BTTF2's a Lie!

Seriously! Where's our hoverboards? And not those segway wannabes that someone's trying to pawn off as the next new toy. The mere fact that you're riding around on wheels goes against the very definition of hover! Who's the fucking idiot that took the name for something that's clearly amazing and applied it to something that's clearly stupid and duped the shopping masses into buying this hazardous piece of crap!? Your idea's bad and you should feel bad.

And the way I see it, there's really anything else 2015 to talk about? Oh wait! Games! But, of course. How obvious. Not many games, but enough. Eighteen to be precise. Eh, it's enough to scrap together a top ten for good measure.

It feels like it's been a long year since it seems like eons since I checked off a few of the games on this list. Meanwhile, some of the more recent games failed to make an impression, or rather, made the wrong impression. There's been a good variety of games beaten this year including a personal heavy hitter, and likely my wildest trip into childhood nostalgia. Very few games, if any, will ever invoke the kind of nostalgia that Zork I did. The only games that may have the faintest glimmer of hope: Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?, Smurf in Gargamel Castle, and the almighty River Raid. Except, I played a brief few minutes of Smurf in Gargamel Castle several years ago as well as running through a couple segments on River Raid so the excitement level will never compare to that of Zork I's when I realized it truly was the same game from so long ago. Sadly, for as much as it was a keynote experience this past year, it narrowly missed this year's list. Oh! Spoiler, for those keeping track.

How can that be, you may ask. But alas, as always, my list is an expression of many factors; most importantly, what game would I genuinely return to for some additional game time? For as much as Zork I amazed me as a general experience, the likelihood of powering it up again is slim to none. Perhaps in another 25 years.

What games did make the list then? Well, let's find out.

10. Tengami
-Ok, maybe the game has little to no replayability, it was far too easy, and ended prematurely, but the overall presentation and experience left me wanting more. Not just more in the game, but more Tengami in general. If a sequel ever came out, I'd be all over it.

9. Ecco the Dolphin
-If there was ever a game that epitomized a love/hate relationshp, it would surely be Ecco the Dolphin. There's so many reasons to throw my arms in disgust, but at the same time, so many reasons to marvel in the aquatic antics of that spry little dolphin.

8. 12 Labours of Hercules
-Proof that casual games can be a blast. I expected a meager amount of enjoyment, but instead I got a game I just couldn't put down until I managed Gold across the board.

7. Forza Horizon 2 Presents Fast & Furious
-There's no reason for this game to exist as a standalone, however, considering I don't own Forza Horizon 2, I did thoroughly enjoy the arcade-like antics that only the Horizon series can deliver for the few brief hours it took me to finish this.

6. Eighth Annual Vanilla Level Design Contest
-I've gradually lost interest in ROM hacks, namely SMW hacks over the years, however, compilation hacks have always managed to pique my interest as a wide variety of approach and experimentation blossoms within. These VLDCs certainly do not disappoint.

5. Me & My Katamari
-It may have lost some of its luster compared to the original, or even the sequel, but at the same time, it's a Katamari game. As long as the basic principle hasn't changed, I know I'm going to have a blast playing through them.

4. Abobo's Big Adventure
-And here I always thought I Wanna Be The Guy was a fantastic mashup. Abobo's Big Adventure clearly defines what a video game mash up should be. Everything else likened to the genre has mighty big shoes to fill - Abobo's shoes.

3. Mega Man 3
-Long been my favorite among the original NES Mega Man games, and for that matter, all Mega Man games, the Doc Robot stages have always been the standout feature. Many games have tried stage remixes over the years, but I've always believed this is the only game to get it right.

2. Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker
-I'm not sure what I expected from this game, although it looked like a fun and interesting puzzle-like game. Captain Toad absolutely blew me away and I think it's one of the better games Nintendo has come out with in a loooong time (discounting obvious MK and SSB material).

