Bonus Link Dump Friday:
Shooter Edition
January 30, 2009
With a nearby volcano threatening my loved ones, I thought it might be a good time to let off some steam. This week's Bonus Link Dump is all about shoot shooty shoot bang thwa-bam! Use of your mind is discouraged, but your lizard brain may come in handy.
Super Mega Ultra Battle Robot - Despite the name, Super Mega Ultra Battle Robot is pretty laid-back and groovy, at least until one of the gigantic bosses shows up. Lots of different weapons and toys to play with here, including a sword and a mega-ultra time shield that slows down bullets.
Mechanical Commando - So. Fast. Paced. It may get a little repetitive, but this overhead shooter piles on the explosions. Big rooms full of turrets and giant mechanical bosses break things up, and there's even a story! Not, like, a story that you'll be stealing for your creative writing class, but it's nice to know the explosions have meaning.
Virus - Not only do you have to stop the viruses from reaching the bottom of the screen, you have to beat back the hexagonal mesh-work they leave behind. You get a choice of three different ways to use your bombs (using the number keys 1 to 3), and you'll need to figure out the best situation for each. Nice vector graphics.
Melbius - A colorful side-scroller that would have fit snugly onto the Mega Drive in 1991. It's also quite hard—one hit from any of the dozens of moving objects on-screen will kill you, you cute little bird-thing. Switch between four different weapons, and don't forget to pace your shooting to keep your gun charged up. Scroll down the page to find the game, right above the keyboard reference.
B29 Assault - Fight your way up through the city, kill a boss, and then fly straight back down and kill another. Collect power-ups for stronger weapons. It's standard vertical shooter time! There's some simple gesture-based weapons to spice things up, though, and the long life bar means you can play this one without slamming an energy drink prior.
I just thought it should be brought to your attention that War Machine is a rather blatant reskin of the game "B29 Assault" by FreeWorldGroup. Many of the attacks are just recolored and some of the enemy sprites are completely unchanged. Seeing as there seems to be no discernable connection between FreeWorldGroup and MaxGames, I think there may be some less-than-legit .swf editing going on on the part of the "developer."
If I am wrong, then I am wrong, and I accept that. But I just think the whole thing is a bit fishy.
[Edit: Hmm, that does seem fishy, however it is also plausible that the developer was hired (or sponsored) by either one or both of those portals to create a version for them. I will follow-up on this, though, just the same. Thanks! -Jay]
SMUBR (yeah, smubber) sort of feels like what a Game and Watch version of a mecha game would play like.
The sword is mainly useful for deflecting projectiles. Yes, you can even deflect bombs (upwards, ha) with the sword. When you're fighting a boss and tons of projectiles are caught in your time bubble, one swing of the sword will send them all flying back.
It takes a heck of a while to reload, so try not to get into any huge trouble before then.
Hey, does Mechanical Commando remind anyone of Iron Tank (1988) for the NES?
Mechanical Commando seems extremely similar to RoboKill.
Very astute observation, mkelican. We've changed the link to B29 Assault. We don't know for sure that anything unscrupulous happened, but it's clear that FreeWorldGroup's version of the game was developed first.
[Update: As a result of our conversation here, War Machine is rightly being deleted from the sites of several major sponsors. Thanks again for bringing this to our attention, mkelican. Developers, please don't try to make a profit off the hard work of others.]
Shouldn't the referrer be jayisgames on all of these?
[Edit: Why should it be when it's clearly Psychotronic's piece? And why does it matter? Don't you think I have enough points on Kongregate? xD -Jay]
Yay, a second round of LDF! I can never have enough of it =D
In Melbius, if you collect all the different types of weapons as soon as you can (grabbing more than one of the same type will not enhance that weapon any further), any subsequent powerups will turn into "P"s, which will give you unlimited max power for a short duration. If you die, you lose that weapon and have to pick it up again, so try not to die. XD
Incidentally, it takes almost the same duration for a powerup ship to appear, meaning that if you collect them the right way, you can pretty much rain continuous hell upon the masses.
Super Mega Ultra thingy has possibly the worst menu ever in a game.
I can't get enough of super mega ultra battle robot, but it's pretty hard not to die when the boss ships attack. I'm in Anchorage, Redoubt's going to be a blast!
[Edit: Wheee! I've got family there. I hope you're stocked up on face masks and batteries. Be safe. - Psychotronic]
Mechanical Commando seems to have spawned an unlimited number of little alert overlays saying I'll have a better gameplay experience if I use Flash 10. I'm sure I will, with an infinite number of alert overlays eating up my system resources under Flash 9! The developers might want to fix this.
Update