Pugsley’s Scavenger Hunt (NES, SNES, Game Boy)
The Addams Family: Pugsley’s Scavenger Hunt was the 3rd Addams Family game to be released and the second that was available for the Super Nintendo. This particular iteration was also available for the NES, Super NES and Game Boy.
It is a fairly typical side-scrolling platform game with an Addams Family theme and featuring Pugsley as the main character. The goal is for Pugsley to find items scattered about the various levels. One unique feature is that the game is non-linear in the sense that the player can choose the level by choosing what door to enter in the house. It was a fairly difficult game, made harder by the fact that the SNES version didn’t have a save or password feature (the NES and Game Boy versions did).
For some reason, the NES version of this game was not a port of the same game on the SNES but a port of the previous Addams Family game, originally just titled The Addams Family, released for the SNES, Genesis, Amiga and Atari ST. The same levels were featured (if scaled down) and the same enemies, items and gameplay were also there. It just used Pugsley instead of Gomez as the main character. I have no idea why they did this but I suspect it was a timing/marketing issue. The games were only released about a year apart so it might just be that the NES port of The Addams Family for the NES was ready around the same time as the SNES and other versions of Pugsley’s Scavenger Hunt. It probably made more sense to market them together as the same game. This was near the end of the life of the NES anyway.
Other than the difficulty criticism and the lack of a password/save feature for the SNES version, the game was generally reviewed positively with the SNES version being the best (despite the lack of the save/password feature). The excellent graphics are particularly notable. Personally, I would skip it unless you are a big Addams Family fan. It’s ok but there are far better games out there.
The above ad is from Volume 3, Issue 3 of the Super NES Buyer’s Guide.
