Tiger Claw 2016 C64 Review
“Four magic scrolls have been stolen by the three lords of evil. Help TIGER CLAW on his path to retrieve the four valuable scrolls before the Fire Fist, Thunder Chain, and Angry Tongue can unleash their full potential. Fortunately, Master Lee transferred some of the scrolls power into the four masks of endurance before the scrolls were taken. Find the masks and use them wisely. As Confucius said ‘He that would perfect his work must first sharpen his tools’ ”
This game reminds me a lot of the 1984 C64 port of the game “Bruce Lee”. That had to be where the inspiration came from. Bruce Lee was a great game so why not use that as your starting point to build another great new game.
Tiger Claw was developed by
Lazycow and Saul Cross and released exclusively on the cartridge by RGCD for backers of the C64 in Pixels Kickstarter (Fusion Retro Books, 2016).
I happened to be one of those backers and I was very excited to receive my complete in box copy. It even included a sticker stamped 2016 with my name on it. This game is beautify designed. It was first released by RGCD in 2014 as a 16K cartridge where it placed second in the game developer competition. It was since redesigned for the Kickstarter, as a 64K cartridge adding in additional rooms, and modes, including the training mode and multiplayer options.
Collect ancient masks to gain new powers!
Slay dozens of enemy foot soldiers, deadly ninjas, fearsome daemons, rabid hounds, and birds of prey!
Full NTSC support, with identical game and music speed on both PAL and NTSC systems.
When you power up your C64 with the cartridge in you see an image of the tiger and are then brought to the RGCD logo just before opening up the title screen. The title screen allows you to select between several different options. The first one is “Training” mode. Here you can practice all of your moves against a seemingly endless barrage of enemies. From what I gather, it looks like your primary moves are punch, high kick, and flying through the air jump kick.
Alternately you can select the “Versus” mode. This makes available the multiplayer options. With the multiplayer, you have the option of not only playing against one other player but you also have the option to play against up to three additional players! What a blast that would be. The manual states that for three or four player modes, you need a hardware add-on called the protovision four player adapter
http://www.protovision-online.de/shop/product_info.php?products_id=34&language=en
The next option on the menu allows you to change the background music. By the way, the background music in the game is terrific. This option allows you to select between different songs.
Moving down the available game options, there are difficulty setting, Standard, Easy, and Hard. Easy mode gives you a smaller map, only one wave of enemies and they are slower to react. Hard mode is the same as Standard but you start out with less health, according to the manual, the floor has less friction and your opponents react “deadly fast.”
The final option is “START”. Start, will begin your adventure.
If you sit on the title screen long enough, the attract mode will startup. The attract mode simulates gameplay on various levels and will continue until Fire is pressed on the joystick.
The graphics in the game are excellent. There are a total of 24 different screens to explore and the game continues to challenge you with differing enemies and challenges along the way. The soundtrack is great, never seems to get old.
The gameplay can get a bit repetitive since the bad guys will re-materialize every time you return to the same screen. At least in the early screens, you are awarded 5 points for the first two kicks or punch and then 50 points for a kill. The more difficult enemies have differing point values. If you punch out a dog you get 50 points.
Even though the cartridge version was limited to the Kickstarter participants, you can still get your hands on this game by visiting the RGCD website
https://rgcddev.itch.io/tiger-claw
You can pick up the rom for only $2.99, and play it on emulation or use your Ultimate 1541 II, for example, to play it on real hardware. The original 16K version of Tiger Claw is available for free to download. I am still fighting my way through this game. I have yet to complete it, but I am enjoying trying to do so.
Highly Recommended
Youtube Description
This is my review of Tiger Claw 2016 for the Commodore 64. Spoiler: This game is awesome, great graphics & sound, loads of beat’em up fun.
Tiger Claw website & purchase information:
https://rgcddev.itch.io/tiger-claw
Lazycow website (game developer Matthais Bock):
http://www.lazycow.de/tigerclaw/index.html
Protovision 3/4 player interface:
http://www.protovision-online.com/hardw/4_player.php?language=en
C64 Bruce Lee Wikipedia entry:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Lee_%28video_game%29
Youtube Original Post Date: 04/27/2016
