paleface [sys=PCCD; cat=Shooter_Horiz; reg=JPN] |
| | At first glance this game would seem to have a lot going for it: vibrant, cute super-deformed sprites, a bouyant rockabilly soundtrack (if "rockabilly" can be taken to mean something along the lines of "hick ass-rock"), and... oh wait, I've just run out of things. The game has only four levels and you can play them one at a time in whatever order you like. They aren't long and really aren't particularly challenging, other than the challenge of staying awake. The main menu has lots of toggle options but they all seem to lead to these four levels--possibly some of the options change the difficulty a bit, but I'm not certain of that. CD Kid (this is all a little in-joke parody of Hudson's own PC Genjin (aka "Bonk" -- and see entry 477) games, of course) sometimes finds little animal type things that give him a new outfit with new powers, such as sushi chef. While cute, you only come across one of these costumes per level (that's all I found, anyway) and they don't seem to be power-upgradeable. Actually that reminds me, one of the most frustrating things here is the power level of your guns: weak. It can take four or five seconds of solid auto-fire (built in, just hold down the button) to take out even little lame commonplace enemies. Not that fun. Something odd happens when you press the other button if you have a costume: the costume flies off, leaving you with your normal weapon, but then it comes back and flies around you as an option, unless you press the button again to re-arm it. An odd little ceremony, and doesn't really seem that useful when the options' power levels are so much lower than everyone else's, anyway. The game feels a little--make that a lot--lacking. I hear the HuCard CD Denjin game is much more inspired, but I haven't really sat down and played that one yet. |
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| | Erps, the HuCard one is "PC Denjin," of course. |
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