Recent reviews by FreddyTheMonkey

This is a fantastic collection that offers us both Ace Attorney Investigations games, spin-offs featuring our dearest Miles Edgeworth as a protagonist. It's the first time Investigations 2 gets an official Western release and that alone makes this package a must buy. Investigations 1 is also great in my opinion. Capcom went the extra mile and remastered both games well, with crisp visuals and incredible chibi HD sprites in lieu of the pixel art ones featured on DS (still available if so inclined). An amazing package for sure. Detailed individual reviews below:


I originally played this on the Nintendo DS and replaying it after what felt like a billion years was awesome. My boy Miles Edgeworth's first game as a protagonist shakes up the Ace Attorney formula far more than any other mainline game did. The funny thing is that the changes aren't that major when you really dig into them, but they shift your perception of the game a lot.

Basically, you don't really go to court anymore. Investigations is all... well, investigations. You explore locations by physically moving Edgeworth around (the original sprites were very cool and the new HD chibi sprites are incredible, super fun and expressive, great job on the remastering front), exploring every nook and cranny and finally confronting witnesses to basically solve cases before they even get to court. It's not like you don't have the distinction between investigation and "trial" anymore, you still do, but the new format makes the game feel far brisker than the mainline games, even though the playtime is about the same. The new mechanic is Logic, by which you can link different information and come up with new conclusions, shedding new light on the cases.

The plot deals with Edgeworth finding himself entangled in various cases related to an international smuggling ring. People always b1tch about Investigations, saying that the story isn't great because it's not "personal"... I say who cares. It's less melodrama and more "murder mystery" than your typical Ace Attorney game, which I welcomed then and welcome now. The Yatagarasu subplot is great and that's where the main emotional weight of the game is at, so I was satisfied. Sure, the cases are not what I'd consider the most brilliant overall, but they're good across the board and, like I said, they work wonders as mysteries to solve, rather than story chapters to get through. I also liked the infamous final case, though I can certainly agree that confronting the culprit takes a lifetime and a half and gets a bit silly with how drawn out it is. But I'd say that this is the only relatively big criticism I have for the game.

I like Investigations a lot, and Miles as a protagonist is the bomb . Plus, I like many of the new characters, with Kay Faraday being a favourite of mine and agent Lang as a very enjoyable rival. I'd rate it about the same as Apollo Justice and Dual Destinies overall, it doesn't have the highs and emotional beatdowns of those games but it also doesn't have their bullsh1t gimmicks and stupid logic. It's a different flavour of Ace Attorney, but I dig it.


I never played the fan translation of Investigations 2, so it was a totally new experience for me. This is always considered one of the best games in the whole franchise, usually to the detriment of Investigations 1, and I have to say that I agree (on I2's quality, not on I1's alleged mediocrity, that's a bunch of bullsh1t). I2 plays off of I1's international smuggling ring plot and evolves into something much greater, keeping the world building heavy angle of the first game while offering five elaborately interlocking cases and telling a much more personal story all at the same time.

The formula is the same as I1's, while featuring one new gimmick, Mind Chess. It's a sort of a mixup on the usual witness testimonies, as our boy Miles the eloquence master plays mindgames on whoever he is confronting, trying to make them spill the beans. It's a neat concept, it's not executed with finesse and involves a good deal of trial and error, but it isn't outlandish in the slightest and I have no strong positive or negative feelings on the mechanic. The rest of the gameplay is pretty much unchanged, bringing the focus squarely on the scrupulous exploration of crime scenes and on logical deductions.

The writing and characters are where the game really shines. I2 features two memorable new rivals: Verity Gavèlle, a fearsome, intelligent judge (and hottest Ace Attorney character by far I will NOT accept any other opinion on the matter) hell-bent of following the "Godess of Justice"'s will, and Eustace Winner, a rookie prosecutor with a massive ego and no skills whatsoever (but very influential connections) to back it up. Verity is elegant and a fierce opponent, to the point of being frustrating. She feels like a wall for the player to overcome. Eustace is no threat whatsoever, but his character arc is one of the highest points of the game, though obviously I won't spoil why. The other notable new entry is Eddie Fender, a defense attorney who used to be the apprentice of the late Gregory Edgeworth, Miles's father. He is an oddball and an endlessly endearing one at that. There are also memorable villains and one very special case that allows us to play as one very special character of the series. Again, no spoilers from me there. Characters from the original trilogy return, sometimes masterfully so, with reappearances of characters I would never have seen coming again. The core cast of I1, with Edgey, Kay and Gummy in the spotlight, performs admirably here and I have never seen a better Miles or a better Gumshoe than in this game.

