Oldie but a Goldie
The year is 1986. With a pocketful of quarters, you and your friends head to the arcade after school to play something called a video game. Being born in 1992, I have no idea what that would be like, but I heard it was good times. If you were around back then to have that experience, you may remember a game called Ikari Warriors. It was a shoot ’em up arcade game developed by SNK. At first, the arcade was the only place it could be played, but Ikari Warriors has since made its way onto different home consoles through the generations. Now, it comes to the modern era of consoles.
If you do not know what Ikari Warriors is about, well it’s not really about anything. Two Rambo-esque shirtless men Ralf and Clark wielding machine guns tear through the jungle, shooting and blowing up anything and anyone in their path. People were cool with that kind of thing in the 80s. In an era of side-scrolling, Ikari Warriors scrolled upward. That gave players side-to-side movement in a sort of boots-on-the-ground version of Galaga.
Going back to the journey Ikari Warriors took through the years, the game has found a home in almost a dozen consoles. Shortly after its release in arcades, it was ported to NES, IBM PC, Apple II, Atari ST, 2600, 7800, Amiga, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, and Amstrad CPC. You have no idea if some of those are real do you? These ports were released between 1987 and 1990, and about thirty years later, we are going to be seeing Ralf and Clark on PS4 and Nintendo Switch. Japanese audiences can download Ikari Warriors on PS4 and everyone can get it on the Switch now.
Will you be picking up this classic? Let us know in the comments below.
Source: Nintendo and Destructoid