River City Ransom

"River City Ransom: one of the most under-rated beat-em-up games ever!"

River City Ransom is a rather old NES "beat-em-up" game by Techno. After playing through it recently, here's what you'll find in it:

The story in the game is fairly simple, you start out in front of "Cross-town High School" and are on a mission to rescue you girlfriend from Slick at River City High School. Along the way you will have to fight with several different gangs such as the jocks, the cowboys, and the mob. In the game you can punch and kick, as well as jump while punching and kicking. The gangs will come at you the same way, although certain gangs prefer some attacks over others and as you go on they'll even have some weapons!

But probably the most unique and enjoyable part of the game comes from its unique leveling-up system. As you fight these diverse gangs, they will drop different money amounts after you defeat them, which you can than walk over the money to collect. As you go along you can visit towns and buy many different items to help you out, including food which will replenish your health and increase your stats! As your stats increase, you can punch and kick harder as well as have more health. You can even increase your willpower which will let you get back up instead of dying when your health is all gone.

On top of the unique food-eating aspect (and there are A LOT of food choices in the game), you can even buy items which will give your character some special abilities such as being able to punch and kick faster, or even flip through the air when you jump. Thankfully you can go back to previously visited areas to essentially re-fight your enemies and get rich. You can even re-fight the various bosses throughout the game since they give substantially more money than the common thugs. You can do this until you decide you are strong enough to beat the game.

The graphics in the game are fairly simple, but at least the character animations are good. The enemies do look repetitive depending on which gang you are fighting, and even a lot of the bosses look the same. The addition of weapons was a welcome, as you can easily pick them up, swing them, or throw them. The backgrounds all sort of blend together, but to be fair this is one city that you are traversing. The character animations are pretty cool, each character has some cool grimaces and fighting animations as well.

The music is mainly comprised of a couple of synthesized tracks overlapping each other, one for the drum beat and one for the main melody. For the most part, these tracks are catchy but fairly forgettable. They also last throughout multiple screens, and only really change beats when you enter certain areas in the game. Sound effects are fairly common, as punches and kicks sound exactly as you would expect in such an early brawler.

River City Ransom can be played with a friend, and this is really the way to go, as you can even name your own character! You can also choose from two difficulty setting right from the get-go. Unfortunately not everything is positive, it is rather easy to exploit the enemy as you fight them, as once you knock them down (especially bosses) they don't have the AI to defend themselves, meaning that you can repeatedly punch or kick them to death. The AI also has no idea what to do if you jump to a level above them, as they'll just stand there doing nothing. I also noticed that River City Ransom provides no help in navigating the plentiful food menus and distinguishing between the game's many abbreviations.

Overall, River City Ransom is a very enjoyable game, especially with a friend, and shows some very unique ideas in regards to powering up your character. If you're a beat-em-up fan, give it a try, I think you'll have a good time. Have fun and keep playing!

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 02/23/09

Game Release: River City Ransom (US, January 1990)