Jetpac Refuelled

A return to old-school arcade sadism

I don't quite know how I feel about this game. It isn't good, that's for sure. But it isn't bad either, that's also for sure. As you might have guessed from the name (and from the fact that probably 90% of people playing this got it through Rare Replay), this is a reboot/remaster of the oldschool Jetpac game for Atari. The mechanics and premise are the same - fly around the screen, shoot aliens, collect spaceship parts, collect fuel, blast off, and repeat. The first few levels are gently, but the difficulty ratchets up real quick around level 7 or 8.

The online achievements are easy to boost and can be knocked out in 5-10 minutes max. The high score achievement can be boosted on level 25 (see youtube for details on how), and everything else comes down to finishing levels in Refuelled mode, finishing Retro mode, and getting to level 10 without dying. Finishing Refuelled levels isn't so hard, since you get a new checkpoint every 4 levels and can restart from there. It will take some grinding because of how tough levels can get, but when you can blow all your lives and bombs on just getting through 4 levels, you'll get there eventually. Getting to level 10 without dying is rough. Old school arcade difficulty is on full display, and you should be prepared to have enemies spawn on top of you without warning, your gun to randomly change up the timing of its shots to let an enemy through, and Jetman to decide the moment before you take a hit is the exact moment to drop the ship part or fuel cell which would have otherwise saved you. It'll be frustrating but it can be done with some strategic use of bombs, good gun upgrade management, and some luck. As for retro mode... well hell I don't know if I'll ever even get there myself, but kudos to you if you do!

I would never recommend anyone spend actual money on this game, but for a little arcade title that was included in a larger bundle, it's not so bad.
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