I don't know about anyone else, but if I was a kid and someone said they were giving me a game called "Dinoforce," I'd never get over the disappointment by the surprising lack of dinosaurs. Weird title. But there is NO need for that soundtrack to hit so hard! That second stage background music is a solid bop. There needs to be a dedicated soundtrack release of this thing.
PC Engine 35th anniversary & it's still both mediocre, unfinished game. I do have to give a kudos to developers (not publishers) for making a decision not to release a certain game(s). After a certain amount of time, they figure out that their project is a stinker. Firaxis Games put in a lot of work into Sid Meier's Dinosaurs before abandoning the project. Why? They admitted of running out of ideas for making the actual game fun to play😮💨😮💨😮💨
It's not a typical shmup. Very score oriented (Milking enemy generators, Killing enemies fast, block destruction, enemies destruction rate) but it has a weird randomizer with weapons and even bosses. For some tweets I learned that you can trigger even different boss fights, for example the first boss normally is that red crab thing, but 2 guys mentioned it was instead a blue horned thing a couple of times. Also I don't understand exactly the Power counter, it increases with each enemy destroyed but it affects your weapon power level or what, I can't tell any difference. Hope all of this is explained in the manual. Also if you don't shoot you get a rear attack, that works for enemies from behind and to destroy more stage blocks.
Some decent chip tunes, especially on Stage 2- is it just me or did someone really like sections in other shooters where you had to tunnel through little bits and blocks- like on Salamander or Gradius... and I just never did get what was going on with the percentages and the beam weapons- maybe some kind of bonus for score attack games? Regardless, thanks so much for showing this! Long time PC Engine/ Turbo fan, so I'm happy to see anything rare pop up!
Please, stop with the 8-bit/16-bit thing, it was marketing BS. Seeing this, I have my doubts that this was going to be official. 1993? Not quite sure about it.
16bit was just a US marketing thing which is annoying because all the younger people who were not around then keep insisting that the PC Engine is 16bit when it is not and was never said to be until the US machine with its lame marketing came about. This was an official game though, it says Athena on the title screen in Katakana. Checking out the old Japanese game mags also has some images and previews of this game.
It looks like the score and power accumulation is based on defeating the enemies the quickest. The longer they are on screen, the less points and power rewarded. Prioritize quick destruction. Power is spent on items in use from the item slot.
I think I'm gunna copp this off pce works, I've ordered pc engine games from them before and I like all the extras they send like posters and art cards (once they sent me a big steam hearts poster) regardless of the opinions of pce works I still want this game official release or not 🤣
These neckbearded collectors from Sarumaru's circle need to touch grass. It's great when you can actually play and own a game for your favorite system without spending hundreds online .
The ship sprite looks pretty nice (probably a bit too big, though, especially if the hitbox covers the whole spacecraft), but I found the backgrounds to be super basic and uninspired, as if they had no idea what the design the levels around of, but most of all, the super colorful weapons and beams felt hugely distracting to me, and almost gives the thing an unintentional cute 'em up vibe. All that said, the music is pretty nice and catchy; I'd say it's the high point of this one.
Happy to have a new game to play on the PCE and Turbo, but this definitely isn’t the best game out there. The beam sound is horrid. Some of the music is good, at least that I’ve heard so far, but the game itself is no R-Type or even Sinistron. Seems about on par with Psychosis, which is another C tier shooter. Psychosis at least has crazy enemies. The enemies here seem very generic.
Seems like the closer you are to an enemy, the more powerful is your shot. There is an indication for this with the color of the beam. Purple is at it's weakest, red is at it's strongest.
@@RetroCore I would guess that the percentage that appears is related to the scoring system (which I don't understand). But the damage of the shot seems pretty consistent through the video. Just pay attention at how long it takes (forever) to destroy even the weakest of the enemies when shooting from a far away distance.
But... Where are the dinosaurs? The name implies dinosaurs. Disappointed. /S There was once a project to localize an anime and it was going along fine until out of nowhere, the anime dropped in a whole episode about dinosaurs. It made no sense and didn't have anything to do with anything else. It happens to be a truly epic episode in the original, not so much the dub, but that's not important. The localizing writer got the episode without being warned and his reaction "Oh boy... Dinosaurs" in anguish like "how the hell do I localize THIS?" ended up becoming the English episode title. It's hilarious. Look I've had a LOT of coffee just now. That's my excuse.
Funny how this is referring to Saber Rider(Bismarck) yet I was thinking this was referring to Mospeada(third part of Robotech) which also had an episode featuring dinosaurs out of nowhere.
Here's how you activate the two cheats properly: Sound Test: Press 1, then 2, then press start. 10 Lives: Press 2, then 1, then press select, you will hear the sound when activated properly.
@@RetroCore And you thanks for discovering the cheats in the first place! When you are notfiring above, below and behind the ship there is offensive power. Not sure how to call it. You can destroy enemies especially thos coming from behind!
Yeah, saw that. The FMV Saturn game he covered with all the women was originally called Rebellion. I have a super early version of that. Far more early than what was shown on Game Sack. It is indeed a very odd game.
@@RetroCore surprised they were still trying FMV at that point...although obviously it never went through. 3million down the drain! (Or probably absorbed by fat salaries lol judging by that set peice... I mean I doubt the coding was difficult or needed hard crunch to push the limits of the consoles lol)
I don't know. I can't even remember where the Super early version came from. It has no title screen, no life bars, only basic on screen icons and a broken menu. It is prone to crashing too.
I love the weapon. Like a stiff laser from the getgo. I'm wondering if not holding it down can get you more points. Instead only tap it when enemies are close to your nose. That way they'll get the full spectrum in their face! Lol.. I have no idea but looks like there's a fun mechanic somewhere to getting more points.
I dont get the power levels when killing things makes no sence, also i dont get the weapons either its a bit of an odd game . ahh that weapon that put the ship out in front of you distract the enemys thats what it does, well its cool to have a un realesed that the comunity worked to finish off there is that.
The weapon scoring system is indeed very odd. I still don't understand it. The extra weapons are kind of useless as well in most cases. It is great to see an unreleased game but this is one that is probably best left unreleased. Still, great that it was made available for free.
Dinoforce and you don't play as a dinosaur?!? They can keep the game!!! It's obviously appealing to the gay demographic, or Skittles lovers... Don't care either way because those rainbow laser beams are Atari as shit! I've seen my fair share of unreleased prototypes (the unfinished Robocop PS1 still hurts,) but there's some that make sense not to put out. Whether it be the end of a console's life, or in this case the developers knew that they had a turd and didn't want to waste money on the cards they'd have to produce.
