1942

"Long and challenging. Perhaps TOO challenging."

It is 1942. You are in World War II and you must shoot other planes in an attempt to win World War II. It seems that you are the only person who can even do something about the infinite amount of enemies, but we know one thing. It will not be easy. This game throws out hundreds of enemies before you even know what is going on, so you need to be on your toes as you have to shoot or maneuver around all of them. Luckily, this game has an unlimited amount of continues, so all you need to make it through is consistency.

So mainly in this game you are controlling a white plane who has to shoot as many planes as you can, while avoiding getting hit yourself. Yes, this seems like a normal vertical shoot them up, but this has quite a big challenge packed in it. You will have to go through 32 stages of this, all of them are almost exactly the same. The only purpose really is to get from one ship to the other, all the while fighting many enemies and sometimes huge bosses. But getting to the end of not easy, as the game will throws millions of enemies at you. While you are shooting a few orange planes, a huge yellow one will come up, and some gray ones will come down, and shoot at you, so you will have your hands full. Luckily, there are power ups to help you with your journey.

After time and time again of fighting planes, you will eventually lose your lives. But after you go back to the main menu, you are about to press the Player 1 button, when you notice something blinking at the bottom...Continue? I can continue? Yep, there are infinite continues on here, which takes away from some of the fun, trying to get through 32 levels without continues. However, your score resets to zero, so getting a high score can still be a big challenge for you to go for. More challenge can be found in the game itself. You have to have a great concentration level to watch both where you are shooting, and the bullets coming at you. This high of a challenge really takes away from the fun.

The bosses are even tougher then the stages themselves. You find yourself being shot at from five different directions, while having to watch your bullets hit the plane, that requires even better concentration, and only a god could have that kind of concentration!

Aside from that, the controls are very responsive, and stay this way for the whole game, which is important. When you see all the enemies on the screen, you will be glad the controls are easy to master. Your fingers will get tired after a while of playing, since you have to constantly hit the button while you are shooting, which really hurts your hand.

The sounds are perhaps one of the worst in any game I have ever played. It sounds just like a game made in 1850. All they are is beeps, doo, duh, more beeps, more beeps.. need I go on? It is necessary for in order to enjoy this game, that you need to lower the sound. If you go deaf from these sounds, you can not hold me responsible since I tried to warn you.

There is not much to say about the graphics, they are just incredibly average. Nothing to be amazed at, nor there is nothing to be mad about. The text is pretty much blocky. The ship from where you take off from is only jagged gray, and you are in a normal white plane, nothing spectacular but it does the job. The enemies are gray, orange, and green triangles, and what they shoot at you is only orange circles. The bigger enemies are more detailed but it really is not saying much. The backgrounds are very bland. It is either blue, yellow, or green, which are supposed to be the ocean, the sand, or an island.

There is hardly any reason that you would want to play this again after beating it once. There is not much motivation, no rewards. The only reason you would want to is to get a better score, but this is hardly a reason, since you will be getting many Game Over's and losing your score.

Overall, 1942 is a frantic shooter that requires a lot of concentration. Besides the really large challenge, this is a good game.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 08/14/03