1. Fallout 3
-For me, Fallout 3 is in the running for greatest game ever, which is something because over time I've lost interest in open world games and have generally never enjoyed FPS titles of any kind. Even with its bevy of bugs, crashes and general programming incompetence, everything in this game just managed to click perfectly. And I'm certain there's still an enormous amount of secrets I've managed to overlook throughout the Capital Wasteland.

FDS - Super Mario Bros. 2

Haiku-Review:

we'll change bricks to stone
and give most everything eyes-
voilà! a new game!

Additional Comments:

Traditions, traditions. Honestly, I didn't think I'd manage another Mario Christmas. But here we are!

My original intention was to run through Super Mario 64 this year, but due to various reasons, that never materialized. Reason number one being I have zero interest in playing that game. It just feels so alien whenever I play it. Mario game? What's a Mario game?

I thought of a couple other possible kooky titles to hit up, but in the end, I wanted to tackle a game that falls directly in the line of sight of a Mario platformer. Ooh! Wait! What about that one game that was an actual sequel according to Japanese Mario lore but was nothing but a mythical Nessie to the rest of the world? After all, I somehow skipped over it in order to play Yume Koujou: Doki Doki Panic...er, Super Mario Bros. 2. But...this is Super Mario Bros. 2. No. Wait...what? Could be worse. Could be Final Fantasy III...I mean VI...I mean... Wait. If it's VI, then where are the three unaccounted Final Fantasy games? Ah, Japan, you sneaky little devil you, keeping everything to yourself.

I played Super Mario Bros. 2 years ago as part of Super Mario All-Stars where it was cheekily dubbed, The Lost Levels. Nice save there, Nintendo. I remember very little of the experience except for the newly implemented wind feature being doubled up with some disgustingly stupid jumps and the overall increased difficulty compared to the first SMB. I think I quickly put that game down and returned to SMB3 - my personal favorite. The Lost Levels felt like a sour pang. It was so cool to see this "lost," to the Western world at least, Mario game, but at the same time, I was hugely disappointed. Not just because of the difficulty or the lack of noticeable improvement over the first game, but something just felt off. It felt lazy; unnecessary. Nothing grabbed my attention other than the mystique behind the game's existence itself. Then again, maybe it was just those god forsaken wind jumps.

This is the first time I've returned to this game since that experience. I've always wanted to return to give the game a proper chance, but I always knew in the back of my mind that the game would feel like nothing more than cutting room scraps. After completing it, my opinion on the matter barely deviates from my original thoughts. It feels like a lazily slapped together game shoveled out with the intent to make a few extra yen. In today's terms, it feels equivalent to some thoughtless DLC created to make a quick buck because everyone loves the base game so much, they'll buy any old horse shit that we decide to pack on. I know this is likely a controversial viewpoint on the matter and people likely think I'm just butthurt over the difficulty, but I'm not. I simply believe I played through a poorly designed game.

You don't have to venture far on the internet, or amongst gamers in general, to know that this game has acquired a reputation for being notoriously difficult compared to the first. But what makes it difficult? In the first game, the difficulty was progressive on a fairly linear scale. New enemies were introduced as well as more complex structural patterns and jumps in fairly forgiving ways. The sequel, however, appears to take the position that players of SMB2 will be players who have already conquered SMB, therefore there's no need to potty train them all over again. They're aware of everything we're going to throw at them so let's pick it up from right where we left off. This is a ridiculously stupid model. Granted, we're talking about the early days of platforming and few if any sequels existed. So it was all very much up in the air as far as how games were designed moving forward. Why reinvent the wheel all over again when we can just pick up where we left off?

The argument can be made that the game is simply introducing what sort of challenge to expect. Instead of starting at the ground floor, this game starts you on the tenth floor and gives you a royal kick in the arse saying, "Have at it (you foolish idiot)," as you go hurtling through challenges never before imagined over the course of the first few floors. Only, as the game progresses, the difficulty curve is all over the place, like a highly turbulent day on Wall Street. This alone pisses me off in regards to starting the game at such an extreme level compared to the original game. There's no sense of learning. Instead, there's often a sense of relaxation or stagnation, or simply, we ran out of ideas so enjoy this long stretch of flat land with very few enemies.

