Summer Carnival '92: Recca (NES, 1992)
Graphics-8 Sound-6.5 Control-8.5 Challenge-9 Story-?
Level Design-6.5 Frustration-9 Fun-6.5 Originality-6
Overall Score-6.5
+
Some interesting mechanics (gun drone formations, drones as shields, charge up smart bomb which also works as a shield (you can fire during its effect and it covers a relatively small portion of the screen)
Very good bosses overall
Some large and detailed sprites
Some nice visual effects (basic sprite scaling, raster effects, fast scrolling, multi-jointed arm parts on some bosses)
Manual speed adjustment
In some ways technically impressive (but repetitive and mostly forgettable) soundtrack
+/-
Respawn on the spot (see below)
Power ups quickly leave the screen
-
No credits (!)
Slowdown and flicker (makes the difficulty very uneven because the game's much faster after dying, flicker affects enemy bullets)
No weapon inventory
Trial & error (using the right weapons for every situation, fast and unsignalled attacks, some attacks from behind, boss patterns)
Hard to recover after dying later on (respawn on the spot without any upgrades and without getting new power ups during boss fights)
Repeats bosses 1-4 once
Tedious third boss
Some bosses go down to quickly to bombs (final boss for example)
Pretty basic level design overall (no level hazards or ground enemies, no destructible scenery)
Some annoying sfx and instruments (Jetter/stage 1a, laser weapon) and nearly the whole OST sounds like boss music. There's also a bug with the triangle channel making it always be on and playing what sounds like the lowest possible note whenever it's not used for the music, causing an annoying dissonance in various tracks
Removes the HUD for boss fights (shows speed and how charged the bomb is)
Level Design-6.5 Frustration-9 Fun-6.5 Originality-6
Overall Score-6.5
+
Some interesting mechanics (gun drone formations, drones as shields, charge up smart bomb which also works as a shield (you can fire during its effect and it covers a relatively small portion of the screen)
Very good bosses overall
Some large and detailed sprites
Some nice visual effects (basic sprite scaling, raster effects, fast scrolling, multi-jointed arm parts on some bosses)
Manual speed adjustment
In some ways technically impressive (but repetitive and mostly forgettable) soundtrack
+/-
Respawn on the spot (see below)
Power ups quickly leave the screen
-
No credits (!)
Slowdown and flicker (makes the difficulty very uneven because the game's much faster after dying, flicker affects enemy bullets)
No weapon inventory
Trial & error (using the right weapons for every situation, fast and unsignalled attacks, some attacks from behind, boss patterns)
Hard to recover after dying later on (respawn on the spot without any upgrades and without getting new power ups during boss fights)
Repeats bosses 1-4 once
Tedious third boss
Some bosses go down to quickly to bombs (final boss for example)
Pretty basic level design overall (no level hazards or ground enemies, no destructible scenery)
Some annoying sfx and instruments (Jetter/stage 1a, laser weapon) and nearly the whole OST sounds like boss music. There's also a bug with the triangle channel making it always be on and playing what sounds like the lowest possible note whenever it's not used for the music, causing an annoying dissonance in various tracks
Removes the HUD for boss fights (shows speed and how charged the bomb is)