Bravoman

~ BRAVOMAN ~

Namco / NEC

HuCard

1990

Upon giving Bravoman a few quick tries when I first acquired it, I found it to be a fairly routine and innocuous beat 'em up with one interesting element in its hero's ability to stretch his limbs to ridiculously extreme lengths. I decided that it really didn't deserve its bad reputation, as it seemed to make for a goofy-but-enjoyable romp. Having actually experienced the adventure in full since I formulated those early opinions, I now know the truth of the matter, and I wonder what the hell I was thinking in the first place. This game is bloody awful.

Most of the enjoyment to be had here comes from beating up on Bravo's allies and reading the resulting talk-bubble bits.

Additional chuckles are to be had when the bosses make "scary" threats.

The one technical merit the game has going for it is parallax scrolling. Sadly, the same few backgrounds are employed ad nauseam as you "stretch fight" your way through an absurdly high number of levels. The enemy sprites are dirty, ugly, and oddly diminutive. Bravoman comes off as a stinker of a "superhero" as he bullies around tiny tanks, dwarfish ninjas, and other such munchkins who stand barely one-half his height.

Not content with mere multilayer backgrounds as their trump card, the Bravoman design team tried to go the extra mile by tossing sidescrolling shooter levels into the mix. Unfortunately, Bravo's hitbox is huge, the controls feel clunky, and all of the strips look the same.

In fact, repetition is what ultimately deals the deathblow to Bravoman. It may seem like an acceptable game early on because of its amusing cheesiness and parallax-graced backdrops, but eventually the experience becomes sickening, as one continually comes across redundant visual elements and perennially endures the hero's infamous, irrepressible shouts of "Bravo!" And as all of the recycling occurs, the bosses become more aggressive and the stages themselves become more mazelike and restrictive, making the inadequacy of the controls not only evident but also unforgivable.

Detana TwinBee

~ DETANA!! TWINBEE ~

Konami

HuCard

1992

I think of TwinBee as one of those games that make people like them a little more than they really deserve to be liked. It's a cutesy vertical shooter that reminds me of Cyber Core gameplay-wise (both titles allow one to blast through airborne adversaries while simultaneously bombarding terrain-based nuisances), but CC moves along at a faster pace and keeps the player much busier.

TB's "pelt-a-bell" power-up system (blast an uncovered instrument to effect a change in the weaponry that can be acquired from it) is inconvenient and yields weapons that are nothing special. Its music is completely inoffensive but forgettable and is often drowned out by the sound effects, which are decent but not noteworthy aside from the impressive ones used for explosions. Personality is essential for a cute 'em up, and this game has it, but not nearly as much of it as true stalwarts of the subgenre like Parodius have. It's short and quite easy. And while its bosses are cool enough in appearance, you shouldn't anticipate any thrilling confrontations.

All of that being said, the game does look very nice, though not necessarily in a technically impressive way. The color choices are impeccable, and some of the background concepts are extremely interesting. I particularly like the wavy green clouds in Stage 6 and the pretty pink mountains overrun by streams and waterfalls in Stage 5.

Considering TwinBee's focus and merits, I'd say it's more suitable for a casual player than for a hard-core shooter fan. Still, it's good enough to be worth the low cost for anyone. It's true that for most of the time I'm playing TB, my thoughts are elsewhere, with my attention only occasionally recaptured for moments when I think, "This is a nice-looking part." But having such a game to play every now and then really isn't such a bad thing.

Sonic Spike

~ SONIC SPIKE ~

IGS

HuCard

1990

This beach-volleyball game seemed utterly awful to me at first. The players, with overboard "beefcake" physiques and caricaturish facial features, looked absolutely ridiculous. The animation fared no better, and the music was NES-type garbage. There was too much "downtime," as I regularly found myself waiting around while the crowd cheered or the players switched sides or prepared to serve. And the gameplay sucked.

Well, as I spent more time with the chip, I gradually discovered that the gameplay isn't completely terrible. Elements of offense are actually handled pretty well: bumping, spiking, and serving all feel good once you get the hang of the controls, and it can be pretty exciting to nail a super-fast winner or serve up a crucial ace.

Defense, on the other hand, never feels all that great, as the action is too random. You can try to anticipate where an opponent's spike will end up, but blocking/returning said spike will ultimately prove to be a matter of luck. Instead of being able to rely on skill, I was relegated to "hoping for the best."

So after elements of offense redeemed the game to a degree, aspects of defense killed it all over again. Shame, but in truth, Sonic Spike doesn't have enough appealing ingredients to come off as a strong title anyway. If you really must play an old volleyball video game, go with the much better Kings of the Beach for the NES.

Pick your players (I like to go with Cindy for her "SLNM Spike"), and then face off against other "global superstars." My evil counterpart is apparently a "boss blocker."

Everyone is all smiles before a match begins.

One or two of the backdrops actually look pretty nice, while others are just odd.

Serving and other aspects of offense feel fine. It's too bad that the defensive elements don't follow suit.

