Should be ZERO levels of surprise that a SunSoft title has a Boss soundtrack; their legendary levels of music made the dump-correction- toxic waste site-fire that was "Fester's Quest" PLAYABLE.
Glad you reviewed this game and mentioned the music. The soundtrack was freaking awesome and gives me goosebumps whenever I listen to it. As a child, I saw this random game at a game store and picked it up because it was discounted. I enjoyed it a lot, but it was too hard, and I had to resort to using a Game Genie to get to the higher levels. Memories. =)
If you collect for NES and like side scrolling shooters, I'd say it's definitely worth grabbing. it's not crazy expensive and it's still very solid. Cheaper than I think all of the mega man games, so if not being mega man is the biggest problem, at least it's priced as such. I didn't really get the "why would I play this when I can play megaman" because one of the main points of this show (and why I love it) is that it shows you games that might not be as well known and polished as the top games (marios, zelda's, megaman's, metroids etc) but are fun and worth checking out if you like the top games in a genre (and this is a very competent run and gun in an NES library filled with cruddy games of that genre); the "why would I play X when I could play Y" is a criticism that could equally apply to any number of games that have been reviewed, but weren't. Just my 2 cents.
I just picked this one up last weekend and I can't wait to try it out. Sorry to hear this one doesn't tickle your fancy, but I'm glad you gave it a whirl anyway!
The main difference is that the main character's jump has much more horizontal commitment than Mega Man. That informs a lot of the challenges. You end up with more difficult setups that use simpler obstacles and patterns.
I love how they still use floppy disks in the far future in which this game is supposed to take place, according to the manual... guess the devs couldn't have known that you'd be able to hold way more data on a pendrive in the not-so-distant future!
That's clearly some sort of compact optical disc rather than a common magnetic floppy disc though, just that it has a "floppy-style" casing (like Minidiscs).
I rented this game back in the day, the main character was lame but the animation and music blew me away. I remember letting the title screen just play, it was so good.
I disagree. Mega Man is more polished (for better or worse) than Journey to Silicus but I don't see them as that or this. I see them as both. If you want something like Mega Man but with a different vibe - This is a great choice. The music is kickass and the game is difficult but not impossible. The last level and boss requires patience and to know when to attack.. Not something you complete in the first run. The first three levels aren't that hard but four and five is very different from each other and quite hard!
While there are lots of mechanical simiarlities to Mega Man, I never felt they played that much alike in the end. Silius is IMO way more run'n'gunny and feels more like an in-between to Mega Man and Contra.
It's got problems. Controls can stall when going from crouching to jumping (keep crouching as you jump to avoid this.) Bullets can still come at you when on elevators/defeated a boss. There's a lot of cheap moments too. Mainly beginners traps with enemy placement. Which wouldn't be so bad if you had infinite continues....Which you don't. Probably because the game's so short. Weapons are meh too. It's a good game, but yeah. Could've been a top tier game with some tweaks.
Just beat it (via Switch Online)....Fucking hated it. The 2nd to last boss was dull, and the last boss was just stupid after I figured out the pattern. - Beating this made me appreciate the likes of Castlevania, MegaMan, and Contra even more. As tough as those games are, the controls always work as expected, and the design is much more refined. Take Castlevania's infamous Medusa Head/Knight hallway. It's hard, but they give you a x3 & cross power ups before it, you have infinite continues, and you can master the flow. In Silius, just timing your shots jumping or changing direction can be really fussy, and not work. I PRESSED THE BUTTON AND IT DIDN'T GO! - I started Silius at a 8-9/10. Found some of the flaws but still thought 7/10. By the end with it's lame bosses, 6/10. Okay. But I don't want to play it ever again. This was a case where I used save states mid-level. If it weren't for them or Game Genie, I wouldn't have bothered playing at all.
I beleive this games harder than the Mega Man games. Simply because it doesn't have unlimited continues. Anyways, this game is worth it for the soundtrack alone.
The boss battles were deff my favorite part of the stages. Honestly though, the music to this game is legendary. One of my favorite tunes in general is that first stage tune.
I was looking for this review to mention the difficulty, and you nailed it. I WANT to like this game so much - good music, kind of a hidden gem - but everytime I've owned a copy, I play it and I'm reminded how stupid hard it is. If the makers had just included a difficulty setting option, Silius would be gold.
Well there is an option to add 2 more continues. At the title screen, press the B button 33 times then hit Start and it will open an option menu with a sound-test and the possibility to add up to 2 continues.
