Overall 8.9 Graphics 8.2 Sound 9.2 Addictive 8.4 Story 6.3 Depth 6.8 Difficulty 6.2
8.5
Actraiser - an age old battle between good and evil geeogree
Released in 1990, Actraiser was one of the earliest but by far one of the best games for the SNES. It combined 2 different game play styles into 1 game perfectly. You start off the game waking up from a deep
sleep where you are told that the world has been overrun by demons and monsters and that you need to reclaim the world from them. You then go down into the world to fight off those demons. Once you have beaten the first of 2 levels per area in the world then the game switches from a side-scrolling fighting style into a top down city building style. The city building is very basic but still enjoyable as there are monsters to defeat in that mode as well. These 2 modes are switched back and forth multiple times over the course of the game which keeps each mode fresh and enjoyable.
Graphics 9/10 – this game is beautiful, especially for 1990 but even if it were made a few years later I would still consider it one of the nicest looking SNES games ever made.
The side scrolling part first – the level design is amazing. Every single level is unique and vividly made. There is no wasted space on any of these levels. If there is a background it is well filled in but not to the point where it feels cluttered but natural. The character you use to fight with is also really well done. Looks very clean. The animation is quick but looks good. The controls are mostly good to use. It takes a bit of getting used to in relation to jumping because if you make a big jump you seem to really fly to the side that you jumped towards more than you would expect. That is not a big deal though. The enemies are also really well done. Each level and area of the world have unique monsters for them. There is very little repetition in monsters design which really helps this game stay fresh and enjoyable.
The top town city building part now – while not as nicely drawn as the side-scrolling portion you should not expect it to be. It is a higher up view do detail should be less common. You spent most of your time as an angel that shoots arrows at monsters that fly around. There are only 4 types of monsters (or demons) in the over world view which feels like it is a bit small. Even 1 or 2 more would have felt a bit more rounded out. There were levels involving a fair bit of fire and ice respectively so a monster unique to those areas using those elements against you would have been nice. Getting frozen or taking a bit of extra immolation damage would have been neat. That is a minor complaint though.
The city building itself is pretty basic but the building and city designs vary from area to area enough that it is interesting to see how the building deigns will progress. There are also the occasional hidden items hidden among the world that you can find which adds a bit of fun to the over world. There is another element this game has which I had never seen before. The world contains obstacles (trees, rocks, swamp, desert, ocean) that you must use your “god-like” powers to remove. You can call down lightning to get rid of trees or rocks that are in the way, sunshine to dry up the swamp, rain to clear away a desert or an earthquake to fill in an ocean and allow you to reach an island area that would otherwise be inaccessible. There is also an occasion to use wind though it feels a bit lame and otherwise would not be in the game. The animations for these powers is repetitive but the fact that they were included adds a fun look to the game that would otherwise be really boring without. Overall though the graphics were extremely well done. Small improvements could have been made but they are very minor.
Sound 10/10 – I do not think I have given a 10 for sound before but this game deserves it! For the most part the music does not sound like you are playing a video game at all. It sounds more like an orchestra playing the music than the normal 8 or 16 bit sounds that a lot of other games were stuck with. I think the only track that does not sound like orchestra is the regular over world theme. That one sounds a bit artificial. The rest though are absolutely stellar tracks that really build the theme and feel of this game beyond what it otherwise would have been.
Even the sounds in the side-scrolling portion of the gameplay worked so well. You can tell that the developers put a lot of time into the music and the sound of the game. There are certain tracks in certain levels where the action matches the sound perfectly. It is hard to describe without a video track to go along with the review but if you have played the game you can probably think of a couple of those spots. Overall I can not say enough good stuff about the music for this game. In my opinion it is up there with the best of the best from Final Fantasy and other games like that which are known for their music being top notch.
Addictiveness 10/10 – I do not know how many times I have played this game through but it is a lot. This was another game I had when I was growing up and I beat it so many times it nearly became second nature to me. Except Northwall. That area was always more of a challenge than the rest.
