Heavy Weapon: Atomic Tank Review.
I downloaded this on PSN mostly because I’ve always been into the jet/tank side-scrolling games like Gradius and Jackel, so I figured I would like this one as well. Here’s a little bit about the game to tell you if it’s worth the $9.99 in Playstation/Xbox points.
The game starts you out with a basic tank, and basic machine gun weapons. Hordes of planes and helicopters fly over you as you are able to side scroll from left to right, as the whole screen side scrolls right. Each level is brightly colored and has cool backgrounds, but seem to drag on for a little too long. By the the time the boss arrives you are definitely beyond ready to start the next level. Each boss is pretty unique but overly easy (with exception of a few). I only a died a handful of times throughout the entire game.
After each completed level, you are awarded with a skill point. The points can be added to several different powers that you can acquire for your tank. These powers can be heat rays, double missiles, lasers, spark shots, defense circles and a few other crazy atomic weapons. The more skill points you add to each weapon, the more crazy powerful and ridiculous they become. My only problem with this is that by the time you level up your tank to have lots of points on several different powers, the screen becomes so filled with junk coming from your tank, you really can’t tell where you are, where the enemies are, or which missiles and shots are yours, and which are the enemies. This can become quite annoying. The more power-ups you obtain, the easier the game gets as well. You can pretty much just clear the screen with every turn of the analog stick with all these power-ups, and when the screen is too full to see what’s going on, you can use nukes that you pick up along the way. These instantly kill everything but you, and usually can take a quarter of the boss’s life meter. Bosses are insanely easy if you have three nukes saved up. Helpful helicopters also fly by giving you power-ups, as you’re not supposed to shoot them. It is almost impossible not to shoot them…as this picture shows.
Can you tell me who is shooting what?
What We Loved:
- The controls are pretty much the same as Geometry Wars. Move with one analog, shoot with the other, and press a button for bombs. Nothing complicated here.
- The levels were cool looking, and brightly colored.
- The weapon additions are awesome and do loads of damage to your enemy.
What We Didn’t Love:
- The levels get long and boring, and the repetitiveness is aggravating.
- Aside from the weapon additions from skill points, this is like any other side scrolling vehicle shooter.
- The levels and bosses were very easy.
- When acquiring lots of power-ups the screen becomes very difficult to detect what is going on.
- The Price! $9.99? Wow!
All in all, the game was enjoyable…but only for the (maybe) two hours it took to beat. It is too easy, and the levels are too long and repetitive. I wouldn’t pick this game over classics like Jackel, or Super R-Type, but there is still some cool factors about it. $9.99 is definitely too high of a price for this game, though. I would probably pay five bucks, but nothing more.
Score 3/5
1 Comment
I played the demo, and I kind of liked it, though i totally agree that it is a reptitive game.