REVIEW : Centipede: Recharged (PC)
Space Invaders is without a doubt the forefather of the shmup genre that we all know and love today. When it debuted at the end of the 1970s, it became an instant cultural symbol of the time. To avoid feeling left out, Atari released Centipede to kick off the 1980s, spawning the legendary arcade insect shooter series.
It enjoyed the same level of success and praise as Pac-Man and other arcade legends. Centipede was a shooter with mechanisms that instantaneously linked to the player’s nervous system, as they blasted all types of bugs through high-speed shooting action, like other games from the golden period.
Centipede: Recharged, released 40 years later, continues the tradition started by Missile Command: Recharged last year of revitalising a classic arcade for a current audience. Whereas Missile Command’s modernisation was confined to new aesthetics and a rather simple upgrade system, Atari has gone above and beyond to make Centipede feel fresh in 2021 by adding various playable options.
Atari used Tron-inspired wireframe visuals frequently in their arcade releases in the 1980s, and Centipede: Recharged brings them back in style. The game’s visual aesthetic is simple but engaging, and a piece of rapid techno music accompanies it. Despite the abundance of particle effects, the game never causes a seizure. So everything is apparent and practical, thanks to the distinct colours that make identifying the various threats a breeze. The key artwork is also cool, harkening back to when lavish cover art had to compensate for essentially non-existent visuals.
Although the field of play is much smaller than how the antique arcade cabinet was set together, it is effective and ideally matches the Switch in handheld mode. Players can travel about their field, which is now differentiated by a purple haze, and all of the action takes place on one screen. Various bug adversaries strike from above, and the titular centipedes must be chopped down piece by piece. Other enemies, such as fleas that shower down and scorpions that attack from the side.
Anyone who remembers the original Centipede will recall the infamously speedy spiders. These nefarious bugs would dart about the screen, making it difficult to shoot them down. They’re surprisingly slow and sluggish in the Recharged edition, and that’s because they play a new role in the game design by transporting power-ups.
As the various power-ups provide powers like rapid-fire, dual fire, and spread shot, with benefits like shortening downtime or even scaring bugs away, the main shooting action mixes up in some admirable ways.
Thanks to a simple control scheme and fast-paced action, this is one of those games that you’ll want to repeatedly since everything works so well.
Beyond the arcade game, the true fun is in the challenge mode, where you’ll find a variety of goals and conditions to satisfy, which can be rewarding to complete and even repeat to improve your score (or time) and climb the global rankings. Even though the game only allows local co-op, which is fun, the internet leaderboards alone make it the perfect arcade experience at home.
The high score is timeless and universal, and while video games have gone a long way since the Atari days, games like Centipede: Recharge demonstrate that some gameplay loops never go out of style. The game also offers several milestones for players to seek down and add to their collection of bragging rights.
Shooting a specific sort of bug, using a specific power-up, surviving for a certain amount of time, and hitting a scoring milestone in a certain amount of time are all difficulties. Still, the trials where you are not allowed to shoot any centipedes are the most entertaining since they put your dodging skills to the test.
What’s even better is that when you achieve each of these objectives, you’ll steadily improve your core gameplay skills, which will automatically convert into higher scores in the arcade mode. It’s all quite fulfilling, so even if you only play for a few minutes a day, you’ll want to keep playing.
There are a few little quibbles, but they don’t detract from the overall experience. It would have been helpful to understand how the point and the scoring system worked in the old days with flashing numbers, but this isn’t too difficult to figure out. Furthermore, the absence of the original Centipede game concept from the 1980s was a missed opportunity. Even with the additional power-ups, the Recharged experience remains faithful to the original.