The story is incredibly ambitious as well, with every single one of the five cases intricately connected to each other, a series first if I recall correctly. The mysteries are well crafted and the intensity never lets up, with every case from the third onwards feeling like "final case material". There are countless twists and memorable climaxes, and the most surprising thing is that the game never trips itself up with the dense and complex narrative involving multiple incidents over a span of eighteen years. It really is Ace Attorney at its finest, with zero ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ gimmicks, little padding, no major annoyances and characters being absolutely beautiful.

It's been a phenomenal ride and Investigations 2 is for sure one of my favourite Ace Attorney games, I'd say in a three-way ex-aequo with Trials and Tribulations and The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve. I really hope that Capcom and the Ace Attorney team can be inspired by these two amazing spin-off duologies when they eventually deliver Ace Attorney 7 to the world. Investigations 2 will be a high bar to surpass for sure. I'm so glad Western players can finally enjoy it officially.

The 1990 sequel to Commando is a gigantic step up across the board. Playability, fun factor, presentation, everything is just better and more realized, and while Mercs (the collection only includes the Japanese version but I'm using the easier American name or I'll go insane) is definitely not a deep game, it's a lot of fun and I can see it being the bomb in coop with 3 players.

The story is pretty much this: three muscular dudes need to rescue the kidnapped U.S. president. That's it I think. Chaos and mass murder ensue. Mercs is basically a playable Schwarzenegger action romp, and is exactly as fun as that sounds. The skeleton of the game is the same as Commando: you run and shoot in eight directions. You can't aim, so you gotta go where you want to shoot, and that makes it quite hard; it's the one element that holds the game back, as I feel it would be greatly improved by just being a twin stick shooter. Regardless, you run through stages and murder a plethora of soldiers, vehicles and big bosses. Levels are definitely a bit more elaborate than Commando's, with different scenarios, situations and twists like small vehicle sections. There is a lot of stuff to destroy and lots of items to pick up, from health to points to new weapons (there are four if I'm not mistaken) to Mega Crush bombs to clear the screen and inflict heavy damage on all enemies. The game has great flow and never really stops you, with many popcorn enemies that get dangerous by sheer numbers and strategically placed beefy foes to act as temporary roadblocks. It's a really fun, smooth experience throughout. It's a shame that the final level is so anticlimactic, being a timed "boss fight" that doesn't really feel like a boss fight and that seems not really suited to single player at all (I could only clear it by spamming Mega Crushes, dying and spamming some more).

The presentation wraps everything with a neat little bow. Artistically, Mercs isn't terribly creative, being fairly grounded militaristic style, but bosses manage to impress and there is a good variety of mission locations. There are, however, many details that bring the game to life, such as visible damage on walls and buildings, enemies thrashing violently when ignited with the flamethrower, torpedoes soaring underwater with their satisfying trails and big underwater explosions, our hero getting blown back by the sheer force of the Mega Crush, and so on. Audio is on point and the music, while not wicked memorable, does a decent job in capturing the spirit of the militaristic action movies the game wants to imitate.

By this point, Capcom was mastering the art of polishing, and even games that are not particularly remarkable in theming managed to flex their muscles in the fun department. Power of experience and know-how, it's magical!

Mega Twins is a bit of the odd one out of Capcom's arcade library of the time, being not a fighter, not a shooter and not a beat'em up but rather a platformer clearly inspired by Sega's Wonder Boy franchise. It's a colorful and very pretty, if insipid, take on the genre.

The titular Mega Twins (or just one twin if you play solo, which is kind of anticlimactic) need to gather the powerful Gifts of the Earth, the Heavens and the Sea to defeat a powerful clown magician; in the Japanese version, they also save lots of bikini-clad babes at a rate that would make Duke Nukem embarassed (maybe that's why they purged this from the international release lol). The graphics are pretty amazing, with big, detailed sprites and vibrant colours to really sell the kiddies fantasy world. Some enemies and bosses have creative designs and the vibes are really fun. The soundtrack is not incredible, but it's pretty catchy and upbeat, fitting the game like a glove.

