Galaga
SCORE: 68
I am very thankful I had the money to
purchase Namco Museum Collection 2 on the Evercade system. One of the
games included on that compilation cartridge is Galaga. At first I
thought I had already played
Galaga. The reason for this is Galaga and Galaxian are very similar.
Not only do they look similar, they also sound similar. On top of that
the gameplay is similar. I had to do a double take to realize they are
two different video games.
Galaga was released two years after Galaxian. Both of these games are
space shooters where we shoot the aliens that are coming at us. This
concept is similar to Space Invaders. We don't hide behind shields in
Galaga or Galaxian. The enemy ships in Galaga do not start in rows and
march down toward us. Instead a row of enemies flies around the screen
letting us take pot shots at them. Then they line up. There is less time
in Galaga before enemies start to fly down at us.
I found Galaga to be more difficult than Galaxian. There is less time to
react since the enemies are constantly dive bombing you. The movements
of the enemies felt different to me in Galaga as well. There are
different levels in Galaga. We have one where we are trying to shoot as
many aliens as possible to get a higher score. If you can beat the 255th
level in Galaga then the game will reset.
Technically Galaga is the sequel to Galaxian. There are obvious
improvements to the game that make it more challenging. As a retro video
game Galaga has a lot of history in it. The concepts in Galaga have been
used in a plethora of other shooters since then. Some of the ideas in
Galaga are actually pretty good for its era. The graphics and audio are
slightly better in Galaga.
I find it interesting Namco decided to do a sequel with a different
name. I personally believe it would have been smarter to name Galaga -
Galaxian 2. You might disagree with that. I had to do research into
Galaxian and Galaga because it certain confused me all these decades
later. Since the games were two years apart adding a two to the first
one makes more sense to me. It is what it is though.
- Paul
Graphics: 66%
Sound: 77%
Replay/Extras: 72%
Gameplay: 60%
Family Friendly Factor: 65%
System: NES/Evercade(tested)
Publisher: Namco
Developer: Namco
Rating: ‘NR' for Not Rated
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