Zarlor Mercenary is a single or multiplayer vertically-scrolling “bullet hell” shooter that was developed by Epyx and released exclusively for the Atari Lynx in 1990. The game plays in landscape (horizontal) format, and the background scrolls horizontally too.

Zarlor Mercenary was programmed by Chuck Sommerville (the creator of Chip’s Challenge, Summer Games II and California Games, among others), with graphics by Matt Crysdale; music/sound and level design by Chris Grigg, and additional programming by Stephen Landrum.

The plot, such as it is, sees you intervening in a years-long war between the Zarlor and the Mendicant. Having reached a stalemate the Zarlor have hired mercenaries to help tip the balance and defeat the Mendicants, which is where you come in.

There are six different mercenaries to play as, each with their own permanent ability (Brenda, for example, will start with auto fire by default – meaning that she fires repeatedly if you hold down the fire button). And there are six different stages – a desert level, a swamp level, a water level, a moon level, an ice level, and a city level – all of which are located on the Mendicant planet that you are attacking.

Your primary weapons are missiles that fire forward when you press the ‘A’ button. Secondary weapons are picked-up as you progress through the levels and these are fired by pressing the ‘B’ button. Pressing ‘Option 1’ unleashes a “mega bomb” that will destroy everything on-screen, or severely damage bosses. These are very limited, though.

Destroying enemy craft and ground installations earns you money, and in-between levels you get access to a shop where you can buy and sell ship add-ons, mega bombs and extra lives. Selling one of your lives to raise extra cash is not something you see very often in a game like this (not that I ever did it, but you might want to), but it is an interesting feature.

Another interesting feature is that you can stack up ship enhancements. As you play, floating spheres can be collected that award you add-ons like side blasters, auto-fire, speed-up boosters, mega bombs, and more powerful front-mounted cannons, and if you already have, say, an auto-fire, then collect another, if you lose a life (and therefore your ship’s current enhancements), any auto-fires you have in backup will be applied to your next life, which is a good way of not losing all your enhancements when you lose a life (an annoying and common problem in progressive-weapon shooters). It seems like the developers have really thought some ideas through in Zarlor Mercenary, which makes the game more enjoyable.

At the end of each level there’s a boss battle, and these are fairly spectacular for a handheld shooter. And they’re pretty tough.

Up to four players can play Zarlor Mercenary simultaneously using the ComLynx port, but each player must have their own cartridge inserted for it to work. In multiplayer mode there are extra abilities – like the “backstabber” weapon which can kill other players – or you can cooperate to complete the game.

Zarlor Mercenary was obviously designed by Epyx to be the best scrolling shooter on the Lynx, and it arguably is, with decent graphics and solid gameplay. It’s also a very challenging game and truly is ‘bullet hell’ at times, with lots of objects moving around the screen and no sprite tearing to be seen at all. The only downside is that there’s no scoring, or high score table, and when the game ends there doesn’t seem to be any way to re-start, other than by re-setting the Lynx (which is a bit severe).

Overall, Zarlor Mercenary is still worth playing today. And if you’re a collector of real Lynx hardware and games then it’s a must-own title.

The game was re-released on Steam in 2022, but it’s a bit expensive for what it is. It should really be half, or even a quarter of the price they’re charging for it.

More: Zarlor Mercenary on Wikipedia
Steam: Zarlor Mercenary on Steam