Development
The game was released by Sunsoft in Japan as Chô Wakusei Senki Metafight (also simply called Metafight or Meta Fight) on June 17, 1988 (1988-06-17). It was released under the title Blaster Master in North America in November 1988 and in Europe on April 25, 1991 (1991-04-25). Metafight, along with Ripple Island, was re-released for the PlayStation in Volume 4 of Sunsoft's Memorial Series in 2002. The game was released for the Wii's Virtual Console service in North America on December 14, 2009 (2009-12-14). The game's Virtual Console release marked Sunsoft's first North American release since deciding to return to developing video games for the Western market through its partnership with Gaijinworks. Metafight was released for the Virtual Console in Japan on June 29, 2010 (2010-06-29).
Blaster Master was created by Yoshiaki Iwata, who would also direct the reimagining Blaster Master: Overdrive. The game was made by a part-time development team of about five people, which included a main programmer, sub-programmer, lead designer, character designer, and sound programmer. Iwata did the game's opening sequence and designed the map, overall layout, and bosses; and he oversaw all phases of the game's development. In a 2010 interview, Iwata said: "we were trying to make the best action game to date, with all that entails. With SOPHIA (the game’s vehicle), we wanted to bring to life a sense of action that incorporated all 360° of the environment in a way that players hadn’t really experienced up to that point. Along with that, we wanted large, expansive maps so that we could support that vision."
The game's design came from Iwata, who was able to transport his original ideas directly into the game as far as the NES' graphical capabilities could be taken at that time. He said: "the goal was really to try to pull off the best graphics on the NES to date. Simple graphics were more or less the standard on the NES at the time but I had this firm belief that it was possible to do something better, something prettier. I feel like we pulled it off and were able to show people what could be done . It left an impression around the office, and from what I've heard influenced the work of other games that were later made by other NES developers as well." The game's music and sound were designed in cooperation between Sunsoft's staff and an outside composer, Naoki Kodaka, who had previously worked on scores for many of the company's other titles. Iwata credited him for giving the company a good reputation for video game music in the late 1980s and lamented that "none of those people are working together anymore since they've all separated from Sunsoft ".
The other members of Blaster Master's development team created the system of alternating between the 2D platforming and top-down modes. During the game's planning, the team came up with the idea that SOPHIA would eventually be able to go anywhere in the game, including navigating on the ceilings and walls. The team created the top-down portions to allow Jason to shoot in all directions and to enable them to "express large bosses that really had an impact". They did not want to design the gameplay in a linear progression; instead they drew inspiration from and were influenced by Nintendo's Metroid to create a game that allowed players to freely move between levels. According to Iwata: "We wanted the player to experience the feeling of excitement that comes from discovering something after endeavoring through a difficult search, which is why we composed a map that allowed the player to move freely between different areas. We really put a great deal of thought into that element of the game design and, I mean this in the best possible way, but we wanted the player to have to struggle."
The game was localized from Metafight in Japan to Blaster Master for Western markets. In North America, plot elements normally present in anime (as featured in Metafight) were not yet popular; Sunsoft's U.S. division asked the Japanese development team to change the game's original plot elements. Hence, the game's plot changed to that of Jason and his pet frog Fred, and name of the planet "Sophia the 3rd" in Metafight became the name of Jason's tank in Blaster Master. The original staff also omitted a portion of the map in the fourth level in which "the player was forced to control Jason and make a desperate suicide-leap for a ladder suspended in mid-air," after complaints from the U.S. staff.
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