River Patrol (video game)

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River Patrol
Developer(s)Orca Corporation
Tigervision (2600)
Publisher(s)Arcade
Tigervision (2600)
Platform(s)Arcade, Atari 2600
ReleaseArcade
2600
Genre(s)Action
Mode(s)Single-player, multiplayer

River Patrol (Japanese: リバーパトロール, Hepburn: Ribā Patorōru) is an action arcade video game developed by Orca Corporation and released by GGI in Japan in 1981. It was licensed to Kersten for distribution in North America.[2] The player pilots a patrol boat along a vertically scrolling river to rescue people from the crocodile-infested waters while avoiding obstacles along the way. Tigervision released an Atari 2600 version in 1984.

Gameplay[edit]

A swimmer in trouble is to the left of the patrol boat (arcade)

River Patrol is an action game where players take the role of a captain navigating a river patrol boat across multiple levels to rescue drowning people who fell into the crocodile-infested river for points while avoiding incoming boulders, floating logs and other obstacles that threaten to sink the vessel.[3] The main objective is to reach a dam at the end of each level before the timer runs out and the boat sinks.[3] Hitting a crocodile or crossing over a whirlpool causes the boat to sink rapidly, however crashing another boat, log, boulder or TNT instantly sinks the player's boat.[3] Once all lives are lost, the game is over unless the player inserts more credits into the arcade machine to continue playing.

Development and release[edit]

River Patrol was the second game to be developed by Orca Corporation, a Japanese video game developer headed by Takeshi Tozu, after 1980's Shogun.[1][4][5][6] The game was first released for arcades in Japan by GGI in July 1981 and later in North America by Kersten.[1][7] An Atari 2600 port, developed by Tigervision, was released in 1984.

Reception[edit]

In Japan, River Patrol was the eleventh highest-grossing arcade video game of 1981.[8]

In a retrospective review, Atari Gaming Headquarters' Keita Iida gave the Atari 2600 port a six out of ten score.[9]

Legacy[edit]

A bootleg version of the game developed by Falcon titled Silver Land was also released, changing the main premise to skiing.[10]

The 1981 VIC-20 game River Rescue has strong similarities to River Patrol, but scrolls horizontally. In 1982, Koichi Nakamura programmed a clone of River Patrol for the PC-8001, also titled River Rescue, that was published in the Maikon Game Book 4 special edition of Japanese magazine I/O.[11][12]

After the release of River Patrol into the market, Orca would go on to work on several projects: The Percussor, The Bounty, Looper, Springer, Funky Bee, Slalom and Sky Lancer, Vastar (published by Sesame Japan Corporation),[5][13][14] and Espial, among others.[1][6][15] On June 20, 1983, Orca went bankrupt.[6][16] Former members of the company later worked at Crux before forming Toaplan.[4][5][13][14]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d Akagi, Masumi (13 October 2006). オルカ Orca; Thomas Automatics (TAI); R (in Japanese) (1st ed.). Amusement News Agency. pp. 22, 138, 163. ISBN 978-4990251215. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  2. ^ "Overseas Readers Column - Orca Apologizes To Sega For Copies Of "Pengo" Also". Game Machine (in Japanese). No. 212. Amusement Press, Inc. 15 May 1983. p. 28.
  3. ^ a b c River Patrol Instructions (Atari 2600, US)
  4. ^ a b "ゲーム". Game Machine (in Japanese). No. 218. Amusement Press, Inc. 15 August 1983. p. 6.
  5. ^ a b c Iona; VHS; K-HEX (June 2009). "東亜プラン FOREVER". Floor 25 (in Japanese). Vol. 9. pp. 1–70. (Translation by Gamengai. Archived 2020-10-10 at the Wayback Machine).
  6. ^ a b c Uemura, Tatsuya. "私はだまされてゲーム屋になった！". Magicseed inc. Archived from the original on 2011-07-16. Retrieved 2020-07-30.
  7. ^ "River Patrol". Killer List of Videogames. International Arcade Museum. 2020. Retrieved 2020-07-30.
  8. ^ "Overseas Readers Column - "Donkey Kong" No.1 Of '81" (PDF). Game Machine (in Japanese). No. 182. Amusement Press, Inc. 15 February 1982. p. 30.
  9. ^ Iida, Keita. "AGH Atari 2600 Review: RIVER PATROL by Tigervision". atarihq.com. Retrieved 2020-07-30.
  10. ^ "River Patrol". arcade-history.com. Archived from the original on 2016-03-25. Retrieved 2020-07-30.
  11. ^ マイコンゲームの本 4. I/O別冊 (in Japanese). Kōgaku-Sha. 6 December 1982. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  12. ^ インタビュー: 中村 光一 (in Japanese). ASCII Corporation. 15 January 2005. pp. 62–65. ISBN 978-4756145918. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  13. ^ a b "東亜プラン シューティングクロニクル". SweepRecord (in Japanese). SuperSweep. 14 November 2011. Archived from the original on 2019-10-21. Retrieved 2020-07-10. (Translation by Shmuplations. Archived 2018-07-11 at the Wayback Machine).
  14. ^ a b Kiyoshi, Tane; hally (VORC); Yūsaku, Yamamoto (3 February 2012). "東亜プラン特集 - 元・東亜プラン 開発者インタビュー: 上村建也". Shooting Gameside (in Japanese). Vol. 4. Micro Magazine. pp. 33–40. ISBN 978-4896373844. (Translation by Shmuplations. Archived 2019-09-06 at the Wayback Machine).
  15. ^ "Overseas Readers Column - Orca Held First Private Show". Game Machine (in Japanese). No. 195. Amusement Press, Inc. 1 September 1982. p. 26.
  16. ^ "Overseas Readers Column - Orca Corp. Goes Bankrupt". Game Machine (in Japanese). No. 219. Amusement Press, Inc. 1 September 1983. p. 30.

External links[edit]

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