ADG Episode 60 - Raptor: Call of the Shadows

[@chanman819]

It's only years later now that I see all the ways the creators saved time on this game. For example, there is actually very little animation in this game. The player's craft has something like 7 frames, and most enemies have none at all (a couple of the flying enemies do have a frame or two of banking animations and at least one of the tanks has a recoiling animation when it fires.) Another area is that all of the weapons effects except for the perfectly symmetrical enemy bullets only move vertically. Missiles never turn, for instance, and again the only animation is the exhaust glow/trail (also the only animation most flying enemies and bosses have)

[@5chmts]

I have incredible memories about this game and loved every freaking byte of it. It's definitely flawed, but back then I didn't have a lot of games laying around so exploitation to get by was the way to go for me. Anything aside I still think it's pretty awesome for you to have reviewed the game.

[@Lyne_Taperz]

The 2010 version has slower speed only applied to the player. This was the only reason I stick to the dos version when it's comes to Raptor.

[@DarkTenka]

I think another point why everyone liked this game just for having good graphics is.. at the time we were very starved for good looking shmups. I mean, Major Stryker looked very poor aesthetically, Tyrian was'nt released yet.. there was Overkill that not many people knew about and was outdated at this point. Other than that.. nothing at all that I know of, on PC. However in the arcades they had Sonic Wings, 1942, Raiden and many many others. Knowing that those games were 2D shmups using the same 256 color pallette, there was no reason why, technologically, we couldn't have a shmup looking that good on PC at that point in time. Thats where Raptor came in and cleaned up..

[@Pixelmusement]

Dark Tenka A couple other good ones from the time were Stargunner and Tubular Worlds, the first of which I believe is freeware now due to how tricky it can be to get working, while Tubular Worlds I want to cover on ADG at some point but haven't sourced a copy yet.

[@DarkTenka]

***** Wow .. I thought I knew all the Apogee games. I have no idea how Stargunner flew under my radar, it looks fantastic. We had an R-Type! Who knew? Tubular worlds also looks great. I'm going to have to check these out.. thanks! :)

[@TheMoogleMaster]

+Pixelmusement I played this Shareware version of Tubular Worlds, take about a hard game. Is it even possible to get a copy still?

[@Pixelmusement]

TheMoogleMaster I saw a copy on eBay once about two years ago, but I didn't go for it because it was pricy. Since then I haven't looked into this.

[@ameerm4899]

Correct, the game was obviously way ahead of its time in graphics and music arena

[@ChaosPootato]

I spent so many hours on the shareware version of this game, I finally bought a DOS bundle with the game in it on Steam. Totally worth it :D

[@FeelingShred]

Fun fact: the soundtrack to this game was composed by Matt "Guitar" Murphy who also happens to appear on the first "Blues Brothers" movie.

[@ScottHost]

Two different people ... my friends name was Matt Murphy and he did play the guitar but its not the Blues Brothers Matt Murphy

[@nemtudom5074]

Do you have a source on that 'beating the finall boss of a region ups the difficulty'? I cant find any info about this anywhere

[@Pixelmusement]

Uhh... you just have to play the game yourself and you'll notice it happening as there's a distinct difference between the different difficulty levels. Also, Raptor isn't the only 2D shooter for DOS which does this; so does Tyrian 2000. :P

[@nemtudom5074]

@@Pixelmusement I guess, i just asked around a year ago and noone said they knew about this, i personally never made it far enough to beat a final sector boss so i cant say

[@cristiannicolae6309]

This game was actually pretty awesome back in the day, if you didn't already have Tyrian. It's a flawed game but I still have fond memories of it ( as I do of TMNT 1 on the NES).

[@theactualtruth4996]

I'm not particularly good at 2D shooters, I'm not even that fond of 2D shooters, but I loved this game and didn't have any problems beating it. Of course the best thing in any 2D shooter ever is the banana gun in Tyrian. Two highly annoying things you do is you often click your tongue against the roof of your mouth when you begin a phrase or when you're about to make a special point, and when you're making one of your special points you often pause and go "meehh errmm" before continuing.

[@DarkTenka]

I like the "meeh errm" he does .. its kind of like his own little iconic quirk.

[@chrishood2883]

Well I'm glad I'm not a game designer if it can suck the fun out of a game like Raptor...

[@Pixelmusement]

At the same time though, seeing the flaws in a game can inspire a game designer to do better and to avoid making the same mistakes. On a related note, Scott Host, the creator of Raptor, is remaking the game and using some of the feedback I made in this video to guide some of his development! Definitely will be checking out what he ultimately comes up with! :)

[@Roman8707]

I loved this game as a kid. The music with the AWE32/64 MIDI synth was actually spectacular. On an old fashion SB Pro or 16 card though, it was very weak, especially compared to a game like Tyrian, where the default music was pretty good without the AWE wavetable.

