Run ‘n Gun-a-thon — Part 5
Alien Soldier is probably the best foundation for a run ‘n gun. The boss rush element of Contra: Hard Corps is taken to its logical extreme, meaning the action is nonstop chaos from beginning to end. Treasure made a bold, but brilliant decision to give each weapon an ammo limit that automatically refills when unequipped, which can also be expanded between most levels. This ensures you can’t stick to one gun unless you devote more weapon slots to it. Such a strategy isn’t very viable on SUPERHARD, as you only get three continues. Speaking of which, play on SUPEREASY for your first run. It’s almost identical to SUPERHARD, but with unlimited continues.
A staple of run ‘n guns is allowing the player to feel like a badass and Alien Soldier is no exception. Epsilon-Eagle has four weapon slots, a parry that can also recover health, an invincibility dash that deals tons of damage at full health, a jetpack because why not, and the ability to switch firing modes at will. Parrying bullets feels euphoric every time and I appreciate the dash rewarding you for taking minimal damage.
All of that’s great, except the weapons themselves are incredibly underwhelming. There are only six of them, and their functions are as generic as it gets. Rapid fire, close-range flamethrower, spreadshot, homing fire, rapid laser, and shotgun laser. Compare that to Gunstar Heroes letting you combine two weapons out of a possible four, allowing for 14 different shot types. Some of these were definitely more useful than others, but you could still beat a boss no matter what weapons you were carrying. In Alien Soldier, certain weapons flat out don’t work on some bosses, or are so ineffective at dealing damage you might as well ignore them. Figuring out the best weapon for bosses boils down to a boring game of Simon Says and then memorizing the solution for future playthroughs. I don’t mind some memorization, but the problem is that the rapid fire and spreadshot are the worst guns in nearly every situation. They suck at dealing constant damage due to most bosses having weak points that are difficult to reliably hit without homing fire, only vulnerable for short bursts (use shotgun laser), or so easy to hit that other weapons can get the job done faster (flamethrower or rapid laser). Do the classic Contra games force you to use the spread gun to beat a boss? No. You can finish them with the basic rifle if you want to. Weapons should have moments were they shine brighter than others, but it should also be possible to emerge victorious even if you are carrying the worst weapon. If Alien Soldier was designed like that, the ammo upgrades between levels would be much more fun to play with.
Even if the gunplay was more flexible, the bosses would still need to be high quality. Those of you who played the game will probably disagree, but Alien Soldier has the most pathetic lineup of bosses I’ve ever seen in a boss rush. Most have a maximum of two attacks that are very easy to dodge. With the right weapon, they will die in about 30 seconds. How did Treasure think this was okay?! Fighting bosses is the whole game! Even the minibosses on the way to bosses in Hard Corps often had several different moves requiring different reactions. It’s no coincidence the best boss is a rematch against Seven Force, and even this falls short of his original Gunstar Heroes incarnation. More moves and/or phases for the other bosses would have made a tremendous difference.
Man, I was looking forward to playing Alien Soldier after hearing about its amazing boss rush design and inspired character abilities. I wanted to love it, but the more I struggled to write this review, the more I realized how much I was ignoring how empty the experience left me despite some promising ideas. As fun as it can be to create fireworks by blasting enemies, I felt little while playing half the games in this marathon beyond some momentary thrills. That is likely just me wanting more out of the games I play. Now that I’ve experienced more run ‘n guns, I’m going to replay Cuphead and give it the review it deserves. If you are still reading this, thank you for listening to my eccentric tastes!
Alien Soldier is probably the best foundation for a run ‘n gun. The boss rush element of Contra: Hard Corps is taken to its logical extreme, meaning the action is nonstop chaos from beginning to end. Treasure made a bold, but brilliant decision to give each weapon an ammo limit that automatically refills when unequipped, which can also be expanded between most levels. This ensures you can’t stick to one gun unless you devote more weapon slots to it. Such a strategy isn’t very viable on SUPERHARD, as you only get three continues. Speaking of which, play on SUPEREASY for your first run. It’s almost identical to SUPERHARD, but with unlimited continues.
A staple of run ‘n guns is allowing the player to feel like a badass and Alien Soldier is no exception. Epsilon-Eagle has four weapon slots, a parry that can also recover health, an invincibility dash that deals tons of damage at full health, a jetpack because why not, and the ability to switch firing modes at will. Parrying bullets feels euphoric every time and I appreciate the dash rewarding you for taking minimal damage.
All of that’s great, except the weapons themselves are incredibly underwhelming. There are only six of them, and their functions are as generic as it gets. Rapid fire, close-range flamethrower, spreadshot, homing fire, rapid laser, and shotgun laser. Compare that to Gunstar Heroes letting you combine two weapons out of a possible four, allowing for 14 different shot types. Some of these were definitely more useful than others, but you could still beat a boss no matter what weapons you were carrying. In Alien Soldier, certain weapons flat out don’t work on some bosses, or are so ineffective at dealing damage you might as well ignore them. Figuring out the best weapon for bosses boils down to a boring game of Simon Says and then memorizing the solution for future playthroughs. I don’t mind some memorization, but the problem is that the rapid fire and spreadshot are the worst guns in nearly every situation. They suck at dealing constant damage due to most bosses having weak points that are difficult to reliably hit without homing fire, only vulnerable for short bursts (use shotgun laser), or so easy to hit that other weapons can get the job done faster (flamethrower or rapid laser). Do the classic Contra games force you to use the spread gun to beat a boss? No. You can finish them with the basic rifle if you want to. Weapons should have moments were they shine brighter than others, but it should also be possible to emerge victorious even if you are carrying the worst weapon. If Alien Soldier was designed like that, the ammo upgrades between levels would be much more fun to play with.
Even if the gunplay was more flexible, the bosses would still need to be high quality. Those of you who played the game will probably disagree, but Alien Soldier has the most pathetic lineup of bosses I’ve ever seen in a boss rush. Most have a maximum of two attacks that are very easy to dodge. With the right weapon, they will die in about 30 seconds. How did Treasure think this was okay?! Fighting bosses is the whole game! Even the minibosses on the way to bosses in Hard Corps often had several different moves requiring different reactions. It’s no coincidence the best boss is a rematch against Seven Force, and even this falls short of his original Gunstar Heroes incarnation. More moves and/or phases for the other bosses would have made a tremendous difference.
Man, I was looking forward to playing Alien Soldier after hearing about its amazing boss rush design and inspired character abilities. I wanted to love it, but the more I struggled to write this review, the more I realized how much I was ignoring how empty the experience left me despite some promising ideas. As fun as it can be to create fireworks by blasting enemies, I felt little while playing half the games in this marathon beyond some momentary thrills. That is likely just me wanting more out of the games I play. Now that I’ve experienced more run ‘n guns, I’m going to replay Cuphead and give it the review it deserves. If you are still reading this, thank you for listening to my eccentric tastes!