This was about beginning of what I call the "consolization" of arcade titles, where the publishers remade their coin-op games into exercises more fitting for the home audience, especially during the era of Mario and Zelda.
This was the first game I bought for my NES as a kid. At first, I was pissed it hardly resembled the arcade game, but once I got into it, it quickly became one of my most favorite games for the system.
Oh right on! I love when that happens... I think the Master System version's supposed to be more like the arcade, but I don't have a copy of that one hanging around yet. Have you played anything else like this on NES? I love Faxanadu so much!
I used to rag on it as a kid and though it was dumb, but it's one of the handful of games that's great fun to replay these days. It can be gone through more quickly if take on more challenging grinding of later monsters. Also has some great glitches/hidden worlds like Metroid did.
I find it funny you thought of Castlevania 2's environments while playing this. Playing this and Simon's Quest in 1987/1988 in my head I always imagined both games were happening at the same time. It's just that Simon and Rygar were on opposite sides of those Mountains. My NES dream game would be combining the two in a 2 player experience so Simon could whip two headed lion monsters after throwing holy water on them and Rygar could use his disk on Werewolves in the forests. I realize I was 7 years old when I thought that but I still want that.
Welcome back!!! I always wondered if Rygar was influenced by the movie, Krull, as there's a lot of similar elements/themes in it! Also there's a Japanese exclusive Master System version too, but it's a mostly straight port of the arcade game, weird it was never released in the west too as it would have fitted in the library perfectly.
Oh hmmm... I should probably watch Krull one of these days! You might be onto something! I've heard of the Master System version as well but don't currently own a copy. I'm drawn into the adventure/RPG aspects of games like this so I don't know if I'd enjoy that one quite as much, but I'd be willing to give it a go!
I’ve always been a huge Rygar fan,both arcade and NES versions. I got the Nes game on my 13th birthday in 1987! We had a big earthquake that morning before school so they canceled class that day. I got to stay home and play Rygar all day! Good times! Thanks for the cool review!
You really really should. Its total 80s swords and sorcery shlock ala red sonja and conan. However... There was an athelete foot cream commercial that showed like a foot with the toes on fire to represent the irritation. Krull used the same special effect for someone holding "magic fire". I noticed it as a kid and to this day, anytime someone references krull, I cant help but think of an athelete foot commercial.
Grew up with the PS2 Rygar, it's one of my favorite games on PS2 so playing this one I had that in mind and despite this it became one of my favorites on the NES!
It was my pleasure! This game's awesome and I wish more people would try it out. And Simon's Quest is awesome! I'm a huge fan of that game. I just replayed it again in June and it just reinforced everything I've always felt about it.
I appreciate that there's no tedious padding in Rygar. No currency grinding, no endlessly hitting walls for secret passages, nothing like that. Just explore, fight, find items, and get stronger. It sticks to the fundamentals and is better for it.
Yes! It's very much to the point and it's a nice change from some others I've played. Like even if you go through a whole stage and can't get the item that's in there if you're missing a tool, you can probably still finish it and make progress regardless. It was brilliant!
I remember a glitch that put you on the non walkable green area of the overworld. You jump as you move back and forth between screens, and end up on the area you aren't supposed to be on. Not sure if it could be used to skip areas or get items early, just remember making it glitch.
I never tried to replicate any of the glitches I encountered, but I wonder if there's a speedrun category that takes advantage of any skips that can be reliably induced. Interesting!
This one was a lot of fun. Do you think you'll ever try to finish it? Or did you end up doing it later in life with a bit more English under your belt?
Great review. I could never finish Rygar as a kid and it would seem that not having the manual was the reason why. It's very impressive that your Friday afternoon streams end up seeing you finish a first playthrough in one sitting!
Thanks so much! I was expecting for things to take a lot longer and I had thought (and secretly hoped) to be playing it for at least two streams. I was sad to see it come and go so quickly.
"... clip on, without death" had me lol'ing. This is a game I'm going to have to try sometime. I found your explanation of the game mechanics and the storyline a refreshing take on this classic. Thank you for sharing this with us!
i bought a wrestling game when i was a kid. when i got home and put it in my Nintendo rygar popped up on the screen. i beat it from start to finish without dying because i reset on a game over and didn't know about the continue. took me forever. such a great game.
This is one of the games that shaped my interest in gaming. I was playing this and Metal Gear at the same time as a new NES owner and my mind was melted by the depth of the gameplay of both. It was such a leap from the Colecovision and Atari 7800 when the NES came out. If you didn't have an Apple 2E, MSX, or a Commodore, you had not experienced anything like this. Looking back it's hard to imagine how they put so much game into such a limited media.
It's fascinating to see the jump looking back, right? I feel like we're definitely missing that feeling in tech advances these days since really, it's just adding more bells and whistles to something that already feels really advanced. I started out on NES but just went back to visit some Atari 2600 and Intellivision games last week, and I really enjoyed myself! I still think I like the structure of more complex games like those on the NES and beyond, but I was surprised at how fun the older ones were too. I'm mildly obsessed with Kaboom!
@@hungrygoriya You might try Infiltrate, Keystone Kapers, and Towering Inferno. They were some of my favorites on the 2600. Infiltrate is extremely simple, but I had a blast with it when I was a kid.
This is one of the first games I ever owned for the NES when I was a kid. I played it constantly and somehow managed to beat it at an early age (about 8 years old at least). The bosses take so many hits to finally beat and somehow I managed to find a crazy glitch once where I went through the wall at the first boss and ended up facing up against the last boss of the game. I tried to replicate the glitch but it only happened that one time. Thanks for the review and memories!
What a great game to start out with! I think I would've really enjoyed this as a kid, definitely! I think I would've lost my mind facing off with the final boss all of a sudden like that though! I was shocked at how glitchy this one was!
Interesting little factoid about the soundtrack: It's by the same composer who did the soundtrack for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde on NES. In fact, the theme for the guru dudes who give Rygar advice was outright recycled as the title screen tune for Jekyll & Hyde, just pitch shifted down.
For me, Rygar is what I call an "emulator classic." What I mean is, around 1998 I was starting to remember the NES and get interested in its library again, and thanks to emulation it was a period where I was discovering some games for the first time. Rygar was one game I discovered because of emulation and--though I own a real cartridge now--a part of me will always associate it with NESticle. Same goes for Contra BTW. Yeah somehow I had Legacy of the Wizard and Bugs Bunny's Crazy Castle as a kid, but not Castlevania or Contra.
Oh nice! I dabbled in a few NES games that way as well, back when I was wanting to see what games were like before trying to track them down. I think I also used NESticle!
Dear lord, not only echoing my discovery of hundreds of games but also referencing my first love emulator, NESticle. I had a 486DX2/66 in 1999/2000 and it choked on ZSNES (even a Pentium 75 barely ran ZSNES) but NES emulation was far more accessible. My brother and I could stop fighting over games because I could download a ROM instead. When I got my first owned Pentium PC I could run ZSNES no problem, so we could only fight over the PSX! I miss NESticle, and its Sega brother Genecyst too.
The game immediately made me think of a mix of Stryder and Castlevania II for NES. Music sounds kinda Sega Genesis-y too. Rygar's music composer Michiharu Hasuya I learned only worked on two Sega games - Ys III and Metal Unit, interesting. Maybe some day I'll get into NES games, I'll have to check this one out. Great review 👏
Thanks very much! I have yet to try out Strider for NES but it definitely has some of those Simon's Quest vibes. I hope you'll give the NES library a try. There are a lot of great games to experience!
Excellent video! I think you touched on each and every point that make this one of my all time favorite NES games. Now we can only hope to meet again in the sequel… Rygar II: The search for even more tone.
Thank you again for all of the nudging to play this, and congratulations again on the world record! If not for you, I'm not sure I would've moved this up the list so fast.
Very cool review pick - genuinely one of the better NES games from that period, even if we include the JP-exclusive stuff. Controls well and has some good tunes. Quite liked this one way back when.
Was rather mystified that you completed this on your first try in a couple of hours. I do have the PAL version, so that may partly explain it. I never got very far as a kid, I found the game very confusing. Certainly wasn't one of my favourites, but I'll surely give it a try in the not so distant future. Cute voice
Yeah, that PAL version's level cap's definitely a roadblock that I didn't have to contend with. The manual's a big help if you do decide to try it again. All the best on your playthrough!
I’m going to give this one another chance (or a hundred) in the future. I grew up playing and finishing the “NES-hard” games, but as an adult without kid reflexes anymore, I do wish more titles were as forgiving as this one! :) Another fantastic review!
I find comments like these interesting, specifically about how reflexes are lost over time. maybe I'm just a weirdo, but I'm 1000 times better at video games than I was as a kid, and my reflexes are as sharp as ever. btw, I just turned 40 recently.
Awesome review! I have always wanted to try this game but thought it would take too long. Now that I know the world isn't so big I might actually have the time to give it a go!
I hope you enjoy it when you play... I've watched a lot of speedruns but retained nothing apparently. I got it all figured out in a couple of hours. It didn't even take me a whole stream to finish it! I believe in you!
Great review and I enjoyed hearing your perspective on this classic title! Oh my beloved Rygar...you have so many flaws but I still love this game and play it regularly. It also has one of my favorite soundtracks on the NES. I'm always curious what younger players think of this game because I remember when it was released and how amazing it seemed at the time since there wasn't much to compare it to. Time has not been super kind to this title...but it does take you back to a simpler time and what it does, it does well. And it is definitely an improvement over the arcade version. :)
I don't know if I would've enjoyed the arcade version nearly as much with the lack of adventure elements. There's something about an experience system that captures my interest so well. I really enjoyed most of the soundtrack too, especially the music in the cave area! I wish I could've played this one when I was little.
Finally got to watch this.. Fun as always. I've probably played through this game 3 or 4 times and still have zero idea how all the spells and magic work. I'm lucky that I did get to experience this one as a kid.. it's one that holds special memories for me now. Thanks for another solid review.
