Still keeping its vertical view arcade style as it was back in the 80’s, Alpha Mission is a blast from the past. Still not so sure about picking up this PSN Minis game? Well, buckle up and get ready for blast off and launch towards our review.
Arriving in 1985, Alpha Mission is a vertical shooter developed by SNK. Alpha Mission has made its way into the PSN Minis section for both the PlayStation Portable and PlayStation 3 system. It is very similar to Xevious a game by Namco in 1982.
You must pilot your all powerful fighter ship SYD and go against the deadly fleet of the Seven Stars Alliance. For its PSN Port, Alpha Mission got some improvements, the controls feel nice and responsive. The graphics weren’t touched much at all, which is good for being an old school arcade game. To start the game you’ll need to press the Triangle button to add coins (or continues). To fire our main guns press the X button (this is for destroying aerial enemies). To fire the missiles press the Circle button (this are for the ground based enemies). Both types of enemies add a level of difficulty, which is a good thing. To move your battle spaceship you move it with the left analog stick. A really cool feature in this game is that weapon power-ups may be collected, such as faster shooting, shield, and among others. You will need the upgrades, each final boss is one heck of a fight. It takes precise shooting and keeping an eye on their weapons. Some of the bosses, even have “tentacle” like parts that will kill you if you get touched by them.
The menu is the same as most others PSN Minis title we have reviewed (Vanguard and Vanguard II). To access the menu press the Select button. From there you can save and load at any time during the game. Checkpoints are in the game, if you die at any moment you’ll will not be punished and be put at the beginning of the whole level, instead you will spawn close to where you got killed. But remember that you do have a limited number of lives, so don’t be getting yourself killed. But if you do, at the Game Settings in the game menu, you can add a few more chances to your success by changing 3 lives to 5. There you can also change the difficult settings, from Easy (for those who are new to games like this) to Hardest (to masters who eat games like this for breakfast, or just want to be challenged).
Alpha Mission is a fun PSN Minis, and it comes with a price tag of $2.39 for PlayStation Plus members. For those without PlayStation Plus the price is $2.99. Its download size is 5958 KB (5.9 MB) a very decent size for a PSN Minis so don’t need to worry about taking up too much space. You will have a ton of fun playing this from the comfort of your couch at home or on the go on your PSP. Give this game a try. It’s a great time killer and it tests your reflexes.
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