Last updated on February 3rd, 2026 at 04:46 am
Vigilante is a beat ’em up arcade video game developed and published by Irem in Japan and Europe, and published in North America by Data East. It was released for various platforms, including the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum and Amiga.
The game Vigilante, originally released for the C64 and Amiga, has also seen a remake. Despite receiving mixed reviews for its original versions, the Amiga version of the game was praised for its graphics and sound effects, while the Commodore 64 version received criticism in these areas.
The game’s story revolves around a martial artist who sets out to rescue his girlfriend from a ruthless gang. The player must fight through the gang’s members to reach the girlfriend and ultimately confront the gang’s leader.
The remake seeks to capture the essence of the original game while addressing some of the criticisms it received.
Despite the mixed reception of the original versions, the Vigilante game series holds a place in gaming history, and the remake offers an opportunity for both fans of the original and new players to experience the game in a new light. Whether the remake successfully addresses the shortcomings of the original versions is a matter for players to discover.
The Amiga version of the game received some positive reviews for its graphics and sound effects, while the Commodore 64 version received a low score for having no action and no game.
The Remake
The original VigilanteTM is an arcade game published in 1988 by IREM CORP. They are the authors of this work of art and playability.
“This” Vigilante is coded by me (Yves Rizoud) in C w/ DJGPP and Allegro, and is NOT an accurate port or anything:
- I developped for 1 year with only memories of the arcade game, and an emulation of the PC Engine version of Vigilante (the most accurate of all, yet very minimalistic)
- Then the MAME team added support for the original Vigilante in their emulator, and at that time I felt in heaven. I spent weeks ripping from the ROM and recomposing the graphics. So all the background art and 95% of the sprites are from the arcade. Others I did draw myself.
- But I silently fixed some ‘bugs’ (mainly playability ones), while keeping some interesting ones, and added some new features (the original game has one weapon, I added 5)
- Finally I began freely tweaking the gameplay and added even more new stuff.. experimental things.
All in all, I tried to keep the feeling of the game that captured my heart; while adding new game possibilities. The visual is as close as can be, the animation is top smooth. Ahh, the sound effects are 80% from the original game, so they’re ok, unfortunately I found no fitting soundtrack… The music packs contain music found from various Internet sources, it’s a very different feeling from the original game and I don’t like it very much.
When I will finish this project, if I have time and keep interest in it, I may add a new episode with new enemies and such.. but this is only a possibility.
