Lost In Translation/Athena

This page is a stub for arcade games that are part of the Lost In Translation series using information based on MAME (version 0.113u2).
For an example of preferred content and layout please refer to Out Run or The Ninja Warriors.

Athena
Manufacturer	SNK
Released	1986
Control Method	8-way Joystick 2 Button(s)
Main CPU	(3x) Z80 (@ 4.000 MHz)
Sound CPU	Mono (2x) YM3526 (@ 4.000 MHz)
Video Details	Raster (Horizontal) 288 x 216 pixels 60.00 Hz 1,024 Palette colours
Screens	1
ROM Info	14 ROMs 297,984 bytes (291.00 KiB)
MAME ID	athena

About The Game

This is a pretty hard platform game where you take the role of Athena fighting your way through different worlds inhabitated by all kinds of different enemies, ranging from moving pears to huge golems and flying devils.

You start out with nothing more than your feet to fight with and no more protection than Athena's underwear (she actually loses her dress in the intro to the first world) but can collect a huge number of different weapons and armour, as well as a great number of power-ups ranging from the usual more-power-for weapon or armour, through boots that allow her to jump higher and wings for flying, to one where Athena becomes a semi-god and actually growths to twice her usual size and gets a huge burning sword and full armour.

The worlds are filled with stone blocks that can be smashed when searching for secrets and items, as well as several levels connected by ladders or other means of transportation.

Athena is a great game, and will give even the most hardened platform-player a real challenge, for it is NOT an easy game, even with the dip switches in 'Easy' mode.

Trivia

The main character, Athena, appears in The King of Fighters series.

The 'Athena' logo on the title screen appears in 1991's "Sengoku" by SNK. In level 2, there is a store called 'Boutique Athena' in the background with the original 'Athena' logo.

Tips and tricks

• Test mode : hold START during machine boot.

• Something not found in the manual to this game is that there exists a 'secret' mode of the game - if you set dip switch 7 of bank 2 to 'ON' you will get one life less than usual (2 instead of 3 or 5), but the life meter will start at 22 and not 12 or 14 which is the standard. This will make the game much more interesting.

• Every time you die you loose every equipment you collected up to that point, unless you also have a 'K' Item in your inventory. If you have it, when you die you will only loose the 'K' but keep the rest of the items.

• There is a secret level that can be reached collecting a magic key on the Ice, Hell or Sky world. Other may exists. This world is called 'World of Labirinth'.

When you complete the 'world of labirinth', you will meet an angel. Do NOT attack her, but wait until she drops an harp. If you collect it, it will work as a perpetual 'K' item, and you will never loose your items again when you die.

• When you complete the 'World of labirinth', you will be returned to the level following to the one you picked up the key on.

Series

1. Athena (1986)
2. Psycho Soldier (1987)

Cabinet and Artwork

• 

  Athena flyer.

• 

  Back of the Athena flyer.

Ports

Bob Wakelin's original box art for the Imagine port of Athena.

Consoles

Nintendo Famicom (1987)

Computers

Commodore C64 (1987)

Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1987)

Soundtrack Releases

Album Name	Catalogue No.	Released	Publisher	Comments
SNK Game Music	28XA-120	1987-02-25	Scitron Digital Content Inc.	CD version.
Game Music Now & Then	SCDC-00292~3	2003-12-17	Scitron Digital Content	2 CD version.
SNK Game Music	SCDC-00106	2001-08-01	Scitron Digital Content	CD version.
SNK Game Music	ALC-22910	1987-02-25	Scitron Digital Content Inc.	Cassette version.
SNK Game Music	ALR-22910	1987-02-25	Scitron Digital Content Inc.	Vinyl version.
Athena the Music	SCDC-00567	2006-12-06	Happinet Corporation	CD version.
SNK Original Best	SCDC-00055	2000-12-06	Scitron Discs	CD version.

External Links

• Sinclair ZX Spectrum version of Athena at the World of Spectrum

References

The contents of this page are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
The sources used include MAME (version 0.113u2) and history.dat (revision 1.28 - 2008-10-18).
Please see http://www.arcade-history.com for credits.