Ristar

Ristar, or Ristar: The Shooting Star as it is known as in Japan, is a platformer developed by Sonic Team and was released on February 16th, 1995 in North America. The game focuses on the hero, Ristar, as he is summoned by the people of the planet Flora to save them and other planets in the galaxy from the evil space pirate, Greedy, who has corrupted the leaders of each planet. In the US version, Ristar's dad was first pleaded to, but Greedy captured him, so Ristar took his place.

Ristar began early in its development life as the planned mascot for SEGA to go against Mario for the company. The early concept was known as Feels the Rabbit, who would have stretchable ears to grab on to different objects, climb, and grab enemies. As development continued, some higher ranking SEGA officials supposedly did not like that Feels was as slow as he was. From a marketing standpoint, they wanted a faster mascot that had some attitude to it so that they could highlight Mario as a franchise for kids and that it was played on a slower system. Feels was put on the back burner, opening the path for Sonic to be developed and become the mascot for SEGA. When Feels the Rabbit was returned to, the character turned to Dextar, followed by a back and forth between that name and Ristar. Finally, Ristar was settled on and released at the end of the Genesis/Megadrive life cycle.

Before I talk about the game itself, I should give a little bit of a disclaimer as to my love of the game. My birthday is actually the same day as the release date for the US, so when I was a kid I got the game that day and fell in love with it. Also, I speedrun the game now, so my time with it is incredibly high. I will try to stay unbiased as much as possible, but that is my background with the game. Finally, while this review is classified as the US version, I will touch of differences with its Japanese counterpart because I have played both quite a bit. The PAL version is the one that I do not have enough knowledge or experience with to talk about.

The gameplay of Ristar is very simple at face value. You move with the d-pad, jump, and grab. Those are all of your inputs. In the options menu, you can move the buttons around so you have either two for grabbing or two for jumping. While it seems very simplistic, the usage of the grabbing in game can go very deep. The ability of Ristar to grab enemies, climb walls by repeatedly grabbing at them, and use the various swings in the game allow for one mechanic to become very deep. Along the lines of grabbing the walls, there are various treasures for more points and extra lives that can be found by either grabbing chests, holes in walls, or treasures found secretly by hitting the right parts of walls. The grabbing itself is extremely tight, which is desperately needed as it is the main mechanic. The swings that are found throughout the game also add depth to it. By grabbing the swings and rotating around them, Ristar can go further distances faster. With 6 rotations, Ristar will launch off the swing, going the direction that you release. After seven or more swings, Ristar will launch with a powered release, causing him to travel even farther for a time and killing enemies as he travels through them. Another added layer is that bouncing against walls while in the powered swing will extend the distance that Ristar will go, up to a certain threshold. This allows the finding of quicker paths and faster routes. The overall gameplay of Ristar is simplistic, but, with tight controls and hidden depths, a player can find great enjoyment in it.

The game itself consists of 6 worlds and a last stage, with each world having 2 stages followed by a boss. The first stage of each world ends with a mini-boss fight, ranging from fighting a large snake like creature to a snowball fight. The end of each stage also has a swing that allows the player to try and go as high as possible on the edge of the screen to earn more points. The worlds fall into typical platforming themes, at least for the most part: Flora, a jungle and luscious plant world, Undertow, a water world, Scorch, a fire world, Sonata, a music themed world, Freon, an ice world, and Automaton, a machine world. However, there are some differences that make these worlds stand out a bit. Undertow is actually a water world that isn't frustrating to play. Ristar moves faster underwater and controls just as well as he would on land. The unique music world of Sonata is a nice standout to many other platformers of the time, and even today. The last stage consists of a short platforming section, followed by fighting the last 2 bosses in succession. Also, in between each world, there is a transition screen showing the players current earned points and how many were earned for the previous world, giving a rating like fantastic or unbelievable based on the amount of points earned. Ristar even says, "Come on" as he lands on each planet, which is a cute touch that is appreciated. The bosses themselves follow with the themes of the planets, as Undertow has a hammerhead shark as the boss and Sonata has a giant bird that cannot sing, which warps the screen a bit. While the boss fights are engaging and have unique mechanics to them, the bosses overall are not too challenging as compared to the gameplay of the levels leading up to them. The overall presentation of the worlds appear to mostly be typical of a platformer, but the variation is enough to keep the player engaged and wanting to see what is next.

The visuals and music really help support the tight gameplay and presentation of the game itself. As it was the end of the life cycle for the Genesis, the bright and vibrant colors give a pleasing feeling. The visuals fit each world well, ranging from the vibrant jungle of Flora to the gritty feeling of the machine world of Automaton. The visuals hold up incredibly well even now, especially when compared to other Genesis games. The backgrounds for the levels also give a great backdrop when traveling across the different worlds. As far as the sounds and music go, these aspects also hold up very well. The composer, Tomoko Sasaki, who went on to compose for the NiGHTS, does a fantastic job of keeping the music varied and pushing the often maligned sound of the Genesis to the limit. The music fits each stage so well, varying from relaxing in Undertow to intense in Scorch. I will even go out on a limb and say that the ending credits music and presentation might be the best of the era. Some sounds can be recognized from the Sonic games, but the sounds still feel satisfying. Hitting an enemy or against a wall really give great feedback in terms of knowing exactly what the player is doing. The sound and music, while maybe not standing out in a particular track or signature noise, give great support for the rest of the game to stand on by adding and not subtracting.

Before I give my final thoughts, I felt as though I should point out some of the differences between the Japanese and US versions of the game. Most of the changes are actually visual sprite changes. SEGA of America felt as though the American audience might find Ristar too cute, so his idle animations, which vary from world to world, were changed to appear more angry. Many of the animal enemies were changed visually so that they did not look as close to a flying squirrel or owl as they did in the Japanese version, trying to avoid any hassle in regards to animal abuse supposedly. An interesting change to the boss of Freon is that the American version has the boss look like an ice monster, while the Japanese version is a large robotic cat. The change is due to the fight itself. During the fight, the player has to throw hot soup into the mouth of the boss to try and melt him, at least in the US version. In the Japanese version, you do the same thing, but this is due to a Japanese idiom that has to do with a cat eating hot soup too fast supposedly meaning restraint, at least as I understand it. The interesting thing about this change is that during the ending credits, even in the US version, the boss appears with his tail, which must have been an oversight of some kind. Besides these visual changes, the names of the worlds are different, faster load times can be found in the Japanese version over the US, and an extra short cutscene of Ristar skiing is in the US version instead of the Japanese version. From a speedrunning standpoint, one of the bigger changes is in the 4-1 mini-boss. This mini-boss consists of a bird that conducts floating heads to come down at certain intervals. In the Japanese version, there are musical notes that appear to let the player know when they are coming down. In the US version, these are removed. The player can make it through this mini-boss in one cycle, so from a speedrunning perspective, the visual queue makes it one less headache in an already difficult run.

Arguably the best game on the Genesis and from Sonic Team, Ristar is a hidden gem that still does not get the recognition it deserves. You are doing yourself a disservice by not playing this game and should give it a play. It has been released on different collection packs and is currently on Steam. Each version plays just fine, even though the sounds of the games get a little distorted on some of the collection packs for the 360 and PS2. It continues to get overshadowed by what I feel are the inferior games of Sonic. The overall aspects of gameplay, music and sound, and visuals add up to a presentation that still holds up as a fantastic game that is a pleasure to play and experience.