The main issue is that arcade platformers were never the most compelling games. Aside from exceptions like the Ghosts 'n Goblins series, which I'd say is more run 'n gun than anything, the platformer genre didn't really get to a particular level of sophistication, unlike beat 'em ups and shmups which eventually reached a peak that hasn't been quite replicated elsewhere. Hell, even console platformers got more refined and engaging very very quickly. In Mega Twins, there isn't much platforming at all really, you only have a basic jump and the obstacles are simplistic at best. It's kind of like playing a basic platformer through shoot 'em up levels: other design choices seem to corroborate this, such as your screen-clearing magic power which acts much like a bomb. But while in shooters the level is almost always just the backdrop and the action is the centerpiece, level design is integral in a platformer. This is mainly why the game feels more primitive than others of the era, though excellent-looking.

Aside from advancing, you whack enemies with a sword and occasionally face a boss. It's all pretty repetitive as there are no combos or anything like that, just a "power attack" executed with the proper timing and a shockwave when you have no magic left and don't attack for a bit. The action is not very exciting, also because the difficulty is relatively toothless. It can still suck a fair amount of quarters, but the game seems designed to slowly wear you down instead of properly f*cking you up.

This can all probably be explained with the hypotesis that the game was seeking out a new, younger demographic. Unfortunately, the result is a game that, while great to look at, isn't particularly fun or compelling.

SNORE. Carrier Air Wing is kind of a glitch in the system for 1990 Capcom, being an obscenely boring game in a library of arcade titles that were anything but. Hell, a few months prior 1941: Counter Attack hit the arcades, and it was a vastly better game.

Carrier Air Wing is a horizontal shooter in which you're tasked with the destruction of an ultimate weapon. The story is of course meaningless (even though, amusingly, you're briefed on the missions by a Sean Connery ass looking dude), and the meat of the game is embarking on one of three planes with different attributes and blow up other planes, ships and the likes. The gameplay is adequate, it's functional, but is not satisfying or exciting in any way. It has probably a lot to do with the visuals. Everything looks boring in this game, your plane looks boring, the enemies look boring, the bosses look boring. Perhaps it's because of how static everything is. Everything has precious little frames of animations, with the game feeling like someone is moving paper cutouts of aircrafts and ships in front of you as a result. The realistic setting doesn't lend itself to the imagination of the artists, either. Even the bosses seem so mundane, they don't seem cool or impressive, they're just planes and sumbarines and assorted hardware store thingamabobs.

The gameplay can't really do the trick by itself. You have a fuel gauge a là 1943: The Battle of Midway that slowly depletes and acts as a health bar, but other than that it's standard fare. You can pick up three main weapons during levels, but one seems obviously better than the others, so there's not a lot of reasons to ever change it. They try to spice things up by having an end of level shop, Forgotten Worlds-style, and you can buy secondary weapons, shields or bigger fuel tanks. Items reset every mission though, so there is no sense of progression, and the secondary weapons rarely feel particularly fun (plus, they have limited ammo). Finally, everything is so expensive, so it's rare to be able to afford a lot of items at any given time. There is a game loop here, but the act of shooting is never very engaging, which is kinda sorta maybe possibly a problem in your SHOOTING GAME.

Though Carrier Air Wing is a playable game ("s' aight, it do the job", at its most fundamental level) and probably isn't insufficient objectively, it's aggressively mediocre and bland to the point of being offensive. A rare disappointment for the Capcom of the time, capable by then of producing excellent, quality arcade games.

A premise is in order here: I love history, I have a deep fascination with World War 1, and am kind of obsessed with the Battle of Verdun specifically. I've read a lot about it and went on a trip to France in order to visit the forts and battlefields, which was a profoundly meaningful experience. Some additional context: within WW1, one of the bloodiest and most brutal conflicts in history, Verdun has the infamy of being the battle with "most dead soldiers per square kilometer". Ever. It was an operation engineered from the very beginning to "bleed France white" and that is why it is sometimes referred to as a "meat grinder" that swallowed more than 300.000 sons of Europe. Total casualties amount to more than 600.000, with many young soldiers going completely insane after the trauma they experienced.