Thank you for taking the time to watch, as always! I'm jealous of your childhood Rygar experience... I wish I'd had that time with it in my younger years. Have you streamed it before? If not, I look forward to the day where you might revisit it!
@@hungrygoriya I think a friend and I rented it a few times and I think we beat it.. so fun, and yes I've streamed it before.. maybe sometime I'll do it again.
I think I need to play through it again sometime. I enjoyed it when I did a year or so ago now, but I don't remember much. I do plan to revisit it soon though... for another video project...
My uncle really liked this one. He rented it and brought it over to our house to play when I was a kid. He was better at it than we were, but we still liked it.
Confession: I have never had any interest in playing Rygar. i can't really explain why. It just never really intrigued me. But after having watched your stream and heard your perspective in this video, I'm now excited to give Rygar a try sometime soon. Great job, HG!
It's honestly a lot of fun and the forgiveness it dishes out makes it approachable in my opinion. Despite my seemingly endless patience, I'm not always up for making up lost progress or grinding out really tough sections when they're so punishing. Maybe after you finish up Golden Axe Warrior, eh?
Can I admit something? I almost never pay any attention to the story in retro games and when I watch your videos I'm often learning the story for the first time. Whether it's a Master System game that I'm trying for the first time or a Nintendo game that I've played dozens of times over 30 years I almost never know the actual story. Don't know what that says about me or if they should put me back in retro jail but I enjoy it as a part of your review videos. Rygar is a fun game and I agree the boss fights feel a little lackluster and better bosses could have jumped this game into another level. But still fun and if you like adventure games it's worth playing.
There is no need to go to retro jail, haha! I don't know why, but having a little stupid story to frame why I'm doing what I'm doing usually makes the experience a bit more fun for me, so I'm happy to pass that information along in my reviews to bring everyone else up to speed as well. I spent a ton of time reading manuals as a kid, especially the Faxanadu and Zelda 1 books, so they're something I'm automatically drawn to. If the bosses had been a tiny bit better, this would've easily been a favourite for me. I still enjoyed other sidescrolling action adventures more though!
The flying creatures remind me of Blue Meanies, also I like how you tried to jump and hit every NPC you showed in the vid and that's totally something I would be tempted to do as well 😂 (Assuming it's your gameplay, of course)
The jump is just too satisfying not to constantly use! And yep, it's all my gameplay. I usually livestream these games over on Twitch and then repurpose the recordings for videos if I want to do a review of something later on.
I loved this game too and wish I could've tried it out when I was younger. Good to know you enjoyed the arcade as well. I haven't tried any version that's supposed to emulate the feel of the arcade game but I hope to experience that some day too. I've been eyeing the Master System version.
The backgrounds always amazed me back in the day. I was and still am a fan of the soundtrack. I can't always tell you what song is from what game but I always get Rygar right.
The aesthetic of Rygar’s weapon always felt cool and powerful to me as a kid. Who wouldn’t want a mega death yo-yo? The only think that was a huge problem for me was the lack of save, password or code. I remember having to carefully pause, place the controller in a protected spot and turn the tv off overnight while praying that my mom wouldn’t turn the system off while I was asleep. I never had the manual and no internet to bail me out, so I would spend hours wandering around to find stuff. I was also scared it would burn out my NES by leaving it on overnight. (Love your videos)
Thanks about the videos! I'm glad you're enjoying them. For me, with the help from the manual, I was able to finish this in an afternoon so the lack of a password or save function didn't bug me, but I can see why it'd be frustrating if you went longer than a couple of hours with it. I hope you eventually got through it without having your system turned off!
@@hungrygoriya it was also a renter for me. I never had the game in the house all that long so I always felt like I was in a rush. So many games like that, and j should totally go back and finish em.
I was already subscribed, but between this, your Faxanadu, and Lunar SS videos I feel your reviews match my tastes very well. I have a lot of nostalgia for Rygar. Its world felt so strange and that was only emphasized by it's soundtrack, even the underwhelming pieces. It was mysterious, strange, and since I didn't have the manual I got lost in exploring it. The setpiece of the large sun setting behind the mountains has always stuck with me.
Thanks so much for your kindness! I was actually floored at how much I liked Rygar. I'd watched a lot of speedruns of the game in the past but was really excited to finally try it out for myself and figure it all out. I'm sure you could find your way through without the manual, but it'd be tough! I enjoyed playing with the manual as a compass of sorts to lead me through a logical set of steps to get to the end. The artwork is so pretty. I love the red sky and the sunset, as well as all the enemies too. It was a lot of fun and I'd like to play it again soon!
@@hungrygoriya Your videos never do!! It was a fair review. The game isn't without it's quirks but like you mentioned I did get to experience it at a young age and have held it high since. I even really enjoy the arcade game too. The soundtrack is one of my absolute favorites. The funny thing is I was listening to it this morning then later saw your review. The Japanese version of the game has some really good tunes that we didn't get. I think as far as nes music goes it's definitely my favorite to not have any percussion. It's so epic and Conan like. Cheers ☺️
HG thanks for the video review this looks like a fun romp game. I missed most of the stream but I’m envisioning 9,001 don’t touch me’s. I always thought a yo-yo of death sounded like a neat weapon idea.
I love Rygar on the NES so much. It's about a 30 minute playthrough or less for me these days, as I've been beating it for more than 30 years at this point, but it's one I'll always enjoy. The soundtrack is actually different on the US and Japanese versions of this game. I bought a Japanese copy just to check it out. I prefer the US version myself. More than anything, I just love the atmosphere of the game. Like other games of the time like Rastan, it just has that creepy sword and sorcery flavor of something like Conan, with mysterious ancient gods and devils, burning sunsets, and creepy music. The music for Gran Mountain is as iconic as any single song from a game to me, and no matter how many times I've beaten it, watching the door to Ligar's castle appear as I play the flute atop the tower of Lyle is always a satisfying moment to me.
It's such a fun little game, I agree! I've listened to the Japanese soundtrack and it's wild that the music's different. I can't think of very many experiences where that's the case. I wonder if there was a good reason for the music swap. The music's great and definitely helps to set that triumphant tone of a hero going to slay the enemy. I really really love the visuals though... the NES never really seems very colourful and I enjoyed the graphics in the outdoor areas.
Rygar was one of my very favorite games when I was a kid! Even before I owned an NES, my friends had it. I wasn't very good: mostly because I didn't really understand the game mechanics. It was probably a couple years later, after experiencing Simon's Quest and Dragon Warrior, that I mastered it. Rygar just fascinated me! I think it was because the monsters weren't run of the mill, the nonlinear exploration, and the environments like towers rising to the sky or a land of floating rocks. I still play it every now and again.
I don't blame you for going back to it regularly. It's a great game and I'm already looking forward to my next playthrough as well. I would've really enjoyed this as a kid too.
Maybe my favorite NES game. The music is SICK! And I love the physics, maybe the best in any NES game. I play through a couple times a year. I finish the game in about 40 minutes.
Had this game as a kid, used to watch my older brother play it but I don't remember ever getting far. We didn't own the manual for it, and we died so many times trying to use those pulleys because we thought they were like tightropes you had to walk across but just never got the hang of crossing them.
Oh man, I could totally see thinking those were tightropes! As kids, who knew about zip-lining?! It was always a clenching moment trying to get on, especially on the overworld. In the sidescrolling stages though, walking off the edge usually clipped you on... usually.
i got into gaming around the nes time and some of my first games i loved was the double dragon trilogy, river city ransom, final fantasy, crystalis, rygar, trojan, castlevania trilogy and ninja gaiden trilogy. simply great games.
I've played many of these games by now minus the Double Dragon/Ninja Gaiden games (though I have played NG one and just haven't finished it yet), as well as Trojan. It looks like there's still lots of awesome stuff to look forward to on NES.
Playing this game with no manual was fun and frustrating especially since neither me or my brother ever thought of taking notes or drawing our own map... Then again we didn't know enough English when we got it to understand the hints either :-) It spent a couple of years in the bottom of the box until we finally went back and beat it. Fun memories.
Congratulations on making it through eventually! I think it would've been just fine to finish without the manual, but in this case, it was nice to formulate a plan using it. I just wish there was more game!
Great review. We played this a lot in the early 90s at my friend's house, and it takes me back watching this. I love the ideas the game presented, though like you mentioned some aspects were quite difficult to manage (looking at you, rope and pulley thing). Still loved it, and it was one of the first action adventure game I remember farming. Love the graphical glitches you included. I'm not sure people realize how weird it was when something like that happened back in the day. Typically no one had a VCR running so you'd try to convince your friend it really happened. BTW, "Animalized Men Wriggling Eerily" would be an AWESOME band name, don't you agree??
I'm glad you have such lovely memories of this one! The glitches honestly cracked me up a lot and it wasn't until I was editing that I got to really go frame by frame and see what the heck popped onto the screen in those moments (there were several!) A band with that name would sell out every concert, no doubt!
Another fabulous review of yours! I have some experience playing Rygar (NES) on original hardware and emulator, and I think my brother beat Rygar on original hardware long time ago. I tend to agree with a lot of the points mentioned here. Great job!
This was one of my favorites as a child. I remember the first boss was the hardest for some reason. I found little tricks to easily defeat all the other bosses. For example the boss featured in 9:08 I remember jumping back and forth and attacking and you can easily beat him. Also there's a glitch for the boss in the ice fortress where you grapple down and back up and he'll get stuck in the ground and you can easily jump and attack him without going up to his level. Many fond memories.
It's been about 35 years since I played this, but some of it still echoed strongly. Last. Attack & Assail. Those evil trees. I've always remembered the Diskarmer. I used to have dreams where I had one. Did you play on the NES or with an emulator? I remember we had to leave the NES on while we were trying to beat this. Was there actually no save system, or was there one we didn't know about?
I played this on the NES! I have a physical game collection I'm trying to make my way through, but I finished this game over an afternoon. There was no save system so you had to finish it all in one go as far as I understand. Very cool to hear about the tidbits that stuck out in your mind from childhood!