God Panic

~ GOD PANIC ~

Teichiku

Super CD-ROM

1992

God Panic resides with Star Parodier in the PC Engine's niche of wacky/cartoony verticals, and the one you prefer might just come down to the kind of humor you enjoy in your "lighthearted" shooters. SP cleverly caricatures Soldier-series enemies while GP features a huge, weird-looking red guy with explosive farts. SP has bright, gorgeous snowfield and underwater levels while GP has you soar over an enormous bikini-clad sun bather.

Seriously though, GP actually does succeed with its nutty character designs. The fourth stage alone features the aforementioned crimson fart giant; pudgy pouncing guys whom you can knock to the turf; a mohawk-sporting, chain-wielding punk-rocker dude and his two oddball sidekicks; clones of your own character; a lunatic tanuki; and a fire-breathing dragon.

That's a solid boss parade, and even the normal enemy sprites are often large and appropriately off the wall in design.

The soundtrack is pretty good and presents rips of some famous rock numbers (like "Danger Zone"). Still, SP whips this game superficially, as the background graphics here are far from impressive. But GP holds up well enough with its aesthetics.

Its gameplay is where most of my concerns lie. The action is heavy on projectiles even though your hitbox is a little large for a bullet-heavy style of play. In fact, even the bullets themselves are huge, relatively speaking. (The developers seemed to have an idea that this would be a sloppy affair, as they decided to grant players an extendable life bar and allow play to resume right from the spot of death even after the use of a continue.) GP is still easy, though, as it suffers from the Cyber Core syndrome: it keeps you busy with lots of things to blast, and it hurls lots of crap at you, but somehow it still ends up lacking challenge. The weapons are lame for a shooter of this ilk, and the adventure is too short, with only five proper stages to play through. (If you're wondering what I mean by "proper," well, let's just say that there's a GNG-ish twist that a lot of people will not be amused by.)

Once you do reach the end (which will probably happen sooner rather than later), there's little incentive to take another trip through the game. You can set it to Hard to try to draw a little more life out of it, but then you end up with sped-up bullets hurtling towards your huge hitbox, which just makes the whole thing feel messy. If you stick with the default difficulty level to maintain a playable feel, you'll find that it's simply too easy to stay one step ahead of the game, regardless of the constant fire coming at you; and you'll discover that GP is a classic case of a title featuring a lot of good concepts that aren't executed particularly well. Take the last boss, for instance.

He's a gigantic vampire/monarch/pro-wrestling-champion bear dude, definitely neat in design, and he has five or six types of attacks at his disposal. Unfortunately, instead of utilizing his attack types randomly to keep you on your toes, he continues to use the same one over and over until you deal a certain amount of damage to him, provoking him to switch to the next. What should've been a great battle ends up a simple scrum, just like the fights that precede it.

GP certainly had the potential to be one of the PCE's true sleepers. It's still a decent shooter, boasting charismatic enemies, quality tunes, and consistent action. Honestly, though, based on screens I'd seen and reviews I'd read prior to purchasing it, along with the first few fun-filled moments I'd spent with it, I thought it'd be a bit better than it actually is. I ended up disappointed, but I have little doubt that there's an audience out there for it. Nonetheless, if it comes down to buying either this or Star Parodier for $5-10 more, SP is certainly the smart choice.

Human Sports Festival

~ HUMAN SPORTS FESTIVAL ~

Human

Super CD-ROM

1992

This disc contains three separate sports games, so I might as well break 'em down individually:

Final Match Tennis Ladies is the girlie counterpart to what is probably the most well-beloved PC Engine tennis game. Perspective-wise, the action is reminiscent of World Court Tennis', but the gameplay is much tighter and more enjoyable than WCT's. Still, the game is a little "dinky," and I prefer the more realistic feel and presentation of Davis Cup. But FMTL is certainly fun and fast paced, and it should be a treat for anyone who thinks WCT is even remotely playable. It easily could have stood on its own as a worthwhile HuCard.

Formation Soccer Human Cup '92 makes a poor first impression with horribly repetitive music and a cumbersome control scheme that has you press Run both to switch from one player to another and to select a teammate to pass to. Once you've got the controls down, the game isn't exactly terrible, but it can be quite boring, as you have to spend a lot of time simply fighting for the ball. Halftime is the highlight, as you can change the channel on a monitor that the contest is being "watched" on and check out other stuff like wrestling matches and Human's weather channel. It's pretty amusing (once).

Fine Shot Golf was a pleasant surprise. The gameplay is tight, and everything that needs to be done in setting up and taking a shot is made convenient for the player. The holes get pretty tricky but never stupidly so. I'm sure that some golf-game aficionados will find it too simple and easy, but it fits the bill fine for me as an enjoyable pick-up-and-play title. The graphics are definitely on the simplistic side (you never actually see a guy swing and hit the ball; it just sort of takes off on its own), but the jazzy music is surprisingly good and actually reminds me of Langrisser's soundtrack at times. This game manhandles Power Golf.

So the disc gives you two good games, and since it's extraordinarily cheap (often five bucks or less), it's easily recommendable to players who have even the slightest interest in tennis or golf sims.