Tag: Metroidvania

Yars Rising trailer looks “Dread”-fully Metroidvaniac

Atari
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Atari dropped a trailer for a new game in the Yars’ Revenge series, Yars Rising.

Quite a departure from OG Yars, but maybe in a good way

The game seems to be primarily in the Metroidvania genre, with a heavy Metroid: Dread influence.

It looks competent, yet uninspired.

Had Atari been ready to launch the VCS with this in 2017, the year Metroid: Dread released, that would have been something, wouldn’t it?

But as it is, it feels like Atari cribbed Nintendo/MercurySteam and created a “me too” game that recycles the original Yars Revenge, to create a “me-too-vania”.

If the mechanics, level design, and boss battles are on par with Metroid Dread, it’d be worth money and worth a play, I suppose. But something about this feels a bit too “on the nose”, like it’s really little more than a re-skinning of Dread, with all the soul and originality sucked out of it, and the wireframe of what’s left painted in with bits of Yars “lore”.

I feel like it’s a bit sad, because if Atari could put all this effort into a project and have it turn out reasonably good, then they’re firing on nearly all cylinders; they just need to have that spark of originality and innovation.

That’s what the games that original Yars Revenge creator Howard Scott Warshaw created for Atari back in the day always did with the games he created. HSW’s games on the original Atari 2600 innovated, pushed limits, and advanced notions of what a video game could be.

So with that in mind, it’s a little bit sad to see his creation, Yars Revenge, being recycled on what looks like a generic Metroid: Dread clone that will genuinely surprise me if it does bring something new to the table.

The main character of Yars Rising is a woman (like Samus), and has a lot of “attitude”, quipping wisecracks and sounding annoyed at the things she must go through all in a day’s work for a hero such as herself. I think the character model is well done, attractive without being too sexualized, and the voice acting is pretty good. Yet somehow the whole feels a bit forced, and falls a bit flat.

The graphical style of the platform engine feels almost entirely derivative of Metroid: Dread, and while I loved the graphics in Metroid Dread, here it all feels a bit too “seen before.” I’ll be honest, I’m not expecting that much out of Atari’s new releases. I’m happy to ignore what they release if it’s not my thing. It’d be great to see Atari release something that puts them on par with where Nintendo was at… 7 years ago… but I’m not exactly expecting that. I’ll be happy to be surprised, though. I’m open to being surprised by Yars Rising, but not expecting it.

It’s only a 2 minute trailer, so I am not going to speculate too much on the game. There are a few clips showing classic Yars Revenge style gameplay sequences among the clips of Metroid: Dread ripoff fare, but how this is integrated into the whole isn’t really clear. It seems they are min-games that you access through kiosks that you find in the main game.

Overall what we see looks competently executed, just not exactly all that original or innovative. Considering that Metroid Dread came out in 2017, it would have been so much more interesting if this had been a launch title for the Atari VCS.

Xanthiom: an Atari 2600 demake, homage to Metroid

Atari, reviews
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A day ago, a video of an Atari 2600 homebrew for a Metroid de-make was posted on Reddit. I’m used to seeing these types of post and then losing track of the project as nothing happens for months or years. But this developer, MathanGames is working very quickly, it looks like in Batari Basic, and has already released a ROM.

The first two releases had a vertical jitter bug that gave the game a feeling like you were playing in a world prone to frequent earthquakes, which made jumping gaps somewhat dicey, but the 3rd build seems to have eliminated this defect, and is more playable. To hopefully avoid copyright/trademark infringement problems from the notoriously litigious Nintendo, the project has been renamed Xanthiom.

The game is not really attempting to port Metroid, exactly, but there’s a many familiar features: missiles,energy tanks, jump boots, wave beam, varia suit all make appearances. But there’s no morph ball, no bombs, no vertical shooting, no ice beam, and no screw attack. The starting world feels like Brinstar, and is joined by elevator pad to an area that seems to be Norfair, but the map layout is different, so it’s only very loosely based on Metroid, more homage than port.

Still, you’ll find doors to shoot, red doors require a missile, of course. A few of the enemies from Metroid also appear: Zoomers, Rippers, Rio,, and Skree. Even the mini-bosses, Ridley and Kraid, even a fake Ridley.. or is that a Space Pirate? Sadly, no Mother Brain, no Metroids (unless I haven’t found them yet.)

There’s no musical score, but there are sound effects for shooting and getting hit.

Controls are pretty awkward; it feels like the jump mechanics could use some polish. And some of enemies don’t collide with the backgrounds, so pass right through walls.

I love it. I’m hoping that the developer continues with this project, adding more to it, because what’s here already shows a great deal of promise, and I love playing NES de-makes on Atari 2600.

Altogether, this has a feel similar to Princess Rescue, but I think it feels better. Not terribly challenging, unless you count the rather awkward jumping, but you’ll enjoy playing through it in 20 or 30 minutes.

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