Wednesday 8 September 2010

Rage Of Dinosaurs

In 1994 the 2D fighter Primal Rage was developed by Atari Games (Probe on home consoles) and published by Atari (Time Warner on consoles.) First off, can 1994 qualify being called 'retro'? Well Sony's original Playstation is thought of by some (including myself) as being retro, so this slab of gaming brilliance does indeed. (Defining what is retro will always be argued in the same way nobody can ever agree on BEST OF lists, its all down to personal choice.)
Anyway onto the game. I didn't play a lot of this when it was released but recently got it bundled on one of those retro compilations (Midway Arcade Treasures 2 on Xbox) and I must say WOW! What a cool game and seriously good looking compared to some of the titles on offer back in '94. Playing it last night, I often caught myself forgetting to play properly simply in order to just ogle the screen. It really IS that nice looking.
I really love the story behind it too. Whereas other fighters like to confuse its audience with ludicrous, off the wall stories (Tekken im looking at YOU) Primal Rage has a neat straightforward clash between the Virtuous beasts and the Destructive beasts.

In camp virtuous we have -
Armadon - God of Life
Blizzard (giant ape)- God of Gooodness and Virtue
Sauron - God of Hunger (what a strange thing to be a god of?!?)
Talon (velociraptor)- God of Survival

And on the bad Destructive team we have -

Chaos - the charmingly sounding God of Decay
Diablo (T Rex) - God of Evil and Destruction
Vertigo - God of Insanity

Nit-Pickers will of course peg this as being just as ridiculous as anything Tekken has come up with, but NAY I say! Take away the god like statuses and all you have is an almighty scrap between two giant reptiles, which was always happening 60 million years ago.
Another cool thing are the cavemen/women supporters watching the prehistoric punch ups. They whoop it up and jump around clapping if their beast wins and with certain moves you can even bash them into the air with your giant tail or fist. No fun for the hapless cheerleader but a satisfying little extra for you and your dino.
Primal Rage is one the best 90's 2D fighters you can get and to have it for peanuts is a wonderful thing indeed. Praise be the God of games!
Oh and the games coolest dinosaurs? Without doubt its the two apes (Blizzard & Chaos) and Diablo, a fiery red T Rex. Awesomness!

2 comments:

  1. I remember this was released amongst the deluge of SFII wanabees after that game hit the big time. Most of them sucked so I never really gave this much attention either, but you're inspired me to give it a try! :)

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  2. Check it out, I was impressed anyway :)

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