Rolling Ronny is a vibrant and colorful platform game from Starbyte Software. It was released in the very early nineties and found its way onto several platforms, including the Amiga, the Atari ST and the Commodore 64, and of course the personal computer running the MS-DOS operating system. It is a fast paced jump and run style of platformer that stars a youngster, Ronny, in an interesting little foray. It was popular enough to garner the workings of a sequel, but nothing was ever finalized.
Ronny is a hip young roller skater, and you will be guiding him all over his town and helping him to avoid obstacles that would prove detrimental to a skater’s health. He is working as an errand boy, and skating is the fastest way to deliver his packages and messages, the jobs for which will make up the levels or missions that you face. You will help him to avoid some not-very-friendly skaters, fallen objects, and other things lying in the sidewalk creating skating hazards. As you would expect in almost any platform game, you are going to have access to some pretty cool power ups, and collecting them will give Ronny some super skating powers, such as amazing speed and the ability to
actually fly.
While the theme of Rolling Ronny is sort of interesting and unique, the first few levels are pretty easy, almost geared for younger gamers. The backgrounds and obstacles are always the same and it gets pretty routine until you break out and pass into some of the higher levels where things change up and it gets a bit more fun. Hang in there. The good stuff will come.
As mentioned before, the basic goal of the game is to earn cash or points by running errands for the eccentric people of your town. There are nine total levels, and they consist of a park, office complexes, an underground sewer and the regular old city streets. Once you earn enough cash by running errands, you will “purchase a bus ticket” and be taken to the next part of town, or the next level.
As a whole, this is a pretty solid platform game. It isn’t overly long, and the first levels are pretty simple, making it more of a casual time killer than some great, never ending epic. The theme is fun, and the graphics are good and colorful, making the whole scene seem a little bit peppier. This is a good, unique game that is suitable for gaming fans of all ages.