I really need to get back to this game, figure I can boot it on my PSP, and make a day of it. The first time through, I was presented with two options, play Rygar or borrow my friend's Virtual boy and beat Wario. I beat Wario, and forgot about this game in lieu of Fantasy Pinball, or whatever the pinball RPG was called on the NES.
Great review! Have you ever played the original Rygar arcade game (it's on Switch as part of Hamster's Arcade Archives series) or the excellent PS2 reboot "Rygar: The Legendary Adventure"? Also, are those Fighting Gods meant to be really freakin huge, or are they just meant to be very close to the camera and far away from the protagonist? I could never tell when I first played this as a kid. :)
I haven't yet! I do have a copy of the PS2 game that I'm curious about though, and I've been meaning to try that one out for a while now. I wish I had a good answer for you about the Fighting Gods. They just look like giant people to me, haha
i bought a wrestling game when i was a kid. when i got home and put it in my Nintendo rygar popped up on the screen. i beat it from start to finish without dying because i reset on a game over and didn't know about the continue. took me forever. such a great game.
This was a great game. I found some awesome glitches/extra worlds back in the 80s that I shared with Nintendo Power magazine. Always thought it should have had some type of save function/password etc like Metal Gear since it was a big game
Great video! I'm glad they decided to add adventure/RPG elements to this version, because while the arcade game was fun, it got boring after about ten minutes. The NES game is definitely better.
If you decide to play through it again, use Power Up as soon as you get three Mind points. Your discarmor stretches longer, but is just as fast. Recover is also super useful. It recharges your health completely! Attack and Assail is good for fighting cheese with cheese. Since it hits the entire screen, it's useful for enemies that hang out of reach. In Garloz, I found the best trick to attaching your pully to the cables was to try and touch your "shield" to the end of the cable. I never tumbled off the cliff after that. If you know you're going to be forced to hang off the bottom of a platform when all you want to do is crouch and attack, make sure you remember to press the D-pad in the direction of the enemy right away. The bright side is while you're on your rope, you can move down and back up as far as you need, and the enemy won't be able to sneak under your strike.
Hoo boy that palace level theme. You know, with having the ability to jump would mean giving you the ability to attach to the rope automatically by jumping on it. Just seems like a given. I feel like Rygar has a lot going for it, but it does come with that NES vagueness sometimes. Great review though!
Thank you very much! And yeah, the controls are not the greatest at all junctures... once you learn its rules, it's at least predictable? I can't say the same for every game!
those zip lines were more dangerous than the bosses lol. this was a surprise hit for me way back, 1987 i think. when i finally played the arcade some time later, i was shocked how awesome it was. the arcade looks great and is pure side scrolling action and fast paced. but the nes version, as usual, was loosely based on the arcade and *better* i think. we didnt know about grinding XP out back then really, so today, if i played rygar again, i'd grind out my character early on and then steam roll the rest of the game. kinda like in zelda 2 adventure of link. get in an enemy swamp and stand at the far left and turn on a turbo auto fire control pad and walk off lol. come back later and you'll be OP. music in rygar is excellent. i remember all the tunes even today. this was one of the few games i was able to beat as a kid back then and felt great after i did.
I think I'd like this version more than the arcade one, just for the RPG elements in it. I'm all for a good run to the right and kill everything adventure, but I also like this stuff too.
I love this game so much! But honestly, I love it far more as an adult than as a kid. I mean, I loved it as a kid, sure, but I had no concept of the leveling system. I think this was even before Dragon Warrior came out, much less any action game "with RPG elements." I never understood that my attacks would actually get stronger as I defeated enemies, so I had no understanding of why some days I could defeat the first boss easily, and other days I couldn't beat him no matter how hard I tried. Also as an adult I have much more appreciation of the original theme. All the mosters are completely unique and original; there isn't even something as generic as a skeleton. The theme of the world and architecture doesn't mirror any real-world cultures or locations. It's all 100% original, and its so rare to find that anywhere! And that's definately a touch I didn't appreciate as a kid. I was a little disappointed when the Rygar game on the PS2 and Wii used a Greco-Roman theme, but only a little disappointed because I love Greek mythology, so it did borrow from one of my favorite aesthetics. This is definately one of the games that I wish got a sequel/remake ont he Super Nitnendo. Imagine what they could do with a Super Rygar with enhanced visuals, a bigger world, a clear levelling system, and maybe even a basic in-game map!
I agree with everything you've said here! I had a similar experience with Faxanadu when I was younger since it'd take a different amount of hits to kill enemies before and after picking up the pendant item (which is bugged and does the opposite of what it's supposed to do). I didn't really understand what experience was either back then, though I don't think I played a stats-based RPG until much later on in life. I still need to play the PS2 Rygar game but that's too bad that they pushed him into a specific area of the world. Was the game good otherwise? And I think Super Rygar could've been phenomenal. I'm sad I only got around to this game at this point in life because I think I would've really loved it as a kid.
As a kid, I didn't enjoy this game since it wasn't really clear what the end goal was or what I should do next. When I was a teen, though, I went back to it and had quite a bit of fun. I wouldn't say the game is 'challenging', but is a breezy adventure that thankfully isn't so long you won't want to go through the entire game in one sitting, since there's no password or save. I think it's just the right length.
I could totally see this being more fun when you're a bit older. Faxanadu got a lot more fun for me when I understood the NPC hints and had a better feeling of what I needed to do. For Rygar, I honestly wish it was a little longer. I was sad to see it come and go in a single day.
I saw you briefly reference Ctusader of Centy at the beginning of the video. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on it. I think its a delightfully charming game with an endearing story, but I have a lot of nostalgia for it and I'd be curious to see someone with a non biased critical perspective on it.
You know, I've had a half-finished script for that game sitting around for a while. I'll see if I can get back to it soon and finish it up. I had a lot of thoughts about it when I played it.
The arcade version isn't as much fun as the NES one in my opinion anyway. It's a very straightforward run to the right, kill the enemies, get a high score and don't die. Not a bad game but turning it into the adventure game was a major plus.
4:03 Ah yes Rygar's infamous "Meow Mix" song. 🎵I-like chic-ken, I-like liv-er, Meow-Mix, Meow-Mix, please de-liv-er, I-like chic-ken, I-like liv-er...🎵 Interestingly the Japanese has a mostly different soundtrack that is also hit or miss. It has better music for the castle yet replaces the American version's very popular cave song with a track that sounds like little more than jumbled noise.
I've watched a friend speedrun Rygar an awful lot over the years and there's a grinding area in the Meow Mix castle... we get to hear that song for longer than most areas, haha And funny how some of the Japanese tunes are different but also great in some cases! A fusion of both soundtracks seems to be the answer to this hit and miss problem!
I haven't had a chance to listen through yet, but I've heard from a few folks here that it's worth it. It's on my weekend to-do list :) And thanks very much!
It is rather amazing that they've turned a mediocre run-and-hit sidescrolling Arcade game into a full-fledged zeldavania game, even with some control quirks. I never knew this game also had an RPG element until I watched a walkthrough/guide video for this game. I somehow managed to beat the game few times before gaining the knowledge. This game sure is forgiving in that sense. (NTSC version)
I thought it was a great adaptation for home consoles. The arcade game still looks fun, but this kind of adventure gameplay with all its RPG elements are way more my speed.
I just got my pal version in the mail because I heard the same rumor you said about tone and mind not going as high making it harder. I ended up maxing out at 1028 instead of 4000....that same ntsc glitches I tried to use a secret helper didn't work like I hoped a few were still there but overall its like a whole new game. Needless to say I beat it in five times longer than usual. The medals don't drop as much either making it a pain to help with the boss fights. Atleast I can say I own both carts plus the arcade cabinet now. Try it if you got a spell of downtime it actually lets you sightsee a little more and you do realize how much prettier the game looks even though it was gorgeous to begin with.....nice vid be good
when I was a kid I could never make it past the first stage, and the incredibly repetitive theme music is still instantly recallable today. one sunkissed saturday afternoon I finally made it through level one, and you better believe I kept pushing until I beat the game in fear of never having another chance, thanks to the continue system and several hours of not needing to be anywhere in particular. it was like in 2004 when the red sox finally got past the yankees in dramatic fashion to advance to the world series for the first time in forever - after that, it didn't matter who the opponent was (and yes, they swept). I was psyched for like a month after I beat it.
Thank you for sharing this memory... I have also had a similar experience of getting through a childhood game I could never finish, and it's so elating. I love how you remember all the details of the day as well. It must've been a very special time, and understandably so!
This one is definitely on my "Gonna finish this one one day" list. I didn't play it for the first time until it was made available on Nintendo Switch Online, and despite have a modicum of knowledge about the game, with no manual I was really lost and died.. a lot xD This game was really ahead of its time, with its explorable world, upgradable protagonist and forgiving continue system
I hope you do get around to finishing it. The manual map is really helpful and there are a few scans online to consult. I think it would've been a lot harder without the map. You'd eventually find everything but at the cost of time and frustration. I died soooo often in this game that it wasn't even funny! I don't think I was kidding when I said I died 100 times. Sometimes Rygar has sticky feet and doesn't want to jump over pits.
@@hungrygoriya Now that I know the map exists, I'll probably look up a scan on my phone and keep it on hand. The NES Classic mini console actually has official PDFs on Nintendo's website for every game on the system, I wish NSO had that, too xD
I was just about to reply to your other comment about checking out a manual scan. It has everything you need to know and helps to reduce the wondering where to go.
Fester's Quest has been intriguing to me for a long while so I definitely need to get around to it as well. Milon's Secret Castle's actually coming up on my list of things to play on the livestreams so I'm looking forward to it. I did play a bit of Karnov one time but couldn't figure out how to get to the other half of my inventory... I'll try again with a thorough manual read through next time! It was fun though!
