R-Type: Good or horrible?
I know, right? R-Type. The jaw-dropping poster child for Speccy brilliance? How could I even suggest such a thing. Well, here's the thing. It is a stunning conversion and qualifies as a bonafide technical marvel so not questioning the Speccy version's awesomeness.
But the game itself.
Level 1: brilliant. Introduces the fab weapons and power up system. Has the big wheel of guns thing and, of course, the amazing end boss.
Level 2: first half is alright, second half gets a bit dull. The flying debris is rubbish though. Snake bit is epic though. Final boss is a bit stupidly designed for me. Probably a right chore if you die beforehand too.
Level 3: brilliant again. A show-stopper visually. I had no idea what to expect and it blew my mind at the time. A tough but fair level. Final bit is a bit of a ballache but overall it's a good level.
Level 4: starts off okay but then you end up with baddies coming at you from all directions. With all the dots on the screen limiting your movement, this level is all about trial and error. Figuring out which route to take. Becomes a memory test. Final boss is a hateful bullet sponge.
Level 5: looks awful, plays awful and has a terribly dull bullet sponge boss.
Level 6: A horrific maze where horrible death awaits you with every incorrect binary choice. There's no fun to be had in this level and the shooting becomes secondary to the memory aspects. Boss is a prick too.
Level 7: like a hard version of level 1. Not bad actually, although a few too many enemies from behind. UTTERLY RUINED by a completely horrible boss battle with stuff falling on you.
Level 8: invincible enemies and a boss that you can't get too. A bit cheap on the old difficulty.
But the game itself.
Level 1: brilliant. Introduces the fab weapons and power up system. Has the big wheel of guns thing and, of course, the amazing end boss.
Level 2: first half is alright, second half gets a bit dull. The flying debris is rubbish though. Snake bit is epic though. Final boss is a bit stupidly designed for me. Probably a right chore if you die beforehand too.
Level 3: brilliant again. A show-stopper visually. I had no idea what to expect and it blew my mind at the time. A tough but fair level. Final bit is a bit of a ballache but overall it's a good level.
Level 4: starts off okay but then you end up with baddies coming at you from all directions. With all the dots on the screen limiting your movement, this level is all about trial and error. Figuring out which route to take. Becomes a memory test. Final boss is a hateful bullet sponge.
Level 5: looks awful, plays awful and has a terribly dull bullet sponge boss.
Level 6: A horrific maze where horrible death awaits you with every incorrect binary choice. There's no fun to be had in this level and the shooting becomes secondary to the memory aspects. Boss is a prick too.
Level 7: like a hard version of level 1. Not bad actually, although a few too many enemies from behind. UTTERLY RUINED by a completely horrible boss battle with stuff falling on you.
Level 8: invincible enemies and a boss that you can't get too. A bit cheap on the old difficulty.
Post edited by Bluce_Ree on
Comments
Myself can't finish level 1 and still consider it great :)
All I will say of the Speccy version is this - whatever you think of R-Type the game , the Speccy version surpassed everyone's expectations in terms of the quality of the conversion; and (despite the inevitable multi-load) in 48k to boot.
Anyway, the game itself was, according to me and my mates, very good indeed. Maybe it did trail off in the later levels, but I doubt that many people saw the latter levels anyway. And it was a stunning conversion for the Spectrum.
'Nuff said...
I'm not a particularly big fan of shoot 'em ups but this is one of a handful that I really enjoy. It has character. If you don't like the original then you're unlikely to enjoy the speccy version much.
I think the game sucks and it's not because I can't pass the first level ... it's because the game sucks and because I don't care for single-direction games ... but mainly because the game sucks, no wait, it's because I don't like single-screen/direction games :razz:
You're thinking of all the nasties on level one.
( no wait, I am thinking that.)
It must be noted that the arcade version is one of the rockest hardest games of all time. If the ports are bastards to complete, then they're doing it right!
Level 1 is very pretty, and has some good moments. The rotating circle and the boss are highlights. Piece of piss to complete.
Level 2 is good. The camouflaged creatures coming out of the scenery are done well, and the snake is epic. The horizontal flying enemies you encounter at the halfway stage are annoying if you lose a life. The boss is easy when you know the trick - position yourself just above the eye and keep shooting and the snake can't get you.
