Gyruss

Year 2500. Mankind colonized the entire solar system , populating all the planets from Pluto to Mercury . Colonies existed in peace and tranquility until the death ships of hostile aliens invaded human territory. Alien invaders managed to neutralize the entire fleet of people and capture all the planets of the solar system. Now mankind's only chance of avoiding complete annihilation is a lone pilot of a space fighter, departing from the edge of the system to free the captured planets one by one. ^[13]

The game belongs to the genre of tube shooters, a subgenre of static shoot 'em up . As in fixed shooters (for example, Galaga ), the player is provided with one axis of movement, but not along the line, but along a closed ring on the outer edge of the game screen. The player controls a space fighter and must destroy numerous enemies — enemy spaceships — over 24 (or 39 in the NES version) levels and avoid collisions with various obstacles - meteorites, fireballs, etc. Most of the enemies appear as if from - behind the screen and, after a short movement on the screen, “moves away” to the center of the game screen, greatly decreasing in size, so getting into the enemy becomes much more difficult. Some of the enemies can appear alone and leave the screen on their own if they are not destroyed.

The goal of the game is to free one by one all the planets of the solar system from invaders. More precisely, all planets, Pluto and the Sun are freed only in the expanded version of NES, and in the arcade version and other ports only Neptune , Uranus , Saturn , Jupiter , Mars and Earth are present. Each planet represents one level, divided into three stages (except Neptune in the original version, which consists of two parts).

In the advanced version of NES, each stage has an excellent construction, so in each first stage the player needs to beat off four waves of enemy ships, in each second in addition to this, a continuously firing station appears in the center of the screen, which also needs to be destroyed, and in the final stage after four groups of alien invaders the player will meet with the "boss" - a particularly strong opponent. In addition, in all versions of the game, after passing the next planet, a bonus level begins, allowing the player to collect additional points without fear of losing his ship, which in the main game is destroyed from the first hit or collision.

Since its release, Gyruss has been reissued for many gaming platforms. Apart from the extended version for NES, the other options almost exactly copied the original, differing only graphically, depending on the capabilities of the gaming platform. Of the small changes, for example, the lack of the version of the game for Atari 2600, Atari 5200 and Atari computers the ability to shoot down a special object on the screen, doubling the firing power of the player’s space fighter. Other features include the presence of an explanatory video on the Family Computer Disk System and a map of the Solar System on the NES.

Twice the game was released as part of Konami classic game collections, the first time in 1999 on the PlayStation in the Konami Arcade Classics collection (along with games such as Pooyan , Scramble , Yie Ar Kung-Fu ) ^[14] and the second time in 2002 on Game Boy Advance as part of Konami Collector's Series: Arcade Advanced, along with five other early products of the company ^[15] .

In critical reviews, Gyruss received ratings from high to fairly low, depending on the gaming system. So, the German magazine Happy Computer in the November 1984 issue , he called the game (its version for the Commodore 64 computer) a successful copy of the arcade original with very good musical accompaniment. According to reviewer Heinrich Lenhardt, Gyruss is the first game since Zaxxon to bring something new to the genre of shooters, and will appeal to every fan of the genre of Action games. ^[sixteen]

The ColecoVision version of Gyruss received a rather high rating - the commercial information base All Game Guide rated the game in   , calling the game one of the best space shooters on this system, with a quality close to the original and a must-have-purchase for every ColecoVision owner. AllGame also noted the quality music of the game. ^[17] However, on the same site, the version of the game for NES received only a 3/5 rating, and Gyruss for Atari VCS - only 2/5 points. In the version for NES, improved graphics were noted, which became similar to those in the game Gradius ^[18] , and the main disadvantage of Gyruss on the Atari console was called unsuccessful control ^[19] .

The latest version of the game for 2012, released in 2007 for the Xbox 360 Game Room, a gaming service that allows you to download classic video games, received less high marks. So, according to the MobyGames website, based on several reviews, the average rating for this version of Gyruss is only 44/100 ^[20] . For example, the English-language news and information website covering the topic of computer games - IGN , rated Konami's space adventures for the Game Room at only 4.8 out of 10 points, including 5.0 / 10 for gameplay and 4 each. 0/10 was set for graphics, sound andre-passage factor ^[21] .

• The main musical theme of the game, present in all its versions, is a slightly modified Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (BWV 565) - a work for organ written by Johann Sebastian Bach ^[22] .
• The designer of the original arcade game is Yoshiki Okamoto , founder of the Game Republic company who participated in the creation of games such as Folklore , Breath of Fire III , Resident Evil , Street Fighter , Genji , Mega Man , Capcom vs. SNK and The Legend of Zelda . ^{[23] [24]}
• The popular online arcade encyclopedia website, Killer List of Videogames , has included Gyruss in its list of the top 100 arcade video games of all time ^[25] .

• Gyruss (English ) on GameFAQs
• Gyruss on allgame