Abadox: The Deadly Inner War

"Look, kids! There's the small intestine!!!"

There's just nothing quite like a somewhat grotesque journey into the innards of a living planet to brighten my day.

Thankfully, old-school NES shooter Abadox is able to provide that sort of visual experience for me. In this game, you control a happy-go-lucky chap out to rescue this girl that somehow got sucked into the center of this living planet. Don't ask how or why. I never read the instruction book and the short pre-game scene doesn't answer any questions.

Six stages of monster blasting (plus a short final level that has no monsters, but serves as the obstacle course you must maneuver through before being allowed to flee the planet) make up this game. Three levels scroll from left to right, while three more scroll from top to bottom.

Graphics/Sound -- 9 -- For the NES, the graphics were very well done. Bright, colorful depictions of internal organs and guts and all that stuff are placed throughout the game. Enemies look pretty nice, too. You get flying eyeball ships, clawlike arms that extend from walls and much more. Bosses (two on each of the first six levels) are more of a mixed bag. You get some that were designed very well such as the face with the two big eyes on the first level or the giant colon (I guess...) at the end of the fourth level. On the other hand, you also have the three jumping robots that serve as the fifth level's miniboss and the worm that is the level two miniboss. Nothing wrong with them, but they are pretty generic. As for the sound, it's hard to really rate it. It didn't really affect me either way.

Gameplay -- 8 -- Like most space shooters, you constantly are picking up power-ups, ranging from speed boosts to missiles to lasers to spread shots, to enhance your shots. While they come in useful, for most of the game, the challenge doesn't come from the enemies, but from the stage layouts. Each level will have at least one area where the path you must fly through is very narrow and/or twisty, which doesn't give you much room to dodge bullets. Getting through these areas, where you'll have five enemies charging you, a screen full of bullets and three inches of room to maneuver in --- let's just say that you'll get killed and killed repeatedly. While you can get power-ups that either intercept bullets or allow you to absorb a little damage, it's still not simple.
As for bosses, for the most part, there are only one thing you'll need to do in order to win: find the safe spot and hide there, only dashing out briefly in order to fire a couple of shots. However, that strategy doesn't work for every single boss, so be prepared to be kept on your toes to some degree.

Replay Value -- 7 -- To my knowledge, there are no secrets or anything new to do on replay. But it is a fun game that isn't that long (none of the levels is an endurance test), so it's definitely worth picking up more than once.

Overall -- 8 -- In essence, this is a high quality old-school space shooter with multiple viewpoints and cool enemies. Instead of generic-looking spaceships, you have evil demon faces confronting you --- giving it some degree of originality. While everything about the game is outdated nowadays, this game is still worth playing for anyone who is a fan of classic shooters.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/31/03