Vanark (Playstation) Review

North American cover art

For my first review, I've decided to pick a little known, obscure game, called Vanark. Whether you're a collector or just enjoy playing retro games, there's a very good chance that you've never heard of this one, and it's part of a sub-genre that is quite few and far between when it comes to the amount of games available. Enjoy.

Vanark is an on-rails shooter developed by Bit Town Inc. and originally published in Japan by Asmik Ace Entertainment in 1999 for the Playstation, where it was titled Astro Trooper Vanark. Later on it was released by Jaleco to North America in 2000, as Vanark. Even with the slight name change, it still says "Astro Trooper" at the title screen. It plays similar in fashion to other rail shooters like Sega's Space Harrier and Nintendo's own Starfox series. To start, I would go as far to say it's the Playstation's equivalent of Starfox 64 (which, by the way, is one of my all time favourite games). But this isn't a bad thing at all. It may come off as a late release budget title, (which in some respects it is) but it gives a quick, fantastic shooting experience. You play as aspiring pilot named Shun as he and his crew members must protect Mars against a rising biological alien army, a pretty cliche story, but in this tale the plot takes backseat. 

As in any traditional space shooter, you control a spaceship that can move in all directions on the screen, as you shoot up enemies and dodge any environmental objects. Your ship can equip 2 different weapons, a simple laser shot and a selection of missiles, which are able to lock-on to a certain amount of enemies, depending on how many upgrades you've gained. Both of these are selected before beginning a mission. Also, you choose a different crew member before each stage, each can help you out during battle, such as giving you weak points during boss fights or show you alternate routes to take during levels. The ship can slow down, and boost to speed up, like Starfox, however barrel roll maneuvers can't be performed (Peppy would be so sad). The game begins with a quick training stage, however the mechanics don't require much learning, it's basic and easy to pick up. The controls are silky smooth and there's never an issue maneuvering throughout a stage. 

SPOILER ALERT: First mini-boss.

Let's get to the gameplay, this is where Vanark truly shines. It is fast paced, loaded with enemies and there is always something to keep you on your toes. A lot of the boss fights are intense, and each is unique with their own attacks and patterns, which are fun to learn. The level designs are nothing that special; your typical water, lava, space, and desert themes, but I can let that pass, regardless they all look great, and I don't mind seeing this in shooters - in fact, this is something I almost expect. Some of the levels do have different paths to take as mentioned earlier, so that can add a bit of replay value. The challenge is a little high but never too frustrating, it's just right. There are no health pick-ups in game, and three difficulty levels to choose from. You're given 5 continues and then it's game over.

Graphically, the game looks amazing for a late, low-profile release on the aging Playstation. Bit Town knew what they were doing when developing this and certainly knew their way around the system's architecture to produce great aesthetics. The textures look good, with little amounts of noticeable pixels and jagged lines, a trait the PS1 is notorious for. The game runs at a very smooth frame rate without any slowdown or hiccups to add on. The lighting effects are also well done and add a great touch, especially in stage 2 where you are transitioned underwater and sunlight shines through the water surface down to the ocean floor. It adds a great sense of realism to these alien worlds as you destroy everything in your path. All of the enemies and environments look great, with each stage having it's own sort of theme.

The audio is decent for the most part. The music is fast and upbeat. It's nothing very memorable, but it gets the job done. The sound effects are solid. Lasers, explosions, and crashes are loud and intense. It's always satisfying to hear a huge explosion after destroying a tough enemy. However, an annoying sound plays whenever your laser hits a target, it's like a weird metallic-y pipe sound. Another noise, what sounds like a loud humming noise, plays whenever your laser hits anything that isn't a target, such as the environment. After a while these sounds only get slightly annoying, but that's really my only complaint with any of the audio.

Vanark plays as good as it looks.

One thing that should be noted about this game is what happens in between flying stages. After completing a stage, you are brought back to your crew's mothership for briefings, watch some story scenes, and even explore the ship. This is done in a Resident Evil fashion, by controlling polygon characters in front of pre-rendered backgrounds. It's pretty bizarre to see this in a shooter game. Hell, you could see this style used in almost any other genre but shooters. These sections do ruin the pacing of the game, because after sifting through dialog you're left to wander the ship, where you will walk around in frustration just trying to advance to the next stage. Luckily the ship isn't very big so you shouldn't get lost easily. The pre-rendered backgrounds look good, with nice touches in the lighting and details. The characters themselves look kind of bad, especially when compared to the flight stages. They don't have much detail, and are rendered with a low polygon count, additionally Shun's movements seem stiff and kind of jerky. There's even a minigame to play, where you have to disable a bomb on board the ship, by guiding a very small dot through a maze. And trust me, this is much, much more difficult than it sounds. If the dot touches any of the walls, the bomb goes off and it blows up your ship and you lose! Actually, it just takes away all weapon upgrades you had gained up to that point. The dialog between characters is kind of boring and uninteresting, however it does have some bad Engrish sprinkled throughout. The text translation overall comes off as poor. Just be glad there's no voice acting, because that probably would have turned out just as choppy as the text translation.

Earthworms become mutated in the future. Wait, would
they be earthworms if they're not on Earth?

Unfortunately, Vanark doesn't stay it's welcome for very long. There is only 6 stages, and the game can be completed in under an hour, with little reason to go back. However there is some variety; such as the choice of weapons, your crew is customizable, as well as branching paths during levels, so those can add some replay value. You even pilot a speeder-bike vehicle in stage 3 for a change-up. The Resident Evil style segments should have been scrapped entirely as all they do is slow down the pace of the game, and feel like they were added in at the last minute to artificially increase the length of the game. It would have been better to add another flying stage or two instead.

To sum it up, Vanark is very decent. It excels in delivering an action-packed shooter while pleasing to the eye. I think if it was a little bit longer I would like it much more. It's the perfect game to pull down from the shelf and play once in a while. However due to it's late release on the system, (Playstation 2 was just around the corner by the time this released), as well as low sales, it quickly faded into obscurity but should be remembered as an interesting take on the shooter genre. It's very, very uncommon and I would even say it's rare, considering copies of the game almost never show up in ebay auctions; a huge indicator of a truly rare game. (As of this review, the most recent ebay auctions for a complete copy have ended at over $80 CAD) So if you see this for cheap, go for it. You'll get to enjoy one of the finest hidden gems the Playstation has to offer.

Later days.