| paleface [sys=PCE; cat=Shooter_Horiz; reg=JPN] |
| | | Offbeat horizontal shooter with really weird enemies. Said enemies not only look bizarre (most tend to be undeciferable, the bosses like to have two sections connected by eyeballs, and you have to shoot out all the eyeballs before you can damage the boss), they tend to have very erratic movement patterns.
Powerups are unusual too--after three stages I was still finding powerups I hadn't seen before, and they all kind of stack on top of each other, so you can become one pretty mean blasting machine, in a weird sort of way anyhow.
All the ships, except bosses, are tiny and hard to see, and that goes double for some of the projectiles they shoot. The graphics in general aren't at all top-notch, though there are nice touches such as the sunrise that gradually illuminates the background of the third stage.
Oh, when you die, you have to restart the level, though you have all the firepower you had when you started the level the first time. Still, it is frustrating, and the erratic movement patterns of the enemies will get you good from time to time, even though your ship can take multiple hits before blowing up.
What else... Sound and music, not so good. Sound is downright bad, in fact. The game has little converations scenes between stages, presumably they're talking about finding this Sunheart thing or something, but for all I know (and for all the graphics show during these scenes) they could be talking about going out for a burger.
The game appeals on a visceral action level since it moves pretty fast and keeps giving you more and more powerups, but the other weirdness doesn't quite hit the right note. Oh, and you only have one button, fire, and it really seems to be meant to be used with auto-fire. So you just switch that on and hold the button down the whole time. |
|
|
| | |