Still, the mixed gameplay styles and the varied level designs and music all combine for a very enjoyable gaming experience. I never got tired of playing this game. I could sit down and start playing this game again and lose an hour without even noticing. And this is not a maybe sort of thing. I know I will sit down sometime in the next 3 months and play this game again. It is that much fun in my opinion.
Story 8/10 – I personally love the story of this game. You are basically God of the world that you can see. For some reason the Devil and his minions attacked you a while ago and did you enough harm that you retreated back to heaven and took some time away to rest and rejuvenate and come back when you were ready. In that time the world was divided into six areas for the 6 minions that helped the Devil defeat you. Your job becomes going into each area to defeat those minions and build up the population of people back up to what it used to be. You are able to interact with the people (in limited ways) and there is some back and forth story going on with them. Things happen to people and you choose whether or not to help them. I have never chose not to because I know what the reward of helping is so I do not know if not helping makes you miss out or not. Still, there are lots of extras and hidden items that you can get by helping the people out or directing them to things. It is not the best story for a game ever but it does give a good reason for both sides of the gameplay in the game so I think it does a great job in that way.
Depth 7/10 – this rating was tough for me. The game has a lot going on in its favor. There are 12 side-scrolling levels and 6 city building areas to “beat”. Once you know what you are doing this does not take that long to do. However, I think the interesting part is the interconnection between some of the areas. An item you get in one area becomes useful in another area of the game. It is pretty obvious what you need to do in most cases but I do like the extra effort put in there.
Overall the game does not take too long to beat but because you are free to go through the game in whatever order you want it does allow for some interesting variety if you care to attempt it.
Difficulty 7/10 – Actraiser is far from a hard game to play but it is not simple either. The most difficult part is definitely the side-scrolling levels. Like most side-scrollers there are pits, spikes and water/lava etc to fall into and die instantly. While this is not a huge problem there are definitely areas of the game where this is a regular possibility. That is where most of the difficulty comes from. Most of the regular enemies are pretty easy to dispatch once you learn their mechanics.
The bosses are also not the most difficult ever designed. However, there are a few that can cause trouble because of the level design associated with them. The first boss of Bloodpool is tough because he is pretty tough to hit a lot of the time and moving back and forth between the platforms on either side can result in death if you miss the jump or get hit during it. There is also the flying snake boss in the first Atos level (I believe). You basically stand on a platform as wide as you are and fight a snake that is flying around. There are other similarly sized platforms around that you can jump to as well but the risk of falling is pretty high. Most of the rest of the bosses that I can think of just require you to be cautious while fighting them until you learn their fight pattern.
Overall 8.5/10 – this might be one of the highest ratings I have given so far (when I factored each area equally) and it is deserved. This game is fantastic. A few more story elements would have been welcomed. Maybe more challenging story elements would have made it more interesting. The city building could have been a tiny bit more varied or complex and that would have made that portion of the game more fun. The difficulty was spot on in my opinion. Hard enough that you were not able to walk through a level without any danger to your life but also not so difficult that you wanted to throw the controller because you died 10 seconds into the level.
I think this game did just about everything right. The graphics were stunning, the music was unreal and the gameplay was addictive. And remember, this was 1990, not 1995. Very few SNES games at this time were this well made. I highly recommend this game to anyone who wants to try out an absolute gem on the SNES that is not always given the credit it deserves.
Graphics 9 Sound 10 Addictive 10 Story 8 Depth 7 Difficulty 7
Review Rating: 5/5
Submitted: 04-21-16
Review Replies: 5
8
Act Raiser, an SNES gem Ghostbear1111
Ah, Act Raiser. The Super Nintendo finally brings us a mixed-platform game, with both side-scrolling hackin'n'slashin and top-down simulation, similar to SimCity.
In a far-off world, demons and evil are taking over. People have been driven away from their homes and only you are able to free them, drive off the evil beings, and provide the people with support to help them thrive and grow.
The beauty of ActRaiser is the balance between the side-scrolling action and the top-down adventure. The game is set up with regions of land as levels and the player must first clear the land from the demons who inhabit it. This is done but jumping, crouching, and playing a side scrolling game with the intent to destroy as many baddies as possible and defeat a boss character. Each region is defined by its geography, so we have a desert landscape, a jungle landscape, snow, mountains, and the levels are designed to reflect the traps and pitfalls each of those geographies have. The scrolling action is not especially hard but it is fun to watch and some of the timing challenges and enemies can be frustrating.
