"Inkhands, I am forever indebted to you for recommending this game"

OPENING STATEMENT
I was looking for a new Super Nintendo game, and Inkhands recommended Super Megaforce. Lucky for me that he did so. Super Megaforce is one of the greatest space shooting games ever made. Super Megaforce takes a formula that Raiden made successful, and adds bunches of more power-ups, and presto! You have an unknown, but excellent, game.

GAMEPLAY--9
There are two types of space shooters on the Super Nintendo. The first type is the type of space shooter that Gradius and Super R-Type are. In these, you see a side view of your plane, or ship, and you can move up or down to avoid bullets. The screen is constantly moving to the right though. Super Megaforce is the second type of space shooter, the type that I undeniably prefer. In Super Megaforce you see an above, or bird’s eye view of your plane or ship, and you can move left and right to dodge enemy fire. The screen in Super Megaforce constantly pulls you up. (Do not get me wrong, you can still always stay near the bottom of the screen, if you wish, with ease.)

Super Megaforce’s key to its spectacular gameplay is it’s power-up system. There are eight different power-ups that you can get. These range from the all to common Multi Directional Shot, to the unstoppable missile. These power-ups can be upgraded by getting orange teardrop like power-ups that frequently float down the screen once you get into an area with many enemies. I’ll use Missiles, my personal favorite power-up as an example. You start with one missile when you first pick up a power-up. Pick up three orange teardrop power-ups, and you have four missiles. Pick up a few more of those orange teardrop power-ups, and you soon have around ten missiles, and you are automatically shooting most everything in sight, before your bullets can even get there, as the Missiles home, which makes them so unstoppable.

There are enemies absolutely everywhere in Super Megaforce. I thought that Gradius III had lots of enemies, but Super Megaforce has about three or four times that many enemies in a level. Some of those enemies take multiple shots to kill, so having a good power-up can really cut down on those shots needed. Actually, enemies seem to go after you just a little bit less when you have ten missiles, rather than just the bullets.

GRAPHICS--10
I actually was far more impressed with Super Megaforce’s graphics than I expected to be. Everything about Super Megaforce’s graphics blow the other space shooters on the Super Nintendo completely out of the water. First of all, the backgrounds on the other space shooters are just blank looking star patterns pasted on a black screen. Super Megaforce’s backgrounds are always changing. I will use the first level as an example. For a while it is a plain, then comes a forest, with a river, and, then another plain. Then, about the time that you reach your first boss, you see some hills in the landscape. The second level in Super Megaforce has a background nothing like the first. It is the little things like that that make Super Megaforce so great.

The enemy designs are even more impressive than the environments. There are a wide variety of enemy planes and space craft for you to battle. Actually, there is even a wide variety of enemy gun turrets. Toho Corporation, a company that I had never heard of before Super Megaforce, really pulled out all the stops on Super Megaforce. The enemies also all look quite realistic, or at least what I think that they would look like in real life. A really funny thing I noticed about the enemy design is that one of the enemies that is fairly common in the first level, looks like the Enterprise, of Star Trek fame, with an orange top.

The explosions look quite good for the Super Nintendo, but, especially in a graphical showcase like Super Megaforce, they are probably the worst part of the graphics. The explosions are kind of like orange and blue mushroom clouds, seen from above. They are really offset though by the many bullet styles and designs, all of which look nearly perfect.

MUSIC--9
SOUND--9
Toho Corporation even did an excellent job on the audio capabilities as well. The music, surprisingly enough, is mainly orchestral. Even more surprising than that is that the orchestral music sounds good with a space shooter like Super Megaforce. Toho Corporation did a great job making the orchestral music exciting, and making it flow with Super Megaforce. On the Super Nintendo, excluding role-playing games, it probably has the best orchestral music on the console.

The sound effects are also superb. The gunfire, which you will hear so much throughout the game, sounds futuristic, realistic, and not annoying in anyway shape or form. The explosions, although they hardly look perfect, they sound perfect, especially for the Super Nintendo. The menu noises are even very good, and they actually sound like derivatives of the gunfire noises.

CONTROL--10
‘A’ and ‘B’ are the only buttons you could possibly need in Super Megaforce. Those two buttons fire. The other buttons either have no functions or have really bad, or useless, functions. Well, except for ‘Start,’ which pauses Super Megaforce. Super Megaforce also controls very well. Your plane responds to your every whim and command, exactly when you want it to respond. Basically, Toho Corporation has done another perfect job.

FUN--9
Although the Main Mode in Super Megaforce is absolutely, completely fun, the Short Mode, as it is called, is not fun whatsoever, Basically, in the Short Mode, your plane is thrown into a level, filled completely with blocks and enemies, and your goal is to get to the end of it. The Short Mode takes everything that is fun about the Main Mode in Super Megaforce and throws it out the window. Do not ever use the Short Mode, whatever the reason may be. Also, much more importantly, what boosts this rating back up to a nine, is that the Main Mode can be completed in cooperative play, which especially is a big plus for me, as I absolutely adore cooperative play.

CHALLENGE--MEDIUM
Without a decent power-up, Super Megaforce is almost impossible. But, once you find yourself with a power-up, especially a Missile power-up, that has been upgraded with the orange teardrop power-ups a few times, you will find yourself, for the most part, flying through the levels with ease. (No pun was intended.) So, I suppose, if you are looking for a good challenge, try to avoid all power-ups whatsoever, because they really do make Super Megaforce substantially easier. But they also make it more fun, so you have to pick and choose.

REPLAY VALUE--HIGH
Super Megaforce presents, especially in Cooperative Mode, an undeniably addicting experience. Chances are, even if you cannot play cooperatively, for whatever the reason may be, you will play Super Megaforce again and again. The game just has that addicting quality that never gets old, just like I could play Raiden everyday for the rest of my life in the arcades. Toho Corporation did an excellent job making Super Megaforce have lasting fun, and making sure that you want to play it again and again.

PROS
*Graphics, especially the enemy designs, are nearly perfect.
*Orchestral music that actually sounds good in a game such as this.
*Eight different power-ups, all that can be powered-up themselves.

CONS
*Maybe a bit too easy, especially for a veteran of the space shooting sub-genre.
*The Short Mode is basically useless.
*Super Megaforce is just too good to allow me to think of a third con.

CLOSING STATEMENT
Super Megaforce is yet another spectacular reason why the Super Nintendo is the greatest console ever created. I do wonder what happened to Toho Corporation, though. I have never seen another game by them, and I wonder if they folded, or were absorbed by another company. Whatever happened to them, and even if they never make another game, Super Megaforce will rank among the best of the best for all eternity, especially since they stopped development long ago for the Super Nintendo.

OVERALL--10

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 12/13/00, Updated 07/18/01