Galaxian Review – This Early Famicom/NES Shooter Is Better Than Expected!

Sometimes when playing titles closer to in order of release, one may play games that you’re not very excited about. Galaxian from Bandai Namco was one such game for me. 

Premise and Expectations

It’s an early space shooter where you control a spacecraft and move from left to right at the bottom of the screen and shoot aliens that are in formation near the top. The game was created in response to Taito’s popular Space Invaders which was released in the late 1970s. I played the Famicom (Japanese NES) port on the Namco Museum Archives Volume 1 through Steam. 

As I said above, I wasn’t really looking forward to playing this title. Essentially, I was dreading it because I knew that you could only fire one time and then had to wait for your missiles to either hit an enemy or leave the screen before firing again. 

However, when I gave the game a real chance it grew on me!

Graphics

Since this was an early Famicom title it came out around the time that Mario Bros was released in Japan (Mario Bros Review). It was one of the first spaceship shooter games for the system. Concerning the graphics, they are not very impressive, but they are pretty accurate to the arcade game.

Galaxian features simple colors and the background is mostly black. However, the sprite work is fitting for this style of game, and it is somewhat endearing, especially for fans of Namco’s more popular Galaga.

By the way, some of the stand out features for this game was that it featured true color for the sprites (Space Invaders used an overlay) and the background stars scroll downward as you play. Both aspects are good improvements for the genre!

Sound Effects

In regard to sound there is not a lot of music in the game, which is similar to other early Famicom titles. However, the sound effects are effective some of the time. Admittedly, when firing off your missiles the sound is a bit puny. Yet, the sound for when an enemy is defeated is fine.

The big reason why I like the game’s sound effects stems from the effects when the aliens swarm down at you. What impresses me about this is that it seems like the enemy is screaming at you. I thought that was a great way to add tension to the game.

Gameplay and Tension

Speaking of which, Galaxian has a few gameplay aspects that heighten the tension while playing. One is the aforementioned “screaming” of the enemies. Another is that the alien foes regularly break away from formation and come down toward the player to attack. This is done through firing multiple shots at your ship, or simply crashing into you. Both means of attack are often effective, and you need to be careful to survive such onslaughts.

One thing that impressed me is just how well the enemy bullets and ships move to the corner of the screen to hit you. It seems like the game has fewer safe areas compared to its sequel. Additionally, not only do the aliens try to dive bomb you individually, but some can do so with a small formation of three. This was quite surprising the first time I saw it, especially since it can happen on the very first level!

What this all means is that Galaxian has tension from the “screaming” enemies. It has tension from the dive bombing enemies. It has stress from the formation of 3 that could come after you. And all this can happen in quick succession, with multiple enemies coming after you at once.

That’s all an impressive improvement over the original Space Invaders formula! Plus, since your ship can only fire once, it means that each shot counts.

By the way, my concern for only being able to fire at once wasn’t as bad as I expected. If your aim is accurate and you keep hitting your targets, the limitation of each missile at once is not a hindrance to gameplay.

Summary

Overall I ended up liking the game! While I don’t think it is as enjoyable as Galaga. It was more fun than I thought it would be. The fact that there were the effective use of sound effects to cause tension and new ways for the enemies to attack you, I thought the game advanced the genre a good deal.

My next NES review will be Pac-Man, while another game in this style that I plan to review is Taito’s Space Invaders.

Title: Galaxian (Price Charting)
Genre: Shooter
Year Released: 1984
Developer: Bandai Namco
Played On: Namco Museum Archives Volume 1 on Steam
Price Paid: $0.39 or $4.22 for the collection

Remember, we can have different opinions about the games we play. If you like something more (or less) than I do, both of our perspectives are valid.