Sunset Riders

The Short


Pros


- Fast paced arcade shooting action across eight stages
- Colorful, comical graphics that carry over nicely into the SNES version
- Four players in arcade, two on the SNES make this a blast co-op
- SNES has a difficulty scale and up to 25 lives that makes it much more tolerable when you die
- Fun mix between on foot vs horseback stages

Cons
- Genesis version is garbage
- Having 25 lives is nice, but why not unlimited lives, SNES?
- Was supposed to come to Xbox's Game Room as the arcade version with four player support, but never showed up. Come on, re-release this game already!
- Some of the final bosses/stages can get pretty ridiculous with the number of bullets on the screen
- Bosses are borderline racist, but I guess it fits the western genre

Time for an arcade classic. 

The Long

Sunset Riders comes with a story. Way back when I was a Boy Scout, my brother and I would frequently go with our troop to a favorite campout by a hot springs. In the area leading into the hotsprings itself, they had a few arcade games (a trackball bowling game and a copy of Gradius III, if I remember correctly) but the standout was the bright and colorful, four-player Sunset Riders. Despite begging my father every time we went for quarters, I'm pretty sure we only played the game maybe four times over the multiple visits to this particular campout, and while other arcade machines came and went the Sunset Riders machine persevered.

Then we found out it had been ported to the SNES so all our troubles were over. So the point is that for this review I'll be writing as someone who played a ton of the SNES port, a decent amount of the arcade game, and as much of the Genesis version I could tolerate before quitting (read: the first stage).

I want these to be my final words, too.

Sunset Riders is an arcade shooter with a western theme. It's pretty basic: run from left to right while blasting everything in sight and not getting shot yourself. Your bullets are fast and explosive while all the enemies are stuck in the Matrix and shoot obscenely slow-moving projectiles. They'll also come at you with dynamite, burning lanterns, and other nasties later on, but for the most part you'll be gunning down hapless, woefully underequipped cowboys.

What sets this game apart is its colorful visuals, hilarious scenarios and bosses, and sense of style. For example, most levels have two planes of fighting (upper and lower), but whenever you jump to the higher balcony your guy doesn't just jump, he does this badass flip thing that sends his hair flying (if you are playing Bob, who is the best character because his horse is pink and has green hair). Your character always has a classy smirk on his face while he's making mad cash gunning down everybody, and the death animations are goofy and earn a smile. One downside of the SNES version is they got rid of a lot of these animations (flattening, burning, etc.) and replaced it with the enemy just falling over to the generic "Aaugh!" sound that you'll get sick of very quickly. But listen: there's a part where you run on the backs of cows during a stampede. And this is the first level. How awesome is that?!

The arcade version also had an awesome opening movie, that didn't make it to the SNES version

There are four characters, though really only two playstyles. You can play as either a cowboy with revolvers who shoots in a wider arch but with less projectiles, or a character with shotguns who shoots tons of bullets directly ahead but without the wide spread. There are two forms of powerups as well: double guns (which doubles the bullets) and a "gold badge," which basically just acts as if you had a turbo button on your controller. Death makes you lose these powerups, which sucks, but on the on-foot levels they are plentiful so long as you share with your co-op buddy.

Speaking of co-op, that's where this game shines. The arcade version had up to four players at once, which is absolutely awesome, while the SNES only supported two. That being said, while the game is loads of arcade-blasting fun single player, it's in multiplayer that it really shines. While you do have to share the powerups, the game is considerably easier with two players if only because there are so many projectiles being fired, and working together to take out the bosses and their henchmen is easier and funner with a friend. It also has the benefit of the SNES version of letting you continue exactly where you left off, where if you lose all your lives in single player and continue you have to start the whole stage over, which sucks.

This game's presentation of Native American's isn't exactly PC, but whatever...

The great part about the SNES game is that it's an almost exact port from the arcade, with a few exceptions. Aside from only supporting two instead of four players, the graphics are a little more pixelated but still look fine (except the dynamite explosions, which look absolutely horrible with massive pixels on the SNES). All the stages are ported over exactly the same and with all the bosses from the arcades, and the addition of a difficulty scale is appreciated.

One really annoying change, however, is the removal of the "questionable" content. Often in the game you can go into bars and taverns to get powerups, resulting in a fun scene. My favorite is the first bar, where your cowboy takes a long drink of whiskey and then breaks the bottle over his head (or hat). In the SNES version this was apparently bad, so your guy just runs in, and then runs out pumping his arms in the air. Ok?

The other thing they changed was the women. In other taverns you'd go in then pop out with a bar wench (as is standard for Westerns) wrapped around you. She'd give you a kiss and a powerup and off you'd go. Apparently this was too "edgy" for the SNES, so they replaced the "immodestly" dressed barmaids with what could only be described as good puritan women, who show less skin than a nun. That's not how westerns work!

The last addition is the grenade-throwers in the arcade were women (the only women enemies in the game) but they have been replaced by red-headed guys (racism!). I guess shooting the women is out, too.

But saving them is ok. 

I'll give a brief blurb for the Genesis game: rather than actually port the arcade version, the Genesis game was essentially remade for the system. It only has two of the four cowboys, the stages are completely different (the first one doesn't even have a boss), the music sounds way worse, it has half the number of stages, and looks...pretty awful. I know a lot of people prefer it because it was the one they played growing up, but I can't fathom how you'd look back now after playing both versions and not see how incredibly inferior it was. However, I suppose I have to admit that they probably shouldn't be compared too heavily since the Genesis version is so completely different from the Arcade and SNES versions, but I didn't enjoy the time I spent with it so I'd suggest skipping that version.

But it did keep the hookers. Genesis does what Nintendon't. 

Sunset Riders (Arcade and SNES versions) is awesome. It's one of my favorite arcade games, and the excellent SNES port makes it easy to play it at home. There is only one big issue: this game has never been re-released past that. Despite being promised in Xbox's now-defunct "Game Room" program, it never saw the light of day. So currently the only way to play the original Sunset Riders is either finding it in an arcade somewhere or grabbing the SNES cart. It's a relatively rare SNES game, so it'll run you around $40-55 over eBay (I was lucky enough to find a cart at a local game store for only $30) but I'd say it's worth the cost. If you have a friend who loves arcade shooters and want to have a great time blasting cowboys and running atop a stampede, you could do a lot worse than Sunset Riders.

Four out of five stars. (SNES version. Genesis version would get two out of five stars)

RUN, YOU FOOL, RUN!