“Mum, can we get Strider?”
“We have Strider at home”
RunSaber.png

When Strider was released to arcades in 1989, it blew people away. A marvel showcase in terms of visuals and hyper-kinetic gameplay, Strider was a big deal for many years. So it's no surprises that there were clones (as well as numerous Strider ports) and while some hit the mark (Mega Drive port of Strider, Cannon Dancer/Osman in Arcades), some just missed the mark by a long shot. Run Saber is the latter, a title that publishers Atlus won't be quick to bring back

Released three years into the Super Nintendo's existence, Run Saber has no excuses for looking as bland as it does. Though there is variation, enemies just look simple (aside from stage 2 boss, which is pretty cool design) and the level design is forgettable. Animation is also basic. Its not all horrible but it just feels so mediocre that its almost painful and what is bad (awful Mode 7 effects) is cringing. The music and audio effects are just there, with nothing memorable to stand out.

Gameplay is the game. While the controls are admittedly decent, with the strider-cloned platforming movement intact and there is some decent offensive options, Run Saber never does anything with it to take advantage of these things or challenge the player, aside from the rare tricky platforming and it's held back by the slower pace of the game and how movement feels like your walking on a sticky floor.

The game itself is pretty easy overall by default. Some of the minibosses and bosses make cost you a life at first but once you figure out their patterns, they become cakewalk. (It is funny how minibosses can be tougher than bosses). Hard is a challenge but only due to the relentless pace of the enemies and pickups being less. With only five stages the game won't take long to finish. Again there is nothing inherently bad with the game but its just so "meh" that it feels a letdown.

Run Saber tries to copy the homework of Strider but doesn't understand what its copying and so just churns out something that is middle of the road. A forgettable experience, more so by the giant looming shadow of its inspiration.

Rating: 5/10

Better than Strider but also kind of Not Strider in ways that make it a lot worse than it could be. You get this huge moveset to work with and yet not a lot of encounters feel designed to facilitate them. I wish movement speed and slashing were faster and longer, and I really dislike that bosses have enormous i-frames - like, half of the appeal of Strider is getting into a safe zone and mashing B for an immediate kill. And I swear the collision was fucking me over 90% of the time, like goddamn if you're gonna have a hitbox this unforgiving at least have a loud and clear indication of when you get it.

This is all overly-negative but it IS a really fucking cool game in spite of that and I wouldn't be surprised if playing it on real hardware would bump my rating up further. I really do love the art and spirit of it all.

A syllogism:

I don’t like strider.

This game is a lot like strider.

I don’t like this game very much either.

Meant to play this back last year but never got the chance to. I wasn’t a big fan of Strider when I first tried it on the Mega Drive. Not that it’s a bad game but I just couldn’t get into it no matter how hard I tried. It’s probably a skill issue but I still can’t say much positive about my experiences. So obviously the best idea is to try the whole series out and some clones and well only this game I got to, expecting to find it mediocre at best but I ended up really liking it!

This game is short and not too challenging, I played on the normal difficulty. The gameplay isn’t perfect but I loved the variety of moves in here. Once I found out about the slide, I reset the game just to try it with the slide and it’s not the best slide out there but it works. My favorite move was the one where you hold up and press jump. Makes fighting air enemies such a non issue or even enemies above you in general. You can even run in this game though it took me a while to realize and I was not gonna reset again I’m sorry. You also have this screen clear move and it’s okay but not a fan of how they reset to 2 if you die. Also I really wish you didn’t start with 3 hit points instead of your max but I get it because if it didn’t then it would be very easy.

The bosses are kind of cool but have issues. I wish you could have more uses for all of your moves because it’s too risky to do without weaving around. They aren’t too challenging but it’s very easy to screw up and die. There also was a boss late into the game that had a blind spot making it a joke which might sound nice but I never like when devs miss stuff like that. Thankfully death does not start you back to a checkpoint, neither does using a continue. Also some of them don’t really give the most satisfying feedback when hitting them which is a shame but damn does it start so cool with that first main boss fight where you’re on a plane!

The graphics are pretty plain and the music isn’t too special but the game can just be a blast. You can even play this with a 2nd player if you’re able to. Really the game is just so much fun for me. When I was curious to see the game over screen, I started playing stage 1 again because it’s just ahhh so much fun!! I had to mentally tell myself “Arle don’t do this, you just beat the game.” This game won’t be for everyone but I will gladly come back to this every now and then because this was a really engaging game from beginning to end.

One fact I have to give is this was supposed to come out on the Super Famicom but was for some reason canceled. There doesn’t seem to be a reason either that I could find. Here’s an image for the Japanese release with art not seen here. Makes me wonder how many people there are even aware of this game. Oh also while looking this up, found out you can change the color palette of your character’s sprite by pausing and pressing select. That’s pretty cool.