But what makes the game difficult is the poor design. Looking back on Super Mario Bros., the levels appear to be well made, as though there was purpose to every brick, every pit, every goomba etc. Here, it seems like the designers blindly slapped the levels together in the dark. So much of the game feels like a bad YouTube hack. No other official Mario release, at least that I can think of, carries such a comparison. It feels like there's no rhyme or reason to anything here. Instead, it's like someone had a handful of bricks, question blocks, platforms, enemies, etc. and nonchalantly splattered them across a giant canvas. Voilà, level 3-1, or 4-2, or 7-4, or what sort of level did we need? Underground? Ah yes. Just add a bunch of random pipes. That'll do. What? The piranha plant is dipping into the ground? Who cares?

A result of the slapdash design is incredibly dickish jumps. This mostly revolves around wind or the more infuriating, green springboard. More than anything else in the game, I abhor the green springboard sections. Unless I'm just flat out misunderstanding moon launch physics, Mario's return to earth is total guesswork. I died far too many times because I misjudged where Mario was going to drop from the top of the screen. Every time I expected him to be relatively center, he'd somehow drop on the far left. How is that happening? In an attempt to correct, I'd overcompensate and Mario would suddenly drop center screen. Far too many Marios lost their lives to these blasted devices. And it's such a shit way to die because I felt like I had no control over the situation. If I die because I fall in a pit while attempting a particularly tricky jump or run straight into a koopa because I mistimed something, I can totally accept that because the game got the better of me and I made a mistake - sometimes a stupid mistake. But to die over what's essentially a blind jump is pure bullshit. Frankly, it amazes me that a game that has zero vertical scrolling somehow managed to introduce blind jumps. That's brilliant minds at work right there.

Even the old staples of annoyance like fortress mazes make an unwelcome return. That was one aspect of the original I never liked and this game somehow made the concept just that much more frustrating. The first game at least had mazes that felt intuitive, but here, there were a couple maze that kept throwing me for a loop because there were a couple blocks I never would have guessed were part of the design. I think one of them I solved by sheer accident. Another maze, I'm not even sure what the intended method is, but if it's how I eventually solved it... *Facepalm* There's nothing more to be said. More incredulously, backwards warps were added. If the game couldn't troll you enough - backwards warps. Wow!

It's not all bad, however. There are some improvements over the first game that I enjoyed. As much as I hated the wind sections, I found the wind to be a very unexpected, and rather genius addition. Eventually, through the NSMB series, we came to see the wind gimmick being used with proper intelligence and we have SMB2 to thank for that. Additional types of moving platforms were a highly appreciated improvement. We even find the precursor to the platforms that move infinitely to the right in later games like SMB3. So yes, along with poison mushrooms (though I hesitate to call that a worthwhile improvement - it actually adds very little to the game in my opinion) or elongated fire bars, there's is a handful of new elements to help freshen up the gameplay so it's not a completely stale rehash of the first game. Unfortunately, most of the welcomed improvements are far outshined by everything that's wrong with this game.

I can't convince myself to recommend this game under any circumstances. I suppose if you like shitty SMB hacks, sure why not? But if you want to play a quality product, this is not it. Even if you simply like a good challenge, I can't recommend this game in good conscience. To me, it's a poorly made mockery of everything Super Mario Bros., and that's rather depressing because it's such a mythical game in the early days of the Super Mario franchise. People often say the game was never brought to the Western world because Westerners can't appreciate a good challenge like the Japanese gamers can. I've never understood that as we had a number of stupidly difficult game here in the Western world. In fact, if I'm not mistaken, The Adventures of Bayou Billy actually saw an increase in difficulty for its Western release in comparison to its Japanese counterpart, Mad City. In my opinion, the whole notion of Westerners hate a good challenge is nothing but a crock of shit. Yes, remarks have been made that NoA didn't wish to bring the game to the Western world precisely for the above reasons, but I call bullshit on that. I wholeheartedly believe this game never saw a Western release because its crap. I'm glad we got a hastily converted game about a family in a strange Arabian setting as opposed to this poor excuse at level design. What came to be "our" Super Mario Bros. 2 is a vastly superior game in the platforming and design departments. I wouldn't say it's a superior Mario game as I still don't find it Mario-esque at all and if there's anything the Japanese version is, it's undeniably a Mario game. But as far as everything else is concerned, the Yume Koujou: Doki Doki Panic ripoff that we got is a game of far greater caliber.

