An on-foot Vertical Scrolling Shooter for the Nintendo Entertainment System, made by Hudson Soft. It was released in Japan by the year 1987 (as Shin Jinrui: The New Typenote ) and in America by the year 1989.
Tropes:
- American Kirby Is Hardcore: Inverted. The American boxart feels tame when compared to the Japanese boxart which has mild cartoon violence.
- Bullet Hell: Everything shoots little white flickering energy balls at you. EVERYTHING. The monsters that walk back and forth, the monsters that fly in arcing patterns, the monsters that fly in zig-zag patterns, the monsters that try to dive bomb you, they're all shooting at you, all the time.
- Continuing is Painful: Dino Riki's default weapon is throwing rocks which are unreliably slow but can be replaced, via weapon upgrades, with Tomahawks, Boomerangs, and finally Fireballs. Unfortunately, dying reduces him back to using rocks, which leaves him at the mercy of fast-moving enemies.
- Endless Game: After defeating the final boss, the game just loops back to stage 1. Which means that you get absolutely nothing for clearing all seven worlds in one sitting.
- Equipment Upgrade: Dino Riki initially throws rocks, but power-ups let him upgrade it into tomahawks, then boomerangs, and finally fireballs that he can shoot in various directions; however his weapons downgrade again if he takes damage.
- Hard Levels, Easy Bosses: With the exception of the Monster Fly, the bosses are pretty easy even if Dino Riki is using the stone. If he's got the torch, they're pretty much "Hold A and Win".
- Hyperactive Sprite: Justified since the stages are constantly scrolling, forcing Dino Riki to stay on the move. At least up until you get to the Boss.
- Lily-Pad Platform: Large lily pads can be stood on. Some of them temporarily sink into water.
- Painfully Slow Projectile: Dino Riki's default weapon: Throwing rocks.
- Power Up Let Down: One of the power-ups transforms Dino Riki into Macho Riki, which lets him shoots psychic projections of himself at enemies and take a hit without losing health. Unfortunately, the fact that Dino Riki reverts back to using throwing rocks after getting hit and the fact that the fireball weapon is much, MUCH better make this power-up more trouble than it's worth.
- Getting too many 'Boot' powerups, which increase Dino Riki's speed, will make him almost uncontrollable and increase his risk of running into an enemy, an enemy's bullet, or falling into water/a pit.
- Lady Not-Appearing-in-This-Game: There's a cave girl in the Japanese boxart
who does not appear in the game itself. Not much is shown of her since the game's logo covers most of her. - Prehistoria: The game takes place in this setting, the player character is a caveman, and some of the bosses includes a T-Rex, and a Pterodactyl.
- Shout-Out: Dino Riki was modeled after Riki Choshu, a popular Japanese pro wrestler.
- Super Drowning Skills: There are river crossings in this game that serve as deathtraps if Dino Riki botches a jump. And on top of that, there are also small (but deep) puddles that will kill him just as well.
- Temporary Platform: There are big lilypads in the jungle levels which sink and float back up for a few seconds.
