Dyna Gear (Arcade)

Today i review another arcade game. But this time it's fast-paced platformer game. It's Sammy's Dyna Gear (1993)!

With the subtitle "An Action Adventure on The Era of Dinosaur" which is located above the main title which is uncommon position for subtitle. Anyway, it's another game with dinosaurs. Hooray! Don't you like the giant prehistoric reptile? But before we jump into the action. We have to know the backstory of the game, right?

 

Two starships from 2993 A.D. travel to 65 million years ago. A (time) criminal: ruthless Gustaf aboard the red starship. While a time patrol named Roger pursuits Gustaf, is in another starship. Thus they shoot each other with their starship laser cannons which ends up they fall together into a nearby planet which you may guess is inhabited by Dinosaurs.  

 

And apparently by Wolf man race too. Roger meets one of them named Wolf (Sic!). He has score to settle with Gustaf too. He said that he have brainwashed Dinosaurs to become evil. How come Gustaf have done so big evil accomplishment while he's still new to the planet as early as Roger? Forced scenario climax Gustaf's charm over Dinosaurs, is my guess.

 

Not long after i choose either as Roger or Wolf. I enter this fast-paced zany action. The control is simple: joystick to move/aim/crouch, one button to attack, and another button to jump. Right now, i attack by throwing swords and those dinosaurs become premature fossils in a jiff!

 

Then i found hammer weapon (that actually is spiked iron ball with chain) and Wolf's friend. He's not so helpful as he can only punches enemy within small distance. On the other hand, the hammer that i found is quite great. With each pressing attack button, a hammer/mace/spiked ball surround Roger. Pressing more when there's 4 of it, will activate a special rapid attack: many spiked ball will orbit him. In fact, all of the weapon in the game have that special attack by pressing attack button rapidly. So, i hope you have durable fingers if you play this game. C:

 

Wolf's fellow stop followed me and warned me about flying dragon. Here's the flying dragon. It doesn't look intimidating, dumb even. But can spit fireball, mind you.

 

This time, another Wolf’s fellow comes to help me fight the boss battle: a Triceratops. His usefulness is only to take damage from Dinosaur while I keep chucking axe at it. He’s not so tanky so no wonder he goes down quickly. God bless him. You notice that there’s giant coin with symbol that quite similar to Mortal Kombat’s ones! I can’t reach it. I can do double jump. But instead of jumping again like what i expect, i’m rolling in mid-air with close to none boost on height. Tough luck.

After i finish that Triceratops, i visit Wolf’s village. One of his friend tell me to shoot something behind him which reveal secret coins for score-up and extra life. You see coin indicator in bottom screen that has writing 31/200? If i make the upper number into 200 i will be granted with extra life. The bigger the coin, the bigger score that i can net. Do mind about the quota number! It will be increased if you have fulfilled the previous ones.

 

Next stage called The Field, even though there’s dozens of tree in the background. Take him away? Yes, i reckon i can deal with this flying “dragon” like before.

 

Turns out, it help me destroy any enemy that i encounter. Sweet!

 

I don’t have it, mate. Can’t you see I’m busy cling into this dead tree? Go away! I can cling into any solid wall or ceiling and climb along. So the platformer part in this game is not only jump around! And i'm just Time Patrol, not ninja. Eat your heart out, Ryu Hayabusa!

 

This bouncing Ankylosaurus is the sub-boss here. So i have to round back and forth to evade it. Luckily i have homing arrow as my weapon to make my job here easier.  

 

I thought i had it. Then it goes inflated so its attack become much wider. Even though the process to defeat it is remain the same only faster, I got cocky and there goes my first credit. At least, the gameover screen is fantastic: Nova blast suddenly appear in the center of screen. Michael Bay most likely will love this.  

 

After i beat that Ankylosaurus, i climb this cliffside and there's chest! i wonder what prize i can found there? Coins? Or other weapon probably?

 

Darn! At least, some narrator feels sorry to me.

 

A wolf man is being harassed by dino man, the primitive version of Reptile's (from Mortal Kombat) kin. Luckily, i'm here to safe his tail just in time. In fact he does nothing sensible like run away or fight back. He just stand there accept his cruel treatment. The lazy sod.

 

I found Gustaf's ship wreck. But he isn't here. Perhaps he's not far from here.

 

Here's Gustaf. Judging by how well his wording (which is simple yet stupid), he's man with primitive mind. No wonder, he's able to persuade Dinosaurs here to work for him.   

 

He leaves me with Barney here. He can bite and jump around. But surprisingly for boss stage, he's much easier than Ankylosaurus the sub-boss. I feel that he has less health and speed. Also he can be stunlocked.

