Metal Slug 4

"Metal Slug have seen better days. Don't play this unless you have played any of the others first!"

The Metal Slug series is one of the Neo-Geo's most popular series thanks to being totally different from all the fighting series on the system. All the previous Metal Slug games were designed by SNK, the creators of Neo-Geo. However since the company got bankrupt and got Playmore bought them, another company called Mega Enterprise got the task to try to make a worthy sequel of the previous godly game Metal Slug 3.

Metal Slug 4 is just like the other Metal Slug games on the system typical "Run and Gun" games. There are six stages, or missions as the game says it is, but the point is basically to get to the end of each stage where a boss waiting for the player and shoot down as many enemies as possible during the way. On the way to the boss the player will meet civilians which can give him/her a nice power-up, like a more powerful weapon. There are also vehicles on the stage that the player can take control over to do even more destruction.

The first thing that's completely new about this game is that only two of the original Metal Slug team is playable. I have no idea what the storyline says about how Tarma and Eri aren't a part of the missions in this game, but anyway the two new characters are Trevor and Nadia. While any sane person would think that they would be equal to Marco and Fio, or offer a new style of gameplay, Mega Enterprise decided to make the new characters just palette swaps of Tarma and Eri with a few changes (For example Trevor has a shorter haircut than Tarma). However both Tarma and Eri do make a few appearances in the game.

Except from a few new weapons, enemies and vehicles, Metal Slug hasn't much to offer. The first two stages looks awfully like stages in Metal Slug 1 and 2. The boss fights aren't even close to those in Metal Slug 3 when it comes to creativity or fun to fight against. Just like Metal Slug 3 had a underwater mission among other things that changed the gameplay, Metal Slug 4 has something that changed it in a bad way. No matter if it's rope climbing or riding on a motorcycle, it's still the same type of shooting, just that it's much harder to move.

While the Metal Slug type of gameplay is always fun, this game is really disappointing. It's not even the classic General Morden who is the villain! It's considered to be the worst Metal Slug game for a reason. But no matter what you say, Metal Slug 4 can still be really fun to play if you play it with a friend. Just remember that the other Metal Slugs are better.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 12/11/06