Gate of Thunder (PCE CD, 1992)
Graphics-8 Sound-8 Control-8 Challenge-8 Story-?
Level Design-7.5 Frustration-8.5 Fun-8 Originality-4
Overall Score-8
+
Good variation (especially the enemy variation with very few repeats)
Manual speed adjustment (three levels)
Good bosses and mini-bosses overall (though most of them take very few hits with the third weapon)
Thunder Force-style weapons, level design and art direction
Respawn on the spot (unfortunately this makes the game very hard later on because you don't get a power up after death and you lose all weapon upgrades + your options)
Some cool effects (parallax, sprite scaling)
Nice intro
Difficulty options (easy to very hard)
Smart bombs (get them from power ups after full upgrades, they often come when nothing much is happening)
Almost no slowdown (some flicker instead)
+/-
Fairly long levels
Grabbing a shield allows you to take a few hits before death
-
Slightly unresponsive controls for the gun drones (works about 9 times out of 10 - when it doesn't they start spinning)
Uneven difficulty (Too hard to recover later on and too easy in the first levels)
Some levels look pretty samey (enemy base backgrounds)
Safe spot on first and second to last boss
Trial & error (enemies attacking from behind or from the background, bosses with fast attacks)
Controlling the options could be easier (you have to double tap to make them turn, otherwise they spin without shooting - stupid design decision)
Most backgrounds are a bit distracting (high contrast + high saturation)
Only three different weapons (and the green beam is noticeably weaker) but at least two of them have their specific uses
Music volume is a bit low
Uneven visual quality (some stages/enemies look worse than in TF3, others look like Lords of Thunder)
Somewhat scratchy voices
Level Design-7.5 Frustration-8.5 Fun-8 Originality-4
Overall Score-8
+
Good variation (especially the enemy variation with very few repeats)
Manual speed adjustment (three levels)
Good bosses and mini-bosses overall (though most of them take very few hits with the third weapon)
Thunder Force-style weapons, level design and art direction
Respawn on the spot (unfortunately this makes the game very hard later on because you don't get a power up after death and you lose all weapon upgrades + your options)
Some cool effects (parallax, sprite scaling)
Nice intro
Difficulty options (easy to very hard)
Smart bombs (get them from power ups after full upgrades, they often come when nothing much is happening)
Almost no slowdown (some flicker instead)
+/-
Fairly long levels
Grabbing a shield allows you to take a few hits before death
-
Slightly unresponsive controls for the gun drones (works about 9 times out of 10 - when it doesn't they start spinning)
Uneven difficulty (Too hard to recover later on and too easy in the first levels)
Some levels look pretty samey (enemy base backgrounds)
Safe spot on first and second to last boss
Trial & error (enemies attacking from behind or from the background, bosses with fast attacks)
Controlling the options could be easier (you have to double tap to make them turn, otherwise they spin without shooting - stupid design decision)
Most backgrounds are a bit distracting (high contrast + high saturation)
Only three different weapons (and the green beam is noticeably weaker) but at least two of them have their specific uses
Music volume is a bit low
Uneven visual quality (some stages/enemies look worse than in TF3, others look like Lords of Thunder)
Somewhat scratchy voices