 

Next stage named: Dino Village. But i start at this cavern that has prehistoric age version of thwomp and this mushroom. From the looks of it, you can tell that it's poisonous. But beyond my knowledge, it's also explosive! So i have to mine mushroom sweep it with my axe.

 

I don't think that flying limbless creature there is a dinosaur. This monster is more fitting to horizontal shmup game rather than platformer game like this.

 

A wolf man appears next to checkpoint flag and tells me to take this T-Rex with me. Sure, why not?     

 

I guess the wolf man tribe hold really big grudge toward dino man tribe as one of them happily sent T-Rex to assist me raze this village. The dino man had installed some primitive turrets but they're useless to stop crazy man that throws any weapon he has and this 3 tons carnivore reptile.

 

But then there's dead end for this T-Rex so only i can move further. So disappointing. :C

 

On the top of the cliffside, i encounter dino man chieftain. He’s tough to defeat thanks to his slim size and ferocity. In this screenshot, i know that he can perform flying uppercut. It’s dragon dino punch move! I lost another credit in sub-boss battle, again. 

 

I switch to Wolf. Beside sprite, he’s not much different from Roger except he jump slightly higher but run slightly slower. The boss here doesn’t move as aggressive as that Dino man chieftain. I can defeat it with no problem.

 

Or not. In case you don’t believe me about nova explosion that mark gameover, here’s the solid proof. You like it? The problem with this boss battle is can’t dodge his claw while i’m cornered. But soon i found the solution. Pressing jump button while crouching will makes me rolling. While doing so, i can bounce harmlessly on some of enemy’s attack including that claw attack. With that knowledge i can proceed to next stage.

 

Next stage is The Labyrinth. Hey! That background is the same with one in title screen. Also there's ancient robot and a chest.

 

The Labyrinth or to be more precise The Temple, is closed space stage. So you're often to climb ceiling or wall here. One of the benefit of climbing: you can disarm this falling boulder trap instead of triggering it by walking beneath it. By disarm, i mean destroy it.

 

Then a sub-boss fight happen. Did i mention that the every stage is short or can be finished relatively fast? Because it is. This time, there's 2 skeleton pterodactyl. If you can roll on their head so you can bounce harmlessly, you won't get boxed by them.

 

Only few steps from previous sub-boss fight, there's another one! It's armless Armadillosaur! Actually if you look it really closely you can see its arm hidden near chest region. He only attack you by walking toward or rolling around. You will take damage if you try to rolling jump on it. Luckily his move is quite predictable and slow so you can jump over it relatively easy.

 

Then i rolling pass spiked traps and check point flag! This reminds me of Sonic The Hedgehog game. In fact beside the rolling in ground or air, Roger or Wolf moves slow at the beginning and gradually faster like that Sega's Mascot. Thus Sammy learns a lot from 2 platformer game: Ninja Gaiden and Sonic The Hedgehog.

 

The boss stage this time: giant totem pole that come from above. Each segment can shoot rock or other things at you. But you all need to do is just hammer the attack button in front of it. The boss fight will be over soon. I still wonder why the sub-bosses are much harder than the bosses in this game.

 

I believe i never go to this bonus stage before. Maybe there's score quota for each bonus stage but i'm not sure myself. In this bonus stage, you have to collect floating items by using springy mushroom and/or climbing. Imagine Sonic's bonus stage where you can climb ceiling and wall. You got the idea here.   

 

In the Ruins stage, Roger got brutally slashed by this buffed dino man. For what he did to that village, i say he deserve this. Roger's blood spurt out! To lessen the violence intensity, there's cute flying seahorse on the left side. Nice, huh?

 

You know the scene in Lost World: Jurassic Park where dozens of Compsognathus surround humans? But imagine they got aerial support from Pteranodon kids. That's 100% worse, right? That's what happen here. Arrows have longest range and homing to enemies. But they don't homing to small enemies here. Luckily there's hammer weapon there. I can sweep them all easily with that weapon.

 

Here's the proud mother of those swarm as boss stage. At first, it takes form of bipedal dinosaurs but then it change to this mini Pteranodon. Beside flying, it can emit fireball. Overall, it's quite easy to beat.

 

Next stage is Dessert where there's dinosaurs and sand worm here. The green dino over there is helping me. As it can do nothing but rolling and biting. It's not so helpful in my quest.

 

The sub-boss this time: this ant lion. You already knew that every sub-boss is challenging. This insect is the same. Especially, it can catches me off guard by making its pincer spin like helicopter so it's able to reach highest place.

