As featured in Retrogaming Times Monthly issue #81, February 2011.

Before we begin with this issue's NES'cade I want to announce a couple changes for the column.  Although no one other than myself has known it, I've always had a couple rules for this long running part of Retrogaming Times Monthly.  NES'cade began as a solution to the problem of running out of NES arcade conversions published by Tengen for my original column.  Once the supply of these games were exhausted, I would be out of stuff to write about and the column would end.  So a couple months before my regular Tengen column was to run out of content, I came up with the idea of doing the same but with any publisher.  Arcade ports have been big business since the earliest days of video games in the home and they continue to be a profitable part of the industry to this day.  Now that I would be walking face first into the entire NES library, I had to lay down some ground rules to prevent the column from becoming a simple series of NES game reviews.

Rule 1:  Each game had to be in the arcade before being on the NES.  I call this the no reverse-conversion rule.  In other words, there had to be an arcade release prior to the NES version.  The game can't begin on the home hardware and then appear in the arcade.  An example of this I can think of off the top of my head is Cosmic Chasm on the Vectrex, which later had an expanded arcade version made.

Rule 2:  Each game had to have a US release on the NES.  This makes sense since this column is from an American perspective.  It's okay if the arcade release was originally Japan only, as long as the game had a legitimate NES release.

The second rule leaves out a lot of classic arcade games that appeared on the Famicom (what became the NES outside of Japan) but never had NES releases.  This was mainly due to the amount of time between when the Famicom versions were released and when the NES was picking up steam.  By the time the NES was popular, some of these games were already over seven years old.  With limited shelf space and Nintendo's tight manufacturing regulations, it makes perfect sense that these games never had NES releases.  It's a bit of a shame to us retrogamers as there were some great ports of some classic arcade games.  So in the era of emulation, compilation releases, multicarts, gaming history studies, easy importing and a strong and ongoing retrogaming movement around the world - I'm throwing my second rule out the window.  From time to time NES'cade will compare and contrast Famicom conversions against their arcade counterparts going forward.  I'm going to kick things off with one of my favorites, Galaxian.

Galaxian was released to arcades in 1979 by Namco and was essentially their answer to Taito's Space Invaders which took the world by storm just one year earlier.  Galaxian took the basic game play of Space Invaders and made it faster, more colorful and increased the challenge and variety.  Enemy invaders would now break off from the convoy and directly attack the player's ship, running different attack formations and moving at varying speeds.  Galaxian would be the game that bridged the inventiveness of 1978's Space Invaders to the refinement of 1981's Galaga.  While Space Invaders is regarded as a shining classic and Galaga became the common game player's go to classic shooter, Galaxian instead became a bit of a footnote to the general gaming populace at large.  This is a shame since Galaxian is a very challenging and rewarding game, elegant in its simplicity.

The player takes control of the space fighter Galaxip in a battle against a series of never-ending alien squadrons.  Each squadron, or convoy as they are called in the game, consists of 30 low value invaders, 8 middle value invaders, 6 high value escort invaders and a pair of Galaxian flagships.  Each stage begins with the squadron appearing at the top of the screen, moving back and forth.  Unlike Space Invaders the entire squadron doesn't descend as a unit but rather invaders will break away from the main group and dive at the bottom of the screen as they shoot, usually going after the Galaxip.  If an invader gets passed the Galaxip it will return from the top of the screen and rejoin the squadron in formation.  Point values for all invaders are doubled when they are away from the squadron so if you're looking to rack up a high score, shoot the invaders when they are on the attack.  If you'd rather just blast everything on screen that's fine too, as the squadron is always open to your assault.  The middle value invaders will make longer and faster left to right sweeps as they descend, requiring some fancy maneuvers to shoot them down or avoid them all together.  The escort invaders aren't too bad on their own but they will often break off from the squadron in pairs, with a Galaxian flagship in tow.  These can be both a problem and an opportunity.  While the Galaxian flagships have a higher point value while attacking, that value increases even more based upon how their escorts are taken out.  Shooting both escort invaders and then the flagship while the formation attacks will yield 800 points for the flagship, not to mention the 100 points a piece for the escorts, a cool 1,000 points total.  However if you shoot the flagship first or only shoot one of the escorts before hitting the flagship, the flagship bonus will decrease.  Once the squadron gets down to just a few invaders remaining, they will blitz the Galaxip, diving constantly without forming back up at the top of the screen.  Any Galaxian flagships that may still be on screen during the blitz will only make a few passes before flying away.  When the next squadron of invaders appears the flagships that escaped will be at the top of the formation.  A maximum of four flagships may form up at the top of the squadron if they continue to get away during the blitz.

While a powerful craft, the Galaxip does have its limitations.  The Galaxip can be moved left or right at the bottom of the screen but cannot advance up or down.  Additionally only one blaster shot from the Galaxip can be on screen at a time.  So if you miss the squadron completely you must wait until your shot clears the top of the screen until you can shoot again.  This doesn't seem like too much of a problem, and it takes less than a second for a shot to clear the screen, but this is one of the most challenging aspects of the game.  Missing a shot when the invaders are diving fast and closing in can mean a quick death.  You have to make every shot count, especially as the invaders get faster and faster as the stages progress.  Success rarely comes in the form of rapidly tapping away at the fire button in Galaxian.

I play a lot of Galaxian.  In fact a Galaxian cocktail table rests less than two feet away from where I'm writing this column.  I'm also pretty good, not record breaking good, not even close but I can hold my own and get a solid play out of a quarter.  The Famicom version is one of the earlier titles on the hardware, it was actually Namco's first game on the system.  Even with how young the hardware was at the time, the game is pretty impressive.  Galaxian in the arcade used a vertically oriented display and the Famicom version does a decent job of squishing the graphics down to a horizontal orientation without changing how things look.  The sprites are a little squished down and stretched out but not by much.  If anything the area where you really lose screen real estate is between the squadron and the Galaxip.  This makes the game a little easier than the arcade version since you're right up on the squadron to begin with and can quickly take them out before things get too crazy in the earlier stages.  The NES port of Galaga had this same problem.  The flag markers for current stage and Galaxips in reserve have been relocated to the top of the screen near the score information, freeing up some space at the bottom of the screen.  The colors are vibrant and look good although the starfield is much less densely packed than it was in the arcade.

Control is fast and accurate - left, right and fire - pretty hard to mess up.  Sound is also really good with accurate reproduction of game sounds although the enemy droning sound is nowhere near as intense as it is on the arcade hardware.  In addition to the difference in screen orientation making the game easier the game is just, well, easier.  On the first few stages you can have almost the entire squadron taken out before the flagships and escorts will begin to attack.  Things get better the further you get into the game and it starts to play more frantically, which is when things get really good.  Still, even early on when the game is playing slow and easy, it still feels like Galaxian.  While other home ports of Galaxian looked good, sounded nice and played solid, most just didn't "feel" like Galaxian.  The Famicom version excels in this regard because in addition to the sounds and visuals, the game plays exactly how Galaxian should.  The scoring works properly, the enemies react how they should, it plays like a slightly miniaturized version of the original.  While I understand that a release of this game on the NES would have been a mistake during the retail era of the console, it doesn't mean the game isn't worth playing.  I'd put the Famicom version of Galaxian as my favorite classic conversion of the title.  It may not be perfect but it's close and really showed that the Famicom could play more arcade games than just Nintendo developed titles.  No substitute for the original but if you have to play it on the Famicom / NES hardware you'll have a good time.
 

"InsaneDavid" also covers all types of video gaming at http://www.classicplastic.net/dvgi

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