Got this game in December of 1987 for my birthday along with the NES when I turned 7. Got to the jungle boss and the boss and music scared me so I stopped playing it (the boss at 9 minute mark). I also didn’t really know what I was doing. Came back to it a year later with more NES experience and beat it. Great game I really liked it although I made it easy by grinding the robots in the Sky area for the stars and level ups. Also could never figure out the stupid grapple on the overhead map level so kept trying until I fell in the water or got it 😂
Hey congratulations! I'm glad that you got through it in the end. It's a very fun game that takes a little bit of practice and work, and finding some good grind spots.
Surprised to hear you list the music as a downside, since I've always felt this game has an absolutely AMAZING soundtrack. The first three tracks you hear (the first area/Superman theme, Gran Mountains, and Garloz) are all absolute classics that run through my head constantly, and Sagila's Den is one of the NES' all-time best tracks IMHO. There are those odd overhead-view dungeon themes that kind of suck, but that's only two tracks out of an otherwise really solid OST -- and one of those two tracks (the final dungeon) is even kinda decent, just a bit underwhelming compared to the rest of the soundtrack. Still, very cool to see you pick this one up. I have a ton of really fond memories of this one from when I was a kid. And if you want a fun glitch to play around with, I definitely know of one that I absolutely loved messing with as a kid: go to the final dungeon, and on the very first screen, jump left, off the edge of the floating island. You're close enough to the left side of the screen that you'll trigger the screen to scroll, and rather than dying, you'll wind up on top of the dungeon walls, running around in an area you are definitely NOT supposed to be. You can't really do anything there, and there are some random invisible holes that you'll probably fall into and die if you venture too far, but it's a really fun little glitch to play around with nonetheless! I forget if I've ever mentioned these to you before, and one of them is an all-time classic that I'm sure is on your list anyway, but I've got a couple recommendations for you. Considering your love of adventure games like Legacy of the Wizard and Rygar, I definitely think you need to play Goonies II sometime -- possibly my all-time favorite NES game. It can be considered a bit clunky by modern standards, and the way in which you find the candle is completely random and seems pretty impossible to figure out without a guide, but otherwise, it's just a really solid, fun, charming game that's an absolute joy to explore and mess around with. And it being a classic Konami game, it should go without saying that the soundtrack is simply EXCEPTIONAL, featuring the best ever 8-bit rendition of Cyndi Lauper's "Goonies R Good Enough" as the first area theme. That song was MADE for 8-bit, as far as I'm concerned! The other game I feel compelled to recommend is Solstice, which people often cite as being some sort of IMPOSSIBLY DIFFICULT BEHEMOTH of a game... but it's honestly pretty easy once you learn its mechanics. It's an acquired taste, but the sheer design of the castle is simply incredible -- catacombs, a courtyard, four towers, etc., all modeled out in actual 3D that fits together superbly. I'm not sure any other exploration-focused game has ever entranced me quite as much as Solstice. Part of that, of course, may be due to its soundtrack, which is... unique. And composed by the great Tim Follin, whose chiptune work is some of the best you'll ever hear (and who created his own sound drivers just to play it, I believe!). The title screen theme from Solstice is pretty infamous at this point as perhaps the single best work of legitimate progressive rock ever featured on an 8-bit video game console. And the in-game theme is just... very eerie and unique (though it doesn't play correctly on early-model Famicoms and some NESes, nor in a lot of emulators, so if it sounds a bit off to you, that's probably why!). Anyway, this is a bit of a rambly comment due to me being fairly tired and it being nearly 3am where I am, so I'll cut it here. But really cool video, and a great watch before bed! Thanks for another excellent review!
@Boco Corwin Oh, I know. I'm just surprised she was even THAT down on it! But that's also why I'm subscribed to this channel: she gives honest, genuine reviews of each game, good or bad, which is both really informative when she covers games I'm not familiar with, and fascinating to hear when she covers games I am. Definitely not intending to criticize! Just reacting in the moment with genuine surprise, as I have previously and undoubtedly will again in the future.
I did like the music in general. It's hard to explain but some of the music just felt a bit empty? There's not a lot going on with some of the tunes other than a strong melody, which is fine. I've just heard a lot of true jams on NES, and Rygar's soundtrack is still good, but not as great as those if that makes sense. I'm glad you have that music running through your mind a lot. What a nice accompaniment to life! I had no idea you could glitch like that... someone during the livestream mentioned seeing people get up on those walls, and that must be how it's done! Ever neat! Goonies II and Solstice are definitely games I'm interested in playing, especially the former. I've watched so many speedruns of that one in particular by the fellow I mentioned in the description who just got the WR today for Rygar. He apparently has excellent taste since he also nudged me to play this game too, but I am definitely looking forward to both of those games. I am also mildly terrified of Solstice! I hope you've had a good rest there. I'm just about to head to bed here since it's after midnight, but thanks for the thoughtful comment.
1:27 I swear when we played this as kids it took days before we figured out that you could go across these. After dying enough times you give up and assume you can't cross them.
I guess this game really needed people to have the manual. I remember wondering how to get past obstacles in lots of older games and being happy but also mad when I figured out I had a way through.
@@hungrygoriya in Rygar its the wierd looking over world design and a few boss fights and of course the character you play as with the strange weapon. In Karnof it's the strange character you play as... the music... the ladder... and some of the boss fights. Just games that always stuck in my memories for just being odd.
Yeah, as a European player I can confirm the PAL version is a lot harder, especially the final boss, which you must face with less energy. However, I don't remember it being very glitchy, maybe something was rectified in the NTSC-PAL conversion. In the end, it's a great game, except from those ropes. I fell in the water so many times while trying to reach the other side. Very frustrating.
Ah geeze... I'm sorry the PAL version is so hard! I think it's just a bug rather than an intentional change, but it's still unfair. Do you think you'd ever try the NTSC version instead? And I don't know what was up with all those glitches, but they made me laugh. I know it's at least in other people's NTSC carts since I watch a few speedrunners here and there and some similar things happen to them as well. I have yet to watch anyone play the PAL version though!
I think the "Game Over" screen is based off their Arcade mentality. Somehow they where thinking we be putting in quarters in NES Rygar after a Game Over.
This was about beginning of what I call the "consolization" of arcade titles, where the publishers remade their coin-op games into exercises more fitting for the home audience, especially during the era of Mario and Zelda.
Yeah totally... I think the NES saw more transformations of games versus the Master System, which seemed to get a lot of straight ports.
This was the first game I bought for my NES as a kid. At first, I was pissed it hardly resembled the arcade game, but once I got into it, it quickly became one of my most favorite games for the system.
Oh right on! I love when that happens... I think the Master System version's supposed to be more like the arcade, but I don't have a copy of that one hanging around yet. Have you played anything else like this on NES? I love Faxanadu so much!
I used to rag on it as a kid and though it was dumb, but it's one of the handful of games that's great fun to replay these days. It can be gone through more quickly if take on more challenging grinding of later monsters. Also has some great glitches/hidden worlds like Metroid did.
Keeping the legacy of these games alive includes detailed, genuine, and curious reviews. Bravo!
Too kind! Thanks so much!
I find it funny you thought of Castlevania 2's environments while playing this. Playing this and Simon's Quest in 1987/1988 in my head I always imagined both games were happening at the same time. It's just that Simon and Rygar were on opposite sides of those Mountains.
My NES dream game would be combining the two in a 2 player experience so Simon could whip two headed lion monsters after throwing holy water on them and Rygar could use his disk on Werewolves in the forests. I realize I was 7 years old when I thought that but I still want that.
You never know... there might be a hack that comes out eventually that does just that!
Welcome back!!! I always wondered if Rygar was influenced by the movie, Krull, as there's a lot of similar elements/themes in it!
Also there's a Japanese exclusive Master System version too, but it's a mostly straight port of the arcade game, weird it was never released in the west too as it would have fitted in the library perfectly.
Oh hmmm... I should probably watch Krull one of these days! You might be onto something!
I've heard of the Master System version as well but don't currently own a copy. I'm drawn into the adventure/RPG aspects of games like this so I don't know if I'd enjoy that one quite as much, but I'd be willing to give it a go!
I’ve always been a huge Rygar fan,both arcade and NES versions. I got the Nes game on my 13th birthday in 1987! We had a big earthquake that morning before school so they canceled class that day. I got to stay home and play Rygar all day! Good times! Thanks for the cool review!
@@robertsaurer6431 What a funny memory! I hope everything was okay despite the earthquake, but an excuse to stay home is always nice.
You really really should.
Its total 80s swords and sorcery shlock ala red sonja and conan.
However...
There was an athelete foot cream commercial that showed like a foot with the toes on fire to represent the irritation.
Krull used the same special effect for someone holding "magic fire". I noticed it as a kid and to this day, anytime someone references krull, I cant help but think of an athelete foot commercial.
@@childofcascadia Haha oh noooo! That's so funny!
Grew up with the PS2 Rygar, it's one of my favorite games on PS2 so playing this one I had that in mind and despite this it became one of my favorites on the NES!
I have a copy of PS2 Rygar coming in the mail, so I'm excited for that! It's totally different though eh? A 3D game that's more of a hack and slash?
@@hungrygoriya Yeah it's more of a hack and slash with ongoing story, it expanded a lot of the same gameplay ideas from the nes game too.
thanks for a great review of one of my childhood favorites. and i loved the reference to my ALL TIME Favorite NES game: Simon's Quest. I must be crazy
It was my pleasure! This game's awesome and I wish more people would try it out. And Simon's Quest is awesome! I'm a huge fan of that game. I just replayed it again in June and it just reinforced everything I've always felt about it.
I appreciate that there's no tedious padding in Rygar. No currency grinding, no endlessly hitting walls for secret passages, nothing like that. Just explore, fight, find items, and get stronger. It sticks to the fundamentals and is better for it.
Yes! It's very much to the point and it's a nice change from some others I've played. Like even if you go through a whole stage and can't get the item that's in there if you're missing a tool, you can probably still finish it and make progress regardless. It was brilliant!
I remember a glitch that put you on the non walkable green area of the overworld. You jump as you move back and forth between screens, and end up on the area you aren't supposed to be on. Not sure if it could be used to skip areas or get items early, just remember making it glitch.
