Omega Boost

"If Starfox was better, this would be it"

Recently buying this game by trading in armored core and spyro 2 for it at Electronics Boutique, it was so worth my trade. This game, having it for only a week, is so amazing the first time I played it, I have never belived this kind of game could have been done on ps1. If you have ever played starfox on N64, or panzer dragoon on Saturn or Xbox, you know the formula: You are playing on a invisible rail, and can only control which way the robot is facing, and shoot everything that moves. But Omega Boost does so much more than this.

Graphics: 10 (out of 10)

Jaw dropping visuals, amazing for the ps1 (its like a 64 bit ps1). The background graphics could use a touch, but the robot animations are strong, fluid, and awe-inspireing.
The frame rate moves at 60fps, which is probably the only playstatin game I have seen do that. And, it does all this without slowdown. There are like 30 enemies on screen, youre like shooting all your ammo at them, and this is all happening without any slowdown. Some ps2 games cant even pull that off. Also, the bosses are huge and amazing, and sometimes very hard. Its a preety package, and I love it.

Story: 8

The story is very amusing, and having seen Terminator 3 after I played this game, you can see some huge similarities. Its the year 2090-sumthin, and this kinda computer virus called alpha core begins to take over the world, and the humans want to stop it. So they build a time machine to go to the past, so they can stop alpha core before it was created. But, alpha core finds out about it, and steals it, and now he wants to go back in time, so he can infect the first computer ever designed, so he can become humankinds god. The humans last resort for this, is a robot capable of traveling through time called the Omega Boost. And so begins the story. Reminds me too much of Terminator, with the time travelling and the alpha core is a lot like sky-net.

Sound: 10

Good sound effects, a lot like another shooter game called Macross VF-X 2, which i did a review for back in the day. The music is good, and it changes its style from level to level.

Gameplay: 10

This game move so fast, it makes my head spin. The point of the game is to move through the stage as fast as you can, and shoot everything as much as you can. You can level up, and that means you have more missiles (or lock on lasers, as the game calls it, but its just a missile rip-off). You have almost infinite eveything, except your ultimate move called the viper boost. You only get to use that about once per level, but its really powerful. This game is preety much perfect.

So why did i give it a 9 instead of a 10? Its short. I can beat it in like half an hour, but you can get extra missions, so its fun. If you are a hardcore shooter fan, buy it, its only 10 bux (15 canadian dollars) at EB's, and it is so worth your time. But, if you just want a few nights of fun, rent it if possible.

Overall: 9 out of 10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 07/20/03, Updated 07/20/03