Review written by Serge
Chillingo - The Premier Games Publisher
&b=POCKETGAMER">Buy Invasion from Clickgamer
[Editor's note: A demo is (finally!) available via the Clickgamer software store]
Around twenty five years ago, Taito released space invaders in Japan. It was an instant hit, and was quickly brought over to the United States. To this day, countless numbers of remakes have been made for many different platforms. There are several space invaders based games for the pocket pc, but only one truly shines and stands out among the bunch. The game I am referring to is Zeoneo's Invasion. Naturally, the premise of Invasion is to destroy the alien invaders attacking earth, with your ship (the SF-7 Barracuda).
Graphics: The graphics in this game are simply stunning. When your ship gets close to the water you can see its reflection, and when it's shot down and falls into the water, splashes can be seen (splashes are also created when the enemy's weapon shots hit the water). When you destroy an enemy, a fiery explosion ensues. Simply put, everything is crisp, clear, and beautiful.
Sound: The audio in this game is great. When an object hits the water, you can hear the splashes it makes. When you shoot your weapon, you can hear a distinctive sound, based on the weapon you are currently using. Also, your weapon makes a different sound for each enemy upon contact with them. The only thing this game lack in terms of audio is in-game music. The main menu has music, but while playing the game, there is no music.
Thankfully, the gameplay in Invasion is as good as the visuals.
Controls: You can control your ship via stylus or d-pad, however, the stylus offers much greater control over your ships movement.
Enemies: The enemies are varied, and they each have their own tactics. Some will just follow regular formation (moving around once in a while), while others will dive into the water and attempt to strike you based on your current location. The game could have used more enemies though, to freshen up gameplay in the later levels.
Levels: Invasion is made up of a mission system, where you go on a mission, complete 3 parts, and go on to the next mission. After you complete 3 missions, you will be given an extra life.
Ship: Your ship has a shield, which protects you from a certain number of hits from the enemy weapons. If you collide with an enemy, you usually fall into the water and lose a life. Your shield is restored when you finish a mission, and go on to the next one. Your basic weapon is pretty weak, but it does the job, and it's able to counter the enemy's weapons. Apart from the basic weapon, there are 5 different super weapons. What they are and how to get them is left up to you to find out. It is important to remember that you can only wield 1 weapon at a time, and once you obtain a super weapon, your supply of it will be limited. You have unlimited supply of your basic weapon, but you are limited as to how many shots you can fire, before the basic weapon “replenishes” itself. The least amount of shots you can fire is 2 and the max is 5. In order to be able to fire more shots before needing to replenish, you need to keep your accuracy above a certain percentile (which can be found on the lower left of the screen).
Options /Ranking: If you click on the option screen at the main menu, the following will appear:
Clicking on set audio leads you to a screen where you can toggle audio on/off, effects volume, and music volume. “Set controls” allows you to select the control mode (d-pad-stylus/stylus), button mapping for fire, and button mapping for pause.
Clicking on set visual leads you to a screen where you can disable weapon sparks, score tags, smoke effects, ripple effects, and explosion sparks. Quick mode, when enabled, gets rid of the in between mission screens and the boot up console. I found this option to be very useful, and I always used it. Mission skip allows you to select a mission to skip. For example, you completed mission 3 and started on mission 4 but exited the game. This option would therefore allows you to select “mission skip: 3”, and by doing so, sends you straight to mission 4.
Other things worth mentioning:
• If you are playing a game (let's say you're on mission 2 part 3) and need to pause, simply press the pause button. You will be led to a screen where you can continue, toggle audio, toggle volume level, set visual options, view ranking and quit. If you choose quit, you will be able to resume mission 2 part 3, by selecting resume, located at the main menu. However, you will start at the beginning of mission 2 part 3, and not where you left off.
• At the beginning of any mission or part, make sure to keep your ship low, to avoid colliding with the enemy ships that appear.
Pros:
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Great remake of a classic game
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Beautiful visuals
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Very fun to play
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Smart A.I
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Good documentation
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Great sound effects
Cons:
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No demo
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No music in-game
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Price is somewhat expensive
Conclusion:
Invasion is a great game, which is easy to pick up and enjoy. If you're even the slightest bit into gaming on the Pocket PC, I strongly recommend it.
Overall Score: 9/10
Many thanks to Amiga Inc. for providing us with our review copy.
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