Tyrian 2000 comes with a huge amount of options, which makes this game one of the best Arcade-Scrolling game in years.
To start, let's talk about the game's mechanic. You can play two types of single-player games: 'Arcade' and 'Full Game'. The Arcade mode let's you play Tyrian like the 19xx game series: You start with an weak ship and gets stronger by destroying the targets (flying enemy ships, buildings and so) and picking up the power-ups. This mode is old-school and is OK, especially if you're going to let a high score for others to beat. The 'Full Game' mode is away more interesting, and allows you to save and load your progress. You start with a very weak ship, 10,000 credits and a menu that you can buy and sell a variety of equipments for your ship. The first option is also one of the most important, it's about the ship you're gonna use. In general, the expansive one is the best (with a few rare exceptions). There is no big difference between the available ships, just the visual and the 'armor', which means how much damage you can take before you die. The other options lets the player to choose the 'front gun' (your main weapon), the 'rear gun', the 'left' and 'right sidekick', the 'shield' (additional protection to the armor) and your 'generator' (it produces the amount of energy necessary to recharge the shield and to use the weapons). Although there're a lot of options, you just need to use four keyboard keys and the directionals to play Tyrian 2000. Also, it can be played with the mouse.
The front and rear guns can be upgraded up to level 11. This increases the damage dealt, rate of fire, generator usage and the price to the next weapon's level. The left and right sidekicks are additional sources of damage, weaker than the front and rear guns. Some sidekicks have limited ammo, but they recharge over the time and also when a level is completed.
After upgrading and enhancing the ship, the player can start a level. Sometimes the game lets you to choose the next level, which significantly changes the game's course for a while. Each one has a lot of enemies, towers and other buildings to shoot at, not counting some asteroids and obstacles to dodge. Most targets, after destroyed, provides some cash and other few rare power-ups (some are temporary, others not). Almost every level you can find crystals, fruits, flying beers (!) etc. that gives you a lot of credits.
If you like story and some reading, there're a huge amount of text about almost everything in the game, found at the 'Data Cubes'. These ones are flying objects, mostly acquired after destroying an enemy. I recommend the reading of these messages; some of them contain important information of the game.
Also, there is the option to play a cooperative game. It plays much like the single-player arcade, but one of the players controls some sort of 'mother ship', that can be attached with the ship controlled by the second player. It's fun, but could be a lot better with the 'Full Game' options, like saving and loading feature, ship customization and so.
The 2000 version of Tyrian comes with two new episodes (added to the original three episodes), a few new weapons and ships, new levels to first three episodes and some in-between mini-games. The last episode is a joke, unfortunately. Although there're really good equipment for your ship, most enemies are flying, huge fruits and parts of the human body (noses, eyes...). But it's okay, because Tyrian 2000 already comes with sharp graphics, great sounds, amazing soundtracks and a freakin' replayability. You can try numerous of ship combinations, along with three difficult settings, not to mention the secrets.
Is there a better arcade game than Tyrian 2000? As you can see, I love this old MS-DOS game. Incompatibility with newer Operating Systems is probably the big issue with Tyrian 2000, but this can be easily solved with DOS emulators. I recommend this game if you're either an oldware's fan or not.