Space Gun - Arcade

You're in Space, and you have a gun... Gun Space! -ah shit...

Light Gun time again as we venture to planets unknown in search of the mystic plot device as to why people have gone bye-byes and odd creatures are in their place making life miserable for all and sundry. Yep it's the age old alien space monster plot of Distant-Planet-Lost-Contact-With-Space-Ship-Go-There-To-Find-Aliens-Kill-All-And-Run motif. Or DPLCWSSGTTFAKAAR for short.

Blood guts and gore everywhere.

Very quickly the plot in Space Fun falls into the Aliens category of space monster madness in that a spaceship goes silent, so people go to investigate it, then a planet, then you stop an alien army... By yourself (and a friend perhaps) while armed with a machinegun and an assortment of weapons and, wait for it, a PEDAL! Yes that's right ladies and ladies, you heard it first here, a pedal used in a light gun game before Time Crisis was on the scene. Predating Namco's title by around 5 years or so.

The player is hardcore, a slash damage that size from something akin to a bear is an Ouch...

While the gun remains as one might expect, a gun. Space Gun allows us the ability to select between four different special attacks. While specials were available in Beast Busters (and quite a few there too) and also in games like Revolution X, Operation Wolf (Ah the grand-daddy) this time around we're able to select which special we wish to use. Ranging from the flame shot that incinerates most enemies if they're grouped together, rockets for the welcome-home feeling, a laser sword swipe that cuts through all enemies but is very narrow in it's spread of attack and an ice shot that freeze enemies for more damage with the main gun and could shatter most smaller/basic enemies.

Nice and large bosses to battle

All the usual cliché’s are there in Space Gun. Dark and difficult to see corridors filled with monsters that can have arms and limbs blown off, HEADS blown off and still attack you, pods that release ravenous teeth-filled spores, critters, creepy crawlies and many more assorted monsters that get bigger and more stubborn to succumbing to death and are otherwise known as boss monsters. While at the same time you've also got plenty of pods around that can give you ammo and health, or shields against the aliens, other people are around that need saving for bonuses at the end of the level (If you make it that far) and then there's the pedal that lets you backtrack to either slow down the onslaught of enemies or go back for something you missed! EPOCH MAKING!

AHEM-Ripping off Aliens-AHEM

Aesthetically there's some lovely little touches in Space Gun, the occasional instance of blowing glass out of a spaceship results in shielding coming down to prevent exposure to vacuum (but who puts GLASS between a walkway and outer space?), mutations of would-be hostages that become aliens just before you save them are animated in an interesting and fairly unique manner, while most of the game seems to rip/borrow from Aliens up to and even including the planet base looking like the main site of LV-426 from Aliens. Thankfully nothing in the game actually LOOKS like it's from alien... Aside from the eggs and wall crawling little critters... And most of the aliens.

Last boss, Hint: Be accurate...

Plagiarism or Homage? That's not for me to decide, but what I can comment upon is that while the game is fun, it has its hang-ups. For instance, the selection of the extra weapons is sequential, so getting to the one you want, while under the extra pressure and stress of fighting off aliens, you're likely to over shoot the one you need, or not hit the one you want and make various, multiple mistakes. On top of this there's the issue of the game purposefully overrunning you with more enemies than you can attack at once, or just hurling at you bosses and monsters that shrug off multiple shots before arbitrarily just giving you a dry slap.

Did you kill something, or sneeze?

It's not a huge list of awkwardness, and the reverse function with the pedal is rather downplayed. The biggest gripe with the game is the brevity, it's just too short but having said that, the final fight is made all the more interesting by having your accuracy be paramount to success. A fight between yourself and the last boss, while in front of the control panels that fly the spaceship. Happy shooting! It's certainly worth the time to play but don't invest too many credits for it.

Flame Gunner - Arcade

Who's GAPS inc? Should we care? Yes, yes we should.

Gaps Inc isn't that well known for the games they've made, in truth I've had a hard time working it out in the brief spell of research I've conducted, but what they have produced here is rather impressive.

Each arena holds little tricks and traps to drain your health but you can avoid those.

Flame Gunner is a Third Person shooter, to put it very lightly. Not the over-the-shoulder shooter, but more the Resident Evil type of 3rd person where the camera remains fixed and the character wanders around freely. It's an odd take on the situation and it doesn't quite manage to pull off the attempt in doing so but it's still intriguing to see what they've made as a game.

No, really? I WAS the only one playing!

The gameplay in Flame Gunner involves you picking a character that determines the starting point to the mission. The mission being to one-man-army against a nutcase who wants a rocket to go into space. So that means you get to turn up and Rambo your way through the game, shooting people, blowing stuff up and generally causing havoc. Movement is determined by your joystick pointing you the way with you wish to go and also aims your gun. Shooting is just tapping or holding the fire button, the difference between the two being that holding the fire button locks your aim in that direction while you can still move and dodge shots. Grenades/Explosives can be fired as well but take a little while to launch and there's a dodge button.

Wreck it, blow it and destroy it for bonus points!

Enemies in Flame Gunner will aim towards you it'll be OBVIOUS that they are, you're safe until the line of fire turns read and then you'll have to be out of the way. Each enemy has a health bar and as you progress, the odd levelling system in the game will determine enemies to get harder as you go and more numerous in later missions. Levels don't have to be played in order and you can choose (usually) which levels you wish to take next with some having more difficult missions than others.

Mission tasks differ from location to location.

