Is Rygar [NES] Worth Playing Today? - SNESdrunk

Thanks to Roger for the request. I love the ideas in this game, but they're not always carried out to their fullest potential. Also, I forgot to make a joke about how the guy on the cover art looks like Donny Osmond.

[rpm]

Last week, after 32 years, I think I finally got the Rygar music out of my head. And now it's back in it.

[LAVATORR]

There's this really heartwarming Youtube channel called Reactistan where people from rural Pakistan react to various foods and inventions from across the world.

One episode introduced video games, and when asked if he'd ever played one before, the villager said he had, many years ago, and that it was about a man who threw his shield. Then, out of nowhere, it struck him: "RYGAR! I loved Rygar!"

Seriously, the channel is amazing. Elderly Pakistani goat herders are surprisingly good with Zangief.

[bananonymouslastname]

Rygar is probably a top 10 NES game for me. Its Conan-esque theme reminded me of Rastan as a kid, but its music and exploration hooked me. Its power-ups like the grappling hook, pulley, and crossbow were very different from what you saw in Zelda or Metroid, and the visual of Ligar's castle floating over the Tower or Lyle is one of the coolest on the NES.

[thenostalgiafactor]

Total length of video: 440 secs.
Total length of "SNES Drunk": 3 secs.

.68% of the video was spent listening to "SNES Drunk".

[AMMAZZARE]

This was my first NES game. I actually got it at a flea market a few months before I even owned a NES.

[JPHarringtonJr]

This music just plays in my head anytime I set out to go anywhere cool. I remember watching my older sister playing this in the early 90s, it was blowing my mind to see her get items and be able to zip line across stuff. Then I'd play and get killed by naked lizard men. This game is very special to me.

[Facepalm]

If you asked me to name just one game from my childhood that was the definitive, formative experience for me, it would be Rygar.
I still play it every year or so for that dose of soulmending nostalgia. The world seemed so huge, dangerous, and mysterious and I felt like I was really on this mythic adventure.

[ObsessedCollector]

Rygar IS my all time fav game! Got it for my birthday in 1988 and played it over and over. The music is PERFECT, the gameplay is tricky at times. The items are awesome. The leveling is NOT bad at all if you level a bit at the beginning, then level up on the robots to 9 bubbles, then PLOW your way to the snails and max your stats on them. This is one of a few games I can easily finish without dying once.

[yvendous]

The commentary about drawing the map on a Denny's napkin with a bank's pen was the best you've ever said.

[freddiejohnson]

I still have my copy of Rygar because it was one of the few NES games that I had that I felt got better once you knew what was going on and you learned about the mechanics. The music for me is so memorable too. Probably would have helped back in the day if I had got a manual with my copy but people tended to lose them so easily back then or just throw them away might have made it so much easier to figure out what was going on.

[zeldamike]

My favorite thing about this game is the music. It's so good.

[TonyGearSolid]

I played Rygar a lot when I was a kid and its always been a personal favorite of mine. The game has some rough edges, trying to use the grapple in the overhead areas can be a real pain, but the developers were definitely ahead of the curve with some of their ideas and made what easily could've been a complete mess into something unique for the time.

[mafiousbj]

What I love about this channel is it presents me with games I'd probably never heard off and will never play, yet you usually introduce them with an anecdote from your chilhood or life in general that just builds a connection from the get go!

[WillCooper]

I remember there was a trick / cheat. You could just have the character auto-fire to kill enemies on a screen, turn off your TV and walk away from the system then come back hours later to a character that had completely powered up from all the exp. This avoids the repetitive grinding at the beginning.

[archaicruinx]

It was a fun and ambitious game. My neighbors had it, and I remember they left their NES on overnight so that they could beat it. Back when there was no internet, this game took 8-10 hours to complete.

[deniskenn]

I play through rygar once a year. One of the best nes games. I always used to rent it and finally bought it at funcoland for 10$ around 1999.

[ericwillard]

Man, I love this game, and I feel like it still holds up. When you put this one up against other 1987 releases, it’s pretty well ahead of its time.

[hungrygoriya]

I was one of those people who played this and never used the magic at all because the manual let me down. I think I might've enjoyed it a bit more than you did, but I'm also a sucker for sidescrolling action RPG games. Thanks for shining some light on this one!

[DanJackson]

The game was called Rygar in arcades too...that's where I first played it. it was Warrior of Argus only in Japan.

[notorious]

I still remember getting bored as a kid and jumping off the edge of the final castle only to discover another castle. Couldn’t really do anything but run around but it was still a cool discovery.