Adventures of Dino-Riki

The Good
Known by the somewhat generic name of The New Type in Japan, The Adventures of Dino Riki is recognised as a minor classic in the NES canon. When I first played this game it was not on the NES (I hate consoles) but instead on one of those crappy NES compilation handsets where all the hardware and software is built into the controller itself. I was seven at the time, and I used to play Adventures of Dino Riki obsessively even though I didn't like it much.

The game is basically a overhead vertical shooter like Xevious or Galaxa (enemies fly at you in swarms and, just like in real life, you shoot them) except has a prehistoric theme and you play as a caveman fighting giant bugs and dinosaurs. You play in a series of levels based on forests, temples, and underground tunnels, and at the end of each level you fight a huge dinosaur boss (easily the coolest part of the game.) There are weapons and other powerups you can collect, and a few secrets that you can only really find by chance.

Graphics are fine for the time period, with lots of detailed animation and sprites. The bosses in particular are awesome. There are some fairly creative puzzles scattered around like fire-shooting statues and lilies you use to cross flowing rivers. Overall, the game does a good job of putting you in a convincingly real environment, although it's neither as interactive or involving as its contemporaries.

As you can see my enthusiasm for Adventures of Dino Riki is flowing off the page, so I'll end here. Although your character does have a really funny death animation. His eyes bug out and he flaps his arms around like he's having a seizure. I laugh every time I see it. Ahem, anyway...

The Bad
The game's shortcomings were rather obvious even to the seven-year-old kid I was. No story, dubious production values, gameplay "inspired" by lots of better games, repetitive levels and enemies, crappy controls, and as the icing on the cake there is NO ending (I'm serious about that. You beat the final boss and you start again on the first level. There isn't even a Congratulations screen). Adventures of Dino Riki is one cheap-ass game.

Also, it's blood-sweatingly hard. Remember, early console games had for the most part the shelf life of a t-bone steak. Many developers compensated for this by amping up the difficulty to absurd levels (did anyone ever beat Gradius?) and Adventures of Dino Riki is no exception. To write this review I played an emulated version of the game that allows you quick-save, which helps, but even then I was ready to give up in several places. The controls just don't work properly for a game like this. Your character is too slow, and the levels are full of instant-death puzzles. Shooting enemies is a particular problem, since Adventures of Dino Riki's numerous pieces of eye-candy (trees, rocks, statues) all block your shots and make it hard to hit enemies. Strangely, your enemies don't seem to have this problem and their shots pass through everything, even a solid brick wall!

And I love it how every time you die you lose all of your weapon powerups, which are more or less essential for survival. The whole game becomes a struggle to make it through each level without losing lives, because if you do you won't have any weapons and therefore probably won't be able to complete the level. Other ideas have promise but just aren't implemented well, such as flying. You have to hold the X button down for the whole time you're flying, which is a major annoyance when you have to fly for several minutes at a stretch. Oh, and there are jumping puzzles. :(

The Bottom Line
In short, Adventures of Dino Riki is just your typical Hudson Soft game. You could never call it a classic, and as far as I'm concerned it barely makes it to "decent game" status. Despite this I can't all-out bash it. It does have some good points and next to NES disasterpieces like Action 52 it is frequently a pleasure.

However...I hate to keep beating a dead horse but this game is HARD. Why do people say action games are getting tougher? If for some reason you decide to hunt this rarity down, prepare to leave your ego at the door.