Quite a stunning run and gun, surprisingly not based on an anime property, but with character design from the inimitable Satoshi Urushihara. You control a mech at the end of a tragic war, fighting against almost impossible odds to save the earth. The game was subject to some censorship in the west, most notably the removal of the European Union as the enemy, and some plot points regarding suicide and death. You can still annihilate all the little people running under your feet though XD
November `23 GOTM - Had some fun with this one but difficulty way too high combined with awkward aim controls. Save states will be required for most people i would say.
This is admittedly one of those games that were way too hard when I was a kid but might enjoy now. However, my only memories of this game were raging I could never get past level 2.
Also known as Assault Suit Valken!
Leynos' successor is IMMEDIATELY a huge face-lift, bring an astronomically larger budget and infinitely more balanced pool of systems and concepts. The SNES control layout is put to great use with a strafe-based weapons system that really makes you feel like an unstoppable tank. Powerups and new weapons are also found in the stages instead of being given as rank-based rewards after a mission. You would think mandatory exploration would ruin the flow of action, but Cybernator makes it work by letting you totally 'roid yourself as early as the second stage. The level 3 vulcan and laser feel amazing.
I'd recommend the JP version if you can - with a caveat: The current retranslation patch on romhacking.net has a bug where some tiles in the 6th stage's upper route are replaced with walls. I took this path and savestated, softlocking myself and forcing a clean reset. But despite this, the retranslation is still the way to go: It's a much more appropriately tense and OVA-esque script, and there's lots of expressive character portraits that got scrubbed from the US version for some reason ("the americans HATE anime prettyboys >:[[[[["). The US translation also scrubs most of the incidental dialogue for generic quips - stuff like 'roger', 'mission complete', 'return to base', 'we'll pay for your education if you bomb these innocent villages'. Last one felt a bit out of place.
I think the only thing missing from Valken is that the macro-scale depiction of global conflict feels heavily subdued. Despite all its problems, I admire Leynos 1 in its ability to make you feel like one disposable soldier amidst a larger legion, taking on impossible, merciless odds. Valken's function focus keeps the conflict mostly on-ground and largely pretends the rest of your team doesn't exist. It's power fantasy over disempowerment defiance. Still a better-feeling game, but it blends in the larger crowd of 'badass dudehero run-and-gun' games on thematic terms.
Assault Suit Leynos 2 is next on the menu whenever I buy a Saturn. Someday! I swear!!!
Leynos' successor is IMMEDIATELY a huge face-lift, bring an astronomically larger budget and infinitely more balanced pool of systems and concepts. The SNES control layout is put to great use with a strafe-based weapons system that really makes you feel like an unstoppable tank. Powerups and new weapons are also found in the stages instead of being given as rank-based rewards after a mission. You would think mandatory exploration would ruin the flow of action, but Cybernator makes it work by letting you totally 'roid yourself as early as the second stage. The level 3 vulcan and laser feel amazing.
I'd recommend the JP version if you can - with a caveat: The current retranslation patch on romhacking.net has a bug where some tiles in the 6th stage's upper route are replaced with walls. I took this path and savestated, softlocking myself and forcing a clean reset. But despite this, the retranslation is still the way to go: It's a much more appropriately tense and OVA-esque script, and there's lots of expressive character portraits that got scrubbed from the US version for some reason ("the americans HATE anime prettyboys >:[[[[["). The US translation also scrubs most of the incidental dialogue for generic quips - stuff like 'roger', 'mission complete', 'return to base', 'we'll pay for your education if you bomb these innocent villages'. Last one felt a bit out of place.
I think the only thing missing from Valken is that the macro-scale depiction of global conflict feels heavily subdued. Despite all its problems, I admire Leynos 1 in its ability to make you feel like one disposable soldier amidst a larger legion, taking on impossible, merciless odds. Valken's function focus keeps the conflict mostly on-ground and largely pretends the rest of your team doesn't exist. It's power fantasy over disempowerment defiance. Still a better-feeling game, but it blends in the larger crowd of 'badass dudehero run-and-gun' games on thematic terms.
Assault Suit Leynos 2 is next on the menu whenever I buy a Saturn. Someday! I swear!!!
This controls worse than me when I was five years old and had to go to a special behavioral school because I cried and hit and bit people too much
Game Review - originally written by Kitsune Sniper
Assault Suits Valken is the Japanese version of Cybernator, a game that Konami brought over to America. The game is a sidescrolling shooter similar to Contra, but here you pilot a huge Mech named Gundam err I mean Valken. The main difference between this version and the US one is the story - a lot of things were removed by Konami for no reason, and the game paused itself while you received instructions during a mission in the US version. Valken doesn't do that, which may be a disadvantage - particularly against the last boss, who you can't attack until he shuts up. But he can attack you! Yep, unfair, but that's life.
Assault Suits Valken is the Japanese version of Cybernator, a game that Konami brought over to America. The game is a sidescrolling shooter similar to Contra, but here you pilot a huge Mech named Gundam err I mean Valken. The main difference between this version and the US one is the story - a lot of things were removed by Konami for no reason, and the game paused itself while you received instructions during a mission in the US version. Valken doesn't do that, which may be a disadvantage - particularly against the last boss, who you can't attack until he shuts up. But he can attack you! Yep, unfair, but that's life.
This soundtrack is everything. Controls feel a bit awkward but have this satisfying weight to it.
What if Assault Suit Leynos was competent
A decent and somewhat clunky mech based action game. The music and graphics are classic konami which is definitely a good thing. The difficulty is pretty high and the screen can get overflowed with projectiles rather easily. A solid game for the super nintendo, but not a must play for a console with a lot of better games.
weird fiddly controls and an emphasis on managing your jet boosters is an excellent abstraction of mech simulation into a 2D platfomer