Fair enough. still a good sunsoft game. i think it one of there better ones personally. would have been a decent terminator game aswell, a franchise which didnt get much in terms of quality in regards to video games. MM games are better and JTS is pretty slippery feeling. but you could do much worse with something like Krion Conquest, JTS wipes the floor compared to that MM rip off. but yeah i can totally see this game kinda feeling meh. personally i'd still say its a fairly strong nes game that does enough things right but ive always felt it was a bit over praised too.. good review SD!
Since the beginning of this review, I noticed the music was gonna be good and sure enough you said it was good. I never even heard of this game until now.
I'd say this game is at least as good as MM5 and 6. The music is fantastic, and the challenge is ludicrous. I think it is far better than average, considering average on NES was Astaynax and Amaggon and crap like that.
the graphics and animation are quite nice... I just played this for the first time on the switch virtual console... it has aged rather well I think. Control feels good.... and the game simply looks great... give it a shot. Loving it so far
I remember finding this game brand new for cheap around the end of the NES lifespan and I didn't care for it much. So hard though. I think my 10ish year old self made it to stage 2 like once. lol. Oh yeah and the music was in fact rather dope.
It has been bugging me for days trying to remember what this game was called. I got suckered as a kid with this in a loan trade for my game genie. Then the other kid was super reluctant to trade back at the agreed upon time. Grrr curse journey to silius. And thank you snesdrunk! Must have been nearly 30 years now.
Why play this over a Mega Man game? Length, for one thing. Sometimes about 30 minutes or so is just about the right amount of time to action-platform around for. You'd be hard-pressed to complete any Mega Man title in that amount of time, but Journey to Silius is very doable in a half-hour window. It's short but intense in the same sort of way Sunsoft's NES Batman is, and I think there's a place for that.
I did, and didnt find it that difficult, after some time playing it, tbh. You have to try and try again and eventually you'll breeze through the first three levels. Last level is a challenge of course . You can check out the playthrough on my channel if you want :) ruclips.net/video/W1dS8aggBBA/видео.html
I have to disagree about the game's difficulty. This game is way easier than Contra or Super C. It's only 5 levels long, you have a lifebar (unlike Contra), checkpoints and several continues. And the last stage is just an auto-scrolling level with absolutly no enemies in it, you just have to avoid pits, falling boxes and other hazards. The final boss is a joke, you can easily jump over him everytime he tries to reach you. To say the truth I've never managed to beat Contra nor a NES Megaman game ( I mean, the boss fights alone in some Megaman games are harder than Journey to Silius) and yet I'm able to finish Journey to Silius within 30 minutes. I think that this game is, with Gremlins 2, one of the Sunsoft's easiest games on the system, the hardest being Batman, Blaster Master and Super Spy Hunter... Of course this game is not suuuper easy. You won't be able to beat it in one setting on your first try. But I would not say it's a super hard game, it's standard difficulty for an NES game.
TZMG: I second you on the Mega Man bit. Starting with 2, those games get way easier due to the password system, but the power up distribution in the final levels of the first one makes the difficulty curve for that game goddamned ridiculous, and that's still acknowledging that the game allows you to refill all weapons to the max before beginning the game's final boss arc (and speaking of boss fights, while I'm not complaining by any means, the only way I've ever managed to beat bosses like Clone Man and The Yellow Devil is by selecting the Elec Wave and then abusing the shit out of the pause trick!). Thanks for contributing!
I don't know, I think Journey to Silius is really good. Maybe not as good as the Mega Man series but plenty of games on the NES aren't. It still looks great, the music is great, and it plays rather well. It's difficult but I never found it to be difficult in a cheap way. Enemies typically have a set way to approach them and after a while I could easily clear the first couple of stages. Really good tbh.
Interesting seeing a contrast between your reviews with the older reviews done by Derek Alexander back when he called his show Happy Video Game Nerd 8 years ago. On Journey to Silius: average with some interesting jumping momentum going on which makes you think how to jump. Rough World aka RAF World in Japan. Least Tokai Engineering did their best making their game.
that guy was always too stuck up. he was trying to be a happy video game nerd but he needed to justify himself and was just arrogant and typical. real typical. ANd the happy console gamer already existed long before him. He did everyHVGN avirtised and did it from the heart and was just more ointeresting. To be honest I've had been checking out some stuff from his channel stop skeletons from fighting and the direction he's going now is more honest and I like his content more. I'm not a fan either way. I don't get a lot of his vids recommended and don't want to look for them. But the topics seem better and it plays to his strength. I think he found himself now. The only old stuff of his I really liked that comes to mind was the D reviews.
