Savage Download (1988 Arcade action Game)

Savage contains three different parts, each with its own style. You can play all three, but to get more than one life on levels 2 or 3, you must first input the code earned on completing the previous level.

You play Savage, a muscular warrior who was imprisoned in a castle. When he broke free, he found out that his imprisonment had been a trick with the sole purpose of imprisoning his love, the maiden. You have to progress through the 3 parts of the game to rescue her. The first is a simple horizontal-scrolling shooter, in which you use the trajectory of your shots to kill enemies and collect the treasures and improved weapons they drop when killed. The second is a 1st person perspective 3D shooter resembling Space Harrier, with skulls to shoot and monoliths to avoid. In the third you play Savage's Eagle form, flying through platform-style levels avoiding timing-based hazards and shooting anyone who gets in your way. In this section bubbles can be shot to release power-ups.

Savage is a little-known gem from much better known software developer, Probe Entertainment (and was even programmed by Brian O'Shaughnessy, who also worked on Mortal Kombat). In Savage, you play the role of a medieval barbarian, interestingly enough named Savage, who broke free from a castle in which he was imprisoned just to find out that he was tricked into the castle just to allow the capture of his maiden girlfriend. As Savage, you must progress through three fundamentally different action subgames in order to save the maiden.

Savage is a technical wonder. Featuring tweaked PC-speaker music and sound, amazingly well-programmed EGA action sequences (including two side-scrolling levels with many sprites and even a 3D-view plane with depth-scaled sprites), Savage thrills me even today with its excellent graphics and great music. It is a classic how few people know, and I'm glad I kept the disk and can play it today as well. Get it. Now.

How to run this game on modern Windows PC?

People who downloaded Savage have also downloaded:
Space Harrier, Smokin' Guns, SideWinder, Starsky & Hutch, Star Wars: Millennium Falcon CD-ROM Playset, Soccer Kid, Speed Busters: American Highways (a.k.a. Speed Devils), Alcor Trivia Pro Classic Star Trek (Star-Log I)