Yars Rising

• Genre: Platforming Action (Metroidvania), Arcade
• Spoiler Free Review: Mostly, just mechanical progression shared and such. The story isn't the draw anyway.
• Time Played: ~10 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It's solid.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: Actually way better than I expected going in. It's a pretty awesome soundtrack with a lot of original vocal tracks.
• Why I played: I've been playing Panzer Dragoon Saga here and there and while I was playing I wanted to play Panzer Dragoon(not Saga), but diverted to the 2011 Yar's Revenge which is also an on-rails shooter, but then was like "Wait don't I have some kind of Yars-themed Metroidvania and I decided to check this out.
• Jank: It's got a little jank with the controls not feeling 100% the way they're supposed to. Other than that I don't think there is anything.
• Difficulty: This one is a roller coaster. Because of the original Yars Revenge style arcade challenges, it has moments where it's very difficult. By default it leaves a prompt for "Invincible Yar" for arcade sections - if you lose a couple times it'll prompt you at each challenge. I turned this off myself, so I can't speak for how much "easier" the game makes it. I imagine some of those arcade challenges might even be a little difficult even when invincible. 
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm pretty please with this, I enjoyed it way more than I expected.
• Recommend to others: I'm not entirely sure I would go out of my way to. It's not like I know a lot of people clamoring for more Yars Revenge content in 2026. It's kind of an odd weird out of place game that feels like it's made by a bunch of of 50+ aged developers who want to make a game to appeal to the 15-35 age group who aren't into classic Atari games enough.
  

Yars Rising surprised me, I enjoyed it a lot. As a stand-alone metroidvania, it's not too much, it's pretty much the basics at bare-minimum with serviceable game play, often cringy but not entirely too bad dialog, in near-stock with just enough going on to not look too bland environments. It's one of a million in the genre, especially those in the breadth of recent indie metroidvania games.

Then there is the music, the music is stellar enough that it may have kept me playing on it's own. Good music can really elevate an experience in a video game. Not necessarily make a bad one enjoyable, but make a somewhat enjoyable one enjoyable enough to keep playing, or otherwise make a good game a great experience.

Then there is the "hacking", which is performed by playing various challenges that are - for the most part, just playing the original Yars Revenge, each with a condition, goal, modifier, etc. Sometimes you're playing a version inspired by another Atari game entirely. Some of these are extremely difficult, but besides turning invincible mode on, you also have a degree of skill customization that allows you to equip abilities for both the overworld game play, and the hacking.

And that's another point. The game isn't just a Yar game, it's an Atari game. It's filled with references to other Atari franchises - primarily in it's boss battles. As you progress, or once you've finished the game, you've unlocked dozen more of the Arcade-style challenges just to play from the main menu sans equipable skills. So when you're done with the adventure, you're still left with more straight-forward Yar game. At the very least, it's a good value.