Nano-Rant:

I actually have two things to rant about - one short one long.

First, my true nano-rant: floating bloopers. This is yet another reason why I can only compare this game to juvenile YouTube hacks. It just screams unprofessional.

And now for my more serious complaint: Worlds A-D. I have nothing against Worlds A-D themselves, and rather enjoyed them a bit more compared to the rest of the game, except for the sections that were blatant copypastas of previous levels. My issue is with the hoops you need to jump through just to access them. Beat the game eight times? What a ridiculously arbitrary number and what an unbelievable way to pad out gameplay in hopes of replayability. World 9, on the other hand, has a totally sensible method of unlocking: beat the game without warps. That's completely fair. But beat the game eight times? What kind of third rate award tactics is this?

I hated the game on my first playthrough, so there's certainly no way I'm playing another seven times. Even if I loved the game, I'd likely play it two maybe three times through completion in a relatively reasonable time period (few months to a year?) at least to experience the full game with both Mario and Luigi. Additional playthroughs would be sporadic at best over the span of years because it still doesn't have the same exact type of replayability as say Mega Man 2 or Super Mario Bros. 3 where you can impose a number of challenges upon yourself to make things more interesting. Needless to say, there's no fucking way I'm ever going to play this game through to the end eight times, even if I just ran the minimalist route. A sensible solution would be to beat the game twice, once with Mario, once with Luigi. I could totally accept that since there are some slight differences in physics between the two brothers so the experience would be ever so slightly different across each playthrough. And then, ta-da! Bonus world!

As is, I'll use Game Genie, thank you very much.

Rating: 1.5 peace pavers out of 5

GEN - Sonic the Hedgehog Spinball

Haiku-Review:

Mr. the Hedgehog!
It was inevitable
to play some pinball

Additional Comments:

After the sheer disappointment that was Soldier Girl Amazon, I had to crank out something I knew I'd enjoy. Something I loved in the distant past that I've been itching to return to after all these years. Something carrying the name of excellence. Without wishing to venture into Sonic the Hedgehog 3 quite yet, Sonic Spinball sounds like the perfect candidate for the job. Besides, outside of a quick ten minute refresher a couple of years ago, I think it's been close to twenty years since I sat down with this beauty.

From the very beginning, Sonic screamed pinball as he rolled through loops at dizzying speeds and bounced recklessly about from bumper to bumper. And if these little prophetic mechanics weren't enough, whole stages echoed the magnificence of pinball within their 2D platform design such as Spring Yard or Casino Night. In fact, Casino Night Zone had pockets of pinball-esque areas where you could use a set of flipper to send Sonic bouncing about racking up points or hopefully dunk him in a roulette where he could score big. It felt a natural evolution to further Sonic's forays into pure pinball platforming, perhaps minus the platforming?

Sonic Spinball managed to fulfill that step to a T. Obviously, many liberties have been taken in regards to actual pinball chicanery with a good bit of platforming still present, though squashed to a extremely minimal amount. Still the walking and jumping mechanics are prevalent enough to remind you that Sonic Spinball isn't quite a full on pinball emulation. If anything, it's like the developers said what if we take the most action packed segments of Spring Yard or Casino Night and made a whole game out of them. Add a little extra pinball-esque pizzazz and that's essentially what's here.

