Welcome to the 62nd issue of the GBAtemp Recommends Revival Project! This project is a weekly feature where we share our favourite games and applications with you. The titles we recommend may be "old school" games, a piece of Homebrew, a ROM hack, sleeper hits, an application, etc, but one thing's for certain, we think they are fantastic and deserve your attention!
GBAtemp Recommends!
Tyrian 2000
In 1995 Epic Megagames published one of the best shoot-em-ups on the PC, hell it holds it own against the arcade and console games. During the first four years of release, the developers still worked on it, improving aspects, gameplay and even adding a lot of content like a whole new episode, two player modes, bonus games (in v2.0) and also a nice little Xmas mode (V2.1). In 1999 they re-released it as Tyrian 2000 adding a 5th episode to it and also making it work a lot better with Windows (which was becoming a more dominant OS taking over from DOS).Tyrian 2000 is a vertical shooter, you pretty much already know the drill; control a ship, shoot stuff and defeat a big boss at the end. If you like shooters, jump in because you'll love it, if you don't...well go away. Unlike most shooters you find on the consoles, this is one hell of a lengthy game. The game was originally split into three episode and each lasted just as long as a console shooter. The game wasn't overly hard like some but you can change that with hidden modes, making the game scroll faster etc. Also type in ENGAGE on the title screen and you'll get a insane difficulty mode.
Another great thing about this is the level of customisation you have in the game for your ship. Throughout the game you will earn credits by shooting enemies and buildings, these credits will then allow you to buy new ships, add better shields, generators & weapons. I really liked this feature, it added to the way you play and you can tool the ship up to suit how you play shooters.
Graphically it was really nice, some good transparent effects and it never seemed to slow down at all when there was a ton of crap on the screen (something that can't be said about the more popular SNES shooters sadly). The music was neat in places and meh in others but after playing the tunes will still be in your head. The sound effects are pretty good, the usual blasts and explosions.
This game is now freeware and I recommend downloading it from the GoG website (link below) and it requires zero fath to get up and running. There is something about the OpenTyrian version that doesn't feel like the original, it places well enough but doesn't seem to be in tune with the controls. Also unlike OpenTyrian, it still has the fifth episode. However what is omitted from the freeware versions are the Red Book Audio tracks that featured on the CD ROM version of the game so some people may want to track down that and run it through DOSBox.
The game was also headed for Gameboy Color and Gameboy Advance courtesy of World Tree Games. These were finished but ultimately cancelled, however you can get a ROM of the GBC version which is pretty good considering the limitations of the GBC, though the levels are also restructured.
Download:
Genre: Vertical Shoot-em-up
Release Year: 1995 (original Tyrian) 1999 (Tyrian 2000)
Developer: Eclispe Productions
Published by: Epic Megagames
Released For: MS-Dos/Windows. OpenTyrian can be played on Wii/DS/Android and others.
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