Conscript is a top-down survival horror game by lone Australian developer Jordan Mochi. A Kickstarter project more than seven years in the making, I backed it from day one because it deals entirely with the Battle of Verdun. And what a special game it turned out to be. The premise is simple: André, a French soldier, must find his brother Pierre, missing in action during the Battle, by navigating through trenches, forts, ruined towns and the devastated countryside. The game's tone is the first element that could alienate players: survival horror is never the happiest genre of all, but Conscript has almost zero elements of levity. It understands its subject matter perfectly: it is about trench warfare, abysmal hygienic conditions and humanity's madness on full display. The cruellest conflict in history. Playing Conscript is facing massacres, mud, rats, blood, viscera, explosions and rot. It's a draining experience, with little personal triumphs that often ring hollow, and climaxes that feel nullifying instead of exciting. Soldiers in Verdun, French and German alike, cared little about winning the battle after witnessing the trenches and the front lines: most just wanted to get home. Conscript nails it, and it is so, so special for that. It nails the humanity of the conflict: the brief conversations you have with fellow soldiers, the mundane act of giving a smoke to a companion or finding a lost photograph for a prisoner of war feel so much more impactful when everything around you is screaming for complete annihilation of the very concept of humanity. There are no clear-cut good guys and bad guys, either: many times, you'll kill a German soldier just for him to drop a photo of a girl, or a baby. One time, I shot an armed enemy that was looking at an agonizing soldier on the ground. He was carrying the photograph of two young men. I had just killed two brothers just as I, André, was looking for mine. Their only fault was to be on the other side, as was decided by power-hungry generals who treated war as a personal stage and a ticket to further prestige and power. The soldiers, mere lambs to the slaughter.

The gameplay skeleton is the early survival horror template set by Resident Evil, with inventory management, item boxes, resource conservation and puzzle solving. There are RE4-like elements, like a merchant to trade and upgrade weapons with, and he is pretty much the only solace from the constant grimness. Level design is complex and mostly really tight, with numerous shortcuts and nooks and crannies to explore. Many puzzles involve finding the right items, but there are also numerous combination locks which can be quite tricky and very satisfying to figure out. There are a good number of enemy types, all soldiers with different gear and roles, such as raiders armed with shovels, elite riflemen with deadly bayonets and armored, axe-wielding knights. You can kill or try to evade enemies with your speed and your clumsy dodge, each approach having its own benefits. But there is also the threat of rats to consider: they feed on fresh corpses and carry deadly diseases, so you'll have to evade them, dispose of them or burning the bodies of slain foes, saving you from potential headaches but costing some inventory space to do that. Combat is simple, and not entirely reliable. You are slow and must be very deliberate in aiming, shooting and reloading. Sometimes hitboxes are a bit janky, but the general feeling is brutal and impactful and I think it worked fantastic for the game, even if it made me feel horribly. The game is also quite long for the genre's standards, and never loses steam, which is a commendable feat.

Artistically, Conscript is oppressing, with muted, dark colors capturing the atmosphere of utter horror and hopelessness. Some effects, like the explosions, look exceptional and intimidating. It feels authentic and effective. The audio is incredible, with foreboding, suffocating ambience that would rival Silent Hill, and some utterly beautiful, somber tracks that play in safe rooms and during pivotal moments to crushing emotional effect. I loved the SFX and what little voice acting there is.

Conscript is a very special game that feels made for me specifically, and I can't thank Jordan Mochi enough for it. It won't be for everyone, but I think it must be experienced by those willing to confront our kind's darkest hour yet.

I impulse bought it as soon as I saw it existed. Sorry wallet, I may have already played these games at least six times each before, but this was non-negotiable.

Also, not only did they include Haunted Castle as an extra, they made a full remake of it? And it's GOOD? It's on the easy side for a Classicvania, for sure, but it's really, really good.

I'm flabbergasted, Konami. What are y'all smoking over there?

Damn the early 90s were the arcade golden age! Powered Gear is an absolutely NUTS beat 'em up and I had a ton of fun with it. It's not the deepest or most strategic game, but it has exceptionally detailed pixel art, blazing music and a plethora of really, really cool ideas. For fans of mechas, it's the ultimate treat.

Powered Gear has a story and a surprising amount of dialogue, though since we played the Japanese version I didn't understand any of it. I can gather it's about the struggle between Earth and another planet and there's a dork in a black mech that acts as a recurring antagonist. Anyway, it's not a focus, as you'd expect. The focus is punching other mechs so hard they explode, and boy is the game great at that.

