Be careful, each boss gets increasingly difficult and painful. You will either receive: Rapid Fire - Golden badge that makes whichever character's weapon, much faster! Dual-Wield -Silver Badge, that allows you to carry two weapons firing it about a 45 degree angle! 1-Up - A 1up symbol for extra life And sometimes just a coin to increase your score! Each stage, like all other games, ends with a boss, and each boss has a money reward that you will receive for killing them. To make it a fair fight, enter bars, a barmaid will wave you goodbye and you gain a power-up. Beware though, enemies will follow, so use levels to your advantage quickly! As you progress through the stages, you will find new enemies that present an ever-increasing danger! Some will have dynamite ready to blow you up, others will be fast with the draw, and some will offer you power-ups if you manage to take them down. Though jumping is not as prominent as in other Konami shooters, your players can pull off some rather amazing leaps on to rooftops and ledges, and jump between moving train cars. This is great and adds to the determination you will have to want to master the game's 8-directional shooting as well as sliding to dodge bullets and take out your enemies in a safer proximity. Fierce accuracy is almost required throughout the game, especially if you make it beyond stages 3 or 4. Choose one of the four characters (Steve, Billy, Bob, and Cormano) and let loose on the baddies disturbing the Wild West. Shoot, slide, ride, and jump your way into becoming rich, through tough bosses with bounties on their head. If I had to bring about one bad thing the SNES version lacked, it was 4 player or the fact that the controller at the time was miserable for control, but now that shouldn't be a problem! Still remaining two players and insanely fun, bring a friend for the ride! Sunset Riders shoots up an 8 out of 10! Directions: The Genesis version was addicting, but misses some of the best aspects, especially levels and characters, each cut in half! The sound and graphics aren't on par with their Arcade counterparts either! If you haven't played Sunset Riders or played the Genesis instead, you have sorely missed out and should play now. The controls in this game are solid and tight and you have a much higher precision shooting than in most other shooters. Rumor was they were making a pirate one next, but it never came to see the light of day since Sunset Riders never took off as they anticipated. This game is a great stand-alone shooter that was mainly overlooked for its cowboy theme.
Move through each invigorating stage, getting closer and closer to eliminating the big boss and claiming all the gold and the maiden! I cannot stress how solid this game is for a 1991 shooter, especially coming off the heels of Contra. Have fun jumping to balconies to shoot enemies or shoot dynamite to blow them off the screen! Keep your eyes peeled and be sure to see every bullet and its trajectory, moving accordingly to save your life but take theirs. Take time to perfect your timing and aim, and you'll be blazing through this western game in no time at all. Dash through 8 stages of bliss, receiving power-ups from barflies and dead enemies as you fight your way to claiming your reward. Bob and Cormano use shotguns requiring less accuracy, but are therefore slower. Steve and Billy use revolvers which are fast, but require a bit of accuracy.
Each of the four characters are slightly different. Sure, Clint Eastwood might not be a playable character, but you'll still feel drawn into this fast paced Wild Wild West world! Konami did some great work bringing every piece of what it means to be a Cowboy together! You'll shoot your way through 8 stages of tough, bullet dodging, speedy madness as either Steve, Billy, Bob, or Cormano, all four Western bounty hunters out for blood, money, and women. The game-play remains strong and as addictive as it was in Arcades, and no major elements are removed.
The SNES version is as faithful as you can get to the Arcade version, although Nintendo did censor it a little bit. Sunset Riders for the SNES is better than the version for Genesis for many reasons, and I hope to give you dozens why! Sunset Riders is a classic run'n'gun shooter by Konami, creators of other such games such as the most popular example Contra.