| Star Luster 1985, Namco, Famicom |
Star Luster is a Space Fighter Simulator bearing a striking resemblance to Atari's 1979 game Star Raiders and Activisions 1982 Atari 2600 VCS release StarMaster. It is said to take place in the Bosconian universe also created by Namco. It's also somewhat similar to Solaris also for the 2600 as well.
The player - much like Starmaster and Star Raiders before - flies around in outer space, using a "radar map" of sorts to determine where to go to using Hyperspace. These include enemy combatants, places to refuel your ship, other planets, and whatnot. The resemblance to Starmaster is so uncanny, wonder's don't cease if that was not the inspiration for this game, except the NES's extra buttons make the interface on this game so much better. This was the Final board to the Rabbit Hole of Nintendo Famicom for me - My Experiences I honestly blame the Sup-400-in-1 for getting me interested in collecting for the Nintendo Family Computer and getting adapters for it's games (and quite possibly, in the future, modding my American NES so I can use things like the VRC6 and FDS with it)....because christ on a bike, for the longest time, outside of Solaris, there was no space simulators I quite enjoyed this much except X-Wing and Tie Fighter which came out for the PC about 7-8 years AFTER this. And the fact that this was a Japanese Exclusive title. Seriously, this title had me sold on Famicom! As Bithead1000 would say, "I'm IN!" I think this was one of the first sessions on the Sup 400-in-1 Game Box I spent over 30 minutes playing, and I can play it for hours on end like I can Starmaster. I dunno why, but there's just something fun for me with this particular title. And what's nice, is it's not expensive either - I've found copies online for as low as $7.99 - which I'm planning to snag one for my NES adapters so I can have a copy that will outlast the Sup 400-in-1. It's like an upgrade to Starmaster, which is one of my favorite Activision titles. Videos
Let's Play StarLuster (Famicom On NES, 2024) |