You can choose between four characters, each with their own mech with different stats (such as agility or ammo for your secondary weapon). The game supports up to 3 players in co-op and it's utter mayhem even with just 2 players so I can't fathom how chaotic it would get with more. You have an attack with your robot arm that can perform combos and a special long range attack, then you have a sub weapon with limited ammo. It's possible to perform a Giga Crush like in Final Fight to knock down surrounding enemies at the cost of some vitality, but also an Ultra Giga Crush for screen-wide damage (for an increased cost of course). Plus, you can jump and perform different attacks in mid air. So you have a decent array of moves, but the star of the game is in its title: the "Strategic Variant Armor Equipment". Basically, you can pick up different weapons from the ground: main weapons (each with their own full moveset), sub weapons and "legs" that dictate how you move and which attacks you can perform in midair. You can basically mix and match your robot with different gear and this gives the action a lot of variety. Plus, most weapons are just cool. You can get drills, laser blades, shield-guns, lock-on missiles, and move on treads that transforms into buzzsaws, spider legs that spin like blades and so on. There are many combinations and most are so fun and effective at tearing through enemy mechs.

Enemy variety is decent, there are different robots to fight who can wield the same weapons as you, so it's satisfying to pummel the opposition and pick up their arms to use against them. Each level also features a strong boss mech, and sometimes you get "shooting sections" to add a little extra dash of variety. Most of the time, the action is incredibly chaotic because you face a billion enemies at once, each shooting their weapons and brawling the hell out, so the action is really chaotic and not the embodiment of finesse, but it's never any less than fun. Especially when there are random badass ideas like a hidden item that, in coop, allows you to combine into an invincible super mech for a limited time against the end-of-level boss. The game follows the rule of cool for everything and it's glorious.

So there is a lot of fun to be had, but the presentation is the real secret sauce. Every level is PACKED with detail, excellent pixel art and smooth animations, mech design is not the most inspired but it's incredibly fun in how modular each robot is. Special effects abound and there are a lot of details that make everything extra fun: when you defeat an enemy with the laser blade, you cleave them cleanly in two; you can smash open cages and make human hostages escape, and so on. On top of this, the music ROCKS, it's catchy and high-energy and is a superb companion to the mayhem on screen.

Powered Gear may be still repetitive and not very deep for modern standards (as most beat 'em ups are), but it's varied, memorable and an unholy amount of fun. I think it's an hidden gem of Capcom' s arcade catalogue. I loved it.

Short version: Giga Wing is the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ bomb, play it.

Long version: Giga Wing is a shmup published by Capcom in 1999 and developed by Takumi Corporation. Takumi is one of the offshoots that followed Toaplan's bankruptcy (along with Cave, for example) so you can immediately tell there was chaotic, brilliant expertise in shmup design in there. And lo and behold, Giga Wing is an exhilarating vertical shmup with a unique central mechanic, specifically designed to pump pure serotonin in your brain in apparently never-ending supply.

In Giga Wing, you're involved in a war revolving around a powerful mystic stone that can cause untold devastation on the world and must therefore be destroyed. You can choose between four characters with a different shot each (and a visually different but mechanically identical screen-clearing bomb), the unique mechanic being that, if you hold the fire button for one second, you can discharge a two-seconds force field that makes you invincible and reflects bullets back at your foes. This being a bullet hell, there are many bullets to reflect, and the force field isn't a finite resource, but can be used repeatedly after a five-seconds long cooldown. This creates a unique game rhythm: you're encouraged to dive straight into as many bullets as possible with your shield and quickly reposition to survive for the next five seconds, then do it all again. This is incredibly fun, but the secret spice is the scoring: almost every enemy drops golden medals worth points, and each and every bullet reflected with the force field turns into more medals as well. You're constantly flooded with sparkling collectibles that get more and more valuable the more you collect, resulting in an infinite dopamine cycle that sees you earning literal trillions of points and more. I'm not exaggerating! Even if you don't really care about scoring efficiently, it really adds to the fun.

The addicting, chemicals-releasing gameplay is supported by a great visual style. Giga Wing starts off pretty safe, with unsurprising militaristic design that sees you storming into bases and fighting planes and ships. It still grabs your attention through setpieces like flying through an exploding base or witnessing an aircraft nuke a city of innocent people. You see the stone (that looks Mesoamerican in design) powering different machines, and the game gradually leans more into that, with more fantastical later levels inspired by Miyazaki's Castle in the Sky and by Aztec, Mayan and Asian cultures. One of the highlights is stage 5's boss, a sort of Aztec golden-plated glider that takes off from atop a pyramid. It's just fun, it's not the most creative shmup there is but it has enough personality and is engaging throughout. The music, unfortunately, is quiet and quality-wise it goes from generic to just bad. That's a shame as it could have elevated the whole package.

