Steel Empire (Game Boy Advance) - Review by Andrew

Introduction

When Steel Empire was first released way back in the early 90's shoot'em ups were at the height of their popularity and the SNES was the last word in home consoles. Since then, of course, shoot'em ups have taken a bit of a back seat with only a few products a year released to appease trigger-happy gamers largely due to the popularity of the First Person Shooter, which has pretty much hijacked every publisher's release schedule for some time now.

Gameplay

While it may seem obvious (and to be honest it is) the gameplay involves shooting... Everything! That's right. If it moves, shoot it and if it doesn't shoot it anyway just to be on the safe side. There was never anything sophisticated about games of this genre and the same remains true today. Before you tackle any of this though you'll have to select your ship. There are only two of these but while one is more robust with the most basic of weapons the other has little in the way of shields but is fitted extensively with the latest in lasers and bombs. It's then up to you to get through the levels intact, most of which not only feature an end of level boss but also a mid level boss too. There's also the question of equipping your ship and the levels are scattered with bonus items such as extra lasers or more powerful bombs. There's even cash to collect although this only bumps up your high score. Things become incredibly challenging when you find yourself mid level having just lost a life. Here your various bonus items will float around randomly for a few seconds waiting for you to collect them and so re-equip your ship. Miss this opportunity however and you've just made a tough game even tougher.

Controls

Very easy to use indeed with the access to your primary and auxiliary weapons just where you'd expect them to be. Don't think for one second that this is going to save your aching fingers though because it's not. One nice touch is the fact that you can fire both forwards and backwards and only a few minutes with the game will illustrate just why this has been made possible.

Graphics

Unusually for a shoot 'em up there's little in the way of shiny futuristic space ships with the design here clearly led by a Jules Verne fan. All this makes for a refreshing change too and even the cut screens have been 'aged' to give them the appearance of old newsreel footage. The animation's pretty good too with multi-parallax scrolling providing a real sense of depth while the size of the ships have to be seen to be believed. This does cause the occasional slow down but not as frequent as we've seen in other games.

Sound

The soundtrack is certainly not the best you'll hear on the GBA and it does appear that the music has been simply ported over along with everything else from the original source. Unfortunately things have moved on a little since 1992 and the whole thing does sound a little weak especially when you consider just how much is going on in the game. The sound effects are much better though it's just a shame there's no option to isolate them and listen to your favorite CD.

Final comments

It would be very easy to be critical of Steel Empire due to its lack of modern day polish but to be honest this is what makes the whole thing so appealing, especially to Shoot 'em Up enthusiasts. There's no namby-pamby saves or a never-ending supply of continues and if you're just not fast enough well... you know the rest. This really is one for shoot'em up fans who want a real challenge and are prepared to suffer shocking blisters and seized up hands in the process. Rookies need not apply!

Pro: Fast and Relentless
Con: Very Tough
Final score: 6.7

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