Run Saber is a game that I have known about for quite a long time at this point. I had first found out about it back around, I wanna say, 5-7 years ago, when I saw one of my favorite YouTubers playing it, and from what I saw, it looked pretty interesting and fun enough. It looked like it would have the same pacing and energy as something like Contra, which was a series I wasn’t too fond of, but I liked well enough to want to give this particular game a try. So, after all this time, I finally decided to try it out, and needless to say, I was not prepared for how… underwhelming the game really is. It was so underwhelming, that I couldn’t even think of a “clever” intro for this review, due to how average it was. With all that being said though, just because it is average doesn’t mean it is bad, and in terms of Run Saber, it is a pretty good game. It doesn’t do anything new at all when compared to other titles, but for a short title you can blast through with a friend, it is a decent enough time.

The story is themed around pollution ruining Earth, and instead of calling Captain Planet, a scientist decided to launch a missile containing a chemical that would wipe out all the pollution, while also mutating anybody infected by it to rule the planet, so it is up to two cyborgs that are part of Project Saber to stop this scientist and save the day. It is an average enough story with enough complexity to not make it seem too simplistic, and it does get you going to start slashing up any forces in your way. The graphics are pretty decent, looking pretty good for the SNES at the time, and having plenty of detailed enemies, characters, and bosses, but it isn’t anything too impressive when compared to other games, the music is half and half, with most of the tracks being decent enough, while some other tracks sounding like gutter trash, but overall, it isn’t anything too spectacular, the control is about what you would expect from this game, and it works well enough, even if some of the climbing mechanics can be a little janky, and the gameplay is fairly standard for the time, doing nothing new to enhance the genre, but for me, that is ok.

The game is a side-scrolling action platformer, where you take control of either Allen or Sheena, two of the cyborgs that are part of Project Saber, take on a set of five stages that take them all around the world, slash your way through plenty of enemies that come in various shapes and sizes, gather plenty of health items, hyper bombs, and powerups to give you an advantage against the many threats that you will face against, and take on many different bosses that range from being easy enough to being fairly difficult, while also having pretty decent designs. It is a lot of what you would expect out of an action game from that era of the SNES, but to the game’s credit, it does have some appealing aspects going for it.

In many ways, the game feels extremely similar to that of Strider, with many of the different moves that you can pull off in the game being pulled directly from that game. You have a fast, slashing sword that is your primary weapon, you climb around on any surface you can grab onto, you jump around in a bunch of flips, somersaults, and what have you, it is all EXTREMELY similar to that of Strider. The only real thing that isn’t copied over from Strider are the screen nuke special attacks that you can pull off, which were instead pulled from, y’know, every other game on the face of the Earth at that time. So, if I were to describe this game in one sentence, I would say it is a slower Strider, but that in itself isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The gameplay is still solid enough, slicing through enemies feels good, the game doesn’t last too long to where you feel like it is wasting your time, the special attacks are very useful when you are in a tight spot, and unlike Strider, the game actually has a pretty fair difficulty curve. If you are looking for a less difficult, yet still fun-enough clone of Strider, then this would be the game for you.

However, if you don’t care about Strider or these kinds of games, then there isn’t really anything here to get too excited about. Yes, the bosses are cool, and it does feel good to slash through dudes, but this game does absolutely nothing new to enhance the genre, making it feel pretty standard when compared to many other games that were released at the time. That’s not to say that the game is bad, again, but if you are looking for something more creative and unique from your action platformer, Run Saber won’t be giving you that. I myself don’t really have any problems with it, but if I had to get EXTREMELY nitpicky, I would say that it is somewhat annoying that you don’t heal up in-between stages, and how some of the bosses repeat themselves. However, not only are you given plenty of chances to heal up throughout the game, but there are only just a few bosses that come back on some occasions, so it really isn’t that big of a deal at all.

Overall, despite some minor annoyances and how basic the game is, Run Saber is still a pretty good action platformer for the time, one that you could have a great time in with a friend, and one that doesn’t overstay its welcome just in case you aren’t really into what the game is offering you. I would definitely recommend it for those who are into these kinds of games, as well as those who were fans of Strider, because this game should manage to give you just enough fun if you are looking for something new, yet familiar, to play. And now that I have played through this game, I have the urge to actually go back to the Strider series and finally get to the next entry, but I dunno… I’ve heard stories about some of the titles, and I am not sure if that would be a good idea.

Game #447

Run Saber is often cited as a clone of Strider. Oh no!

Thankfully, this one is pretty clearly a game actually meant to be beaten. Offers better control, better graphics and most of all just isn't bullshit. It's very fair, but not too easy necessarily. Its mechanics are indeed very similar to Strider, but for my money it's a much more tolerable experience, a good one even. That said, both are really short, and while that's a good thing in Strider's case, I'm left here wishing there was maybe one or two more levels in this game. Still pleasantly surprised.