Game Reviews

AngerForce - Strikers

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iOS
| AngerForce - Strikers
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AngerForce - Strikers
|
iOS
| AngerForce - Strikers

To the uninitiated, the bullet hell genre can look like utter chaos.

Curling wisps of expended energy darting around a screen as you try frantically to work out where you fit into the madness, and whether or not you're actually doing a good job.

AngerForce - Strikers dulls the blow somewhat with some of the best cartoon graphics to ever grace an iPad screen.

Mechanical monsters shift and transform, their oars beating through shallow waters, their clunking fists twisting as streams of neon-blue lasers burst forth.

On top of that, simple controls let you take a firm grip of whichever of the four characters you choose.

You poke them around the screen with a finger, each movement replicated as you try to dodge the shower of death raining all around.

The action is fast and precise, and the different characters and game modes mean there's always something extra to discover, or at the very least a high score to try and beat.

AngerForce - Strikers isn't without its problems, and it can't quite match the very best shooters in terms of poise and balletic violence, but as an introduction to the genre it's a brilliant, filling, and entertaining romp.

Strike hard

Each game starts with you picking one of the four main characters. There's your standard anime hero and heroine, a big-hearted robot with an affinity with the natural world, and what looks like a magical raccoon with a special face mask.

The characters all play differently, and offer a variety of defensive and offensive special moves that you need to master if you want to get to the later levels.

Some deflect bullets, some hurl out colossal bombs, others create cloud-based avatars that blast a few shots out before disappearing.

You're always firing, whether you're moving or not, and there are a number of ways to unleash your special moves. Double-taps and multi-fingered presses do the same job as reaching over and tapping one of three buttons at the side of the screen.

Enemies lumber and flit, some stomping into view below, others darting around in front of you unleashing rockets and bombs and then shooting off before you get a chance to dispatch them.

There are tanks and airships, huge nuclear rockets that hold flying mechanical stompers, and hot-lead blasting turrets that hurl out showers of projectiles as you zoom past them.

Strike fast

While the presentation is stunning, there's a slight naivety to the level design that keeps AngerForce - Strikers from the top of the bullet-hell tree.

The wave-based, maze-weaving craziness is in place, but every so often it feels a little too fluid. Because while the genre does feel chaotic, there's a precision to the madness in the best games that experienced players can exploit.

That's not to say that the game isn't entertaining though. Its steampunk violence is rich and satisfying, and there's a neat bounce to proceedings that makes having another go almost inevitable.

It's just that sometimes things don't quite click together in the right way, and where the game needs to be tight, it occasionally gets a little sloppy.

Strike precisely

For newcomers to the genre, that isn't going to be too much of a problem, but veterans might find the lapses a little on the annoying side.

AngerForce - Strikers is a brave attempt to do something fresh with the mobile shoot-'em-up, and for the most part it works.

It's accessible, it's enjoyable, and while it might not quite be chiselled arcade perfection, it's a damn good time all the same.

AngerForce - Strikers

A gorgeous looking intense blast of bullet-hell madness, AngerForce - Strikers lacks a little edge, but it's still worthy of your time
Score
Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.