[@ZacharyNoah]

Whenever I use DOSBox to play "Raptor: Call of the Shadows," I use the following sound card settings: Gravis Ultrasound for the music, and Sound Blaster 16 for the sound effects.

[@LogenKain]

Huh, this was one of my favorite games at the time. Can't believe I didn't guess it >

[@CoachTabe]

That's because it's not. I walked right through it and I'm not good at shooters.

[@DFuxaPlays]

Definitely enjoyed this game thoroughly as a kid - course killing enemies nonstop in an overpowered jet would probably do that.

[@kereminde]

Old video, I'm going through some of your list at random and grinning at the nostalgia. And then I come to this one out of order. I don't think you need to really exploit this game to beat it. There are a few ways to really make your way through it and it involves knowing what weapons are useful and which aren't so much. Sell the ones you can't get much use out of, buy shields and bombs. Get to the Twin Laser, and you can pretty much waste most problems except for bullet hell moments. Bullet hell moments are largely figuring out the patterns and where you can hover on the screen to avoid it, but this is actually pretty forgiving since you rarely can't take the hits - due to you maxing shields any time you can. Add in the screen-clear bombs and it's a matter of making sure you make your money back on the levels. I like the music for the most part, but wish they had more tracks in the game than they did. It's not awesome like . . . say . . . "Thunder Spirits" on the SNES, it does work for me though. The downside is it sometimes getting drowned out by the events on screen . . . I liked it. I didn't necessarily love it, but I had a hard time finding shoot-em-ups I could legitimately have a chance with until this one.

[@barryroberts9086]

The difficulty increase is necessary, each time you clear a zone you have built up a much stronger arsenal so you're going in to each zone far stronger than you started the previous one. By the time you get to the last zone you have the auto turret, the dual lazer which is massively powerfull and earn enough to keep your super shields fully stocked before each mission making you almost invulnerable. If anything this game was too easy, starting out as a challenge but gradually getting easier to the point of it becoming boring as you progressed.

[@Maggerama]

Ah, I remember backspacing through this one! What a blast! But yeah, now I can see what a bimbo it is.

[@BlackCatRedScarf]

Hmmm... the game is difficult, but it's a bit forgiving and certainly doesn't require "godlike skills" or being a very active bullet hell player. But, I agree about the odd game design and the unorthodox "game exploits needed" thing. Tyrian look like a bit more refined and balanced when compared to Raptor.

[@Cyberbrickmaster1986]

This game was featured in an eGames demo disc I got over 10 years ago, along with a shallow clone with better music.

[@VaterOrlaag]

4:00 "A mercenary for hire paid by large mega-corporations" - 2x pleonasm combo!

[@lutfimakarim8258]

"This game came out during a time when people are focused on the graphics itself rather than gameplay itself." --> dude, what are you talking about? It's still prevalent to this day.

[@Pixelmusement]

+Lutfi Makarim It IS, but only at the AAA level, and even then, AAA games look so good now in general, regardless of how many graphical features they have, that performance and gameplay is slowly becoming more important. At an indie level, the gameplay has ALWAYS been more important than the graphics and good indie games are far more prevalent and easy to find now than they were in the 90s! :B

[@lutfimakarim8258]

@@Pixelmusement thank you for the quick reply! I guess that's true in a way. Maybe I am a bit guilty at playing too many AAA games these days. Btw, love your channel esp the ADG. Been marathoning all titles but kinda hard with 200+ titles. 🤣

[@duncanidaho4787]

I go through all this masterpiece at the age of 10. I guess it´s an acquired taste, lol.

[@MrTartlet]

Great game. I still think it's one of the more exciting 2D top scrollers I ever played. I especially adore its graphic design. Nonetheless, great video! Thank you for taking a look at it! I understand there are many problems with game design in this one, but consider old Schwarzenegger B-movie analogy: yeah the script was written by a random script generator, yeah there were many filming errors, yeah the main actor was a brick, but the movie was EPIC!

[@paoloantonio1531]

Awww this looks awesome! Reminds me of Firepower (SNES). I wish I played it

[@mikesfx]

Awesome review I know it is from years ago but this is one of my favorite games... hence my user icon. Thanks for posting!

[@andrejrockshox]

how do you get shooting monkeys?

[@Pixelmusement]

I forget exactly how to trigger it but it has to do with messing with the decorative UI elements on the sector select screen prior to starting a mission. :B

[@JamesEmirzianWaldementer]

#RaptorCallOfTheShadows

[@FeelingShred]

My favorite along B-Wings (NES, cool unique bosses) and Stargunner (horizontal shooter with upgrades). Never finished it though

[@Pixelmusement]

+FeelingShred You'll be pleased to know I've covered Stargunner as well! ...and yes, B-Wings is a fun one too! ;) kzbin.info/www/bejne/paKaf4VsosaYgdU

[@FeelingShred]

I think the exploits kind of add to the game as a selectable option. If the player wants to play the game cheating, they have that option. It's up to the player. After a while, he'll be bored and replay the game properly.

