A dog on a journey to rescue its beloved pet, that is a premise that sounds like a cute fairy tale, but Scrapyard Dog hides behind it an honest platformer in the spirit of the genre's finest traditions. And on the Atari Lynx it was a welcome colorful addition.
You guide your four-legged hero through a series of levels full of enemies, chasms and obstacles. Platformers of this type stood or fell on the precision of the controls, a feel for jumps and clever level design, and it is precisely this classic recipe that forms the core of the experience. You jump, dodge hazards and search for the path to the end of each level.
On the Lynx the game benefits from the color screen, which was able to give the platformer a more cheerful and lively character than competing handheld machines offered. Colorful backgrounds and legible sprites help distinguish where it is safe to jump and where danger lurks, which is absolutely essential in a platformer.
The platformer genre was the royal discipline of the eight-bit and sixteen-bit era, and every platform longed to have its mascot and its flagship platformer. Scrapyard Dog fits into this tradition as a likeable representative that does not try to reinvent the wheel, but honestly delivers what you expect from a good platformer.
For Lynx owners and fans of retro platformers it is a pleasant title that reminds us handheld gaming of the early nineties was not just about shooters and racers, but also about classic jumping toward a simple, touching goal.
Why play: For an honest, colorful platformer with a sweet story about a dog's devotion that on the Atari Lynx delivers the best of the genre's classics.
Game 27 of 30 for Atari Lynx
