In honor of Legend of Valkyrie now on Arcade Archives for Switch, let’s have a thread about it!
A sequel to Valkyrie no Bouken on the Famicom, Legend of Valkryie is a Namco System 2 scrolling vertical shooter developed in 1989. It takes place in the kingdom of “Xandra Land”, and features 2P co-op and a beautiful flat vibrant aesthetic.
I’ve never played any games in the series but I know stuff about it because of just knowing about Namco’s legacy IPs and from crossovers. As for playing it in English, I know there was a PC Engine port that had an English localization:
Along with an upgraded port on Namco Musuem Vol. 5 with an English loc:
Besides that, I mainly know the franchise from the green lizard dude partner WHIRLO that gets his own spinoff game on the SNES
Also his skin isn’t even scales, but FUR?? As I only learned a few weeks ago from concept art revealed in a recent Namco Museum of Art video:
(Wait, Namco made the video private now?? Wonder why, it’s the only one they took down)
Another great thing I learned from this video that’s now taken down is that they didn’t even figure out a standardized personality for Valkyrie until well after the game boomed in popularity, and it wasn’t until the manga started before anything got set. So wild to think she was basically a carte blanche character for fans and developers to project whatever they wanted on and yet she was still so beloved. Truly a heroine that lived on the pure strength and appeal of her character design and charming animations alone.
Anyway, tell me what you know about it! Did you play it? Do you love it? What’s your favorite part of the game? Favorite tune? Favorite reboot/remake/sequel/spinoff? What’s the best way to experience this now in English? Is there a fan translation or patch to play the original arcade version in English? What’s your favorite Valkyrie cameo in other Namco games? Why wasn’t Valkryie ever in Soul Calibur as a cameo character??? And is Whirlo the best localized name ever???
I think Valkyrie is a cool design and it has a bangin’ soundtrack but this is one of those Druaga-styled disconnects I have with the Japanese gaming populace that I cannot reconcile
however I’m willing to include it in the “Actually is Namco the best game makers ever?” file
In the pc engine version xandra has a house and when you walk in he quizzes you what his name is. If you know xandra’s name he gives you an item. I’m afraid to get it wrong and see what happens because I don’t want to hurt xandra’s feelings. I guess valkyrie and xandra are only acquaintances or coworkers, for him to ask that. Either that or he’s just very silly
Actually it wouldn’t surprise me if the pc engine version is 1p only? Don’t feel like checking, but maybe that’s why they gave xandra the 2p character a cameo.
I like that your speed midair is so much faster than your walk speed so I just hop around the entire time. Also like the part where you are suddenly very high up in stage 1 and there’s some mode 7 ground way below you. In the pc engine version it’s pretty damn hard to tell what’s going on there. You might just try walking off the cliff and die.
I put an hour into it last night and man, what a fun gorgeous game. I love all the little death animations they made for Valkyrie, they’re so cartoony and cute like Darkstalkers. Also agree that the Mode 7-style scaling FX are really nice and really blow me away. The most impressive one is in level 3(?) where you’re storming a castle and then jump off a catapult and get flung all the way up to the heavens and see the tiny castle below before you come crashing back down.
Jumping is pretty hard to judge though and the hit detection seems to be real rough especially on moving platforms. Like on the one part where you’re jumping on those stone faces to get across the cliffs in level 2(?), I must’ve inserted like 5 credits because I kept mistiming the jump or thinking I made it only to fall straight through the stones.
Beautiful, charming little game! I can totally feel how it was influenced by the other cute 'em ups of the era like Twinbee (1985), Kiki Kaikai (1986), and Fantasy Zone (1986) but with a fantasy twist. I feel like if I encountered this game when I was a kid, I would’ve been a huge fan and it would’ve been pretty influential to me.
slightly out-dated but required reading. Has a ton of great art, too.
The pseudo-remake of the NES game featured in Namco Anthology Vol. 2 was also featured as a “special edition” bonus for Project X Zone 2 (in Japan only, of course). It’s a 3DS game you have to download/pirate, and seems to be mostly a straight port of the Anthology remake, except 3D + dual screens + playable Xiaomu. She’s the heroine from Namco x Capcom et al.
I really need to properly check out those Namco Museum games. Regret so much skipping over them at the time, thinking they were just straight ports of old arcade games instead of being neat time capsules and digital museums of Namco history and lore.