 

Then there's this dessert turtle. It's nothing compare to me and my triceratops buddy here. I like to call this specimen "Pushoversaur"

 

The boss stage: Ultrasaur. He can either spits fireball [so cliché isn't?] or drop its neck if you keep take shelter below it. It's slightly easier than that ant lion.

 

Next stage is: Sky Palace. Thanks for the obvious advice, buddy! But truth be told. I don't encounter any insta-kill pit/abyss in this game. Not even here. You only die if you lost all of your hearts and every harm mean only deplete one of them. That's sounds fair. But keep in mind that harmful things in this game are many and fast.

 

It seems he implies to keep cling on this insect that looks like the enemy. There's difference between transport bug and enemy bug. The former is in blue while the latter is in red. Both of them can be destroyed, of course. The transport bug leads me to this area where there's lots of chest. Very good!     

 

Unrelated to anything sky-ish: Lion man is the boss stage. He's moves fast and aggressively but thanks to my flying buddy here he can be beaten well.

 

The final stage: Castle. You can guess that it's home to boss and sub-boss rush. How dull. Maybe i should talk about the weaponry. There 4: swords, hammers, axes, and arrows. Swords cover short area in front of player's aim with hefty damage. Hammers surround player has quite small damage per hit but has superb rate/speed. Axes deal big damage has longest range with wide hitbox but fairly slow. Arrows have same range with axe, travel slightly faster and has homing capability but inflict the least damage. Everytime you get new weapon, you will get Auto Shot bar. If you have it, you can hold the attack button to attack rapidly and perform special rapid attack more frequently. Auto Shot bar will be decreased if you execute it. Speaking of it, it depends on weapon you carry. If you carry sword, you will execute thousand stabs. If you carry hammer, many spiked balls will orbit you very fast. If you carry either axe or arrow, you will launch which one you carry in eight directions.  

 

Naturally i meet the lion man again. But this time, he joins my side. How delightful.

 

He's less fast than before. But he's tank-y enough to take damage from enemies which is great. Also, there's these cobramen that appear for the first time. But that's quite ignorable, right?

 

Then there's red mermen here. This remind me of early section in Castlevania. Do you feel the same thing?

 

Finally, i meet Gustaf. But he soon dive into red water below (where those mermen come from). I thought we will have fierce battle.

 

So you turn into electric Arowana. He bursts out from below, immediately spits 2 exploding ball and back into the water. You have to stay away from him then approach him fast otherwise you can't hurt him efficiently.

 

Then he has second form: Carnotaurus with more horn in the back of the head. He's like other boss with aggressive move (like jump around occasionally then stop for attack with fast pace) but he's the tallest of all.

 

The real problem is his 3rd and also final form: Wyvern. He flies very fast to everywhere and sometime stop to blow firebreath. Did i mention that any skinship with enemy is lethal to our hero? Because it is. And this bastard exploits this with absolute obnoxiousness. Once you run out life here, you have to fight him from the first form. It seems sword weapon can make this final battle easier. So i suggest you do that too.  

 

Like in 101 villain's rule: your castle will crumble if you die, Gustaf is destroyed along with his prehistoric castle. It also happen in Metamorphic Force, now that i think about it. Later Roger is surprised that his starship has been repaired by Wolf's friends, homemade style.  

 

Would you look at that! Despite how primitive the repair is, the starship can go well, i hope. Roger's departure to home accompanied by Wolf's howl and my feeling of satisfaction and relieved. Dyna Gear (1993) is your typical platformer arcade game that has fast pace. As fast as horse wearing roller skate instead of horse shoe. The game feels really fast thanks to narrow screen. It also allow every action to be so explosive. The music feels ignorable thank to exciting action and fantastic sound effect. Seriously, i can't remember about the music at all. I'm sorry. The visual effect superb. The weapons are all interesting and distinctive. The special attack are what makes the game special than other generic platformer. Roger and Wolf are versatile platformer hero but not so good at jumping. Checkpoints can be harsh especially in final boss fight. The enemy's designs are good even though 40% of the enemies aren't either belong to prehistoric age or dinosaurs. The difficulty can be either challenging and fun or bit unfair but never to the point of nigh impossible. Keep in mind that there's "Sub-bosses are more difficult than bosses" phenomena. Healing items can be scarce. 8 levels sounds long for arcade game but thankfully each of them are quite short and quite well designed.

The conclusion: i can suggest you to play Dyna Gear (1993). It's one of interesting platformer arcade game beside GanryukiMusashi but with more blasting action and narrow screen. Also there's dinosaurs there. Though most of them are hostile and only some of them are willing to help you. Or maybe i can interest you with the existence of wolf men in the game? Though i'm not wolf (or werewolf) liker, i can say they're well designed. That's quite something, right?