I only knew the music of this game at first. So I had to try it out. I can say with some certainty, that it's impossible to beat this game without savestates. Not hard. Impossible.
This game is far too expensive for how average it is. I love run n gun games like this but this should be a $10 game not $70 Edit: Ok, it looks like it's only about 25-35 now but still
I would love Silius more if the hero wasn't so... generic and boring. Megaman's design as a character is what originally drew me to his series. Same goes for Sonic and Mario. The hero of Silius is just some blonde dude. Very 80's I guess.
I'm a die hard Mega Man fan. And I must say Journey to Silius has A MEGATON of personality.
Yes. The music.
That is some epic music
Sounds like the music from the Batman game that Sunsoft also released on the NES...
Should be ZERO levels of surprise that a SunSoft title has a Boss soundtrack; their legendary levels of music made the dump-correction- toxic waste site-fire that was "Fester's Quest" PLAYABLE.
On Switch Online now!!! Been enjoying it a ton so was happy to revisit this old review. :)
yeah it def has some seriously memorable/emotional music.
This is one of my top 3 favourite games of all times and maybe one of the best nes titles ever.
Glad you reviewed this game and mentioned the music. The soundtrack was freaking awesome and gives me goosebumps whenever I listen to it.
As a child, I saw this random game at a game store and picked it up because it was discounted. I enjoyed it a lot, but it was too hard, and I had to resort to using a Game Genie to get to the higher levels.
Memories. =)
If you collect for NES and like side scrolling shooters, I'd say it's definitely worth grabbing. it's not crazy expensive and it's still very solid. Cheaper than I think all of the mega man games, so if not being mega man is the biggest problem, at least it's priced as such. I didn't really get the "why would I play this when I can play megaman" because one of the main points of this show (and why I love it) is that it shows you games that might not be as well known and polished as the top games (marios, zelda's, megaman's, metroids etc) but are fun and worth checking out if you like the top games in a genre (and this is a very competent run and gun in an NES library filled with cruddy games of that genre); the "why would I play X when I could play Y" is a criticism that could equally apply to any number of games that have been reviewed, but weren't. Just my 2 cents.
Lucky for you people in the United States because in Europe it is crazy expensive ;)
1:45 - The first boss being a helicopter must be some kind of inside joke among developers because it happens way too much to be a coinicidence
Sunsoft was always known for using the pcm sample channel on the NES for its bass lines. That’s where they get their signature sound from.
33 times on the B button at the start screen. Remember doing that just to get to music selection. Easily one of my favourite NES soundtracks.
I just picked this one up last weekend and I can't wait to try it out. Sorry to hear this one doesn't tickle your fancy, but I'm glad you gave it a whirl anyway!
I was pretty surprised to see this get licensed for NES Online on Switch last December.
The main difference is that the main character's jump has much more horizontal commitment than Mega Man. That informs a lot of the challenges. You end up with more difficult setups that use simpler obstacles and patterns.
the music is amazing tho
couldn't disagree with you more on this one. you may be one of the few people to see this game as average.
It's a very solid game in my favorite NES genre, though there's nothing that makes it stand out. If only it would have kept that Terminator license.
I love how they still use floppy disks in the far future in which this game is supposed to take place, according to the manual... guess the devs couldn't have known that you'd be able to hold way more data on a pendrive in the not-so-distant future!
That's clearly some sort of compact optical disc rather than a common magnetic floppy disc though, just that it has a "floppy-style" casing (like Minidiscs).
I rented this game back in the day, the main character was lame but the animation and music blew me away. I remember letting the title screen just play, it was so good.
Man, this music rocks!
Much better than okay. Imo better than most of the megaman games
I disagree. Mega Man is more polished (for better or worse) than Journey to Silicus but I don't see them as that or this. I see them as both. If you want something like Mega Man but with a different vibe - This is a great choice. The music is kickass and the game is difficult but not impossible. The last level and boss requires patience and to know when to attack.. Not something you complete in the first run. The first three levels aren't that hard but four and five is very different from each other and quite hard!
While there are lots of mechanical simiarlities to Mega Man, I never felt they played that much alike in the end. Silius is IMO way more run'n'gunny and feels more like an in-between to Mega Man and Contra.
It's got problems.
Controls can stall when going from crouching to jumping (keep crouching as you jump to avoid this.)
Bullets can still come at you when on elevators/defeated a boss.
There's a lot of cheap moments too. Mainly beginners traps with enemy placement. Which wouldn't be so bad if you had infinite continues....Which you don't. Probably because the game's so short.