Usually, your objective in Flame Gunner is just to kill everyone and maybe a boss. Other types of mission include destruction, where you blow everything up; escort, where you have to get someone free of an area as quickly as possible without them being killed; and protection, where you stop the enemies from destroying something within a time limit. Unfortunately, it's not always clear which mission will hold which tasks for you to be done until you start playing it. But the variety does keep the game more interesting.

Lots of FMVs and action happening, plot points included.

Interestingly, some arenas are large enough that if you move to a specific point/location, the camera will change a la FMV and you get to see the fight from a new perspective, likewise some levels will have you moving through stages with the FMV showing the progression ebfore it settles at a point and game can be played from there in almost seemless movement between the FMV and the static image showing the game's level.

Huge wall of fire, a.k.a A Big Gun.

As a game, despite the guns and explosives and fighting Armoured Personel Carriers and tough guys, Flame Gunner is almost calm in its delivery of the game. This may be as a result of the slow movement of the main characters, Generic Asshat, Girly Asshat and OneMoreChoice Asshat. Little seems to be different between the characters which leaves the game to fall back upon its multiple choice system and routes for players to navigate their way around and through the levels.

Sounds like my living room after 2 curries.

What Flame Gunner doesn't hold up on, is the control system. Moving and trying to aim becomes a nightmare if you don't develop these skills quickly and you'll soon be overwhelmed by the enemies attacking you. Dodging rarely seems to work and using the explosives is risable at best for the attempt you'll make. Thankfully you can pick up bonus health, new guns and more explosives but it doesn't stop the game being difficult more so as a result of bad gameplay mechanics than any real challenge to the player.

Some fights are very drawn out.

The sounds are your typical gunshots and explosions, while the music is comfortably mild in the background, never overwhelming but also conventional enough that it doesn't grate and it doesn't stand out as being out of place in the game. It could very easily be in place in almost any game from the 90s to today by the grace of its own merits and dulcet tones.

They don't make it easy on the final stages. Not at all.

Overall, Flame Gunner is worth a look and those in the know will recognise the engine and the models used in the way they've been executed, it's a good game but lacks that final spit and polish that would turn it into a great game. The potential is there and while not entirely a 'miss' more a glancing ricochet away from the bullseye of a great game.

Lucky and Wild - Arcade

Not the best title, try Cars and Guns

It's not quite on the rails shooter fun, it's not quite off the rails shooter fun, but the sheer idea alone of being able to drive down the street using a sit-down racer and then slap two extra guns into the dashboard, makes for a lot of fun assuming one player doesn't mind not being able to drive and just shoots things. Lucky and Wild actually brings something a little unique to the mix-up of sprite based light gun/joystick games.

Nope, not seeing the appeal of coming to this place. Not at all... ... Maybe...

It rides upon the idea of Lucky is an upstanding member of society, straight laced and smartly dressed with a reserved personality, Wild is a gung-ho crazy man who lets the trigger talk more than his mouth but never has a bad thing to say about anyone, together they fight crime and drive around town getting into more scrapes and driving mishaps than the Blues Brothers do. (Don't watch the 2000 film though).

This guy gets off lightly with just a Road Rash beating.

So what we have in Lucky and Wild is a 2 player shooter where one player also has to be dexterous enough to drive AND shoot while the second player just shoots. As such there's the accelerator and brake pedals (no clutch thankfully, we drive automatic here) and in the right hand for player one is a gun, while player 2 just gets the gun and has no control over where player one is driving aside from punching them in the arm if they drive into hazards. The arm punching becomes a quick and effective control method.

Drive and gun, shoot anything and everything that moves while player 1 drives and shoots.

Lucky and Wild plays out like an 80s cop show involving fast car chases and excessive levels of inaccurate gunfire from everyone involved. Except for the gunfire part. Our two protagonists will happily spout phrases and warnings and become more and more upset while their beloved car (which is about as much of a character in this as our heroes) takes more and more damage because the players are either not driving around trouble or not killing/destroying threats fast enough.

I can hear the Peter Gunn theme in the distance... From here to Chicago.

Each level within Lucky and Wild, has a boss and with that boss is a timer to take them down and decipher their weakness. For example, the first boss cannot be shot or blown up and is only defeated if you kill everyone on board (including guys with rockets and grenades) when they pop out to take a shot at you. Later bosses include trucks, monster trucks and more automobile related fun. While at the end of each level you get to go to a cat girl themed repair shop (a sort of cat-house I guess...) and the points/score you earn are converted into replenished health and an abundance of lipstick marks over our heroes faces.

Get points, score bonus, gather health.

The music and sound effects complement each other like Miley Cyrus does a Wrecking ball, badly and worth seeing once but you then wish you hadn't. The sound effects are over the top and actually add to the high paced action of the game while the music tends to be drowned out though what you can hear, fits almost perfectly as a theme tune to an 80s/90s cop show with a fast car. But for the most parts it's the onomatopoeic noises of Booms, Bangs and Phoomps (I'm claiming this one) that will ring out through the speakers in this arcade more than anything else.

More tank than truck, and this is one of the easier bosses.

Overall, Lucky and Wild is worth the play but I'd recommend having two players for the experience, some of the sections can be brutally painful on the health bar with the act of being swamped and swarmed by grenades, rockets, bombs, choppers, bikes, gunmen and plenty more, ALL AT ONCE. But then it's clear that some of these parts are just credit sucks to empty your pocket out, it's not impossible to beat the game on a credit but could end up being more effort than it's actually worth doing.

That's the best body work I've seen after all the bullets and bombs it took earlier