Galerider is a high-speed rail-shooter where you take to the skies on the back of a Wind Drake to defeat the chaotic Overbeasts and save the world.
Certainly taking inspiration from the arcade classic series Panzer Dragoon, Galerider offers fast-paced action, familiar lock-on mechanics and epic boss fights — all while on the back of a dragon. You will need to dodge and dip past obstacles, fire off homing blasts and take down swarms of enemies to see your journey through to the end. Thankfully, Bree the Galerider has a dragon with lots of tricks up his scaly sleeves.
Riding through each level on the back of your Drake automatically pushes you forward, winding through the dangerous paths, as most rail shooters do. Bree can lock on to her adversaries with a swipe of the reticle over them. Holding down your finger on the screen can assist you in continuing to add lock-on targets to these enemies until you finally let go, unleashing a barrage of magic towards her unfortunate foes. If you want to unleash your drake’s more powerful attack, you must collect purple energy that comes from defeating enemies. With an upwards swipe, you can then unleash the ultimate attack, defeating all low health enemies and taking a huge chunk of health from any larger ones who dare stand in your way.
With multiple enemies on screen firing at you at once, it’s good to know that your drake has considerable maneuverability to dodge their attacks. You can shoot them down with Bree’s magic power of course, but if you swipe left or right, you can fully dodge any attack by barrel-rolling to a different ‘lane’ of the screen. This dodge move can certainly be useful during boss fights as it allows you to quickly avoid, in succession, powerful attacks coming your way. Unfortunately, it’s not only evil forces trying to stop you from your quest, as the environment can sometimes be just as dangerous.
During levels, you will sometimes find yourself speeding through environments filled with plenty of rocks, branches and other hazards that damage you if you manage to run into them. These sections encourage you to dodge around quickly between lanes, trying to collect crystals called ‘essence’ that will help to revitalize and invigorate you. Red crystals boost your attack power, blue ones increase your defense, green will restore lost health and yellow ones increase your score. Some of the crystals are placed in tough to reach spots, so it’s always good to keep your swiping finger ready to dodge at the last moment to safety. Enemies can still invade while you are zooming through these zones and defeating them will help you save up some energy for your ultimate attack; since you can always expect a boss to be looming around the corner, it’s good to pick them off when you are able to.
Boss fights are some of the most exciting parts of the game and never cease to inject challenge when you feel the game is getting too easy for you. Each one has unique attack patterns and taking damage from them can quickly take your hit points to zero. While most attacks can be avoided, some bosses have undodgeable attacks that require you to stop them from summoning energy before its unleashed. Doing so will give you a moment of reprieve to lock on and fire off as many shots as possible before they go back to their typical shot and physical attack patterns.
Galerider offers a unique opportunity to play a Panzer Dragoon type game on mobile, with an engaging story and impressive, dynamic gameplay. Having the ability to unlock additional drakes to ride offers a sense of progression and customization as each has its own particular strength, and honestly, they all look amazing and are fun to ride. The music tends to repeat itself often, but the epic score audibly frames your fantasy arcade adventures perfectly. I feel that anyone interested in dragons would fall in love with Galerider and thoroughly enjoy the experience from beginning to end.
Galerider is available now on the App Store.
