A brilliant, no-frills shooter, with an ingenious weapon combo system and hyper-satisfying boss rush design. Like the best shooters, it makes you feel like an absolute badass when you master and overcome a boss’ move set, and it invites you to experiment by being fairly generous with its checkpoints (uncommon for the era). Also, the aesthetic is cool!

Maybe the one nitpick would be a lack of variety in non-boss enemy designs? But that’s it.