At times, however, I wish the developer would have gone in a full pinball direction as the platforming mechanics are a little clunky. Compared to Sonic 2, they feel rough around the edges. The jumping, for instance, instills very little confidence. There's an odd directional delay that can hinder a jump's height. This is most noticeable in The Machine where there's a wall near the top of the stage on either side that you need to jump over. Because of the narrow opening, I always found myself jumping at a bad angle either preventing the jump altogether or retarding the height. Additionally, the walking and turning feels a bit spongier than in the various 16-bit Sonic games.

Then again, to strip the game of the minimal reminders of platforming could potentially alienate Sonic fans altogether. While erratic pinball behavior may be a brilliant step forward in the series, we still need  that simple memento to help us remember why we loved the series to begin with. Although, does it really matter in a spin-off? Probably not, but it certainly helped the case as I think despite the slightly cumbrous controls at times, the platforming adds a much welcomed uniqueness to the overall game that emphasizes the mesh between typical Sonic platforming and furious pinball action., bearing the pinball side of the tale is a bit more heavy handed.

Despite having only four stages, I remember this game holding my attention for days on end in my younger days. Really, I only ever played the first two stages, making it to the third on very rare occasion. Even now, I think four stages, while sounding minuscule in today's standards, is just enough playable material. Any more and I believe the game would begin to lose its charm. My main reason for believing this is with the increasing complexity over each stage, it eventually plays to the detriment of the game. I personally find that the game peaks with the third stage. While the fourth stage, Showdown, is still fun and interesting, I think the sheer size and labyrinthine design steps away from the allure of the first three. Maybe it's just the final boss that reminded me of how arduous a task it is to traverse that particular stage. Even the ridiculous, and surprisingly mandatory, cluck bounces in Lava Powerhouse don't curtail that stage from needless convolution. Lava Powerhouse, as a whole, is still packed tightly enough that you never feel overwhelmed, disoriented, or annoyed with having to repeat the same sections over and over again because you accidentally slipped into one of the previous areas. As much as I hated Mario Pinball Land, that is something that game did right. Even if I fell from an upper board to a lower board, it never felt like a chore to regain ground. And in a game where luck plays just as much of a hand as skill, that's a tough pill to swallow.

Fulfilling the definition of chore or not, I cannot deny the ingenuity behind these stages - The Machine especially. Though it bordered on being too complex for its own good, The Machine was an interesting mishmash of ideas and of the four stages, felt most reminiscent of something that could potentially appear in a traditional Sonic platformer. Parts of it made me think of Scrap Brain, Star Light, or even Death Egg. And while Toxic Caves and Lava Powerhouse teeter on that line, Showdown felt a little too foreign. Yes, I can find similarities here and there - there's no denying it's Sonic in its roots - but I think again it became a case of too complex for its own good to the point it begins to lose the identity shared by the rest of the game. Maybe the stage just annoyed me that much without realizing it and I'm making a mountain out of a molehill.

The good news, however, is there's nothing else I can pick apart. From here on out it's nothing but unicorns and rainbows. Sonic Spinball is a brilliantly fun game. You just need to realize you're getting Sonic's brand of pinball and not true pinball. But you know what? I love 'em both. In my book, Sonic's unique take on pinball is just as enjoyable as the real thing. Besides, one thing the real deal doesn't have is wildly bizarre takes on Dr. Robotnik for some truly intriguing bosses. Robo-Scorpion has always been one of my personal favorites, and Robo-Boiler? What's not to love about that freakishly insane machine filled with four of Dr. Robotnik's disembodied heads spewing pools of liquid hot magma?

Another thing the real deal lacks is some seriously awesome 16-bit pure Sega crunch. I've gone on the record numerous time declaring my love for the sound engine used by the Genesis, and sure as beans, Sonic Spinball plays up my opinion with more of that beautifully jarring growls that we come to expect. Although short, Theme is a classic, but for some of that raw Sega sound, tunes like Toxic Caves or Boss are definite recommended listens.