The town building simulation is, for me, the more enjoyable part of the game. There's an overhead map with a temple from which people build and develop towns. Each town has its own unique problems and needs the help of the main character to direct the people to harmony. The avatar of an angel with a bow and arrow helps lead people to build and develop while protecting them from roving monsters. The ultimate goal is to lead the towns to monster lairs and allow the townsfolk to battle the monsters and eliminate them from the map.
The trouble with the maps, though, is there are geographical obstructions to the path of building. In the desert, large areas are covered by sand. The jungle and forest regions are covered by trees. The arctic region is covered by snow, and so on. The angel has a limited amount of mana to cast spells and eliminate these obstructions and allow people to continue building. Part of the game is simultaneously building and helping people and battling monsters. Those monsters fly and do different damage to the people's town, carrying off villagers, destroying buildings, burning fields of wheat, and so on.
Another clever aspect of the game is the connection between the action and the simulation. The number of hit points the side-scrolling warrior has is based on the population of the towns you grow. So the more people and the more successful the towns are, the more HP you have to battle enemies. There are also treasures discovered by people if you lead them to the right spots and those translate into spells and attacks for the warrior to use when battling new enemies.
Lastly, another fun element of the town-building portion is the development of the habitations, buildings, and farms. When towns first start, they have either primitive wood huts or stone buildings. As more and more demon lairs are destroyed by the people, their technology and their building skills improve. They can build better houses that increase the population and they grow better food to feed more people. It's fun to build a town, see the different buildings, and encourage your people to create.
MUSIC: ActRaiser came out for the SNES in 1990 and it was a game-changer with music. The score reflected the action of the side-scrolling with aggressive, quick-beat music and you could feel yourself actually in the environment, swinging a sword, casting a spell, and battling for your people in the middle of nowhere to help them establish a new village. The music of the simulation portion was slower based, enjoyable, and helped you focus on the building and defense parts of the game. The score is well-written and enjoyable. It was very impressive for the SNES system at the time as well.
DEPTH: As you play, you discover a number of inter-connection between the platform and the simulation play. You think "Oh, I see what they did there," and you smile at the game. It is full of small gems hidden throughout the game. If you don't spend time exploring and letting things run their course, it is best enjoyed with a game guide to save you a few minutes.
PLAYTIME: If you take your time and slow down and enjoy, ActRaiser takes 3+ hours. It's not a long game and it provides enough fun, enough action, and enough novelty to be played once, enjoyed, and revisited a few months later. I play it through once or twice a year and it's always a treat to go back and play. It isn't a Final Fantasy monster that takes 20+ hours and you can blitz through it in under two if you were in a hurry. It's fun, it's quick, and you can get on with your day.
DIFFICULTY: The only trouble is once you figure it out, the game isn't hard. There's not an option, once you beat it, to turn up the difficulty but even at the hardest levels it's still only moderately frustrating. Most people can handle the mechanics and understand the in-game physics. At that point, it is a matter of time before you beat it. The best way to challenge yourself is to not allow the towns to build up so you may deny the side-scrolling warrior crucial HP.
ActRaiser is one of those games everyone should play. It is easy to understand, it's fun to play, it's geared for single-player, and you can check it off your SNES list. It is often found in the Top 30 or Top 25 best games for Super Nintendo. It is well worth the experience and good fun.