I never tried to replicate any of the glitches I encountered, but I wonder if there's a speedrun category that takes advantage of any skips that can be reliably induced. Interesting!
Fond memories. Wish I knew how we beat this and Castlevania 2 back then, had to wait until fourth grade for English class!
This one was a lot of fun. Do you think you'll ever try to finish it? Or did you end up doing it later in life with a bit more English under your belt?
@@hungrygoriya We beat 'em both back then actually, so many fond memories of playing NES with friends I wonder how we ever managed to do our homework!
Great review. I could never finish Rygar as a kid and it would seem that not having the manual was the reason why. It's very impressive that your Friday afternoon streams end up seeing you finish a first playthrough in one sitting!
Thanks so much! I was expecting for things to take a lot longer and I had thought (and secretly hoped) to be playing it for at least two streams. I was sad to see it come and go so quickly.
Same. Thinking back, I don't think I ever read the manual. I remember us wondering what stuff like "last" meant.
"... clip on, without death" had me lol'ing. This is a game I'm going to have to try sometime. I found your explanation of the game mechanics and the storyline a refreshing take on this classic. Thank you for sharing this with us!
So much death! And thanks as always for the kindness :)
i bought a wrestling game when i was a kid. when i got home and put it in my Nintendo rygar popped up on the screen. i beat it from start to finish without dying because i reset on a game over and didn't know about the continue. took me forever. such a great game.
This is one of the games that shaped my interest in gaming. I was playing this and Metal Gear at the same time as a new NES owner and my mind was melted by the depth of the gameplay of both. It was such a leap from the Colecovision and Atari 7800 when the NES came out. If you didn't have an Apple 2E, MSX, or a Commodore, you had not experienced anything like this. Looking back it's hard to imagine how they put so much game into such a limited media.
It's fascinating to see the jump looking back, right? I feel like we're definitely missing that feeling in tech advances these days since really, it's just adding more bells and whistles to something that already feels really advanced. I started out on NES but just went back to visit some Atari 2600 and Intellivision games last week, and I really enjoyed myself! I still think I like the structure of more complex games like those on the NES and beyond, but I was surprised at how fun the older ones were too. I'm mildly obsessed with Kaboom!
das muss ich dir zustimmen
@@hungrygoriya You might try Infiltrate, Keystone Kapers, and Towering Inferno. They were some of my favorites on the 2600. Infiltrate is extremely simple, but I had a blast with it when I was a kid.
This is one of the first games I ever owned for the NES when I was a kid. I played it constantly and somehow managed to beat it at an early age (about 8 years old at least). The bosses take so many hits to finally beat and somehow I managed to find a crazy glitch once where I went through the wall at the first boss and ended up facing up against the last boss of the game. I tried to replicate the glitch but it only happened that one time. Thanks for the review and memories!
What a great game to start out with! I think I would've really enjoyed this as a kid, definitely! I think I would've lost my mind facing off with the final boss all of a sudden like that though! I was shocked at how glitchy this one was!
Interesting little factoid about the soundtrack: It's by the same composer who did the soundtrack for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde on NES. In fact, the theme for the guru dudes who give Rygar advice was outright recycled as the title screen tune for Jekyll & Hyde, just pitch shifted down.
I didn't realize it was the same composer! I knew that one song you mentioned was the same but that's interesting! Thanks for sharing!
For me, Rygar is what I call an "emulator classic."
What I mean is, around 1998 I was starting to remember the NES and get interested in its library again, and thanks to emulation it was a period where I was discovering some games for the first time. Rygar was one game I discovered because of emulation and--though I own a real cartridge now--a part of me will always associate it with NESticle.
Same goes for Contra BTW. Yeah somehow I had Legacy of the Wizard and Bugs Bunny's Crazy Castle as a kid, but not Castlevania or Contra.
Oh nice! I dabbled in a few NES games that way as well, back when I was wanting to see what games were like before trying to track them down. I think I also used NESticle!
Dear lord, not only echoing my discovery of hundreds of games but also referencing my first love emulator, NESticle. I had a 486DX2/66 in 1999/2000 and it choked on ZSNES (even a Pentium 75 barely ran ZSNES) but NES emulation was far more accessible. My brother and I could stop fighting over games because I could download a ROM instead. When I got my first owned Pentium PC I could run ZSNES no problem, so we could only fight over the PSX! I miss NESticle, and its Sega brother Genecyst too.
@@JodyBruchon Genecyst was actually my introduction to Emulators.
The game immediately made me think of a mix of Stryder and Castlevania II for NES. Music sounds kinda Sega Genesis-y too. Rygar's music composer Michiharu Hasuya I learned only worked on two Sega games - Ys III and Metal Unit, interesting. Maybe some day I'll get into NES games, I'll have to check this one out. Great review 👏
Thanks very much! I have yet to try out Strider for NES but it definitely has some of those Simon's Quest vibes.
I hope you'll give the NES library a try. There are a lot of great games to experience!
Excellent video! I think you touched on each and every point that make this one of my all time favorite NES games. Now we can only hope to meet again in the sequel… Rygar II: The search for even more tone.
Thank you again for all of the nudging to play this, and congratulations again on the world record! If not for you, I'm not sure I would've moved this up the list so fast.
Very cool review pick - genuinely one of the better NES games from that period, even if we include the JP-exclusive stuff. Controls well and has some good tunes. Quite liked this one way back when.
I've had my eye on Rygar for a long time and I'm glad I finally got around to playing it. I was pleasantly surprised by just how fun it was!
Was rather mystified that you completed this on your first try in a couple of hours. I do have the PAL version, so that may partly explain it.
I never got very far as a kid, I found the game very confusing. Certainly wasn't one of my favourites, but I'll surely give it a try in the not so distant future.
Cute voice
Yeah, that PAL version's level cap's definitely a roadblock that I didn't have to contend with. The manual's a big help if you do decide to try it again. All the best on your playthrough!
I’m going to give this one another chance (or a hundred) in the future. I grew up playing and finishing the “NES-hard” games, but as an adult without kid reflexes anymore, I do wish more titles were as forgiving as this one! :)
Another fantastic review!
Let me tell you: I don't think I would've felt as fondly for this game had I not had the benefit of its kindness. Enjoy it if you give it a whirl!
I find comments like these interesting, specifically about how reflexes are lost over time. maybe I'm just a weirdo, but I'm 1000 times better at video games than I was as a kid, and my reflexes are as sharp as ever. btw, I just turned 40 recently.
Latching onto those pullies drove me absolutely crazy as a child!
It feels so impossible!
Awesome review! I have always wanted to try this game but thought it would take too long. Now that I know the world isn't so big I might actually have the time to give it a go!
I hope you enjoy it when you play... I've watched a lot of speedruns but retained nothing apparently. I got it all figured out in a couple of hours. It didn't even take me a whole stream to finish it! I believe in you!
Great review and I enjoyed hearing your perspective on this classic title! Oh my beloved Rygar...you have so many flaws but I still love this game and play it regularly. It also has one of my favorite soundtracks on the NES. I'm always curious what younger players think of this game because I remember when it was released and how amazing it seemed at the time since there wasn't much to compare it to. Time has not been super kind to this title...but it does take you back to a simpler time and what it does, it does well. And it is definitely an improvement over the arcade version. :)
I don't know if I would've enjoyed the arcade version nearly as much with the lack of adventure elements. There's something about an experience system that captures my interest so well. I really enjoyed most of the soundtrack too, especially the music in the cave area! I wish I could've played this one when I was little.
Your channel is a blessing for my morning coffe and my NES backlog, great review!!!!
That's very kind of you to say! Thanks so much. I hope the coffee was good!
Finally got to watch this.. Fun as always. I've probably played through this game 3 or 4 times and still have zero idea how all the spells and magic work. I'm lucky that I did get to experience this one as a kid.. it's one that holds special memories for me now. Thanks for another solid review.
Thank you for taking the time to watch, as always! I'm jealous of your childhood Rygar experience... I wish I'd had that time with it in my younger years. Have you streamed it before? If not, I look forward to the day where you might revisit it!
@@hungrygoriya I think a friend and I rented it a few times and I think we beat it.. so fun, and yes I've streamed it before.. maybe sometime I'll do it again.
I LOVE YOUR VIDEOS. You do a perfect job on them. Thank you for your effort. This game looks good to me. I'll try it out.
Clash at Demonhead is great. Hopefully you'll review that one some time.
I think I need to play through it again sometime. I enjoyed it when I did a year or so ago now, but I don't remember much. I do plan to revisit it soon though... for another video project...
Look at that no dislikes and youtube didn't even turn yours off yet. For good reason, always great reviews!!
Not yet anyway, haha... thanks so much!
Excellent review! This was a childhood favorite of mine.
Thanks very much :) I'm really sad I missed out on this one in childhood.
My uncle really liked this one. He rented it and brought it over to our house to play when I was a kid. He was better at it than we were, but we still liked it.
It's definitely fun! I wish I would've rented some NES stuff back then.
Nice video! I clicked on it thinking I had played this as a kid, but nope! I watched it anyway and enjoyed it, so thanks!
I wonder what you played instead!
@@hungrygoriya lol I was thinking of Karnov! haha that's a much different game but the names always get swapped in my head.
@@asymptoticspatula I can understand why: topless man wearing red pants! :)
@@hungrygoriya lol my favorite genre!
....one of my all time favorites!! I loved this version even more than the arcade version. Thanks for the review.
I haven't played the arcade, but this one seems leaps and bounds more fun! You're very welcome!
Confession: I have never had any interest in playing Rygar. i can't really explain why. It just never really intrigued me. But after having watched your stream and heard your perspective in this video, I'm now excited to give Rygar a try sometime soon. Great job, HG!
It's honestly a lot of fun and the forgiveness it dishes out makes it approachable in my opinion. Despite my seemingly endless patience, I'm not always up for making up lost progress or grinding out really tough sections when they're so punishing. Maybe after you finish up Golden Axe Warrior, eh?
