Sunset Riders (1991)

**Preliminary:**A lot of cute touches in this and you can tell they put love into this, but it just isn't hooking me. I just finished the first boss. We shall see if it holds my interest for all 8. (arcade version of course). Great music during the 2nd boss. I dunno, despite the pixel-y Look, I am oddly getting into this. I thought it would just be a status update and move on but I dunno, maybe I'll plan on 4 of the bosses at least.

Day 1

I love when a shmup lets you keep your power-ups between levels. I also liked the instructions of the first level and how smooth a lot of the mechanics are, namely jumping up to higher platforms and down. I also love the duck and roll and duck and slide. Dang another boss done already, and lol the voice acting. And lol the music when the women dance after the Saloon mini-level?boss?thing?

Just 3 Outlaws left. Hmmm to finish it tonight or tomorrow? Impressive it got me hooked tho I can't imagine it being higher than a 4 star nonetheless.

For the most part it's great gameplay. I never like when you ahve to move int he direction your'e shooting.

Well, not a big fan of the caricatures of different races, and of course you play as a white guy getting "outlaws" (oh, except there is a caricature of a Latino for one playable character that I did not play). Gonna call it on this Chief Scalpem level :-/ Boo, was shaping up to be a possible 4 star. But with the mostly mediocre Look (except some neat backgrounds) and some tacky choices like that, it fits neatly as a 3 star.

Look: 7/10 Some good backgrounds

Sound: 7.5/10 Mostly just usual arcade fare, but some real good tracks. And I like that the bonus level music increases its tempo

Play: 8/10 Oddly hooking, good simple power-ups, and simple run n gun gameplay without too many frustrations (at least for the first half of the game, didn't play much past the 5th boss of 8)

Feel: 7.5/10 Some real potential here, bogged down by a mediocre Look and some poor choices.

Attachment: 7/10 Worth a play for fans of run n guns, and I could see this translating well to its home console ports (plus I read some of those got rid of the poor choices in enemies), but nothing spectacular despite my initial excitement after getting into it.

Overall: 7.4/10

Completion: 5/8 Bosses

Playtime: ~20 mins

Yes, I'm aware that pun has been done to death, and no, I have never touched a quarter in my life as I am not American, but that doesn't mean I can't make that stupid pun.

Anyway, Sunset Riders is a classic arcade(the version I played)/SNES side scrolling shoot em up with a wild west theme and a great soundtrack. The gameplay is addictive and fun as fuck. It's notoriously brutal in terms of difficulty, however an emulator with an 'insert coin' button solves that real quick. I beat the game as Cormano (the badass mexican gunfighter with the poncho).

I like how the different characters (3 of which are boring generic cowboy blondes, not cool at all) have different weapons and playstyles (e.g pistols, shotgun, spread shot). The bosses can be challenging but many of them feel a little cheap and just unleash a hellfire of bullets that get increasingly hard to dodge. The American Indian chief is fucking AWFUL though. What a horrible boss. Pretty fun ending though. Harkens back to spaghetti western films.

Basically, the game has a great soundtrack, timeless graphics, decent bosses, and some good cowboy fun. It also has pretty unfair bosses, the indian chief, and some lackluster characters. I'd recommend it if you can easily emulate it, and I'll give it an 8/10 because it's a 'great experience'.

Sunset Riders, for SNES

Rating: 7.5/10; Good

This is a 2D sideview western shooter, which allows you to jump like a platformer, though the platforming is extremely limited. Pick one of 4 characters, who come in 2 types; pistol and shotgun, which have slightly different performance in game. Progress through linear levels fighting minions until you get to a boss, and repeat for the entire short length of the game.

The controls are interesting because the “D pad” allows you to shoot in 8 different directions. Unfortunately, it is also used to move left and right, and duck. At the very beginning of the game you are forced to learn how to switch from the ground to a higher platform, and it is not through jumping. You have to press “jump” and “up” or “down” on the D pad, which the game does not tell you and does not show in the controls. On the plus side, you are invulnerable while transitioning, and this will be important for boss fights. You are also able to do a slide dodge, but this is not shown in the controls and I only found out after beating the game by reading a guide.

Enemies are incompetent, having a significant delay before shooting, shooting very slow moving bullets and dying in one hit. Unfortunately, you also die in a single hit from anything, including bullets that are hidden behind a wagon, a boss’ kick and even just touching some bosses. Getting to a boss is mostly about quick shooting the generic enemies and avoiding hazards. Bosses however are bullet sponges, and victory is more about dancing around to avoid death and hurting them when you can. Needless to say, when the boss can take hits like a tank and you die even if a bullet grazes your foot, the game becomes exceptionally difficult. Bosses also come with large numbers of generic enemies, which makes the fights even more difficult. Some bosses are fairly simple and easy to figure out, while others (the native fighting with knives) are frustratingly cheap. Seriously how can he block bullets with knives, and then throw multiple knives at the same time in a spread that is ridiculously difficult to dodge. I guess he did not get the memo about not bringing knives to the gun fight, but that memo does not apply when you can block and take hits like Superman. Most other boss fights have upper platforms where you can be invulnerable whenever you need by switching between that and the ground. There are also some autoscrolling levels where you are on horseback, though they play essentially the same.

This is a fun shooter (which would be better with 2 players) with a very simple voice acted story. The slightly awkward controls (which could not really have been improved on the SNES controller), very short length and difficult boss fights bring the game down somewhat.