The Astyanax
released on Jan 21, 1990
A long time ago, an ugly battle was being waged everyday as the world was ruled by demons. The people trembled with fear, with nobody to stand up for them. Until one day, a brave young man received a divine revelation from God and was granted the mythical Fire Axe. His name is Roche. Giving the people courage again, Roche embarks on a journey to the Castle of Algerine in order to defeat the demon overlord Argos and restore peace to the world.
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Made by the guy who did Legendary Axe, and it's blatantly obvious. It's about as good, save for the last level which is just utterly stupid and the most unnecessary 80s video game setting and boss imaginable.
I picked up Jaleco's The Astyanax after hearing it mentioned in comparison to Haunted Castle in Cane and Rinse's episode on that game. And rightfully so—in almost every way, The Astyanax is a much stronger execution of a Castlevania arcade idea. I miss using Vampire Hunter, but Roche's axe is satisfying to wield, and has a cool property to it where it will have some hitbox behind your character when Roche swings it back before slamming it forward, so you can end up being surrounded but still be taking out the enemies around you without too much fuss. A few times I was annoyed by the composition of the enemies on the screen—a combination of attack patterns that make it almost impossible to play without taking damage, or too many enemies who take a lot of hits to kill at once, but it wasn't nearly as much of a problem as it is in Haunted Castle. The enemy types lean more fantasy than gothic or Universal horror—mantis men, Harryhausen style cyclops, knights, flying demons with spears that reminded me of the bat wing demons from Anor Londo.
There's one elevator level where enemies drop from the sky, but most of the levels are simple left to right affairs, usually with a handful of platforming heights you can jump between. Each level is arcade short, and culminates in a boss battle. The bosses are pretty simple, though they're more of a fight than Haunted Castle's reward-bosses, and I love seeing the big dragons and wizard and so on. The second to last level even has a sorcerer that feels very Dracula esque as he teleports around and sends beams of attacks at you.
The big surprise is the last level after the sorcerer fight. Roche goes through a portal and is teleported to an H.R. Giger-esque dungeon. The enemy types here are mostly face hugger types that jump at your face, and the final boss is inexplicably a Xenomorph right out of Aliens. The Xenomorph's main attack is extending his arm at you, which really isn't Xenomorph-esque at all. Still, it's a shocking sequence, and I have to imagine absolutely no one would believe you about it back in the day.
There's one elevator level where enemies drop from the sky, but most of the levels are simple left to right affairs, usually with a handful of platforming heights you can jump between. Each level is arcade short, and culminates in a boss battle. The bosses are pretty simple, though they're more of a fight than Haunted Castle's reward-bosses, and I love seeing the big dragons and wizard and so on. The second to last level even has a sorcerer that feels very Dracula esque as he teleports around and sends beams of attacks at you.
The big surprise is the last level after the sorcerer fight. Roche goes through a portal and is teleported to an H.R. Giger-esque dungeon. The enemy types here are mostly face hugger types that jump at your face, and the final boss is inexplicably a Xenomorph right out of Aliens. The Xenomorph's main attack is extending his arm at you, which really isn't Xenomorph-esque at all. Still, it's a shocking sequence, and I have to imagine absolutely no one would believe you about it back in the day.