Can I admit something? I almost never pay any attention to the story in retro games and when I watch your videos I'm often learning the story for the first time. Whether it's a Master System game that I'm trying for the first time or a Nintendo game that I've played dozens of times over 30 years I almost never know the actual story. Don't know what that says about me or if they should put me back in retro jail but I enjoy it as a part of your review videos.
Rygar is a fun game and I agree the boss fights feel a little lackluster and better bosses could have jumped this game into another level. But still fun and if you like adventure games it's worth playing.
There is no need to go to retro jail, haha! I don't know why, but having a little stupid story to frame why I'm doing what I'm doing usually makes the experience a bit more fun for me, so I'm happy to pass that information along in my reviews to bring everyone else up to speed as well. I spent a ton of time reading manuals as a kid, especially the Faxanadu and Zelda 1 books, so they're something I'm automatically drawn to.
If the bosses had been a tiny bit better, this would've easily been a favourite for me. I still enjoyed other sidescrolling action adventures more though!
This title is available on the Switch NES virtual console. I will give it a try. Thank you for the thoughtful review!
I hope you enjoy it! Good luck :)
The flying creatures remind me of Blue Meanies, also I like how you tried to jump and hit every NPC you showed in the vid and that's totally something I would be tempted to do as well 😂 (Assuming it's your gameplay, of course)
The jump is just too satisfying not to constantly use! And yep, it's all my gameplay. I usually livestream these games over on Twitch and then repurpose the recordings for videos if I want to do a review of something later on.
Always loved that game as a kid. Burned through so many quarters playing the arcade version and hours on the NES port. Great review! Thank you!
I loved this game too and wish I could've tried it out when I was younger. Good to know you enjoyed the arcade as well. I haven't tried any version that's supposed to emulate the feel of the arcade game but I hope to experience that some day too. I've been eyeing the Master System version.
@@hungrygoriya I never player the master system version but now i want too!
Great review! Thank you for the upload and your efforts!
It's always a pleasure! Thanks for your time today!
The backgrounds always amazed me back in the day. I was and still am a fan of the soundtrack. I can't always tell you what song is from what game but I always get Rygar right.
It's pretty good in spots. I found a lot of the tunes felt a bit empty? I can't quite describe it but what's there is usually great!
The aesthetic of Rygar’s weapon always felt cool and powerful to me as a kid. Who wouldn’t want a mega death yo-yo? The only think that was a huge problem for me was the lack of save, password or code. I remember having to carefully pause, place the controller in a protected spot and turn the tv off overnight while praying that my mom wouldn’t turn the system off while I was asleep. I never had the manual and no internet to bail me out, so I would spend hours wandering around to find stuff. I was also scared it would burn out my NES by leaving it on overnight. (Love your videos)
Thanks about the videos! I'm glad you're enjoying them. For me, with the help from the manual, I was able to finish this in an afternoon so the lack of a password or save function didn't bug me, but I can see why it'd be frustrating if you went longer than a couple of hours with it. I hope you eventually got through it without having your system turned off!
@@hungrygoriya it was also a renter for me. I never had the game in the house all that long so I always felt like I was in a rush. So many games like that, and j should totally go back and finish em.
I was already subscribed, but between this, your Faxanadu, and Lunar SS videos I feel your reviews match my tastes very well. I have a lot of nostalgia for Rygar. Its world felt so strange and that was only emphasized by it's soundtrack, even the underwhelming pieces. It was mysterious, strange, and since I didn't have the manual I got lost in exploring it. The setpiece of the large sun setting behind the mountains has always stuck with me.
Thanks so much for your kindness! I was actually floored at how much I liked Rygar. I'd watched a lot of speedruns of the game in the past but was really excited to finally try it out for myself and figure it all out. I'm sure you could find your way through without the manual, but it'd be tough! I enjoyed playing with the manual as a compass of sorts to lead me through a logical set of steps to get to the end.
The artwork is so pretty. I love the red sky and the sunset, as well as all the enemies too. It was a lot of fun and I'd like to play it again soon!
Rygar is in my top 5 games of all time. I'm almost nervous for the review.
I hope it didn't disappoint you! I really enjoyed my time with it.
@@hungrygoriya Your videos never do!! It was a fair review. The game isn't without it's quirks but like you mentioned I did get to experience it at a young age and have held it high since. I even really enjoy the arcade game too.
The soundtrack is one of my absolute favorites. The funny thing is I was listening to it this morning then later saw your review. The Japanese version of the game has some really good tunes that we didn't get. I think as far as nes music goes it's definitely my favorite to not have any percussion. It's so epic and Conan like.
Cheers ☺️
If you listen closely to that four-note palace theme, you'll start humming the Meow Mix commercial jingle. "Meow, meow, meow, meow".🤣
Oh yes... I remember those commercials well!
great video! I'm wriggling eerily
*insert spooked Gizmo face here*
HG thanks for the video review this looks like a fun romp game. I missed most of the stream but I’m envisioning 9,001 don’t touch me’s. I always thought a yo-yo of death sounded like a neat weapon idea.
They're certainly easier to learn to use than boomerangs, I imagine.
This was a great game. Brings back many memories.
Oooh. Just stumbled across this channel. Great content! Subbed.
Right on! I appreciate it :) Thanks so much!
I love Rygar on the NES so much. It's about a 30 minute playthrough or less for me these days, as I've been beating it for more than 30 years at this point, but it's one I'll always enjoy.
The soundtrack is actually different on the US and Japanese versions of this game. I bought a Japanese copy just to check it out. I prefer the US version myself.
More than anything, I just love the atmosphere of the game. Like other games of the time like Rastan, it just has that creepy sword and sorcery flavor of something like Conan, with mysterious ancient gods and devils, burning sunsets, and creepy music. The music for Gran Mountain is as iconic as any single song from a game to me, and no matter how many times I've beaten it, watching the door to Ligar's castle appear as I play the flute atop the tower of Lyle is always a satisfying moment to me.
It's such a fun little game, I agree! I've listened to the Japanese soundtrack and it's wild that the music's different. I can't think of very many experiences where that's the case. I wonder if there was a good reason for the music swap.
The music's great and definitely helps to set that triumphant tone of a hero going to slay the enemy. I really really love the visuals though... the NES never really seems very colourful and I enjoyed the graphics in the outdoor areas.
Great video as always!
Gonna have to give this one a try!
Do it! I'd love to watch someone else experience this for the first time. It was honestly a joy to play. I think you'd really dig it!
Rygar was one of my very favorite games when I was a kid! Even before I owned an NES, my friends had it. I wasn't very good: mostly because I didn't really understand the game mechanics. It was probably a couple years later, after experiencing Simon's Quest and Dragon Warrior, that I mastered it. Rygar just fascinated me! I think it was because the monsters weren't run of the mill, the nonlinear exploration, and the environments like towers rising to the sky or a land of floating rocks. I still play it every now and again.
I don't blame you for going back to it regularly. It's a great game and I'm already looking forward to my next playthrough as well. I would've really enjoyed this as a kid too.
Maybe my favorite NES game. The music is SICK! And I love the physics, maybe the best in any NES game. I play through a couple times a year. I finish the game in about 40 minutes.
Right on! Once you know where you're going, I'm sure it's quite short.
Had this game as a kid, used to watch my older brother play it but I don't remember ever getting far. We didn't own the manual for it, and we died so many times trying to use those pulleys because we thought they were like tightropes you had to walk across but just never got the hang of crossing them.
Oh man, I could totally see thinking those were tightropes! As kids, who knew about zip-lining?! It was always a clenching moment trying to get on, especially on the overworld. In the sidescrolling stages though, walking off the edge usually clipped you on... usually.
i got into gaming around the nes time and some of my first games i loved was the double dragon trilogy, river city ransom, final fantasy, crystalis, rygar, trojan, castlevania trilogy and ninja gaiden trilogy. simply great games.
I've played many of these games by now minus the Double Dragon/Ninja Gaiden games (though I have played NG one and just haven't finished it yet), as well as Trojan. It looks like there's still lots of awesome stuff to look forward to on NES.
@@hungrygoriya there are tons for the nes and sms library.makes ya feel like n 80s kid all over again.
I loved the soundtrack to Rygar, with the exception of the Palace of Dorago.
There's lots of good music to take in. Agreed!
das erinnert mich an meinen ersten Spiele. sie waren früher einfacher, aber haben viel Spass gemacht
Playing this game with no manual was fun and frustrating especially since neither me or my brother ever thought of taking notes or drawing our own map... Then again we didn't know enough English when we got it to understand the hints either :-)
It spent a couple of years in the bottom of the box until we finally went back and beat it. Fun memories.
Congratulations on making it through eventually! I think it would've been just fine to finish without the manual, but in this case, it was nice to formulate a plan using it. I just wish there was more game!
Great review. We played this a lot in the early 90s at my friend's house, and it takes me back watching this. I love the ideas the game presented, though like you mentioned some aspects were quite difficult to manage (looking at you, rope and pulley thing). Still loved it, and it was one of the first action adventure game I remember farming. Love the graphical glitches you included. I'm not sure people realize how weird it was when something like that happened back in the day. Typically no one had a VCR running so you'd try to convince your friend it really happened.
BTW, "Animalized Men Wriggling Eerily" would be an AWESOME band name, don't you agree??
I'm glad you have such lovely memories of this one! The glitches honestly cracked me up a lot and it wasn't until I was editing that I got to really go frame by frame and see what the heck popped onto the screen in those moments (there were several!)
A band with that name would sell out every concert, no doubt!
Another fabulous review of yours! I have some experience playing Rygar (NES) on original hardware and emulator, and I think my brother beat Rygar on original hardware long time ago. I tend to agree with a lot of the points mentioned here. Great job!
It's nice to go back such a long way with a game. I'm glad you have some good memories with your brother as well! Thanks for the kind words!
I agree that Clash at Demonhead stands out. I dig it. Weird ideas but mostly in a charming way. Maybe someday Vic Tokai will randomly make a new one.
It was such a funny game! I'd like to sit down with it again soon and try for the not horrible ending!