Graphics 8 Sound 7 Addictive 8 Story 8 Depth 8 Difficulty 4
Review Rating: 4.5/5
Submitted: 08-09-16
Review Replies: 1
9.6
a rare game of pure divinity endings
This is a game you do not want to play with the sound muted. The opening orchestra gives you a prelude that you are in for an epic adventure.And what an adventure! You are a deposed deity, god dethronedby a rival collective of evil demons. Its time for you to reclaim your followers, and save the world from darkness. While it sounds preachy, its really not. You don't have to convert anyone, and other than kicking evil butt and listening to the simple townspeople's needs, you are just a powerful ruler of the world, who happens to have power over natural elements, making lightning storms, drying swamps with intense sunlight... and making statues walk, that sort of thing.Actraiser is two game styles in one. Each country you visit has an opening and closing action sequence, where your spirit possesses a conveniently placed statue of a warrior, who with a powerful sword, slashes and sometimes uses magic to blast through a small group of platforming stages. Each stage is unique in design, and features its own music and enemies. At the end of each action stage will be a boss, and upon beating it, you go to the second part of the game -- which is totally different.The second game is more simulation type, though there is some light combat. If one is familiar with the game, its like Populous. You direct your chubby cherub sidekick, who can use a row of menus to direct the townspeople how to reclaim the land. There are many things the God you play, called Master, does for them. Bringing rain, earthquakes, telling them which direction to build their cities and make roads on, you do a lot. And while you're playing this little sim-lite situation, some flying monsters come by and cause trouble. They range from stealing peasants to burning the houses down outright. You direct your people to build towards the monster lairs and there they will close them, so no more monster will appear out of that one. Sometimes a river or something blocks access, and you have to wait till your people come up with a solution before you can press on. Once all monster lairs are done, you usually get word from the people that the big boss stage is ready. The game goes back into the side-scroller action scene. Beat that and that particular country can be free of evil once more. Repeat for each of the six kingdoms, each in a different climate or region.The six combat stages are great, and each sub-boss and main boss are different and use different attacks. Your sword is fairly strong, able to kill most enemies in a single hit. You also can learn magic spells from the simulation stage, which you use here in the platforming. From shooting flames to raining comets on your foes, they are often like a special move to clear the screen or add breathing room. Your hero, though wrought from a statue, still gets hurt by touching enemies, spikes and a few instant death pits. None of the stage enemies will hinder you much, but each boss requires many hits as they have a ton of life. Fortunately there are breakable orb-like containers in the stages that might hold apples, which heal our hero in full or mid-way.All while you are liberating villages and traveling in your floating sky palace to another one, the sound. The dynamic arrangement for stages like Fillmore and Bloodpool, its so good. The Mode 7 graphics were super awesome for its time, seen when you select an action stage and the camera spirals downward to the location, the music building and building. If I would recommend this game to someone who hates action or simulations, I would at least tell them try it for the soundtrack. Yuzo Koshiro was the music composer, and had other games with good music as well.While the main enemy, Tanzra, is almost a nonentity until the end of the game, I would still say this game has a good story. After all, every stage you play your role to pacify the main area in combat, begin to rebuild peacefully, and then finish the whole stage by one last glorious battle against a unique boss. The people you talk to address you as a deity, and the miracles you perform for them tie in with that. Nothing you do seems out of place, you even take offerings from your subjects if they find something for you. You can also use your powers in the sim game for hidden rewards, which your devout willingly give you. And in some stages where needed, kind God that you are, the Master gives an item to the village that needs help. There is not much in the way of depth, but the few secret items are a plus.Actraiser is a fantastic game from Enix, while some may be put off by the slower pace sim aspect, and some who like sim games might be put off by the required action - its not jarring for me and works well enough. I actually prefer Actraiser 1 over its sequel, which was all action stages and even less story. This is a game that deserves a loving, modern remake. And anyone who loves video game music should definitely give this soundtrack a listen.
Graphics 8 Sound 10 Addictive 8 Story 7 Depth 6 Difficulty 6
Review Rating: 4.5/5
Submitted: 07-06-14
Updated: 07-06-14
Review Replies: 2
9.5
Actraiser Review rka0917
Actraiser is a SNES masterpiece! I can honestly say that this is my favorite action rpg on SNES! This game combines building your own town and some pretty fun sidescrolling stages...
There´s not much for a story, you´re a god who has the task to rid monsters from different locations so people can build a town and live there. With every "town" there´s a sidescroll stage at the beginning and at the end with boss fights after every stage. The sidescrolling part is pretty good, but jumping feels a little broken and jumping and attacking barely works for me which is annoying since some enemies are in the air, but the sidescrolling parts are pretty easy...
