treasurin’ gunstar heroes

my sega experience continues to slowly grow. i finally beat a game on the original sega genesis, gunstar heroes, the first game created by treasure. treasure was apparently created by people who had left konami, and according to this article at hardcoregaming101.net gunstar heroes was developed by several people who had worked on contra iii, a game i had enjoyed but not loved.

although gunstar heroes may have taken contra as its starting point, its variety, unique weapon system (in which you combine two of four types of weapons to make a new one), and cartoony but cool personality make it feel distinctly fresh. in terms of comparing it to the contra series, hardcore gaming puts it well when it says:

In Contra, your heroes are killed after a single hit, demanding exact precision to dodge enemy fire or overpower quick moving bosses. Gunstar Heroes is much more forgiving, and doesn’t require nearly the same amount of reflexive intensity. While one could argue that it makes their games simpler, on the flip side, their relaxed approach actually make them a lot more fun, where you can concentrate more on the joys that come with dealing expansive amounts of damage without worrying too much about memorizing enemy patterns.

in what has become a treasure trademark the game is full of boss battles, and the screen is pretty much constantly chock-full of bullets and explosions, all at a blissfully smooth frame rate. the game features unlimited continues to further emphasize enjoyment as opposed to frustration, and in fact i played through the normal mode all in one sitting. there’s a lot of variety and a sense of always moving forward, although there’s one section (the dice palace) where the game slows to a crawl because you’re working your way around a board game-type board and, depending on how unlucky you are, you’ll probably end up having to play through the same mini-bosses many times. there’s also a shooter section at the end that feels unnecessary and frankly fairly dull.

overall, though, this is probably the best game i’ve played this year, although it doesn’t quite crack my greatest games of all time list. there’s a sense of sheer joy and fun that comes across, and the game points out the many things the contra series lacks that i never realized i missed, like a sense of humor and a cast of colorful antagonists (actually they’re literally “colorful” in this game, as they’re called by colors such as black and pink). i’m looking forward to trying out the game’s pseudo-remake on GBA, and at some point i’ll have to replay the original and experiment more with the different weapon combos instead of just sticking with the double chaser (and then maybe i’ll be up for tackling the hard modes). my experience with treasure games continues to deepen my appreciation for that studio, and i’m looking forward to continuing to delve deeper into their body of work.

treasure these gunstar heroes links:
- entry at wikipedia.org
- review at nintendolife.com
- weapons combinations FAQ

don’t punish yourself by missing the original sin and punishment

the N64 game sin and punishment was fairly well known among nintendo devotees as a highlight of the system, even though it was only released in japan. the game received more attention when it was released on wii’s virtual console in october 2007 in north america, and a few months later when one of its main characters, saki, appeared as an assist trophy in super smash bros. brawl. both were probably in preparation for the release of a sequel to the game, sin and punishment: star successor, two years later (in june 2010 in north america).

phew. with that out of the way, although i had downloaded the original game ages ago i only recently got around to playing through it. although the original voice overs were in english, the new translation of the tutorial for the virtual console rerelease removes any possible remaining roadblocks. the game’s controls do take some getting used to, but the game includes several different control options, and they work quite well on the gamecube and classic controllers (and no doubt on the original N64 controller also).

my experience with run ‘n gun-type shooters has been limited to 2-D games, mostly focused on the contra series, but the game is immediately enjoyable. i started off on the normal mode, but realized it would be easier to learn the ins and outs of the game on easy mode first. finishing easy mode isn’t completely trivial, and the thrills come at a pretty constant rate thanks in large part to the extensive amount of boss battles. the highlight of the game is without a doubt level 2-1, in which you zoom around an aircraft carrier on a hovercraft, but there’s a lot to enjoy even outside of the boss battles.

there’s some cheapness and the second half of the game (including the side-scrolling stage near the end) is definitely not as brilliant as the first, and the story is completely nonsensical and impossible to follow. still, all in all this is an excellent game and ends up earning a place fairly high on my list of best N64 games. don’t be put off by people claiming that the game is too short. although there are only 7 stages including the prologue, beating the normal mode will definitely take more practice. i didn’t manage to beat all of the normal mode, but i left it for another day because i’m more eager to play through the sequel; the wii is absolutely ideal for this gameplay. by all accounts it sounds like the sequel improves on the original in every way, so given the amount i enjoyed this game i’m definitely looking forward to it.

punishing sin and punishment links:
- great FAQ at gamefaqs, including a translation of the background story so you have at least a clue about what’s going on
- entry at wikipedia
- entry on the series at hg1010
- wikipedia entry on the co-developer, treasure

blasting off with astro boy for GBA

it’s been a while since i’d played a GBA game, so i picked up astro boy: omega factor, a game that seems to have gotten a lot of great reviews. the game is also noteworthy for being co-developed by treasure, a company that has a great reputation but that i haven’t spent much time with, not surprising since they’re most known for their shmups, a genre that doesn’t grab my attention that much in general.

anyway, like most americans my exposure to the astro boy universe was pretty minimal. the game is packed with cameos from astro boy-creator osamu tezuka’s entire career, and the game does full justice to his broad range of colorful characters, so much so that i’ve been motivated to explore some of the astro boy anime series and manga.

in terms of the game itself, i’m not a huge fan of beat ‘em ups either, mostly because i find them to be oftentimes mind-numbingly repetitive. astro boy: omega factor does a nice job of providing just enough enemy and scenic variety to keep things interesting, and it also achieves a good balance of requiring the player to alternate between regular attacks (required for filling up a power meter) and special attacks. the gradual RPG-like upgrade of stats such as health and special attacks also helps make it feel like you’re making continual progress. regular stages are interspersed with basic shooter-like stages, and there’s a generous number of boss battles, which again provide a good amount of variety to keep you engaged, helped in no small part by tezuka’s great character designs. the story is fairly nonsensical, and there is a drawback to having so many cameos which is that you don’t get much exposure to any one character other than our eponymous hero. another point worth mentioning is that although the visuals are great and feature tons of explosions and fireworks, the tradeoff is an excessive amount of slowdown that in my opinion is just not worth the cost to the gameplay.

as for other downsides, i’d read that the game was short but i hadn’t realized how incredibly short it actually is. each section of the levels is fairly short, and the game provides unlimited continues; on the default difficulty level you can easily breeze through the game in one sitting. the game incorporates a second playthrough in its storyline which requires you to replay all the levels, some several times because certain story events are only triggered when you play a sequence of stages in a certain order. this is definitely a cheap tactic, and i ended up spending way too much time wandering around trying to figure out the correct order so i could just finish the game. at that point the limitations of the game (and more generally the genre) became more and more oppressive and i was incredibly bored, but in the end i gave in, consulted a FAQ, and quickly finished the game. i tried out the harder difficulty level a bit but didn’t find it made the game any more interesting to me, although i suppose it’ll be somewhat worth getting more into next time i pick up the game.

despite the shortness and repetitiveness (a strange combination) this was definitely one of the better beat ‘em ups i’ve played and has a lot of personality. it points to possibilities within the genre, but for now beat ‘em ups are still going to remain low on my list of favorites.

astro boy’s 100,000-horsepowered links!
- entry at wikipedia
- reviews at racketboy.com and nintendojo.com
- entry at metacritic.com
- FAQ at gamefaqs