Producer: US Gold
Retail Price: £8.99
Author: Probe Software, from a Tecmo coin-op

Future time. The Earth's youth is a distant speck, BT has long been bankrupt and Cliff Richard has just retired.

Out of this mayhem has come Rygar, the legendary warrior. Strong and silent, he speaks but one language... combat. Those who cross his dangerous path regret it - or at least they would if they lived.

But there are still many who resent Rygar's rule and seek to destroy him with the deadly sweetness of their touch - scuttling aardvarks, large-headed snerds, hideous harridans and grunting Goths, These are the dangers the warrior meets as he runs, ducks and leaps his way through the strange landscapes of the far future.

Rygar fights with the power of thunderballs, unleashed upon attackers. But even his fighting skills cannot get the better of a treacherous world, and gaping chasms of incredible depth and darkness await the hero's final fall.

As the eternal struggle rages between life and death, Rygar grows in power by gathering the icons that are revealed when he blasts parts of the scenery. But as the heroic Rygar travels further on his adventurous trail, he encounters ever more weird and deadly forms of futuristic life which (that's enough purple prose - Man Ed).

Probe Software's last release before Rygar was Trantor - The Last Stormtrooper (68% overall in Issue 46), for the GO! label run by US Gold. Trantor's graphics were highly praised, but the CRASH reviewers felt it, like Rygar, was too easy.

COMMENTS

Joysticks: Cursor, Kempston, Sinclair
Graphics: simple but not ugly
Sound: spot effects
Options: definable keys

You can tell just by looking at Rygar that it's a coin-op conversion - it actually looks like it wasn't written to run on a Spectrum. And that's exactly how it plays! The graphics are dull and uninterestingly coloured, the first level is far too easy and the others offer no stimulation.
MIKE [45%]

Not being much of an arcade player - stuck in sleepy Ludlow - I'm usually disappointed by arcade conversions after all the hype they get. But the main problem, graphics, has been overcome well in Rygar. The main character is a bit small, but the colourful parallax scrolling adds depth to the play area, making it a joy to play. And though the first three levels are so easy they're unnecessary, subsequent levels are harder and create a very addictive game. Rygar is one of US Gold's better arcade conversions.
PAUL [70%]

£2.99
Kixx

'Let's fight' says the macho man hero of Rygar, a Tecmo coin-op converted by US Gold in Issue 48. In a future land the enthusiastic hero must battle across countless screens infested by a variety of bloodthirsty aliens. Initially his only defence is the ability to hurl spiked balls (oo-er, missus!) at his assailants, but by shooting boulders and collecting their remnants, he is transformed into an invincible (well not quite!) fighting machine.

It certainly doesn't sound original and plays poorly as well. For a start the game is far too easy to play, and hence becomes tedious very quickly. Graphics look rather simplistic: the hero looks more like a seven stone weakling than a Schwarzenegger-type action man. The meanies are little better and look about as menacing as one of Phil's sheep! Rygar is a mediocre shoot-'em-up game which probably won't keep you entertained for very long.

Then: 58% Now: 45%

US Gold
£8.99
Reviewer: David Powell

Take a pinch of knowhow gained from past smashes like Beach Head, Crystal Castles and Solomon's Key, sprinkle in a little Speccy magic and blend in the entire ingredients of a brilliant arcade game, et voila! (Wot! Ed) the new US Gold hit, Rygar.

If, like me, you've gone absolutely ape over the arcade version, don't be too upset to learn that your Spectral friend doesn't quite cut it as a slot machine. You may get something that looks like gold if you mix gold and silver, but it's never quite the real thing.

Enough of the profundities - on with the game it's 2.5 billion years on and, Rambo-like, you battle your way through rough terrain, exterminating or avoiding the various creatures you encounter. You're armed only with strong legs for jumping and what looks like a tethered circular saw blade for flinging at opponents.

As you race through the levels, boulders sprout up like mutant cabbages and when shot disappear, leaving behind some sort of goody. Normally you just score a few bonus points (useful) but others give large bonuses (v. useful) and the odd extra life or increased time (mega useful). Periodically one of five icons will drop which increase your performance in various respects (oo-er).

Upon completing each of the 27 levels (all the original arcade screens are here), you're awarded bonus points for the number of creatures you kill and the time remaining on a 99-second clock. These can be mutually exclusive, though. Race through, stopping for nothing and you may get a respectable time bonus, but you miss out on the goodies on route. Spend the time killing things and there's a bonus for each hit - but only for fatalities notched up since the start of your current life. Many is the time you polish off 30+ opponents only to die inches from the end!

Naturally each level poses different problems, but please note, unlike the arcade when you fire, you stop moving, and this can be deadly. If things really start hotting up, you can swing your weapon in a satisfyingly destructive half-circle (not the full 360) by pushing the joystick forwards. In this version an enemy just appearing may be made to vanish if you move briefly in the opposite direction.

You lose graphically on this version (not surprisingly), but everything moves well and the screen scrolling is excellently smooth. Differences aside, this is a great game.

I have only one major complaint - it's causing me far too many sleepless nights. Excuse me while I go and burn the midnight oil.