Level 3 is superb. Enormous ship that you have to pick you're way around. It can be a bit of bother to hit the weak point at the end though.
Level 4 is pure cheating bastness unless you are tooled up with a fully powered up helix laser. Lose a life before the mid level restart point and it's a real nightmare. Defeating the boss is rather more freeform than previous levels.
I don't get the hate for level 5. Big centipede baddies and a few enemy craft. The brainy boss is decent enough too.
Level 6 is a maze. Frustrating if you had to pay 10p a go to learn it, but not so bad now you can restart on arbitrary levels.
Level 7 is good tough fun and The boss is definitely owes something to the Star Wars trash compactor.
I always found level 8 a bit easy. Dodge the stars and let the boss have it with the central beam from the reflection laser.
Apart from that I loved the game.
only got to level 5 i believe
want to get a big poster made of the third level!!
As for the level design, some of the later ones are indeed utter swines packed with points where you've got no chance at all of getting through on the first go. Rather it's the sort of game where you have to die lots and learn from your mistakes until you can commit the safe path to memory. Then again, it's not really that different to Lightforce, Zynaps, Penetrator, etc. in that respect.
Yep. That's pretty much my story. I can get to that boss on the arcade and Speccy versions without losing a life. Then I lose all of them.
Very playable, difficulty setting is just right, and lovely use of colour. What more could a person want in a Speccy game?
Platforms, flashing items, and a miner :p
however, and I promise I'm not exaggerating, in my opinion the speccy verion is crap! was so disappointed when I played it. maybe I'd like it if I'd never played the game gear version but the movement of the craft on the speccy version is a joke! hated playing it...and I will only concede a speccy version is outclassed by another format with a gun to my head.... The game gear version is really smooth and fluid, specc version is jerky awkward mess!
I don't know, smooth movement of gamesprites perhaps?
The biggest problem is that it throws huge amounts of stuff at the player - from narrowed areas to the ships which leave solid trails behind them. Then there's the fact that a number of ships are launched from the left-hand side of the screen - just where players tend to sit their ships...
In brief, it's very difficult to survive unless you've played it before, have a perfect memory for enemy placements *and* have a fully-tooled up ship with the "transverse wave" powerup (aka the pretty circles); unless you're a hopped-up hotshot, the default ship just doesn't have the firepower to effectively punch through the enemies and ship-trails.
Unfortunately, since there isn't a level select, practicing and learning the patterns for level 4 is very difficult: at least on the Spectrum, it takes 5-10 minutes to get there (including loading times) and a mistimed twitch of the joystick can see you dead in 30 seconds and stripped of your hard-won powerups.
Admittedly, these days things are a bit easier, as you can use save-states to skip the earlier levels. But back in the day, level 4 was pretty much a brick wall!
Get writing an R-Type themed manic Miner tribute!
Just looked at a video of the MS\GG version...what's up with the scale? The levels in the arcade version are tight and restricting but here it's like flying a model plane through the Albert Hall! The PC Engine version got the proportions right (even if they did have to push-scroll the playfield up and down) but on the MS it's just..........wrong.
Here's a walkthrough (flythrough?) of the 128K hack, where all the levels are loaded in at once:
Technically it's still an excellent conversion. I mean, you can look to Zynaps if you want smooth sprite movement, but it has nowhere near the amount or size of enemies on screen as R-Type managed.
We've been spoiled by better conversions since, but it's still a great Speccy game.
But yes, I'd agree that the difficulty goes crazy from level 4 onward. There's some great stuff going on on level 4, but it's pitched too hard.
I do find the restart points to be pretty well placed for power-ups though, and you only need one power-up to get the Force. Much kinder than any of the Gradius series. It's a real challenge to get two Bits at the same time, since there are only three in the whole game. The temptation to dive in to get the second one on level 4 is almost guaranteed to get you killed.
- IONIAN-GAMES.com -
But, I'm better with the Speccy version than I am with MAME. At least with the Speccy version, I can usually make it past that ring of guns. i don't think I've ever seen that part of the level on MAME :lol:
I think your being a bit fussy there; the game is a technical marvel too as far as arcade conversions go of what the programmers achieved - particularly with all that lovely colour.
A flying vacuum cleaner ... and ... err ... no way to unlock the door on level 2.