Nano-Rant:

Ok, I have one last sour note to end on. After playing through normal speed, I began playing the game on the fast setting. I made it as far as Robo-Boiler and the game came to a crashing halt. For some inexplicable reason, Robo-Boiler lacked any sort of collision which meant I couldn't harm him which meant I couldn't proceed any further in the game. By this point, I was a littler worse for wear as it felt like I had played the game straight for hours, not to mention Showdown along with the final boss began grating at my nerves on my previous playthrough. I had no real particular interest in restarting, at least not at the time.

I looked around on the net to see if this was a known glitch, or at least one that's been reported but extremely rare. Unfortunately, I found nothing on the subject. This disheartened me even more. Frustrated with how the game came to an end, lack of confirmation that this has ever happened to anyone else, and the knowledge that speedruns of Sonic Spinball use the fast setting (obviously), I had to make a second attempt just for the sake of peace of mind. After another attempt, all I can say is that it appears to be a fluke. Just unfortunate that that fluke happened to be a pretty game breaking bug when it occurred.

Nano-Win:

Scratch that! I can't end such a great game on the down and out.  I do have an additional testament of joy to add. For all the years I've owned this game and for as much as I played it years ago, I never knew there were additional bonus stages (stage, singular, really) for collecting all the rings. It just blew my mind that not once did I ever manage to collect all the rings on at least Toxic Caves. There's not that many and they're all pretty damn easy to obtain so....

Rating: 4 mad doctors demanding you smell their socks out of 5

ARC - Soldier Girl Amazon

Haiku-Review:

in the face of war:
blonde on a motorcycle
seeks male idiots

Additional Comments:

I've been so caught up in a few specific games for what seems like months with no foreseen end in sight - games like Fallout: New Vegas, Mad Max, and the surprisingly fun yet not so surprisingly addictive, Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords, along with several other noteworthy titles that I'll cheekily fail to mention at this time. However, with the year coming to a close, I felt like tackling something different, something lacking complexity, and hopefully, something quick. Arcade games usually fit the bill as their purpose has always been to traverse a world filled with incredible challenge from point A to point B on a perfectly linear path. Beyond that, the game heralds little to no depth. After all, who wants to feed a machine twenty bucks in quarters just to read an hour and a half worth of eye-rolling context? Certainly not I. Though I must be grateful that those quarters are only theoretical thanks to emulation. Still, no need for time wasting plot lines mucking up an exquisite action shooter. A blonde, a bike, and a mission to.... A mission to what? Maybe just a smidge of story? No? Ok....

Soldier Girl Amazon is a typical top down shooter in the sense that you're shooting the crap out of some fantastic other-worldly lifeforms while they retaliate with their own barrage of machine gun candor. Yet, the game doesn't exactly feel like a typical shooter. It's more akin to the slightly misguided genre rebels, Jackal or The Lost Castle in Darkmist. Maybe it's because instead of the usual aerial machinery, you play as a bodacious babe out to kick some ass, all the while struttin' her stuff - at least until you hijack a futuristic motorcycle, that is until you lose it exactly three tenths of a second later. Perhaps, but at least she has a gun, so the feel of an aerial shooter isn't far removed. Or perhaps it's that awkward scrolling that I've seen before.

Much like Jackal, Soldier Girl Amazon places scrolling within the player's hands making use of a unidirectional manual scroll. When it comes to top down shooters, or any shooter for that matter, I've never been a fan of manual scroll. Unlike any other genre where auto-scrolling typically introduces a faux brand of difficulty, I find this to be the case for manual scrolling in shooters. Maybe it's the unnatural flow to the levels since you usually have to remain in constant motion. Unforeseen pitfalls always seem to prevail during manual scroll, especially when large obstructions may come into play. One such incident nearly occurred here where I thought I backed myself into an inescapable corner. True, the same could happen with autoscroll, but at least you'll be crushed to death by the invisible barrier within a few short seconds as opposed to spending an eternity in a tiny hollow.

