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‘Henry Explorers’
[aka: ‘Crypt Killer’]

[PS1 / SAT] [JAPAN] [MAGAZINE] [1996]

“Arcades were filled with the sounds of light gun games during the mid-1990s. Everywhere you looked was another Area 51, Point Blank, Time Crisis, House of the Dead or Virtua Cop.

Konami was no stranger to this, putting out its own new arcade game in 1995 called Crypt Killer, or Henry Explorers for the Japanese audience, which was ported to the PlayStation in 1997. Unlike all the above-mentioned games, this one was largely forgotten, and the home version tanked in review scores: 4/10 from IGN, 33% from Absolute PlayStation, and 3.8 from GameSpot.

Big name developers don’t often get hit with low review scores, and there’s no doubt as to what caused the low scores: it simply wasn’t as good as its competition. Time Crisis came out for the PlayStation in the same year, and when comparing the two, Crypt Killer has inferior level design, visuals, and gameplay mechanics.

“Crypt Killer is disappointing, especially considering it came from the creators of Lethal Enforcers” was a common refrain amoung reviewers.

That should be all that’s needed. No need for any more specific information, right? 

The comparison to Lethal Enforcers is what interests me, as it leads to an odd conflict: Crypt Killer plays just like Lethal Enforcers, if not better.”
  ~@tangobunny, TangoPunk (#01)

• Source: Sega Saturn Magazine (JP), 12/27/1996 || RetroCDN; Hivebrain
• Note: TangoBunny’s Patreon-supported zine, TangoPunk, will be having its second issue soon! The first issue contains more of the ‘Crypt Killer’ breakdown that was quoted here and, after reading this and the rest of the issue, Tango definitely has the chops for proper game journalism! You can read it yourself as a PDF, as well as a physically printed zine, when you support TangoPunk on Patreon!