Ristar

As much as I love RPGs, especially ones as good as the game I spent two weeks discussing, sometimes I'm just in the mood for an old fashioned 2D platformer. So I figured I'd tackle one that's been on my to do list for like, 20 years.

Ristar is one of those titles I've always had the urge to play, and I've always had the ability to play, but I'd never actually gotten to it until this random week. I've heard some pretty good things, but Ristar has always been something of an overlooked game. Unlike some of the stuff that I review on here though, the reason why is pretty simple: it came out in early 1995, just a few months before the PlayStation and Saturn would kick off the 5th generation. It really is a shame, as the SNES and Genesis had a lot of really great games come out towards the end of their life cycles. It's not like everyone stopped developing for them as soon as the new wave of consoles was announced and both systems continued to see new releases for quite a while after the release of those newer machines. I can think of quite a few games from this era that I consider to be the best on their respective systems, which makes total sense as developers were now intimately familiar with the hardware. But was the Sega-developed Ristar one of those games? Yeah, I'd say so. It was very clear that the people who created this game knew exactly how to take full advantage of the aging Genesis and get the absolute most out of the console.

That starts with the graphics, which are some of the best on the system. This is two weeks in a row that I've reviewed a game with top-of-the-line 2D graphics, which makes me incredibly happy. Even though you are on a 2D plane, the backgrounds have a ton of depth and the scaling is excellent. Both Ristar and the enemies are well animated and expressive, with a huge variety of facial expressions and movements. The bosses are especially cool, they might be the best looking thing in this game. If not the bosses, it would have to be the level clear screen you get between each new stage. As I mentioned before, this is a late 4th gen game and it really shows, these are some of the nicest looking graphics I've seen on any console of the era. In general, character movement is impressive and clean, graphics are bright and colorful and details are top notch. The sound is also pretty solid. As with any Genesis title, the sound effects are grainy, but the music is clear and fits perfectly within the game. It could just be me, but it sounds a little muted, though its still good.

Gameplay is pretty standard 2D side scrolling fare, but its about as well done as you could expect. Ristar focuses a little bit more on dealing with enemies and finding creative ways around stage hazards than it does on straight up platforming, which I kind of like. The controls are streamlined and responsive, though a little bit floaty. Ristar's jump isn't the best and I found him difficult to control in the air, but that was about the only issue I ran into and the game doesn't require too many precise jumps, so it was rarely an issue. Everything moves at a good pace, not too slow but not too fast, and enemies all have relatively predictable and fair patterns. I did have issues with some enemies, but we will get to that later. It did find it was relatively easy to get hit, but health pickups were more plentiful here than in other platformers of the time. You have five lives, four hits each, to clear the game, no saves or passwords here. I do think by this point, all games should have had some level of password or save system, but Ristar isn't too long and there are quite a few extra lives scattered throughout the game. It also isn't all that difficult, there were definitely some tough parts and I did run out of lives once or twice, but I was able to beat the game with relative ease.

The level design is pretty strong, it's just linear enough to not be confusing, but just varied enough that the player is provided with different paths. Most of the levels have a variety of ways to reach the exit and the ones that don't tend to be the puzzle-based levels, which themselves offer an additional type of variety. If there were one more well known game I could compare it to, it would be Sonic the Hedgehog. Makes total sense, they are both first party Sega games. It doesn't have quite as strong design as Sonic, but it's still pretty good. Ristar only has one attack, he can reach his hands out to grab, but the enemies are placed in such a way that taking them out feels unique and varied. The attacks can also be used to grab onto platforms and climb walls, which the game uses to great effect. Even with just the one offensive attack, Ristar feels like it offers more variety than most platformers of its day. He does have the ability to swing on star platforms and launch himself, but it rarely comes into play. I actually think this should have been used more.

I'd be remiss if I I didn't mention the boss fights, which are all really cool. For one, the bosses are big, detailed and uniquely designed. They offer difficult but not impossible to dodge patterns and change up their fights as you go along. My personal favorite was the third level boss (pretty sure it was third, might have been fourth) who changes up his fight multiple times throughout. It starts pretty normal, but then he breaks the floor and you have to fight him as you fall down a shaft. Once you hit him enough times, you land and resume a normal fight on different terrain. Not all of the fights are that interesting, but they are all very unique, even when compared to one another. If there is any department where Ristar outshines (pun intended) his faster, bluer brother. This may be the best part of this game.

Of course, it's not all positive here. The biggest issue I had with Ristar was the hit detection when using Ristar's attack. It was especially pronounced because hit detection wasn't a problem at all when it came to getting hit by enemies or contacting spikes. But I could never consistently get down where exactly I had to hit enemies to successfully grab them. With walking enemies, this usually isn't a big deal, as you will usually get a few chances to get your hands on them and they have much more predictable movement and attack patterns. But it is damn near impossible to hit flying enemies, especially when you are reaching up for them. On my first run through the game, the first flying enemy, a chicken I ran into in the first level, killed me probably three times before I gave up on trying to grab him and just went around. Maybe that's what the developers intended, but somehow I doubt it. It wasn't game breaking by any means, but it was extremely frustrating and a bit shocking in a game of such overall quality. Going back to the bosses for a second, I think this was part of the reason I liked them so much. The bosses all have such huge hitboxes that the detection issues weren't a problem.

At the end of the day, Ristar is a well made, interesting and fun platformer that made use of every ounce of the Genesis' power. It wasn't a revolutionary title, but it was a technically impressive and well put together game that is worth checking out for fans of old school sidescrollers and 2D games in general. When Ristar came out, gamers were already champing at the bit for the new, upcoming consoles. New games were still coming out for the SNES and Genesis, but they just didn't feel like as big a deal as they once did. It's titles like Ristar that reminded gamers just how great these soon to be outdated consoles were and would allow said consoles to continue to be relevant well into the fifth generation. The Genesis would still continue to see releases as late as 1998 (the last being Frogger, just for reference) and it was games like Ristar that proved continued support of these consoles was worth it.

8.5/10