Scrolling, however, may be of personal taste and isn't the true detriment of the game. Controls and difficulty easily win those honors. The controls are solid for what they are; unfortunately, they're far too clumsy for this particular title. Maybe if the difficulty wasn't turned up to eleven, I could overlook the lack of rapid fire or the use of a single stick handling all of the aiming routines. Except the severe difficulty only makes the frustration with the controls all the more noticeable.

How developers choose to ignore a rapid fire button in these kind of games is beyond me. Sure, I love hammering my thumb on the fire button incessantly for an hour or two without break. Ok, if I was on an actual cabinet, I'd be slamming my palm or tapping my finger on the fire button - not as aggravating a chore as thumb Olympics. Still. But what's more infuriating is the aiming physics. You shoot in the direction you face. In theory, it makes sense, and in a number of shooters, it works perfectly. However, when every enemy has the ability to home in on you and enemy fire appears to travel at a rate equal or greater than your walking speed, it needlessly complicates play technique. If anything, it forces you to go on the defensive more often than necessary because you consistently find yourself boxed in, preventing you from aiming at your enemy lest you walk headlong into their wrath. It's bullshit and nowhere was this more of an issue than the first boss, or rather after defeating the first boss and having to then kill off four of the most annoying enemies I think I've ever come across in any video game. First off, let's think about what I just said. The largest problem area is with the very first boss in the game. That's not a good sign for things to come. Level 1 - fuck it, we're done. Secondly, why do these little adjunct shitheads even exist? I killed the boss and rescued the first of many mysterious men (actually, I didn't, but more on that later). And why are they harder to kill than the boss itself? Can I only harm them by firing into their open mouth? I don't get how these little yellow fuckers function. Let's just move on to the next level already! Oh, it's just more of the same uninspired background and freak-show inhabitants as it is ten levels down the line.

Thing is, those now affectionately labelled "little yellow fuckers" are the sole reason why I hate the way the controls work in this game. After a short time of fumbling around trying to figure out how to kill them, they suddenly began to frenzy, rattling off quick-fire spurts of deadly energy so fast that I had no time to reciprocate my due hatred. All I could do was run circles around them; the slightest hesitation instantly killing me. How the hell am I supposed to aim any sort of return volley when I can't even pause for a nanosecond? If I had the ability to aim with a second stick, the game would actually be playable, but as is...forget it. Oh, I have a few bombs - maybe, if I didn't waste them yet - but they're next to useless.

Somehow, I bullied my way to the boss of the second level where I finally declared the game worthless trash given the insane difficulty. Thing is, there are games out there with insane difficulty that are genuinely fun to play. Any of the Touhous, or hell, most bullet hells in general come to mind. Yes, they're frustrating, but they're playable and have a certain Zen quality to them as you try to carefully work your way through a myriad of beautiful fractal patterns of death. Soldier Girl Amazon, on the other hand, is just amateurish design building proposed challenge with slapdash varieties of mutants with no real ounce of thought to placement. In fact, to create increasingly difficult levels, the game just creates more varied mobs with overall increased numbers. Why not? A group of gigantic bees wasn't enough to aggravate me; let's add some floral mouths, scurrying androids, and most surprising of the bunch, some human soldiers to the mix. The bullets will fly! And to top it all off, make sure the player suffers one-hit kills and we'll send him packing when he dies.

Honestly, it doesn't matter. If you can survive one level, you've essentially survived the game. In many respects, Soldier Girl Amazon reminds me of Exed Exes - in overall style at least. Difficulty, not so much as Exed Exes essentially had an infinite lives mechanic built in. But most everything else, it reeked of the same level of ineptitude. There's really only one level and you just repeat it over and over and over again. There'll be some additional enemies to heighten the action and a couple of new bosses, but there's really no point in venturing forth. There appears to be a rescue scenario at work, except it seems to be perpetual. Soldier Girl Amazon's work is never done, and as such, the game appears to be endless. Granted, an 80s arcade game, endless is appropriate. There's no reason to whinge over that, however, an endless game that's comprised of the same goddamn level over and over...what's the point? High Score? Yea, that is the point of most arcade games, so consider me eggfaced. Except, Soldier Girl Amazon doesn't seem like the game that would rely on such a petty design, and that's what bothers me about it. There could be additional backgrounds or enemies. Why manufacture a couple extra bosses only to recycle everything else? It makes no sense. It's nothing more than a grand illusion to trick idiot kids out of their middling funds injecting the idea that the game is filled with a vast selection of levels.