Weapons are meh too.
It's a good game, but yeah. Could've been a top tier game with some tweaks.
Just beat it (via Switch Online)....Fucking hated it.
The 2nd to last boss was dull, and the last boss was just stupid after I figured out the pattern.
-
Beating this made me appreciate the likes of Castlevania, MegaMan, and Contra even more.
As tough as those games are, the controls always work as expected, and the design is much more refined.
Take Castlevania's infamous Medusa Head/Knight hallway. It's hard, but they give you a x3 & cross power ups before it, you have infinite continues, and you can master the flow. In Silius, just timing your shots jumping or changing direction can be really fussy, and not work.
I PRESSED THE BUTTON AND IT DIDN'T GO!
-
I started Silius at a 8-9/10.
Found some of the flaws but still thought 7/10.
By the end with it's lame bosses, 6/10.
Okay. But I don't want to play it ever again.
This was a case where I used save states mid-level. If it weren't for them or Game Genie, I wouldn't have bothered playing at all.
The ost is amazing tho!!
I beleive this games harder than the Mega Man games. Simply because it doesn't have unlimited continues.
Anyways, this game is worth it for the soundtrack alone.
It`s hard game but not impossible, I like Journey to Silius
The boss battles were deff my favorite part of the stages. Honestly though, the music to this game is legendary. One of my favorite tunes in general is that first stage tune.
Do a review on GI Joe on the NES. It's such an underrated game!
This game is legendary. I actually prefer it to Megaman. 👍
Me, too.
Awesome music fore sure, but in terms of Sunsoft game soundtracks, I have to say Batman is still my favorite IMO.
I was looking for this review to mention the difficulty, and you nailed it. I WANT to like this game so much - good music, kind of a hidden gem - but everytime I've owned a copy, I play it and I'm reminded how stupid hard it is. If the makers had just included a difficulty setting option, Silius would be gold.
Well there is an option to add 2 more continues. At the title screen, press the B button 33 times then hit Start and it will open an option menu with a sound-test and the possibility to add up to 2 continues.
Fair enough. still a good sunsoft game. i think it one of there better ones personally. would have been a decent terminator game aswell, a franchise which didnt get much in terms of quality in regards to video games. MM games are better and JTS is pretty slippery feeling. but you could do much worse with something like Krion Conquest, JTS wipes the floor compared to that MM rip off. but yeah i can totally see this game kinda feeling meh. personally i'd still say its a fairly strong nes game that does enough things right but ive always felt it was a bit over praised too.. good review SD!
it's not megaman quality but it isn't far behind. They did a really good job with this game.
Since the beginning of this review, I noticed the music was gonna be good and sure enough you said it was good. I never even heard of this game until now.
Now on the Switch NES virtual console.
You missed the boat on this one.
I agree. This game is a classic, if not a masterpiece.
I'd say this game is at least as good as MM5 and 6. The music is fantastic, and the challenge is ludicrous. I think it is far better than average, considering average on NES was Astaynax and Amaggon and crap like that.
the graphics and animation are quite nice... I just played this for the first time on the switch virtual console... it has aged rather well I think. Control feels good.... and the game simply looks great... give it a shot. Loving it so far
the music looks like batman for nes music! very nice
The background art style is a lot like Batman too.
I remember finding this game brand new for cheap around the end of the NES lifespan and I didn't care for it much. So hard though. I think my 10ish year old self made it to stage 2 like once. lol. Oh yeah and the music was in fact rather dope.
One of the greatest NES soundtracks
It has been bugging me for days trying to remember what this game was called. I got suckered as a kid with this in a loan trade for my game genie. Then the other kid was super reluctant to trade back at the agreed upon time. Grrr curse journey to silius. And thank you snesdrunk! Must have been nearly 30 years now.
too hard on this one. its a great game. last level will make you curse the world, but, still a great game. music outstanding and control is tight.
Why play this over a Mega Man game? Length, for one thing. Sometimes about 30 minutes or so is just about the right amount of time to action-platform around for. You'd be hard-pressed to complete any Mega Man title in that amount of time, but Journey to Silius is very doable in a half-hour window. It's short but intense in the same sort of way Sunsoft's NES Batman is, and I think there's a place for that.
I'd also say it's quite a bit faster and more "run-n-gunny" than Mega Man.
Has anyone beaten this game without the help of Game Genie?
Yes! Torture though.