BARGAIN BASEMENT

Chirpy, chirpy, cheap, cheap, chirpy, chirpy, cheap, cheap, chirpy, chirpy, cheap, cheap, BLAM! Nuff of that it's time for another trip to Cheapsville, with Marcus "mothballs-in-the-wallet" Berkmann!

Kixx
£2.99
Reviewer: Marcus Berkmann

Awful lot of ™s around this month, aren't there? Rygar, of course, is based on one of 1987's spankier shoot 'em ups and originally came out on US Gold, where it sold pots. Now regurgitated for the cheapie market, it somehow looks less impressive than it did on first viewing. All you really have to do is run along to the right shooting everything from the usual nasties to strange rocks that emerge from the ground which invariably seem to conceal (a la Athena) useful things like gems and better weapons. Initially it's dead easy, which rather reduces the challenge, but don't be put off, as it does get harder as it proceeds. There's not a lot of variation, though, and once again you remember that the original arcade version, while wonderful to look at, was hardly the most sophisticated coin-op in gameplay terms. Remove the amazing graphics and the result is always likely to be on the thin side.

With smallish sprites, and little in the way of interesting backgrounds to look at, it's just a little disappointing, but for a cheapie, Rygar should keep your trigger finger happy for a week or two, and there are no complaints about speed or smoothness. Not for sophisticates, but reasonable fun for the violently inclined.

Label: Go!
Author: Probe
Price: £8.99
Memory: 48K/128K
Joystick: various
Reviewer: Jim Douglas

It's a funny thing - Time. You can blame lots of things on it.

The plot of the game hangs, y'see, on the fact that Time is everyone's worst enemy and it's therefore necessary for this person to slaughter a few dozen creepcrawlies.

Thus, we see Rygar leaping about the place in his standard issue, Superhero, fur-lined loin cloth, offing the opposition and blasting his way through rocks which turn, wondrously, into bonus armour.

Given all the gear that he's entitled to lug about, Rygar is a sad little superhero of sorts. He's a flickery, piddly little sprite with no facial details whatsoever. And that's indicative of the graphics all the titchy and chock-a-block full of attribute clash.

The landscapes are typical of this sort of game. Wilderness, rocks, trees, lakes to fall into. In fact, it's a stunningly unoriginal game to begin with. So the general naffness of the graphics is doubly unforgivable.

I'm not impressed with Rygar (you may have noticed that). Yes, there is a slight amount of entertainment value here. It's a game that's playable, but only in the sense that all games of this nature are. There's no denying that kill, kill, kill is fun, but there's nothing that lifts it out of the ordinary, and there really ought to be. All in all, Rygar's a bit of a waste of what could have been a damn good game.

MACHINES: Spectrum
SUPPLIER: US Gold
PRICE: £8.99

Yeah! Rygar, at last! Get the tape loaded up NOW! Nice loading screen - but what about the game! Hmmm. Graphics ain't that impressive. Rygar looks a bit wimpish and moves a bit oddly for my liking. And was that the first level? I've completed it without losing a life! Shock horror! On to level two - which is a bit more difficult. I'm starting to enjoy this a bit more now despite the dodgy graphics.

And some of the effects - like the three creatures doing acrobatics, leaping on each others shoulders - are a bit neat.

If you've not seen the coin-op you won't know that Rygar is a barbarian character trapped in a world full of larger than life monsters, objects and weapons to be collected and, more importantly, a lot of fun to be had!

The coin-op is a multi-level, horizontally scrolling game with stunning graphics, huge characters and great gameplay.

The Spectrum version, we haven't seen any others yet, crept into our office just before we went to press with this issue, and initially it looks very disappointing. But ignore the graphics - maybe we're being spoilt by all those ST games - and play the game. Soon you'll be hooked.

Although the first couple of levels are reasonably easy to complete you soon work out that almost all the elements of the coin-op are present if you have played the arcade version, you'll be able to use all those hard-learnt tricks in the computer version.

As you hack 'n' slash your way through the assorted monsters you'll find some things are transformed into objects or weapons which will be useful to you in the future. Objects like:

The Star gives you extra firing range.

The Crown - gives you extra firepower. You can kill more than one monster at a time.

The Tiger Head - allows you to kill monsters by jumping on their heads. Without this you can only stun them using this technique.

The Shield - makes you invulnerable for a short time.

The Sun - allows you to jump higher and have a crack at flying monsters.

Each level has to be completed within a set time limit -ticking away at the top of the screen. So don't hang around killing monsters for too long. You can go back on yourself to pick up objects - but beware wasting too much time.

If you reveal a question mark don't pick it up - shoot it first to uncover what the real object its hiding.

Ignore the graphics and enjoy the game is my message. We've yet to see the other versions - but we know you've been waiting for this game with itchy joystick fingers, so watch out for more Rygar reviews in upcoming issues. Overall, Spectrum Rygar is slightly disappointing - compared with Elite's Thundercats, which is, we have to say it, a similar type of game.

Spectrum owners should take a look at the game before they buy - this version could be for hardened Rygar fans only.