Old vs. New A to Z: The letter R

CURRENT SCORE:

OLD GAMES 7

NEW GAMES 10

Ouch, hey get off my picture disc of Nirvana's "Lithium". That's worth £25!

RYGAR

(U.S. Gold, 1987)

Rygar was one of 10,000 arcade licences U.S. Gold had on the go back in those days. They only rarely had an original idea of their own. Well maybe that's a bit harsh, they did do... erm, Killed Until Dead perhaps? Don't think that was in the arcades surely? More's the pity.

Our hero is sent flying by the muties' crack display team

The man himself's snappy catchphrase "Let's fight!" suggests this isn't going to be a farm management game. And so it proves. It's the future but it's all gone wrong as usual and muties are roaming the Earth in that shambly they love so much. The heroic/generic/myopic Rygar dons his Tarzan loincloth and vows to (a) heal the world and (b) make it a better place.

Level 4 sees Rygar confront the Deadly Doughnuts of Doom

Conan, no Trantor, no Rygar has the usual rusty sword to clobber with, but he can also hurl magical fireballs surprisingly, he's not just a buff dad bod y'know. He must make his scrolly way rightwards, destroying all in his path, jumping jerkily over gaps and picking up pick-ups. The drill is surely known by now.

Level 3 is Wet Wet Wet, and "Death is all around you". Argh, hang glider!

Familiar enough, so the devil's in the execution innit? And sadly Rygar is not a very impressive experience. The sprites are small and vague and don't move very well. The sound is minimal and the levels aren't very interesting or varied. The only thing I like is that if you land on an enemy from above, it doesn't kill you. Makes a refreshing change. Beyond that, meh.

This ace screen is truly the stuff of nightmares

RAYS' REPRISAL

(Luca Bordoni, 2015)

Fantastic Voyage. Cats. Twister: Mother of Harlots. What do these games all have in common? They're all cr@p? Cor that's a bit harsh! No, they all had to undergo name changes either before or after being released. Like Poundland's Toblerone rip-off, the Twin Peaks bar. Although quite how they then didn't get sued by David Lynch I'll never know.

You chomp the red wall, which makes the Zorlon Cannon appear on the left. It's not there yet

In this instance, the game in question is that 1982 classic (?) Yars' Revenge on the old wooden Atari, which one of our mates always had, but not us. Luca Bordoni loves re-doing ancient space shooters, such as his Explorer games, so he had a crack at this one too. But Atari-san found out and said "Nada". So Yars became Rays and Revenge became Reprisal. Outrageous stuff!

Woah, nearly bought it at the hands of the deadly Swirl there

It's quite simple really. You have to use your Yar to destroy the Qotile with the Zorlon Cannon. But what I didn't realise at first was that you have to eat away some of the Shield to produce the Zorlon Cannon in the first place. While avoiding the Qotile Defender and also avoiding the deadly Swirl that the Qotile periodically turns into. Alright, basically you have to move your ship around and get missiles firing from the left at the thing on the far right. Any better?

Behold, the mighty blue Zorlon Cannon appears at last!

Despite its highly bizarre methods, which must have been all the rage in Japan in '82, this manages to be a very playable and addictive shooter. You have to keep on the move to avoid the baddies while trying to clear the brick wall in front of you, so you can get a clear shot at the target. You'd have to play it really to grasp it fully, but it's unusual shooty fun for all the family, including Ray.

VERDICT

BEST GRAPHICS - RYGAR

BEST COLOUR - RAYS' REPRISAL

BEST SOUND - RAYS' REPRISAL

MOST PLAYABLE - RYGAR

MOST ORIGINAL - RAYS' REPRISAL

MOST ADDICTIVE - RAYS' REPRISAL

FINAL SCORE

RYGAR 2 RAYS' REPRISAL 4

Rays' Reprisal wins!