Star Raiders Review

tar Raiders achieves the incredible, somehow taking all the fun out of being a hotshot space pilot.

The Bad

• Woefully inadequate tutorials   
• Dull dogfights   
• Destroying capital ships is painfully tedious   
• Bland visuals and annoying sound effects.

The original 1979 Star Raiders was a complex and ambitious space combat game that involved navigating across the galaxy via hyperspace, scanning for hostiles, and managing damage to weapons, engines, and other ship components. It also had a sense of humor; at the end of a game, heroic players might earn the rank of Star Commander, while less successful pilots might be designated Galactic Cooks. Now, following in the footsteps of last month's Yar's Revenge, which also took the title of an Atari classic, is a new game called Star Raiders. But it possesses none of the ambition or fun of its namesake. On the contrary, Star Raiders is an awful space combat game, with nothing to offer to newcomers and only anguish in store for those with fond memories of the original.