Building up the towns was the part that got my attention. You have to guide people in which way to build and use power such as rain, sunlight, lighting and so on to make the land liveable. You also have to listen to prayers from the people for issues that disturbs them and occasionally accept donation and offers. You also do all this while you defend the town from demons and monsters with your naked angel with bow and arrows and leading people to the monsters lairs where the monsters respawn...
This is a game you probably only play once, but you´ll have a great time playing it! I usually get bored quickly with building town and all that, but since monsters attacks at the same time, you are always gonna be in the game. when you boot up the game you are gonna feel confused and maybe think that every option and so on will take to much time to learn, but you get the hang off it really fast. I do feel that it is pretty easy untill you get to the final lair and building a city was actually much harder in the beginning since there are more monsters there.
This game has it´s share of few flaws, but this game is a SNES masterpiece!
Graphics 7 Sound 9 Addictive 6 Story 2 Depth 5 Difficulty 6
Review Rating: 4.4/5
Submitted: 04-21-11
Review Replies: 0
10
ActRaiser Totts
In this amazing game for the SNES, you get the chance to be a God and have boundless power, who has not ever dreamt of this, not even contemplated it once? In the first God game "Populous" many players did get the chance to already meet this dream.
But what if you like action games? Quite simply then, you must gain access to "Act Raiser" as soon as possible, because this Super Nintendo game from development studios Quintet combines skillfully action-packed stages with the most important aspects of a God game.
As a God who is simply called in the game: "The master", you must bring the world deposed from his eternal antagonist Tanzra from chaos to order again. The Tanzras six are demons who have the world divided amongst themselves, while "The master" of the last battle against him is sealed in it’s cloud Palace in the century long batttle who was heavily wounded. Without his parishioners strongly weakened, he faces the seemingly insurmountable task now.
This inspired the stone statue of warrior with his presence and fighting evil with the sword in the form of an action-packed platform game. The first section of game looks surprisingly good today and makes it fun even if it is not easy due to the relatively short energy bar. You can run and jump across platforms of a picturesque woodland, this idyll is only disturbed by the presence of evil monsters. They only leave the area when the boss has been defeated at the end of the level. When this is done, the good and faithful people of the region can settle down and are now dependent on the assistance and protection of the "master".
As a God he has a tremendous responsibility placed on him and highlighted in the following simulation section, which brings his responsibilities clearly to the fore.
The simulation mode, shown from the air, may be useful graphically in terms of functionality, but must be credited with its but with totally uncomplicated handling. Using natural elements it provides a new habitat for his faithful, destroyed like the impenetrable forests with Flash or with the power of the Sun dries treacherous swamps. People then diligently and worship and proliferate as thanks to the "master" all the more. To create the conditions for a high population growth, the primary goal of the simulation game is to get the strength of the "master" to increase with an increasing number of followers which manifests in the increase of the energy bar. The increasingly difficult action growing sections are different not to create. Access to the first Arch demon is revealed only when all evil monsters who charge on the map and destroy houses, burn fields or cause even earthquakes, defeated and their generators sealed by the population. In a second action section, evil at the roots is packed and finally banished from the country.
The basis of the six demons implies in total a whole twelve successful and varied hack and slay levels that are thematically similar to the diverse cultures of humanity. During the simulation some additional life is often well hidden as well as spells that are very helpful in the fight against evil. You should therefore always listen to the concerns of his subjects, because this leads to some interesting reporting. When you have done everything, you must then compete in the thirteenth and final level against Tanzra.
For owners of a Japanese Super Famicom systems at this point you can easily handle the game because of exemplary governance self-explanatory icons without knowledge of the Japanese language. The rest is presented graphically more or less self-explanatory. In the worst case it saves and experimented around something.
"Act Raiser" is technically still very remarkable despite its age. The graphics and the soundtrack are bombastic, never to be forgotten and very detailed and the playability remains excellent. It can safely therefore be called one of the flagship games for the Super Nintendo. I've replayed it often , recently only on my Super Famicom, and I actually found a new spell after all these years. "Act Raiser" is absolutely divine! No Super Nintendo or Super Famicom fan should miss this game!
Review Rating: 4/5
Submitted: 02-20-12
Review Replies: 0
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