Now, to be perfectly honest, I can't attest to Soldier Girl Amazon being truly endless, but I'm 99.9% sure it is. After failing miserably at the boss on the second level, I succumbed to extreme measures to further investigate this game. Some people may find cheats immoral in the face of gaming, and most would likely express the use of cheating strips one of the right to call themselves a proper gamer. I could care less. Perhaps I should feel some guilt, but every once in a while a game comes along that's squarely giving you the finger right to your face. Soldier Girl Amazon is one such game and I don't feel a shred of guilt performing any sort of cheats. Frankly, the game doesn't deserve the time of day to play it legit. Thanks to cheats, I suffered through 20-something levels of repetitive tedium and rescued another 20-something jackoffs from the forces of who-the-fuck-cares. While I experienced ever increasing mobs throughout the levels, nothing else ever changed. I figure a simple equation was put in place to create the increasingly difficult mobs. Otherwise, why put in the effort to make several dozen levels only to change so little, if anything? Eventually, after 20-something levels, the game crashed on me mid-level. My first suspicion was something overflowed and began to eat into some additional data - the score perhaps? The way the crash occurred, it sounded reasonable except the Dec->Hex didn't exactly play ball with my hypothesis. Whatever. I consider it a fitting end to a shitty game.

Nano-Rant:

Is there even a point to having a nano-rant? Pretty much this entire post has been nothing but one giant rant. So what shitty thing can possibly top all the other bullshit? You can completely fail what I can only assume is your mission objective. Granted, it doesn't affect the game in any physical sense, but the sheer fact that it can happen and how it happens is just the icing on the cake.

When the game initially starts, nine futuristic soldiers run off into the distance to fight the good fight. Your mission, so I assume, is to rescue all these asshats as they somehow got themselves imprisoned immediately - quite possibly as soon as they negotiated the upper thresholds of the TV screen. Once you defeat a boss, a single captive is released. However, you have roughly two seconds to move Soldier Girl Amazon on top of the rescued prisoner before he decides to run off into the wilderness. Either he's an ungrateful fuck or duty calls. If this happens, you fail to rescue him. At first, I figured once the captive is shown on screen, everything's right in the world. Intuitive game mechanics for the win - yea. This isn't that big of a deal on the latter bosses, but on the first boss, thanks to those little yellow fuckers, you can't exactly focus on collecting the prisoner.

In the grand scheme of things, none of this matters since there's no ending and no real objective. They're just score fodder - 5000 points a pop. So honestly, there's no point in getting my panties in a wad over a device that is only there to further the overarching premise of a high score mechanic. I'll give it that, but it's little things like that that act as a reminder that Soldier Girl Amazon tried its best to be an actual game with actual substance but rather stick it's big ugly toe in the ocean instead of taking a plunge while giving the impression of the latter.

It's a pointless game. I can't even enjoy it for the simplicity of high score functionality. If that's what I'm looking for, I'll turn to Pac-Man or Fast Food or other such games that pander to the high score arcade phenomena. Soldier Girl Amazon, on the other hand, is nothing but a misleading Two Face.

It's been a while since I've had a game piss me off to such a degree. I suppose it was time for one such nightmare to come along. So much for hoping something from my arcade library would be a quick, enjoyable diversion from my working stock.

Rating: 0.5 wasted powerups out of 5*

*Yet another comparison to Exed Exes - powerups that you pretty much lose immediately because the game exists in a one-hit universe against the player's favor. Yet treasure boxes take a half dozen bullets to break apart. What the fuck is that about!?