Rygar (Lynx) | Retro Review
Platform: Atari Lynx
Year: 1990
Developer: Tecmo
Publisher: Atari Corporation
The Atari Lynx is easily one of the most fascinating gaming systems to ever be released. A huge slab of a handheld that was released way back in 1989 with a colour-backlit screen, scaling support and sixteen whole bits (whatever it is that they do). When the Atari Lynx was released it wasn’t just the most powerful handheld console in the world, it gave the home consoles a damn good run for their money too!
When I think of the Lynx, the first game that always comes to mind is Rygar. Probably because when I first got my hands on a Lynx, this was the game I played the most. It also holds the prestigious honour of being the first Lynx game I ever beat.
This is a port of the 1986 game of the same name; an action side-scroller where traverse through a fantasy world throwing your shield-like weapon (the Diskarmor) at hordes of ferocious monsters and beastly warriors. One of the first things you’ll notice when you start playing this game (other than the fact that the title logo is in Japanese for some reason), is how great this game looks. It’s really impressive how close this looks to the arcade version. The parallax scrolling backgrounds and the huge colourful sprites look great in the Lynx’s signature chunky style.
The Lynx delivers this game on the audio front too. That said, the music is rather limited with only a few tunes throughout the whole thing. That’s not a fault of this port as the same issue exists for the arcade version. Thankfully those same couple of tunes don’t get too annoying and just sort of fall into the background. It’s not some egregious little ditty that will take up residence in your head and drive you crazy or anything like that.
Don’t lose your head! Haha… I’m here all night.
Gameplay and content wise, this is pretty much what you’d expect; a cut-down version of the arcade classic. The most notable thing that has been left on the cutting-room floor for this port is the attack where you throw the Diskarmor around you in a circle. This attack is essential in the arcade version to fend off the legions of flying demons. The absence of this technique is not terrible as it may seem. The difficulty of the arcade version has been turned down immensely, so this move is not really required.
The temporary invincibility power-up has gone too, but the other four are still here. The available power-ups can increase the range and power of your weapon, so make sure to grab them if you can. The best power-up is the one that looks like a tiger’s head. This one gives you the power to kill your foes simply by jumping on them, allowing you to make like an Italian plumber and hop ‘n’ bop your way to victory. With that power-up you can even kill the larger monsters that normally take a bunch of hits in a single stomp!
With the Tiger power-up, even these big yellow dinosaur things are no match for your boot!
Even though not all of the enemy types made the cut to this version, there’s still a decent variety of nasties to keep you busy. Headless ghouls, lava monsters and big yellow triceratops things are among the monsters you’ll be thwarting on your adventure. The most obvious enemy omission are the chameleon things that try to strike you with their tongues on the rope climbing sections. Their tunnels are still there, so maybe they were planned but had to be cut for one reason or another. Also on these sections, the bat-like demon that tries to drop bombs on you doesn’t respawn. If you kill it before jumping on the rope, you can have a leisurely climb without any threat whatsoever.
Just a dude going for a leisurely shimmy up a rope.
As eluded to in a previous paragraph, the difficulty here is nothing like the arcade. In fact, this is a very easy game. Once you’ve got a hang of the basics, it won’t be long before you beat it. Even though you don’t get any continues on this journey, extra lives are so plentiful that continues would seem like overkill. Strangely, the difficulty doesn’t seem to ramp up in the way you’d expect; the later levels aren’t much harder than the earlier ones. The difficulty is one of this version’s biggest issues; while it is nice to actually see a game though to completion, the lack of challenge meant that the victory wasn’t all that sweet.
The game is pretty short too. 23 levels may seem like a lot, but the levels are incredibly short and you’ll be beating most of them in under a couple of minutes. This little cartridge only holds about 30-40 minutes of gameplay, and you won’t need to put in hours of practice to get good at it either. A difficult selection would have done wonders with regards to replay value.
The lack of variety doesn’t do this game any favours either. Most levels purely consist of running right, killing baddies and a bit of basic platforming. There’s a couple of climbing sections to vary things up a little, but that’s about it as far as variety goes. Some more boss fights wouldn’t have gone amiss either; you’ll only fight one during the whole adventure.
Hulk Hogan’s looking a bit rough nowadays…
Despite the issues with the difficulty (or lack thereof) and variety, this is certainly not a bad game. The controls are tight and responsive, and I didn’t experience any hit-box shenanigans. The game looks great and plays it too! This may only be a relatively short experience, but it’s a relatively satisfying. You’ll pick it up, play it for maybe an hour, beat it and then put it down with no regrets whatsoever and move on with your life. As a child, I most likely would have found this game somewhat lacking. As a busy adult with a nausea-inducing games backlog, I really enjoy short snappy experiences like this.
In all, if you’re looking for short yet fun experience on the Lynx, Rygar will do the job nicely. [7/10]
