I can only imagine in 1985 this would have been a pretty impressive arcade shoot 'em up both visually and for it's music. The key word here is arcade though because playing this now you really feel that 'kill them for their quarters' vibe in places. the game will sometimes just railroad you into insane killzones of bullets flying your way or enemies appearing behind you in locations you can't actually shoot them from. It's both unfair and cheap at times. I played this on the Konami Arcade Classics Collection using save states and without them there isn't the slightest micron I would have beaten it or got close without them. It's hard as hell and even with modern platforms it still has a surprising amount of slow down in places.
It's not the only issue though. The game has one boss you fight maybe 5 times with no changes to it's pattern. I'm serious, the last "boss" doesn't even do anything, you shoot it and appear back at the start of the game, I thought my game had bugged initially it made so little sense. Talk about finishing on a whimper.
I will say it's got a pretty cool power up system. You collect what appear to be energy cells which move along a list of options each time you pick one up. when it's on the option you want you power up and gain it. Some have multiple uses so if you're good enough your ship can move super fast with 4 satellite ships firing lasers. The issue is the games base difficulty isn't built around your starting stats and the game knows it to the point when you die it gives a load of red ships / turrets to immediately give you power ups. If it's that poorly balanced then why bother having them as options if it's not rewarding good play is my feeling on it.
This is the 9th shoot 'em up I've played this year but probably one of the ones I liked least overall. It's a pretty well known classic but at the time of writing this game is 37 years old and in some places it hasn't aged well. That said it's still not the worst shoot 'em up I've ever played. Interesting power ups, nice visuals and music make it an ok experience that was perhaps ahead of it's time a bit. Looking forward to trying latter games in the series.
+ Nice graphics and music for 1985.
+ Interesting power up system.
- Cheap at times.
- Only one boss?
- Awful ending.
- Game not balanced around base ship.
It's not the only issue though. The game has one boss you fight maybe 5 times with no changes to it's pattern. I'm serious, the last "boss" doesn't even do anything, you shoot it and appear back at the start of the game, I thought my game had bugged initially it made so little sense. Talk about finishing on a whimper.
I will say it's got a pretty cool power up system. You collect what appear to be energy cells which move along a list of options each time you pick one up. when it's on the option you want you power up and gain it. Some have multiple uses so if you're good enough your ship can move super fast with 4 satellite ships firing lasers. The issue is the games base difficulty isn't built around your starting stats and the game knows it to the point when you die it gives a load of red ships / turrets to immediately give you power ups. If it's that poorly balanced then why bother having them as options if it's not rewarding good play is my feeling on it.
This is the 9th shoot 'em up I've played this year but probably one of the ones I liked least overall. It's a pretty well known classic but at the time of writing this game is 37 years old and in some places it hasn't aged well. That said it's still not the worst shoot 'em up I've ever played. Interesting power ups, nice visuals and music make it an ok experience that was perhaps ahead of it's time a bit. Looking forward to trying latter games in the series.
+ Nice graphics and music for 1985.
+ Interesting power up system.
- Cheap at times.
- Only one boss?
- Awful ending.
- Game not balanced around base ship.
2 Comments
@ Pkshyguy - I tried for a bit but gave up pretty early after dying to these platforms full of turrets that just slaughtered me every time no matter what I tried XD
Pkshyguy
1 year ago