Friday 9 February, 2007

Even though the graphics are all sprites, this game still looks great. Each level has about 10 unique enemies. Enemy shots are bright and easy to see. Explosions are very satisfying with little chunks of metal flying out. There is only one background, which gets a little old, but most of the time you aren't looking at it.

It has an excellent powerup system: when you defeat a powerup-holding enemy, three boxes float in a ring. One box powers up your gun, one box gives you another bomb, one box gives you a shield (you can only have one shield at once). If you are REALLY GOOD, fly your ship into the center of of the ring for a few seconds, and you can pick up all 3. I've only been able to do this once, on the first stage, when enemies weren't shooting at me.

Make sure to use your bombs. If you can do well enough to completely power up your gun and shield, it's very much worth it to use a bomb instead of lose your shield. This is because when you die your gun goes back to normal, and when you're not powered up it can be very tough on the later levels to clear out enemies as fast as they appear. That's probably my least favorite part of the game: once you die once you tend to die again quickly.

Good advertisement, but I'd like to see more reflection on specific elements of the game designe. What makes you thing it's an excellent game, what makes it fun, and what would you have done differently if you had designed it?

i like you