeping orchestral music really gets you pumped up and in the mood to play the game. Normally, I don't care much about music in games. But here? It makes so much difference. The SNES and Genesis games have cheesy, generic music that only somewhat resembles the music from the film. But the Sega CD version's soundtrack is a work of art.

For this reason alone, if I ever come back and play this game again, it is going to be the Sega CD version. Normally, I'd take the prettier graphics over the better music, but it can't be understated how much of a difference the music makes here. Oh, this version has voice acting, too! 

Overall:

I enjoyed this game in all of its iterations. The gameplay is the same across all three games. The only difference is in the presentation of the games.

The SNES version has the best graphics. The Sega CD version has the best music. The Genesis version is kind of the worst of both worlds. So if there is a hierarchy here, the Genesis version is clearly at the bottom. That said, the gameplay for all these games is identical, so I am giving all of them the same review score. That's what we're here for, right? The gameplay. I always harp in my reviews how graphics and music don't matter. It's whether the game is fun to play or not.

Hook puts this theory to the absolute test. I am soooo tempted to give the Genesis game a lower review score. But I am going to stand my ground and stick to my opinion. Gameplay is king. As far as gameplay goes, these games are all the same. They are equally fun to play, so they deserve the same grade. That doesn't mean I wouldn't pick one version of this game over the others (because like I said, if I were to play through these games again, I'd pick the Sega CD version). But that's more of a personal preference.

If you were alive during the 90s and missed out on Hook like I did, you should probably go out and play this game. It is pretty fun. If you are younger and are interested in fun, classic platformers to play, you should check this out. If you're a Hook fan in general (I think it's a very underrated movie), you should check this out.

I feel like I've been glazing this game all review long, so I am a little surprised to find myself giving it only a B and not a B+ or a score in the A range. Why did I grade it so "low?" I just think there are better games out there. That's all there really is to it. Nothing against Hook, because I do like this game. But comparatively speaking, a B sounds about right. I'm not super gung ho about the game. I'm not all like "play this now!! It's fantastic!!" I'm more like: "you should check this out. It's pretty good." That tiny little bit of enthusiasm keeps it from being a truly upper tier game in my opinion.

THE GRADE:

B

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