I did, and didnt find it that difficult, after some time playing it, tbh. You have to try and try again and eventually you'll breeze through the first three levels. Last level is a challenge of course . You can check out the playthrough on my channel if you want :) ruclips.net/video/W1dS8aggBBA/видео.html
Yeah its actually not that hard. Quite a bit of memorisation helps a lot.
I have to disagree about the game's difficulty. This game is way easier than Contra or Super C. It's only 5 levels long, you have a lifebar (unlike Contra), checkpoints and several continues. And the last stage is just an auto-scrolling level with absolutly no enemies in it, you just have to avoid pits, falling boxes and other hazards. The final boss is a joke, you can easily jump over him everytime he tries to reach you. To say the truth I've never managed to beat Contra nor a NES Megaman game ( I mean, the boss fights alone in some Megaman games are harder than Journey to Silius) and yet I'm able to finish Journey to Silius within 30 minutes.
I think that this game is, with Gremlins 2, one of the Sunsoft's easiest games on the system, the hardest being Batman, Blaster Master and Super Spy Hunter...
Of course this game is not suuuper easy. You won't be able to beat it in one setting on your first try. But I would not say it's a super hard game, it's standard difficulty for an NES game.
TZMG: I second you on the Mega Man bit. Starting with 2, those games get way easier due to the password system, but the power up distribution in the final levels of the first one makes the difficulty curve for that game goddamned ridiculous, and that's still acknowledging that the game allows you to refill all weapons to the max before beginning the game's final boss arc (and speaking of boss fights, while I'm not complaining by any means, the only way I've ever managed to beat bosses like Clone Man and The Yellow Devil is by selecting the Elec Wave and then abusing the shit out of the pause trick!). Thanks for contributing!
Playing it now on Switch, and all I can say is thank god for save states!
Totally disagree but interesting to hear a dissenting opinion
I loved this game as a kid that and timelord
The music reminds me of Ys Book 1&2 for TG16
I don't know, I think Journey to Silius is really good. Maybe not as good as the Mega Man series but plenty of games on the NES aren't. It still looks great, the music is great, and it plays rather well. It's difficult but I never found it to be difficult in a cheap way. Enemies typically have a set way to approach them and after a while I could easily clear the first couple of stages. Really good tbh.
Of course it IS WORTH!!!
The music sounds like megaman too
its a good game and deserves a go
Interesting seeing a contrast between your reviews with the older reviews done by Derek Alexander back when he called his show Happy Video Game Nerd 8 years ago.
On Journey to Silius: average with some interesting jumping momentum going on which makes you think how to jump. Rough World aka RAF World in Japan. Least Tokai Engineering did their best making their game.
that guy was always too stuck up. he was trying to be a happy video game nerd but he needed to justify himself and was just arrogant and typical. real typical. ANd the happy console gamer already existed long before him. He did everyHVGN avirtised and did it from the heart and was just more ointeresting. To be honest I've had been checking out some stuff from his channel stop skeletons from fighting and the direction he's going now is more honest and I like his content more. I'm not a fan either way. I don't get a lot of his vids recommended and don't want to look for them. But the topics seem better and it plays to his strength. I think he found himself now. The only old stuff of his I really liked that comes to mind was the D reviews.
I only knew the music of this game at first. So I had to try it out.
I can say with some certainty, that it's impossible to beat this game without savestates.
Not hard. Impossible.
without watching video - is this a real question?
This game is WAY harder than any of the Mega Man games, even 1. At least the Mega Man games have unlimited continues.
and E-tanks
Raf world!
The one area? I would say the music is as good or better. But yeah, the game's pretty average.
Little nemo
It is way better then megaman.
Sad Hoshi is sad :(
See i was the opposite kid I had this game Metriod why did I need Mega Man to me Mega Man was the redundant game
When I played this the level design struck me as really poor.
I got this game as a Christmas present that I didn’t ask for. I didn’t like it. I thought it was too hard and not fun.
This game is far too expensive for how average it is. I love run n gun games like this but this should be a $10 game not $70 Edit: Ok, it looks like it's only about 25-35 now but still
71dembones How good a game has never necessarily correlated with its price...?
One review of yours I wholeheartedly disagree with.
I'm gonna say it, Mega man is over rated.
The X series is still playable though.
Yeah, SNESdrunk is a fraud
Bleh don't agree with review, game is great.
Reviewer might have been drunk at the time... drunk on SNES
Anyone remember Xexyz?
I would love Silius more if the hero wasn't so... generic and boring. Megaman's design as a character is what originally drew me to his series. Same goes for Sonic and Mario.
The hero of Silius is just some blonde dude. Very 80's I guess.