[@jay270486]

So remember this game as a kid. Thought it was quite dark.

[@solsticeprojekt1937]

This is one of the few episodes where I think you really need to put your nose down. When you're the only one seeing issues and nobody else even recognizes that there are issues, maybe the issues exist only in your head. I mean ... other people are game designers too, you know? ^_^

[@Pixelmusement]

Except even the author of this game, Scot Host, recognizes some of those issues too and is using feedback like this to help make his sequel as good as he can; we even follow each other over on Twitter. All of us who make games are always looking to do better and proper, well constructed feedback, positive or negative, is important to that. :B

[@solsticeprojekt1937]

@@Pixelmusement He does? But it's a great game! That's so confusing! lol Also, please, I didn't mean to be disrespectful. I hope you know that. Thank you for the reply! :)

[@Pixelmusement]

@@solsticeprojekt1937 Every game, no exceptions, has issues, even if they're incredibly minor. For instance, Zelda: Breath of the Wild is considered to be a masterpiece... yet I personally found it very difficult to control because jump and dodge needed to be separated into two different buttons. That's a nitpick and also a personal opinion since not everyone is going to see that as an issue. Again, I understand why people enjoy Raptor, I'm just able to see past that and see what could've been done different to make the game even BETTER! (And I will admit, I sometimes got more negative than I should've in my early videos, thus why I try to explain my reasoning for certain conclusions nowadays.)

[@TheOnlyToblin]

It's a decent 2D shooter. It's hardly ground breaking and its mechanics are shallow. But it's a fun romp. I remember liking it as a kid. But it doesn't hold a candle to the 2D shooter power houses like Tyrian 2000.

[@AlexeiVoronin]

Wow, Pixel, you are the only person I know who dislikes this game. Yes, I am quite sure about it. You're the only one. I'd say it's my third most favorite game ever (after Doom and RotT).

[@Pixelmusement]

+AlexeiVoronin What can I say? The game designer in me just doesn't like the way this was designed. :P

[@AlexeiVoronin]

@@Pixelmusement I can imagine. As a professional translator, I can notice a lot of stuff in a written text that most people normally would not. Small details and nuances... I suppose everyone could do something like this in their respective field. One small bit of advice though - don't be tempted to think people like Raptor merely because they don't understand game design. (This applies to translators as well, as I can tell from experience.)

[@VladK-1]

Game Over OST track at the end of this video is awesome! Here is the full version kzbin.info/www/bejne/jHXLp5ypaZKVjJI

[@XanthinZarda]

As for my opinion, I tried this back when it was still fresh, and did not like it one bit. I thought I was generally bad at SMUPs, but in my adult life I found Tyrian and realized that most shooters just franky suck a bit. Ah well, at least it doesn't demand insane perfection, like UN Squadron.

[@Kiatrasi]

"To have any hope of beating this game, you have to be a 2D shooter god", I have to disagree. Just need to buy right weapons as you progress on, because if someone like me who barely plays 2D horizontal shooters can make it through to the end, it's not THAT difficult. I'd say they've managed to get the difficulty curve pretty right.

[@nemtudom5074]

1:01 Starting on veteran? Brave!

[@q009q009]

Oh damn, I still remember this

[@GreetingsField]

As a recommendation, I might put forward Ravage - its a total rip-off of Raptor but it had music that was perfect for it and thus made it a lot more engaging.

[@antdude]

Fun arcade shooter.

[@Macro11Underscore1]

The game isnt as hard as you make it sound.

[@Tim.Hammer]

The art in this game is beautiful, but sadly it all feels the same. The whole game has an overwhelmingly dull palette, especially for the enemies. Almost all the enemies have that same grayish, randomly hyper-detailed look - almost as if they suffered from lack of design and over-design at the same time, however that's possible. And considering how fast each enemy enters and leaves the screen, it honestly just feels like a bunch of randomly arranged pixels shooting past. Also, I know this is picking, but that same dull, brownish orange that is used for literally ALL the special effects like enemy bullets, explosions, etc - it is the crappiest orange I've ever seen in a game, and nothing actually feels "lit" or "energized." There's no fire in the "fireworks," I guess. And you're right about everything else you said too - many of the same reasons I could never get into this game. The buying system, boring weapons, etc. Like the art, over-design and under-design both at the same time. The game just feels stale. I don't know how else to say it.

[@syn010110]

I liked this game when I had the shareware only game. When I got the full version I realized how insanely wonky the difficulty was. Also the music sucks.

[@aaronbuffalo7769]

top 5 DOS games easily.

[@tomspice73]

On a list of 5

[@wardrich]

"I don't like this game" UNSUBBED. lol jks

[@Pixelmusement]

Fun Fact: According to my analytics, this video has generated 17 new subscribers and only lost TWO. ;)

[@wardrich]

@@Pixelmusement Hey, that's not too bad!