The 32-bit generation gave rise to the golden age of rail shooters. This was the only time that developers were prioritizing the genre and actually headlining their consoles with them. We got two Panzer Dragoon games on the Saturn, Star Fox 64 on the Nintendo 64, but things were oddly silent on the PlayStation front. It had rail shooters, but they didn’t make the splash that the others did on the competing consoles. You had to dive a little deeper. I did just that, and found a little game called Vanark. It looks similar to Star Fox 64, but does it play like it? Well, let’s find out!
Vanark takes place in the far future. The year 2200 to be exact. The planet Earth is a wasteland stripped of it’s natural resources. The only alternative humans have is Mars, but a group of scientists have bred monsters and there’s an asteroid belt protecting the red planet now. At least, that’s what I think. The translation here is pretty rough. Sometimes it’s nearly impossible to figure out what’s going on because of the terrible English and awkward writing.
Either way, you play as a fighter ship pilot named Shun. You, along with the rest of the crew of the mothership Vanark must free Mars from the host of monsters that now inhabit it. As I mentioned earlier the gameplay here is purely 3D on-rails shooting action. You view your ship from behind and can move in all directions to dodge and aim at enemies, but are in constant motion forward. You have a life bar at the bottom of the screen as well as a meter which measures your ship’s boost.
Vanark plays surprisingly close to Star Fox 64. Your ship by default comes equipped with twin lasers that you aim with a cross-hair. Moving this maneuvers your ship around in tandem. It sounds more complicated than it is, trust me. You can use a boost to make your ship go faster (until you the meter is depleted that is) and there’s also a brake option. Unfortunately they didn’t copy over the barrel roll. Vanark is so close to Star Fox that I found myself trying to barrel roll constantly on accident. This led to repetitious disappointment on my end.
You’re even given a wingman to assist you in each stage. The interesting part is that you can choose from a list of up to four. They each have their own abilities such as combat ability, enemy analysis, and a few others. To be honest I didn’t notice much of a difference between the bunch. They rarely help you out no matter who you choose. There’s some chatter from them during gameplay but it’s not particularly useful. What would otherwise be helpful is marred by the bad translation.
What’s cool is the fact that you can also select your weapon, and sub-weapon before each stage as well. I didn’t notice a particular difference between them; there’s your standard twin laser (different selections alters the way it looks but functionally they all seem the same) and a homing shot. Perhaps I didn’t pay close enough attention during my playthrough but the selections you make don’t seem to make a lick of difference to be honest. Aside from the graphics, that is.
Vanark doesn’t give you a lot of meaningful choices to make. Where the game really excels is its level design. There are only seven stages (I’m not counting the practice one) and the developers were able to make each one feel like a breath of fresh air. They each are different thematically, have unique enemies and environmental hazards, and feature enjoyable set-pieces and boss encounters. I particularly like the water themed area where half the stage takes place above, and the other below the surface. The transition is smooth and really well done. You’ll also race against flowing lava, dodge meteors, and more. There’s a lot of diversity here.
A few stages take things a step farther by completely changing the formula. One throws Shun atop a futuristic hovercraft/bike hybrid and has you stuck on the ground while fighting foes. The auto-aim makes this less painful than it would otherwise be. Two other areas take your ship off its rails. You can move freely through these arena shaped stages and have a radar to help you find the boss character you must defeat to proceed. While the ground stage is a little boring the free roaming areas are a delightful change of pace.
If there’s one area where Vanark falls flat on its face then it’s definitely the exploration sequences. These take place between each stage and allow you to walk around the ship and speak with the rest of the crew. You guide Shun through pre-rendered environments using tank controls ala Resident Evil. Unfortunately this is entirely too boring. Your objective is never anything more complicated than tracking down a specific character to speak with them. It doesn’t help that the game engine absolutely chugs in these scenes. Movement is super slow and ship is a real chore to explore.
For being a mostly unknown game Vanark sure is a pretty one. Few games on the original PlayStation feature such lush and detailed environments while maintaining a steady framerate. The art style is also quite impressive and the different themes of each stage really shine. The anime character designs are pretty generic/boring, and the FMV sequences aren’t particularly impressive. Despite this Vanark is a really impressive looking 32-bit game. The soundtrack is largely forgettable though. It works well enough on an ambient level but clearly wasn’t a focus. The lack of voice acting in the chatter during gameplay sequences is disappointing too. Audio just wasn’t a priority.
We all need more rail shooters in our lives. If you’re like me then you’ve played through Star Fox 64 a hundred times because it’s one of the few games of its kind from this era. The next time you’re ready to suit up with Fox and the gang perhaps you should give Vanark a try instead. It’s not as good a game and lacks any kind of personality, but the gameplay is rock solid. It’s one of the best rail shooters around which is surprising because almost no one has even heard of Vanark. Get it.