This is the only NES game I still pull out an playthrough every couple of months. It's such a great, quick game to share a couple of drinks with :)
I bet! I can definitely see myself coming back to it again because of its length and the fun factor.
This one looks cool, I’m going to look for a copy.
I think it's relatively inexpensive as far as NES games go these days. I'd be curious to hear what you think!
This was one of my favorites as a child. I remember the first boss was the hardest for some reason. I found little tricks to easily defeat all the other bosses. For example the boss featured in 9:08 I remember jumping back and forth and attacking and you can easily beat him. Also there's a glitch for the boss in the ice fortress where you grapple down and back up and he'll get stuck in the ground and you can easily jump and attack him without going up to his level. Many fond memories.
Awww man, I'm so jealous you got to try it out when you were younger. Those boss strategies seem pretty sound too. Nice work!
It's been about 35 years since I played this, but some of it still echoed strongly. Last. Attack & Assail. Those evil trees. I've always remembered the Diskarmer. I used to have dreams where I had one.
Did you play on the NES or with an emulator? I remember we had to leave the NES on while we were trying to beat this. Was there actually no save system, or was there one we didn't know about?
I played this on the NES! I have a physical game collection I'm trying to make my way through, but I finished this game over an afternoon. There was no save system so you had to finish it all in one go as far as I understand. Very cool to hear about the tidbits that stuck out in your mind from childhood!
I'm sure you made Ren very happy playing this. GG!
I really need to get back to this game, figure I can boot it on my PSP, and make a day of it. The first time through, I was presented with two options, play Rygar or borrow my friend's Virtual boy and beat Wario. I beat Wario, and forgot about this game in lieu of Fantasy Pinball, or whatever the pinball RPG was called on the NES.
Oh Pinball Quest? I need to play that one still, but it looks like fun!
Good luck with Rygar if you get back to it. I think you'll really enjoy it!
Great review! Have you ever played the original Rygar arcade game (it's on Switch as part of Hamster's Arcade Archives series) or the excellent PS2 reboot "Rygar: The Legendary Adventure"? Also, are those Fighting Gods meant to be really freakin huge, or are they just meant to be very close to the camera and far away from the protagonist? I could never tell when I first played this as a kid. :)
I haven't yet! I do have a copy of the PS2 game that I'm curious about though, and I've been meaning to try that one out for a while now.
I wish I had a good answer for you about the Fighting Gods. They just look like giant people to me, haha
i bought a wrestling game when i was a kid. when i got home and put it in my Nintendo rygar popped up on the screen. i beat it from start to finish without dying because i reset on a game over and didn't know about the continue. took me forever. such a great game.
That's very impressive!
This was a great game. I found some awesome glitches/extra worlds back in the 80s that I shared with Nintendo Power magazine. Always thought it should have had some type of save function/password etc like Metal Gear since it was a big game
Rygar has a really really cool logo on its title screen.
I thought it was pretty cool! I haven't seen anything quite like it.
Rygars music is outstanding. So much love for this game.
It's a great one!
I love Rygar's unique setting. Like, Sumerian, central Asian mashup? Seems like he probably hangs out with Karnov.
It wouldn't surprise me!
Great video! I'm glad they decided to add adventure/RPG elements to this version, because while the arcade game was fun, it got boring after about ten minutes. The NES game is definitely better.
I could see why it would get boring... the big draws for me were the RPG elements (surprise!)
Incredible video!😍
Oh thank you :)
If you decide to play through it again, use Power Up as soon as you get three Mind points. Your discarmor stretches longer, but is just as fast. Recover is also super useful. It recharges your health completely! Attack and Assail is good for fighting cheese with cheese. Since it hits the entire screen, it's useful for enemies that hang out of reach.
In Garloz, I found the best trick to attaching your pully to the cables was to try and touch your "shield" to the end of the cable. I never tumbled off the cliff after that.
If you know you're going to be forced to hang off the bottom of a platform when all you want to do is crouch and attack, make sure you remember to press the D-pad in the direction of the enemy right away. The bright side is while you're on your rope, you can move down and back up as far as you need, and the enemy won't be able to sneak under your strike.
Great tips! Thanks for them! I'll definitely play this again sometime and I'll keep these in mind.
Hoo boy that palace level theme. You know, with having the ability to jump would mean giving you the ability to attach to the rope automatically by jumping on it. Just seems like a given. I feel like Rygar has a lot going for it, but it does come with that NES vagueness sometimes. Great review though!
Thank you very much! And yeah, the controls are not the greatest at all junctures... once you learn its rules, it's at least predictable? I can't say the same for every game!
those zip lines were more dangerous than the bosses lol. this was a surprise hit for me way back, 1987 i think. when i finally played the arcade some time later, i was shocked how awesome it was. the arcade looks great and is pure side scrolling action and fast paced. but the nes version, as usual, was loosely based on the arcade and *better* i think. we didnt know about grinding XP out back then really, so today, if i played rygar again, i'd grind out my character early on and then steam roll the rest of the game. kinda like in zelda 2 adventure of link. get in an enemy swamp and stand at the far left and turn on a turbo auto fire control pad and walk off lol. come back later and you'll be OP.
music in rygar is excellent. i remember all the tunes even today. this was one of the few games i was able to beat as a kid back then and felt great after i did.
I think I'd like this version more than the arcade one, just for the RPG elements in it. I'm all for a good run to the right and kill everything adventure, but I also like this stuff too.
4:03 I've heard that song before.....it's the intro to the Meow Mix song.
ligar... is that like a liger in Napoleon Dynamite? Half lion, half tiger? Awesome review. Saving gaming once again! =P
That's all I could think of the whole time. Gosh!
See Rygar in One Life to Live, only on NBC.
I love this game so much! But honestly, I love it far more as an adult than as a kid.
I mean, I loved it as a kid, sure, but I had no concept of the leveling system. I think this was even before Dragon Warrior came out, much less any action game "with RPG elements." I never understood that my attacks would actually get stronger as I defeated enemies, so I had no understanding of why some days I could defeat the first boss easily, and other days I couldn't beat him no matter how hard I tried.
Also as an adult I have much more appreciation of the original theme. All the mosters are completely unique and original; there isn't even something as generic as a skeleton. The theme of the world and architecture doesn't mirror any real-world cultures or locations. It's all 100% original, and its so rare to find that anywhere! And that's definately a touch I didn't appreciate as a kid.
I was a little disappointed when the Rygar game on the PS2 and Wii used a Greco-Roman theme, but only a little disappointed because I love Greek mythology, so it did borrow from one of my favorite aesthetics.
This is definately one of the games that I wish got a sequel/remake ont he Super Nitnendo. Imagine what they could do with a Super Rygar with enhanced visuals, a bigger world, a clear levelling system, and maybe even a basic in-game map!
I agree with everything you've said here! I had a similar experience with Faxanadu when I was younger since it'd take a different amount of hits to kill enemies before and after picking up the pendant item (which is bugged and does the opposite of what it's supposed to do). I didn't really understand what experience was either back then, though I don't think I played a stats-based RPG until much later on in life.
I still need to play the PS2 Rygar game but that's too bad that they pushed him into a specific area of the world. Was the game good otherwise? And I think Super Rygar could've been phenomenal. I'm sad I only got around to this game at this point in life because I think I would've really loved it as a kid.
As a kid, I didn't enjoy this game since it wasn't really clear what the end goal was or what I should do next. When I was a teen, though, I went back to it and had quite a bit of fun. I wouldn't say the game is 'challenging', but is a breezy adventure that thankfully isn't so long you won't want to go through the entire game in one sitting, since there's no password or save. I think it's just the right length.
I could totally see this being more fun when you're a bit older. Faxanadu got a lot more fun for me when I understood the NPC hints and had a better feeling of what I needed to do. For Rygar, I honestly wish it was a little longer. I was sad to see it come and go in a single day.
I saw you briefly reference Ctusader of Centy at the beginning of the video. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on it. I think its a delightfully charming game with an endearing story, but I have a lot of nostalgia for it and I'd be curious to see someone with a non biased critical perspective on it.
You know, I've had a half-finished script for that game sitting around for a while. I'll see if I can get back to it soon and finish it up. I had a lot of thoughts about it when I played it.
Funny timing, I barely found out the other day that there's an arcade version of this game
Awww hooray! I think the Master System version's a lot more like the arcade version. Rygar had a ton of releases on many, many systems!
@@hungrygoriya yeah its interesting, I've just mainly known about the NES one for years
The arcade version isn't as much fun as the NES one in my opinion anyway. It's a very straightforward run to the right, kill the enemies, get a high score and don't die. Not a bad game but turning it into the adventure game was a major plus.
@@francescosmith7859 interesting, guess the NES one had a bit more going for it
@@francescosmith7859 I am not much of a run to the right and kill things kind of person... I can see the fun in it, but I love me some RPG elements!
4:03 Ah yes Rygar's infamous "Meow Mix" song.
🎵I-like chic-ken, I-like liv-er,
Meow-Mix, Meow-Mix, please de-liv-er,
I-like chic-ken, I-like liv-er...🎵
Interestingly the Japanese has a mostly different soundtrack that is also hit or miss. It has better music for the castle yet replaces the American version's very popular cave song with a track that sounds like little more than jumbled noise.
I've watched a friend speedrun Rygar an awful lot over the years and there's a grinding area in the Meow Mix castle... we get to hear that song for longer than most areas, haha
And funny how some of the Japanese tunes are different but also great in some cases! A fusion of both soundtracks seems to be the answer to this hit and miss problem!
Gotta love those back abs!
So toned! So jacked!
Nice review! I've heard that the Japanese version has some different BGM. Did you happen to notice any differences?
I haven't had a chance to listen through yet, but I've heard from a few folks here that it's worth it. It's on my weekend to-do list :)
And thanks very much!
It is rather amazing that they've turned a mediocre run-and-hit sidescrolling Arcade game into a full-fledged zeldavania game, even with some control quirks.
I never knew this game also had an RPG element until I watched a walkthrough/guide video for this game.
