Thank you Ratalaika Games for sending us this game to review!

Gleylancer was released in 1992 on the Sega Mega Drive in Japan. The story takes place in 2025 which isn’t that far away. Sadly, we are not anywhere near their expectations when it comes to spaceships, space armies/federations, or colonies. Lucia is a 16-year-old star fighter pilot whose high-ranking father and his crew are warped out of combat by an invading alien race. In order to rescue him, Lucia commandeers a prototype ship called the Gleylancer. The ship was supposed to be named Greylancer but was mistranslated.

Upon launching the game you’ll have to specify your gunner’s shooting pattern. Here are the following options and explanations: Normal: The gunners will fire in the same direction as the ship.
Reverse: The gunners will fire in the opposite direction of the ship.
Search: The gunners will automatically aim for the nearest enemy, but since this ship is still a prototype, it won’t be perfect.
Multi: Each gunner is restricted to the top or bottom 180-degree arc of the ship allowing for three-way firing.
Multi-R: Like multi but the gunners fire in the opposite direction of the ship. This is the mode I primarily used during my gameplay run.
Shadow: The gunners imitate the firing pattern of the main ship.
Roll: The gunners constantly rotate around the ship at 180-degrees from each other.

There are eleven stages with swarms of bullet spraying aliens that have to be shot down or avoided altogether. Many of the stages have a mini-boss followed by a final boss at the end. While the enemies follow a strict pattern, the boss’ movement patterns are randomized and harder to predict.

Throughout the levels you’ll come across floating blue chests you’ll have to shoot to unlock the gunner upgrades inside of them. Sometimes you’ll unlock laser beams and other times you’ll gain access to twin shots or five-way bullet spreaders. The different attach styles come in handy for taking out the turrets, swarms of enemies, or destructible walls blocking your path. Thankfully, the levels all have checkpoints near the gunner chests so your ship will be decently armed if you crash.

Upon starting the game, you’ll have five lives. With every 100K of points you’ll unlock an additional life. If you lose all of them, you’ll have the option to restart the level and change your firing mode. You’ll also be able to add your initials to the scoreboard if you did well enough.

Gleylancer is pretty challenging and thankfully there’s a save state feature that can be used and abused while you’re learning the patterns of the enemies and quick saving your progress through the boss battles. Most of the bosses are not that difficult, but the final one has multiple stages that you’ll have to restart from the very beginning if you don’t use the save state feature.

Like many games from the ‘90s, Gleylancer is pretty family-friendly. Spaceship violence is a given. There are plenty of explosions, but no blood. The spaceship Lucia flies in is stolen, but it’s the only one capable of saving her father.

If you enjoy classic shoot ‘em ups, Gleylancer is worth checking out. It’s well polished and is sure to keep you entertained for a few hours or longer if you’re not that good and rely on save states…