Argus box art

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Argus

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Argus

Apr 17, 1986

Port of Argus

2.17 average rating based on 6 ratings

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Argus is a vertical shooter by Jaleco and conversion of an arcade game originally released in 1986. The players takes control of a space-fighter equipped with a front laser gun and ground bombs. Although the game features power-ups, they follow an unusual and unique formula - tiles on the ground must be destroyed in order to upgrade the main weapon or trigger special events. However, three of these tiles must be destroyed to activate such power-ups - B creates a temporary barrier around the ship,P upgrades the primary weapon and L gives the player an extra bonus at the end … More
Argus is a vertical shooter by Jaleco and conversion of an arcade game originally released in 1986. The players takes control of a space-fighter equipped with a front laser gun and ground bombs. Although the game features power-ups, they follow an unusual and unique formula - tiles on the ground must be destroyed in order to upgrade the main weapon or trigger special events. However, three of these tiles must be destroyed to activate such power-ups - B creates a temporary barrier around the ship,P upgrades the primary weapon and L gives the player an extra bonus at the end of each stage. Another interesting twist to the game is the Uoru armor; a shadow sometimes appear on the ground and if the player aligns his own shadow with it, then the ship transforms into a powerful robot for a short amount of time. Each stage ends with the same boss battle; a large Mega Argus fortress with a slow flashing core at its center, and the only way to destroy this pernicious mothership is to bomb its core when it is fully exposed. After the boss is taken care of, the player must successfully land on a runway and be cautious not to crash the ship. Argus features nine levels and includes a two-player alternating option. Less
Developers
NMK Co. Ltd.
Publishers
Jaleco
Platforms
Family Computer
Genres
Shooter
Themes
Action
Release Dates
Apr 17, 1986 Full Release (Japan)
Family Computer
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User Stats
23
In Collection
0
Wish Listed
0
Playing
6
Backlogged
How Long Is Argus?
No playthrough data yet
Chovus
Chovus updated their status Jul 24, 2025
Chovus updated their status Jul 24, 2025

Played for a short while before dropping. Boring, lame, annoying. It was a primitive vertical scrolling shoot em up with constant enemies of only a few types, 1 hit deaths, destructible and invulnerable obstacles, and letters on the ground to bomb for power ups. The reticule was for aiming bombs, with P upgrading weapons between a forward facing shot and wide spread bouncy shot, B gave temporary invincibility after 3, and L was a life. The boss did not stop the constant enemy attacks and could only be defeated with a bomb while a hatch was open. In practical terms it it was dodging around spamming bombs until it worked. Then was a very odd sequence with arrows on screen followed by a graph. I was completely confused and thought this was some kind of non linear stage selection or something. Looking it up, it was a landing sequence. I finally got it after many failures. It was very difficult to follow the graph but as long as you were at the correct height at the end of the runway it was a success. It was not fun, pointless and poorly implemented. It did nothing but eat lives in an …

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Played for a short while before dropping. Boring, lame, annoying. It was a primitive vertical scrolling shoot em up with constant enemies of only a few types, 1 hit deaths, destructible and invulnerable obstacles, and letters on the ground to bomb for power ups. The reticule was for aiming bombs, with P upgrading weapons between a forward facing shot and wide spread bouncy shot, B gave temporary invincibility after 3, and L was a life. The boss did not stop the constant enemy attacks and could only be defeated with a bomb while a hatch was open. In practical terms it it was dodging around spamming bombs until it worked. Then was a very odd sequence with arrows on screen followed by a graph. I was completely confused and thought this was some kind of non linear stage selection or something. Looking it up, it was a landing sequence. I finally got it after many failures. It was very difficult to follow the graph but as long as you were at the correct height at the end of the runway it was a success. It was not fun, pointless and poorly implemented. It did nothing but eat lives in an already difficult game. I did a couple more stages before quitting, enough to see that nothing really changed. The stages looked and played pretty much the same, the enemies were pretty much the same, the boss was exactly the same, and the landing was the same. So why bother playing more than 1 stage?

4.8/10

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