Express Raider box art

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Express Raider

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Express Raider

Dec 31, 1986

Main game

3.33 average rating based on 6 ratings

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Express Raider was produced by Data East in 1986.
Release Dates
1986 (Japan)
Arcade
1987 (Europe)
Amstrad CPC, Commodore C64/128/MAX, ZX Spectrum
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User Stats
21
In Collection
1
Wish Listed
0
Playing
7
Backlogged
How Long Is Express Raider?
No playthrough data yet
scoopings
scoopings gave Aug 23, 2023
scoopings gave Aug 23, 2023
Clunky Beat Em Up With Shooter Segments That Was Oddly Addicting... For A Bit
This review is for the Arcade version

Preliminary: I wasn't going to give this a full review, but the more I thought about it... I did just spend over 20 minutes playing this lol... and it did keep having new mechanics along the way, even tho I did quit before finishing all "unique" levels... so it's worth writing about it. I'm not a big fan of white cowboy themed media but here goes nothing

Look: 8/10 Great full sprites, I love the bandana over the main character's mouth, I love the backgrounds, and the horse is very well-made.

Sound: 7/10 Catchy, nothing special tho. High quality as one would expect from an arcade game (as with the Look).

Play: 6/10 Clunky as all get-out, especially during the beat em up sections. But as per usual with me, I kept playing anyway lol, oddly hooked to see if I could get the clunky, bad-collision-masked beat em up segment done. Then it shifted to a shooter... hm. Not a huge fan of those segments, tho the horse sprite was excellent, and I mean, I did push through the first shooter segment anyway. Some pro-tips: you move on on the train by, well, moving on, not by killing a certain …

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Preliminary: I wasn't going to give this a full review, but the more I thought about it... I did just spend over 20 minutes playing this lol... and it did keep having new mechanics along the way, even tho I did quit before finishing all "unique" levels... so it's worth writing about it. I'm not a big fan of white cowboy themed media but here goes nothing

Look: 8/10 Great full sprites, I love the bandana over the main character's mouth, I love the backgrounds, and the horse is very well-made.

Sound: 7/10 Catchy, nothing special tho. High quality as one would expect from an arcade game (as with the Look).

Play: 6/10 Clunky as all get-out, especially during the beat em up sections. But as per usual with me, I kept playing anyway lol, oddly hooked to see if I could get the clunky, bad-collision-masked beat em up segment done. Then it shifted to a shooter... hm. Not a huge fan of those segments, tho the horse sprite was excellent, and I mean, I did push through the first shooter segment anyway. Some pro-tips: you move on on the train by, well, moving on, not by killing a certain amount of enemies. So, you can get a lot of points whacking the guys climbing up from the windows (500 each time!) , but you gotta move on before the next train car detaches and it's auto-death. On the other hand, you move on in the horse shooter parts by killing a certain number of enemies, as indicated at the top. As per usual, spamming works surprisingly well with the beat em up segments, well the shooter segments too since you can shoot away enemy projectiles, but a well-timed low kick is more fun isn't it? Oh one other pro-tip, you change directions after 2 levels :-p Kinda threw me off for a sec.

Feel: 7/10 This is no Mortal Kombat... but I did feel like I was kinda doing combos lol. Mostly relied on kick, primarily low kick, but always fun changing it up acting like you're surprising the AI when you know it was pretty much just about attack range. Speaking of attack range, damn that coal shoveler's shovel! lol. The nice Look, the surprising fact I played through it longer than expected and despite the white cowboy theme, and the arcade quality boosted this Feel up a bit.

Attachment: 7/10 While I doubt I will return to this, there's still a chance, if I wanna remember primitive early beat em ups. And unlike the corresponding microcomputer and console beat em ups from this time, this has that nice arcade quality which means it'd likely be one of the ones I return to if wanna look through the history of beat em ups again (it is a genre I generally like... one of the best for arcades is group beat em ups cuz you can just pick em up and play with friends and family). For now, this is where I called it quits, and tho it wasn't a favorite, the fact I kept playing it in spite of myself (haha) and the undeniable arcade high quality means it was worth a review enter image description here

Completion: Level 4 (2nd horse shooter segment), Score 76,350 Playtime: ~25 mins

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