Galivan

Cosmo Police Galivan
Title screen of Cosmo Police Galivan.
Developer(s)	Nichibutsu
Publisher(s)	Nichibutsu
Director(s)	Shigeki Fujiwara
Designer(s)	Nakagawa Kyoko
Platform(s)	Arcade, NES
Release	1985
Genre(s)	Shoot 'em up
Mode(s)	Single player

Cosmo Police Galivan (コスモポリス ギャリバン Kosumoporisu Gyariban), is a single player, shoot-em-up arcade game developed and released worldwide by Nichibutsu. The game is inspired by the Japanese tokusatsu shows Space Sheriff Gavan and Space Sheriff Sharivan. It was later ported to Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, Sinclair ZX Spectrum and Nintendo Entertainment System. The game is included in the Arcade Archives series for PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch. The game has a sequel on Super Nintendo Entertainment System, called "Cosmo Police Galivan II: Arrow of Justice".^[1]

Gameplay

In the game, the player takes the role of the last remaining member of the Cosmo Police, who runs and jumps around a multi-directional scrolling environment on planet Cynep, with caves, baroque rooms and underwater zones, destroying or avoiding waves of constantly attacking robots, aliens and alien ships.

The player starts the game as an unarmed human, whose only attacking options are kicking and punching, but picking up a POW item encases the human in a robotic suit and arms the player with a laser gun. Collecting the blue POW items while in the suit awards the player with a powerful beam weapon for a limited time, while the red POW item gives the player a three-shot cannon. POW items are dotted throughout the levels and can also be gained by shooting the blue robot aliens.

The player's character has an energy bar that decreases whenever the player is hit. Should this fall below the halfway point, the robot suit will be lost and the player will once again be an unarmed human. Collecting a POW item while in human form will restore the player's energy. If a POW is collected while wearing the suit, however, the player's energy will NOT be increased but their weapon will receive a power-up. The game's platforms are littered with springboards that fire the player high into the air when stepped on. Some platforms - often containing POW items - can only be reached via a springboard.

At the end of every level, the player has to defeat a boss. The game only features two levels which, when completed, repeat endlessly.

Reception

In Japan, Game Machine listed Galivan on their January 15, 1986 issue as being the tenth most-successful table arcade unit at the time.^[2]

External links

• Galivan at the Killer List of Videogames
• Cosmo Police Galivan at MobyGames
• Galivan for Commodore 64
• Galivan for Amstrad CPC
• Galivan for Sinclair ZX Spectrum

References

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