Halley Wars
Reviewed by Inkhands
Halley Wars is a well made overhead shooter for a system
that really doesn't have a lot of shooters available. I do
not know the plot in this game and I did not learn any
background story by the playing the game. You can assume by
the settings that someone from Earth is traveling through
the galaxy to stop evil. I'm not sure what evil, but there's
always a force of evil in games such as these.
This game is rather typical in it's setup. You travel
through a few different stages shooting enemies and earning
powerups. The only options you have at the beginning of the
game is to set the difficulty on one of three levels and
also decide if you want your weapons to have normal
firepower or turbo. The opening stage opens with a very
brief shot of you flying over the Earth, but you will very
quickly be flying over the surface of the Moon. Later stages
have you passing over Jupiter and a space station on your
way to the end of the game. Some of the later levels are
rather lenghty. The difficulty setting determines how
quickly the screen scrolls and how fast your enemies move.
The powerups you acquire will turn your simple little laser
beam, into a triple beam, and then to an even more powerful
triple beam with laser blasts streaming out as well. You do
not earn these powerups by killing enemies. You gain them
usually by shooting at the many light grey rocks that appear
along your path. It takes more than one shot to break open a
rock. Not every rock has an item, but you can usually find
upgrades to your weapon. You can also pick up a shield item.
This shield serves as a good defense, because it allows you
a few extra hits before disappearing.
The other item you can pick up along the way is a side
addition to your ship. One of those little things that will
attach itself to your ship and shoot when you shoot. At the
most I usually had four of these at any given time. I think
that's the limit to how many you can possess at any one
time, but it's still a nice addition. It really benefits
your ship and it's attacking, particularly if you have the
shield item and an upgraded weapon. Your beams will blast
all over the screen and quickly wipe out any incoming enemy
ships.
However, these side weapons will explode when you hit them
against either an asteroid or an enemy. This makes for
moving through an asteroid field tricky if you want to keep
all your side weapons. However, they can also be used as
bombs. One button will fire normally, but the other one will
release one of your side weapons, and it will sometimes
destroy most of the enemies on the screen. Sometimes it
doesn't do anything at all for me. For this reason, I
usually keep them attached to my ship, as the extra
firepower is more valuable than a sometimes useless bomb. If
you lose a ship, they will detach and float around in space.
If you move quickly enough you can retreive them and keep
using them.
You are given three ships per continue. When you lose a ship
you immediately get a new one and continue from where you
lost the previous one. If you lose a continue, you start
that stage over. As far as I know, this game has unlimited
continues. It doesn't have any way to save, but that's
typical in shooters. You earn an extra ship for every ten
thousand points you pick up. Also, you have a damage
percentage. If you lose a ship or let an enemy pass you by,
it will go up a few points. At the end of each level your
percentage will drop a point for every two thousand points
you earned during that level.
Challenge depends on the setting. There is a boss at the end
of each stage. They usually aren't too powerful, but they
all require a certain strategy to be used. You will have to
do a lot of moving and shooting, while memorizing just
exactly what your enemy is going to do next. Memory skills
is needed for most shooters and this one is included. I felt
the game was rather easy, but on hard setting the enemies
move faster, shoot more often, and recquire more hits to
destroy. The control in this game is rather good though. You
hit one button to shoot your weapon and the other to fire
the side weapons you picked up. Moving the ship around is
not a problem either, as it responds very well. Medium
challenge and good control.
I don't usually notice the music in video games and usually
when I do, I don't much like it. However, this game offered
up some nice themes that I actually liked to listen to. They
do loop a little too often, but they sound good enough to
not get too tiring. Mostly it's inspirational type music you
do hear in space movies. There is a song that leads up to
the boss battle at the end of each level that is very
intense. The boss theme is actually less intense, but still
pulsating as you move around the screen. The regular level
music is a bit melancholy and features what sounds like
something you might relax to, instead of shooting at enemy
ships. No rock music here, no guitars, or drums. It sounds
more like a synthesized flute.
The sound effects are very limited. The regular sounding
shots sound like someone hitting a drumstick against a
bottle. The explosions are typical kabooms. Sometimes
enemies will shoot lasers at you and it sounds like a sword
slicing through the air. If you hit a boss in it's weak
spot, you will get a booop, instead of the click on other
enemies. Overall, I liked the music very much, but I wasn't
impressed with the effects. However, I wasn't exactly
disappointed with them either.
Your little ship looks like a white triangle with a blue
dot. All your weapons shoot green laser beams. Your side
weapons look like two pronged forks. The enemy ships mostly
look like regular ships, with varying shapes. There are a
few original enemy designs, such as the floating box that
shoots it's middle at your ship when it gets in line with
you. For the most part, all the enemies are very small. The
bosses aren't exactly detailed or designed well, and are
actually quite small too. Of course I suppose that could be
expected.
The backgrounds are mostly black with white dots for stars,
unless you pass over a planet or the Moon. When you do, the
backgrounds are quite good. You can see the craters of the
Moon and the swirls of Jupiter. There is a stage with dark
grey asteroids that you can not shoot open. There is also a
stage with a space station setting. What the game lacks in
graphics is variety, but it does make up for it by being
very colorful. Also, the game moves very well. Nothing to
complain about graphically, except the lack of detail some
of the ships have, and the empty backgrounds. Just black and
white dots, isn't interesting, but the planets are nice
looking.
This game doesn't offer much in terms of replay value. Play
through it once, I don't think you'll play through it again.
The game doesn't have any extra modes, it's just a straight
forward shooter. One disappointment was the lack of variety
in the weapons. You really only have about four levels of
upgrades. If you lose a ship, you usually begin with one
upgrade lower than what you lost the ship with.
I still had some fun with this game and it's certainly worth
a few plays. It's not worth buying a Game Gear or putting a
lot of effort into hunting the game down. However, if you
happen to already own the system and you see this game cheap
somewhere, then buy it if you like shooters. It's a nice
little diversion and it can be quite entertaining for a
whle.
Graphics - 7/10
Sound - 7/10
Control - 7/10
Challenge - 6/10
Appeal - 6/10
Game Play - 7/10
Replay Value - 5/10
Overall - 7/10
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