Old Games: Encyclopedia Bombastica: ActRaiser

I really want there to be a reboot of ActRaiser with Souls-like combat and some gamepad friendly city builder.

@professoress: Still pretty darn rad!

@steevl: You're not alone! Did the same thing, felt terrible but oh well.

Brad's gotten pretty good at solo video stuff.

And this dude walking around with a big sword explains a lot about his enjoyment of Volgarr the Viking (which I suppose is more in line with sword/shield guy in Actraiser 2!)

Always good to have some more Encyclopedia Bombasticas out there. Actraiser is a super neat game that I'm pretty sure I beat on the Wii Virtual Console. The individual platforming and strategy parts aren't amazing on their own but they work together very well.

This was one of my favs of that gen. I must of bet it 3-4 times over. That is a lot for me. I rarely complete a game more then once. The music is great and the graphic blew me away back then. Glad to see it still holds up after all these years.

Never knew much about this game but it looks pretty cool. I can see how it was kinda impressive back in the day.

I'm surprised i've never heard of this game, it looks really cool.

These are ex-Falcom guys, but little of their 80s catalogue got out of Japan so the sheer uniqueness of the genre mashup for the era leaves us understandably remarking on how before its time Actraiser is.

Damn straight.

Brings back nice memories, I need to play this again, is this on the wii console?

I love ActRaiser, such a great game! This makes me want to get out my SNES cart and play it again. As others have mentioned, the sequel is a bit disappointing as it is less of a genre mashup, and more straight sidescroller.

@steevl: I thought the same thing about Soul Blazer, weirdly enough.

oh word, Brad? cool, cool

Glad to see this Encyclopedia Bombastica is apparently getting more people to try ActRaiser. There really isn't much like it out there.

ActRaiser was one of those games where I would rent and immediately return as I didn't understand the RTS concepts. It also had that horrible box art.

@nggamer: yup

Thanks to my brother's leftover SNES collection I first played ActRaiser 2.

So for a very long time I assumed ActRaiser 1 was more of the same. It wasn't until a roommate made me watch him play it that I realized what it really was.

I hope that Brad did this in order to test his equipment for Extra Life. I always enjoy his stream.

Loved this, thanks Brad!

Love Act Raiser, that is all.

I never had a SNES, but I've always heard how cool and innovative this game was for the time. Good to finally see it. Thanks Brad!

This game looks cool, thanks Brad!

Wow thanks Brad, I haven't thought of this game in a bit. This is up there with my top games of all time and definitely one of the best on the SNES.

Nice to see a Encyclopedia Bombastica in its proper format again.

I feel like I must've been oversold on this game prior to playing it, because I recall coming off it being disappointed at how straightforward the strategy parts were, lacking any actual depth.

I had seen a little bit of the game at a friend's house when I was younger and at that time the language barrier probably made it harder to progress as well. Ultimately leading to me having vague idea of what to expect from it, that didn't hold up when I played it on the Wii VC.

Looking at it today, it seems perfectly fine. The music is very good and it's got a neat style. The action looks standard but has its own feel and the village building parts is at least interesting technically. I never did finish my playthrough of it. That boss rush at the end was too rough and having seen everything else in the game, I wasn't terribly motivated in seeing it through.

I really miss devs like Quintet. Doing weird cool and unique things with genres.... unfortunately maybe a generation too early for financial success.

I think one of the first things I'd ever do if I was set up for creating videos is a full LP of Illusion of Gaia. I have so much fondness for Quintet and their weird ideas.

This was a cool video. I never played this game growing up, and I'm not sure I'd ever seen footage of it. The over-world stuff being so different from the action portions definitely feels incredibly unique for that era.

Never heard about this game, but seeing it in action makes it clear that this is a really fun game.

I'd love to see Brad finish this game on some GB feature/video thing because it looks like a lot of fun.

Why even ask? Is there something wrong with wearing a cap indoors?

Same thing as with wearing shoes and/or socks indoors; It's a weirdly culturally specific thing that feels much more significant than it should.

This game looks ambitious as fuck.

I never really got an opportunity to play ActRaiser, let alone many SNES games as I didn't ever own the system but this game looks really cool.

Thanks for showing us the game, Brad.

I loved this game when I was a kid. It's a later example of the genre bending that was common in the 80s and I guess early 90s too. Maybe that's a key reason why the sequel went to straight platforming, games were starting to settle into more clearly defined genres at that time.

Interesting notes from Wikipedia:
"Unlike the original game, which alternately combined platform game sequences and god game sequences,ActRaiser 2 is only a platform game. It is believed that this game was made by request from Enix of America to Quintet, and that they also requested that the simulation segments be removed because players would not "get" them."

ActRaiser "sold about 620,000 copies worldwide, with 400,000 copies sold in Japan, 180,000 in the USA and 40,000 in Europe.

ActRaiser 2 "sold about 180,000 copies worldwide, with 40,000 copies sold in Japan and Europe respectively and 100,000 sold in the USA."

Guess it didn't work out :), of course there could be any number of different reasons for the sequel selling so much less.

ActRaiser 1 was more ambitious, but man, I think Yuzo Koshiro really upped his game with ActRaiser 2, and it's not like the first game was lacking in the soundtrack department.

I've never actually played any of these games since I didn't have an SNES growing up. The funny thing to me is that while everyone lauds the scope of the first ActRaiser, it's the second one that appeals to me because I think city building and RPG stuff is kind of unbearable. I'm all about that 100% Pure Action and Excitement !

Is ActRaiser by Quintet? That would make it the first or at least a precursor to their "resurrecting the Earth" series of games that came after: Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia/Time, Terranigma.

I'm guessing you're not from Europe?

Never owned the game myself, but played it a few times, it's cool.

Also really good Bombastica, Brad. Keep em coming.

QFT

Great game.

The angel power is a temporary power-up that increases the power of your arrows and then runs out.

ActRaiser will always have a special place in my heart because I'm pretty sure it's the first video game I ever played to completion. I had an NES but was way too young to conscientiously play through a game enough to beat it, and my other SNES games were far too challenging for me (UN Squadron utterly kicked my butt), so this was basically the start of my game-playing career. That Mode 7 zoom to earth brought back a lot of memories!

Does Squenix have the rights to Quintet games? Actraiser is such a cool name, I'm surprised no one has ever tried to revive the name at least.

Crazy idea and major wishful thinking- NX proves to be have mobile and console modes after all, and they bring back Actraiser to have the city building on mobile to power up your main character in a Dark Souls-like experience on the main console. That might be fun!

Man, I could never imagine a city building / side scrolling beat em up mashup working so damn well. It was disappointing as hell that the sequel axed the city building.

Thanks Brad, good stuff. More please!

Damn more Encyclopedia Bombastica is a happy shock and a Brad one make me even happier

Not even ashamed. Brad straight up looks cute in the video.

God, ActRaiser is so good.

Brad's lost some weight, looking good Brad, congrats!
I need to get motivated to do so as well....

Thanks Brad. Looking forward to more stuff from you and hopefully an extra life stream of some sort...

@d_w: I'd fully support a reboot and/or sequel of Actraiser!

Sweet stuff!