Gunstar Super Heroes

Talk about holding down the trigger...

The original Gunstar Heroes was a complete unknown to me, but it sure made an entrance with a bang. A lot of bangs, even. More gunfire than a Call of Duty title. Colourful, cartoony and absolutely action-packed, I liked it. And now it gets a sequel for the Game Boy Advance in Gunstar Super Heroes.

History keeps repeating, and when bad guys are bad, good guys need to be heroes. Trigger fingers at the ready - not that you'll need to release them once you start to squeeze...

Silhouette Mirage

Reflector! Reflector! Hup! Hup! Hup! Reflector! Bambambambambambambam!

Some video game titles just scream 'Japanese release' to me, and Silhouette Mirage is one of them. You just don't get titles like that from western developers; titles that don't quite sound right and give few hints as to what's going on with the game itself, if any.

But a game is much much more than its title, and this one will have us platform run and gunning our way around the place, shooting things in particular ways. What on Earth do I mean by that?

MDK

Murder Death Kill?

I have seen very little of MDK and played even less. After seeing it, I think I filed it away in my memory in the 'weird games' folder, and it wasn't until reading the synopsis before finally getting around to playing it that I understood why.

You are Kurt Hectic, a janitor turned astronaut who, along with mad scientist Dr Fluke Hawkins, and robotic dog Max, have taken it upon themselves to save humanity, whose Earthly home is currently being consumed by giant Minecrawlers on the hunt for natural resources.

You have a gun for an arm, your face turns into a sniper rifle and your parachute is... n't a parachute.

My Dear Knight, what even are you?

Vectorman 2

Geronimo!

I don't know whether it's funny or not that a game can get sequels and still not be heard of. It probably isn't funny at all. The number of games that exist is far greater than the number of games I know to exist, and there are bound to be sequels amongst that number.

All of that is a long-winded way of saying that I have no idea who or what Vectorman 2 is.

Metal Slug

Thank You!

I really should have gotten around to playing Metal Slug sooner. I knew from the moment I first saw it years ago that it was something I'd want to see more of, but it never made it to the front of my mind until now, and that was a mistake.

Metal Slug is like Contra as drawn by Disney or something. It is a visual treat, but it's backed up by some solid gameplay too, both single player and co-operative. You must shoot your way through an armies worth of troops in order to defeat General Morden, and, if you're lucky, you'll be able to do so with the titular tank known as the SV-001: Metal Slug.

Run, jump, shoot. There's nothing to it. In fact, my first attempt should be a breeze...

Alien Soldier

In whitch we fight terrolists and dodge typos.

There's only one thing I know about Alien Soldier, and that's that it's super hard. It doesn't mess around, demanding mastery of the controls to even begin to think about getting through what is actually a pretty short game.

Basically, I know that I'll be judging this game on the first five minutes, and whatever I then watch on YouTube, so let's hope those first five minutes are pretty damn good.

Earthworm Jim

Cow Launched

Earthworm Jim practically screams the '90s, doesn't he? In what other decade does a super suit fall onto an Earthworm, turning him into a superhero intent on serving some justice to ne'er-do-wells and spending some quality time with Princess What's-Her-Name? In no other decade is your answer.

Charge up your blaster pistol, whip your head back and forth and get ready to launch that cow, because I'm going down to the junkyard as a super worm.

Zombies Ate My Neighbors

Extra Bonus Victim!

I knew of Zombies Ate My Neighbors long before I had any idea what the game was about. I had come across the title while looking through lists of available to download .wav music files, back when you had to dial into the Internet in order to see the world as it really was, rather than as it was portrayed in Encyclopædia Brittanica. Guile's Street Fighter theme was more interesting to me at the time, but the title Zombies Ate My Neighbors stuck in my mind.

By that, I mean that I didn't expand upon my zombie knowledge until decades later when I learned it was a run and gun zombie-em-up, and it's not until now that I've even bothered to play it.

Will I be able to save my neighbours before an untimely death? There's no time to lose!

Gunstar Heroes

Your journey ends here!

Sometimes it feels like there are an alarmingly high number of games on this 1001 list that I just don't know anything about. I don't think the number is that high, but I don't even know of Gunstar Heroes in passing, so I'm going into yet another game blind as a bat and seeing where I end up.

In this one, we play as Red or Blue Gunstar in a side-scrolling shoot 'em up run and gunner to gather a handful of crystals before the big bad robot known as Golden Silver uses them to wreak havoc on civilisation. We'll enlist help from Professor Brown and we'll fight General Grey's efforts to thwart us.

Yeah.

Based on the plot synopsis, it's no wonder I know nothing about this game...

Doom

To Quit is to Lose.

Source // Wikipedia

In the late 1990s if I recall correctly (very early 2000s otherwise), I was at yet another cousin's house. He was younger than me and I was barely into double digits, but he really wanted to play a game on the computer that I hope his father got for himself, rather than his young and impressionable son because that game was Doom.

I don't remember much of it at all. I don't even remember playing it myself. Perhaps I only just watched. Whatever happened, Doom didn't leave a lasting impression on me, certainly from that encounter, and yet I - like many gamers I'm sure - know all about Doom, no matter how much we've played it.

It's time to grab our shotguns, chainsaws and BFG's because we're about to go to Hell.

Cybernator

After penetration, deploy the Assault suits.

Cybernator surprised me. I had no ideas going into it what it would be about, and it turns out that you're piloting mechs. In space. And not the stupid, overly designed, dazzlingly coloured mechs that I'm frankly put off by, but grungy, militaristic, 'realistic' designs.

It was - on the premise alone - something I absolutely had to get stuck into, and I hoped that the gameplay was just as inspiring.

Out Zone

Destroy all of them. Goodluck !!

Source // RetroCollect

I couldn't tell you what kind of game Out Zone was even if you paid me. It rings no bells, its name gives off no impression, I simply don't have a clue what I'm in for.

Turns out that it's a kind of bullet hell twin stick (but not twin stick) arcade shooter. Cyborg soldiers must repel an alien invasion in the distant future of 2097. Who'd have guessed that? Sounds great - looks great. Let's jump in.

Green Beret

The gun-less run and gunner?

Source // Arcade Museum

A game called Green Beret could mean a few things, but it's the mid 1980s so it really means only one thing - you versus the rest of the world in nonstop Rambo-esque combat. I don't have a problem with that.

Known as Rush'n Attack to western audiences, it is undeniably Cold War themed, although a single US Green Beret killing hordes of Russian soldiers in an attempt to free four prisoners of war isn't exactly a cold war stalemate...

You'll be using your trusty knife for the most part, with weapon pick ups in the form of flamethrowers, rockets and grenades helping to mix things up through four stages of all out combat.