I somehow managed to beat the game few times before gaining the knowledge.
This game sure is forgiving in that sense. (NTSC version)
I thought it was a great adaptation for home consoles. The arcade game still looks fun, but this kind of adventure gameplay with all its RPG elements are way more my speed.
I just got my pal version in the mail because I heard the same rumor you said about tone and mind not going as high making it harder. I ended up maxing out at 1028 instead of 4000....that same ntsc glitches I tried to use a secret helper didn't work like I hoped a few were still there but overall its like a whole new game. Needless to say I beat it in five times longer than usual. The medals don't drop as much either making it a pain to help with the boss fights. Atleast I can say I own both carts plus the arcade cabinet now. Try it if you got a spell of downtime it actually lets you sightsee a little more and you do realize how much prettier the game looks even though it was gorgeous to begin with.....nice vid be good
Oh gosh... congratulations on crushing this challenge and having the complete Rygar experience at home. That's amazing!
@@hungrygoriya now it's your turn, play the ROM, it's really interesting and different
when I was a kid I could never make it past the first stage, and the incredibly repetitive theme music is still instantly recallable today. one sunkissed saturday afternoon I finally made it through level one, and you better believe I kept pushing until I beat the game in fear of never having another chance, thanks to the continue system and several hours of not needing to be anywhere in particular. it was like in 2004 when the red sox finally got past the yankees in dramatic fashion to advance to the world series for the first time in forever - after that, it didn't matter who the opponent was (and yes, they swept). I was psyched for like a month after I beat it.
Thank you for sharing this memory... I have also had a similar experience of getting through a childhood game I could never finish, and it's so elating. I love how you remember all the details of the day as well. It must've been a very special time, and understandably so!
This one is definitely on my "Gonna finish this one one day" list. I didn't play it for the first time until it was made available on Nintendo Switch Online, and despite have a modicum of knowledge about the game, with no manual I was really lost and died.. a lot xD
This game was really ahead of its time, with its explorable world, upgradable protagonist and forgiving continue system
I hope you do get around to finishing it. The manual map is really helpful and there are a few scans online to consult. I think it would've been a lot harder without the map. You'd eventually find everything but at the cost of time and frustration.
I died soooo often in this game that it wasn't even funny! I don't think I was kidding when I said I died 100 times. Sometimes Rygar has sticky feet and doesn't want to jump over pits.
@@hungrygoriya Now that I know the map exists, I'll probably look up a scan on my phone and keep it on hand.
The NES Classic mini console actually has official PDFs on Nintendo's website for every game on the system, I wish NSO had that, too xD
@@HybridAngelZero It's a shame they didn't think to include it with NSO as well. I think you have everything you need for your adventure!
@@hungrygoriya Knowing that map is available makes me want to give it a real shot soon!
Manuals are essential reading. I probably should have read one.
I was just about to reply to your other comment about checking out a manual scan. It has everything you need to know and helps to reduce the wondering where to go.
You should try out Karnov, Fester's Quest and Milon's Secret Castle if you haven't played them yet. Tough games, but fun.
Fester's Quest has been intriguing to me for a long while so I definitely need to get around to it as well. Milon's Secret Castle's actually coming up on my list of things to play on the livestreams so I'm looking forward to it.
I did play a bit of Karnov one time but couldn't figure out how to get to the other half of my inventory... I'll try again with a thorough manual read through next time! It was fun though!
Got this game in December of 1987 for my birthday along with the NES when I turned 7. Got to the jungle boss and the boss and music scared me so I stopped playing it (the boss at 9 minute mark). I also didn’t really know what I was doing. Came back to it a year later with more NES experience and beat it. Great game I really liked it although I made it easy by grinding the robots in the Sky area for the stars and level ups. Also could never figure out the stupid grapple on the overhead map level so kept trying until I fell in the water or got it 😂
Hey congratulations! I'm glad that you got through it in the end. It's a very fun game that takes a little bit of practice and work, and finding some good grind spots.
@@hungrygoriya great video thanks for reminding me of this game.
Surprised to hear you list the music as a downside, since I've always felt this game has an absolutely AMAZING soundtrack. The first three tracks you hear (the first area/Superman theme, Gran Mountains, and Garloz) are all absolute classics that run through my head constantly, and Sagila's Den is one of the NES' all-time best tracks IMHO. There are those odd overhead-view dungeon themes that kind of suck, but that's only two tracks out of an otherwise really solid OST -- and one of those two tracks (the final dungeon) is even kinda decent, just a bit underwhelming compared to the rest of the soundtrack.
Still, very cool to see you pick this one up. I have a ton of really fond memories of this one from when I was a kid. And if you want a fun glitch to play around with, I definitely know of one that I absolutely loved messing with as a kid: go to the final dungeon, and on the very first screen, jump left, off the edge of the floating island. You're close enough to the left side of the screen that you'll trigger the screen to scroll, and rather than dying, you'll wind up on top of the dungeon walls, running around in an area you are definitely NOT supposed to be. You can't really do anything there, and there are some random invisible holes that you'll probably fall into and die if you venture too far, but it's a really fun little glitch to play around with nonetheless!
I forget if I've ever mentioned these to you before, and one of them is an all-time classic that I'm sure is on your list anyway, but I've got a couple recommendations for you. Considering your love of adventure games like Legacy of the Wizard and Rygar, I definitely think you need to play Goonies II sometime -- possibly my all-time favorite NES game. It can be considered a bit clunky by modern standards, and the way in which you find the candle is completely random and seems pretty impossible to figure out without a guide, but otherwise, it's just a really solid, fun, charming game that's an absolute joy to explore and mess around with. And it being a classic Konami game, it should go without saying that the soundtrack is simply EXCEPTIONAL, featuring the best ever 8-bit rendition of Cyndi Lauper's "Goonies R Good Enough" as the first area theme. That song was MADE for 8-bit, as far as I'm concerned!
The other game I feel compelled to recommend is Solstice, which people often cite as being some sort of IMPOSSIBLY DIFFICULT BEHEMOTH of a game... but it's honestly pretty easy once you learn its mechanics. It's an acquired taste, but the sheer design of the castle is simply incredible -- catacombs, a courtyard, four towers, etc., all modeled out in actual 3D that fits together superbly. I'm not sure any other exploration-focused game has ever entranced me quite as much as Solstice. Part of that, of course, may be due to its soundtrack, which is... unique. And composed by the great Tim Follin, whose chiptune work is some of the best you'll ever hear (and who created his own sound drivers just to play it, I believe!). The title screen theme from Solstice is pretty infamous at this point as perhaps the single best work of legitimate progressive rock ever featured on an 8-bit video game console. And the in-game theme is just... very eerie and unique (though it doesn't play correctly on early-model Famicoms and some NESes, nor in a lot of emulators, so if it sounds a bit off to you, that's probably why!).
Anyway, this is a bit of a rambly comment due to me being fairly tired and it being nearly 3am where I am, so I'll cut it here. But really cool video, and a great watch before bed! Thanks for another excellent review!
@Boco Corwin Oh, I know. I'm just surprised she was even THAT down on it! But that's also why I'm subscribed to this channel: she gives honest, genuine reviews of each game, good or bad, which is both really informative when she covers games I'm not familiar with, and fascinating to hear when she covers games I am.
Definitely not intending to criticize! Just reacting in the moment with genuine surprise, as I have previously and undoubtedly will again in the future.
I did like the music in general. It's hard to explain but some of the music just felt a bit empty? There's not a lot going on with some of the tunes other than a strong melody, which is fine. I've just heard a lot of true jams on NES, and Rygar's soundtrack is still good, but not as great as those if that makes sense. I'm glad you have that music running through your mind a lot. What a nice accompaniment to life!
I had no idea you could glitch like that... someone during the livestream mentioned seeing people get up on those walls, and that must be how it's done! Ever neat!
Goonies II and Solstice are definitely games I'm interested in playing, especially the former. I've watched so many speedruns of that one in particular by the fellow I mentioned in the description who just got the WR today for Rygar. He apparently has excellent taste since he also nudged me to play this game too, but I am definitely looking forward to both of those games. I am also mildly terrified of Solstice!
I hope you've had a good rest there. I'm just about to head to bed here since it's after midnight, but thanks for the thoughtful comment.
That climbing animation tho
I remember trying to climb ropes in elementary school gym class and going absolutely nowhere. I appreciate Rygar's use of legs!
1:27 I swear when we played this as kids it took days before we figured out that you could go across these. After dying enough times you give up and assume you can't cross them.
I guess this game really needed people to have the manual. I remember wondering how to get past obstacles in lots of older games and being happy but also mad when I figured out I had a way through.
Member berry's.... this game and Karnof really bring me back to some of my first memories in life. I was born in 1984.
Curious, what about the game jogged your memories most? Music seems to stick out the most for me when I re-experience something from childhood again.
@@hungrygoriya in Rygar its the wierd looking over world design and a few boss fights and of course the character you play as with the strange weapon. In Karnof it's the strange character you play as... the music... the ladder... and some of the boss fights. Just games that always stuck in my memories for just being odd.
@@theamericanjoeshow Karnov's a game I still need to play, but yeah! Even the red outfit haha
Yeah, as a European player I can confirm the PAL version is a lot harder, especially the final boss, which you must face with less energy. However, I don't remember it being very glitchy, maybe something was rectified in the NTSC-PAL conversion. In the end, it's a great game, except from those ropes. I fell in the water so many times while trying to reach the other side. Very frustrating.
Ah geeze... I'm sorry the PAL version is so hard! I think it's just a bug rather than an intentional change, but it's still unfair. Do you think you'd ever try the NTSC version instead?
And I don't know what was up with all those glitches, but they made me laugh. I know it's at least in other people's NTSC carts since I watch a few speedrunners here and there and some similar things happen to them as well. I have yet to watch anyone play the PAL version though!
I think the "Game Over" screen is based off their Arcade mentality. Somehow they where thinking we be putting in quarters in NES Rygar after a Game Over.
I'm sure there were lots of kids that did just that!