An interesting NES title. A sort-of a very soft action RPG with grid movement and Zelda-like real time attack. Very strange title, feels like a prototype and not like a finished experience.

When thinking about Dragon Quest or Zelda you usually think of grand adventures, but Arkista's Ring is a stage-based affair where you shoot all the enemies on the level and one of them makes a key spawn which is how you exit to the next level.

This could've been a cool game, but it's just too basic. Enemies can drop items of which there are plenty, and most only work on some enemies, and there's some kind of upgrade system. Now, granted, I only learned about this thanks to Retro Achievements, as they kept saying I got a new bow or a new arrow when in reality I barely felt an upgrade. Restarting the game proves that apparently I at the very least had a bunch of range upgrades, but nowhere in the game do your stats track that.

There are no shops, no anything, it's just level after level of, granted, varying baddies that you shoot. I was wondering if it perhaps was an arcade title brought to NES late, but nope, 1990 NES game.

So whatever, a neat little game. I'd be pretty annoyed if I bought it but experiencing it now, it's innoffensive. Or is it?..

There's an air of unfinishedness to it all, and I feel like it's not just my feelings, as the game pulls a Ghosts and Goblins on you. Yep. Beating the last what can charitably called a Boss reveals that the game continues, starting anew. Enemies can now shoot through walls, but your layers of armor also regenerate so "NG+" isn't even interesting. But whatever, I've decided to humor the game. Again 30 stages, only a couple of them annoying, and the game is over.

Still, fun little time, very simplistic but maybe a 2.5/5? Wait, I'm just getting a letter. It's all bloody and just says "FUCK YOU." Faster enemies now.

So there's the kicker. Here I open up Retro Achievements. You have to beat the game FOUR TIMES. Checking Youtube reveals what you might've thought: all changes throughout all playthroughs are just ratcheting up some numbers. No final final boss. Nothing. Only a very basic ending sequence.

I'm dumbfounded. I have beaten games from around the same period that took about the same time to "complete" and were about as easy as the first run through this game so I can't even pretend to understand what the hell was going on with the devs here.

Gun Nac is a blast! On its intended difficulty it's quite easy, but it's a very fast paced experience with tons of weapons, upgrades, bombs, and enemies. If you're familiar with shmups I'd recommend setting the difficulty to 3 or 4 because otherwise first few levels can be completed way too easily with the third weapon: a seeking 8-way blaster.

I've tried difficulty 4 after beating the game and it felt more like a hardcore shmup. However, even then, the game doesn't make you completely helpless: upgrades and bombs are plentiful, and your ship can increase its HP by picking up "wings", basically options. Between levels you can buy more weapons, restock on bombs and so on. Even when dying, you'll usually climb back to full power fairly easily.

One thing I've enjoyed in particular is how sticking to one weapon seems to be a death sentense. Sure, I've enjoyed my seeker, until level 3 where I realized that it doesn't differentiate between targets and spends time around enemies that are still underwater. I've completely ditched the weapon on, I believe, level 4 where it would just run into barriers and be completely useless. Actually, on difficulty 2 before final two levels the biggest challenge was to retain a weapon I liked, because picking up a different number altered your gameplay way too much and led me to panic.

One cool thing about this game is that it has Performance Mode. Yep, a game from 1990 lets you choose between focusing on speed or sprites. I'd recommend switching to "sprites" because slowdown be damned one of the bosses on speed is just impossible to parse otherwise (I had to sit at the top of the screen and spam bombs of which I had a LOT)

It's a really good introductory shmup and I believe I've died only around 3-5 times on Difficulty 2, which can be set even lower, so if you feel like shooting aliens and collcting power-ups but are afraid of difficulty of many games, it's a no-brainer.

A fairly simple NES platformer in the vein of Ninja Gaiden. A little simpler and thankfully easier than said game, but still on the shorter side.

Just like Ninja Gaiden you have a limited supply of ranged weapon, but unlike Ninja Gaide, which cribbed its ideas from Castlevania, this game has enemy drops and end of level bonuses to your health and ammo: no lanterns here. The unfortunate downside of this system is that you only acquire new weapons after each level, so there's no strategy involved to keeping what you might need for later.

The enemies are fairly weak and easy, as well as programmed well, so they don't respawn every time you move a few milimeters, so the main challenge comes from platforming. Doing ninja moves such as jumps from walls and overhangs is a little weird, but it's the actual platforming that's your enemy. The momentum of conveyors and ice is wild. When pushed backwards you can barely jump, and when pushed forwards your jumps propel you like a missle. Of course devs knew that so the final level is a vertical shaft full of conveyors and barely any enemies.

The graphics and music are very good, and the main character design is hella cute. HAL worked on the game so I suppose it's no surprise that everything runs well. I'm a little surprised that delving into NES' later library reveals that developers were moving away from Mario's 30 stage adventures into tighter 5-6 stage games with bigger sprites and nicer graphics. Often those games end up being not memorable at all, but this one is weird enough and just challenging enough so it never gets boring, even if it can get frustrating.