Overall, Giga Wing is a fantastic time: fun, addicting and replayable with a neat twist on the bullet hell formula. Not to be missed.

This 1989 smash hit might not be the defining beat 'em up of the era (that honor goes to Double Dragon) but it refined the essential elements of the genre, combining them with rich graphics and memorable characters to create a classic. Final Fight deserves its fame, even though it's repetitive and a relentless quarter muncher at heart.

The theming of Final Fight isn't anything original: crime runs rampant in Metro City and gang members have kidnapped the righteous mayor's daughter Jessica. It's up to mayor Haggar himself, as well as Guy and Cody, to rescue her by traversing the town and beating all those miserable goons to a pulp. The premise and especially the visual style are clearly inspired by 1979 cult film The Warriors (which I strongly dislike, but I can't deny its gargantuan influence on the action genre and the Eighties as a whole): Metro City features graffiti, junk and all-around neglect in each of its colorful district, and all the different hooligans you'll face have unique, flamboyant styles, both visually and mechanically. It's Capcom's graphical's craftsmanship that makes it all shine: there is a reason why Final Fight is iconic and its characters instantly recognizable. Not only are the protagonists distinct (especially Mike Haggar, the mayor with a pro-wrestling past who goes around bare chested piledriving and suplexing every fool in his way), but the standard enemies too have managed to carve themselves firm spots in Capcom's legacy, with some of them becoming regular Street Fighter characters (Hugo, called Andre here, and Poison especially). This is quite heartwarming considering that Final Fight was supposed to be the sequel to Streer Fighter 1 originally. Anyway, designs are iconic and the graphics really pop out, making this a visual treat.

The gameplay is early beat 'em up at it's finest. Final Fight spices Double Dragon' s formula up while still being pretty simple. You can jump and attack, with simple but dynamic combos when you pummel an enemy, but you can also grab foes in close proximity and hit them or grapple them in various ways based on the directions you press. It's still incredibly basic for modern standards, but it's a lot of fun and the hits look and feel so satisfying. In addition, you can pick up various items and weapons to smash your enemies' faces in, which make you much more formidable. Finally, you can perform a Giga Crush attack at the cost of some vitality, useful to damage and down all surrounding enemies. Quite handy, because these punks are EVERYWHERE. Enemies come in hordes and some of them can knock you down fast and even stunlock you. The game's arcade ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ difficulty becomes apparent quickly, though you can credit feed, so you always make some progress. I do believe there is some strategy to get really good at the game but I sure as hell don't know it.

I have a blast anyway because the game has so much attitude and character. You do not simply walk through a door, you smash it into pieces with a kick. You do not simply game over, you get tied to a chair with a bomb strapped on your character and when you continue, a dagger comes crashing down severing the fuse. That's the magic of Final Fight!

Tenchi wo Kurau is a manga series composed of seven volumes, released between 1983 and 1984 by the extremely prolific (but largely unknown in the West) mangaka Hiroshi Motomiya. It's one of the many mangas based on the Records of the Three Kingdoms, but as far as I could find was not a particularly remarkable work. Despite this, somehow Capcom made FOUR (!!!) tie-ins about it, with Dynasty Wars being the first in 1989.

This curiosity aside, Dynasty Wars is basically a beat 'em up on horseback. You proceed through stages while battling constant hordes of enemies, mini bosses and actual bosses. It's pretty much the definition of "alright". As far as moves go, you have a button for attacking left, one for attacking right and one to unleash a special attack which drains your health. You can also charge up a powerful strike or ludicrously mashing the buttons to unleash a rapid flurry of attacks (awkward as hell, but works fine with the autofire button). The special attacks (or "tactics") are different and seem to change on their own depending on the situations (for example, during boss fights you always get the archer squad, when passing down a cliff you get the rock-slide and so on), so they don't allow for much strategy. There are a handful of enemy types and bosses who have different attacks in theory, but are often recycled and behave very similarly anyway when not. It's decent fun, but it's extremely repetitive, also because it's not a really short game.

The presentation is also very competent, capturing the manga style with finesse, especially in the character portraits and in the "cut scenes" (if you can call them that) between levels. The pixel art is very detailed, but levels get samey really fast and have little visual variety, which compounds the repetitiveness issue.

Overall, it's a neat game worth a shot, if only to experience an early and quite accomplished example of tie-in, but it's little more than a one-and-done deal.