Thanks to GOG for posting one of the all time best shareware games of my youth. Raptor, is, and still is, fun to play, but there is a much better side-scroller that came out a few years after called, Tyrian. It took me all morning to remember the title, and I'm glad I did because it would've been lost in the void forever.
What's better, is that Tyrian is now officially freeware. http://www.freewebs.com/worldtreegames/TyrianFull.zip

What's more better is that there is port for windows and mac os x ... works quite well...
It can be found at http://code.google.com/p/opentyrian/ ...

That's exactly what occured to me as soon as I saw Raptor here.
The prince is already here, now bring on the king of side-scrolling PC shooters - Tyrian! :)

Yup, Raptor has landed .
But there is really something that keep clawing me, and thats was when Tyrian was released all those years ago;
Why did Raptor get all the screentime? Why did poor Tyrian come and then just simply fade away into darkness?
I remember asking alot of friends during my younger years if they had play a side scroller shooter Tyrian but everyone simply didnt know of the game, and yet when i shown them the game they loved it.
So what happened? It seems like Raptor came a year before Tyrian, but what was it that took more gamers to play Raptor than Tyrian?
[NOT SO IMPORTANT] And why did Screwattack add Raptor instead of Tyrian on their top ten side scroller shooter?
I bought Raptor to try it out finally after all these years for serious and well, im still liking Tyrian a bit more, but thats my opinion and everyone has their own voice i guess.
Thoughts?

...+1 to Backhanded Compliments.
Shouldn't "I want Tyrian!" go into the General Discussion forum?

To each their own, but I like Raptor better. I just really like the presentation - the explosions, the sounds, the graphics, destroying landmarks, etc - to me it was awesome. I didn't play Tyrian till a few years later and just did not enjoy it as much.

The day Tyrian comes around on GOG I will nervously click to buy it. Like someone else said, for me Raptor is great....but Tyrian is the king. So many secrets hidden, and ship powers. I long for that day. Maybe they could improve graphics like they did with Raptor, when Tyrian 2000 is around....who knows :)

Should Tyrian really be available on GoG? I can understand that Betrayal at Krondor, while already a free game, was released here - the compatibility issues fixed - but Tyrian is free AND thanks to OpenTyrian does not need any fixes. As a free release like Teenagent or BaSS, if it can be negotiated - sure, I guess, gives it more publicity. But if it were to be charged for... No, just no.
Also, from my first minutes of playing Raptor, Tyrian is superior - there is more screen area, the interface is better, the music is WAY better, and the pace seems quite a bit faster - not to mention all the extra game modes!

Once again,
[url]http://code.google.com/p/opentyrian/[/url]

Perhaps its the fact that I played Raptor first, but I find Tyrian to be... meh. I don't really like the graphics or the sound effects. I didn't play it before it came out on GOG, so I was excited by all the hype I heard about Tyrian by the people clamoring for its release on here.Sure, Tyrian has elements that far surpass those found in Raptor. However Raptor's elegance comes from its simplicity and that's perhaps why I like Raptor better.

I had both growing up (Raptor was actually the first shareware game I ever bought) and played Tyrian a heck of a lot more simple because it's more "accessible" which I guess is a nice way of saying easier. Having multiple lives and regenerating shields made the game much more forgiving than Raptor, where its real easy to get frustrated and quit when everything is so much harder to come by, health is short, and lives are nonexistent.

I couldn't compare the two and say one is better than the other, they're both fun and challenging in their own ways.

In what way is Tyrian simpler? I'm something of a fan of both games, and I hadn't noticed Tyrian being especially simple.

Interesting thought. I think Tyrian does a better job of giving you choices than does Raptor. In Tyrian, you must choose between multiple secret levels, or even between the choice between a secret level you know you can reach and another of which you're uncertain; you must choose whether to go to an exceedingly dangerous level for the equipment which lays before or beyond.
In the shop itself, the choices become just fun. Some weapons aren't worth the price you pay for them. Some are only worthwhile at higher levels, but may only be available now; in which case, do you sell all the levels of your other gun to buy it up, or do you rely on other forms of damage until that gun can be upgraded to usefulness? What if you are choosing between unique sidearms which have helped you up 'til now, or the new and strange sidearm which is in the shop at hand, costs more, but is very affordable?

Y'know, I'd go on more about this, brought to mind because of Extra Credits and their description of choice and decision-making, but I think it's best I take this notion to the Tyrian board.

In all seriousness, I love Raptor, but I always thought it simpler than Tyrian. The above has much to do with that feeling on my part, though mainly for me it's comparative difficulty; I didn't find Raptor too difficult until the final level.

As a further note, the variety of different sidearms and the power plant mechanic allows you to have distinctly different playstyles as well - you can go for powerful weapons you can only occasionally use, or balance for constant output; you can pick a ship for its stats or for a special ability you can really use (armor regen!!), and you can choose different weapons depending on how you like to fly and fight -- e.g. the flamethrowers are very powerful, but only if you are willing to get up close and personal and fly very aggressively, and depending on your weapon layout (and the level you're in!) you may get more value out of the uber-weapon powerup or out of something more defensive (or possibly something else - the fireblast one in particular has some unique uses as well).

I think Satertek may may just have been referring to the ease of playing - Raptor is much less forgiving, and with fewer options (particularly early on), you can't really change your approach to a level that's kicking your behind, you just have to try over and over until you get it right. Tyrian's richness of options make it easier to change your loadout or even fly the level differently (avoiding some reward sections, for example) - you can see simple solutions, while in Raptor it's not always clear what you're doing wrong, you just keep running out of health before the end of the level.