[A-Z Games] G: Gunstar Heroes

Games move on, generally speaking, they get incrementally better which means that older games can often age quite badly. Of course, this afflicts certain games and genres more than others but most of the games of my youth have been significantly bettered. Most, but not all.

In terms of "run and gun", what could be better than this perfectly formed slice of action and destruction? Treasure are a development house that was formed by some departees from Konami and they would go on to provide some amazing moments in the history of gaming stretching from obscurities like Hippa Linda to bona fide major classics such as Gradius V. This was some way to announce your arrival. A screenshot cannot do justice to the manic nature of the game as tons and tons of enemies try to swamp the protagonists (two of them, named Red and Blue) as you progress. There are four starting levels which you can choose from (in itself, quite a different approach at the time) which showed inventiveness and variety in huge dollops. The game follows the classic pattern of run and destroy the standard enemies until you reach a boss and the very first level (as in the first to the left of the selectable section) is relatively standard in this respect but then the bosses get better and better with the epic battle with Seven Force (so called as he has seven forms) being a particular stand-out as you battle the robot transforming through seven forms whilst riding, at speed, a mine cart. It is an exhilarating experience and that is just level two.

The game itself is so tight with effects and explosions thrown around with gay abandon but always being fair, it is so replayable. That is helped massively by the weapon structure allowing you to approach the game quite differently each time. There are four weapons (standard, homing, laser and flame) and each character has two weapon slots which you can switch between and, superbly, combine. I do not remember games having combination weapons before but 20 different weapons (4 + 16 combos) gave so much variety and destruction - especially when you had two players. The combinations were pretty nifty and combined in logical ways. The homing gun is relatively weedy so if you get two homings, the weapon will have a lot more power but effectively be a LV2 version of that weapon. Where it got interesting was combining normal with say, fire - that would mean a explosion shot to wield. Other great combinations was the standard gun with homing giving a bendy powerful shot and the coolest of all - flamethrower and laser give a lightsaber. A lightsaber! Obviously the lightsaber had very poor range but was by far the coolest of all weapons and meant you had to get up close and personal. It could also block bullets....
As you complete each level, you get a little more health (health is shown as a number rather than the standard health bar which made it feel a little more technical) so that is effectively your "power up" and means that you should select the levels you feel are harder last so you get a better chance. There is also a choice between free and fixed shot which allows you to either run and shoot or stand and direct your fire which also added to your variety.

I bought this on the PS2 in 2006 in the Treasure Box but I loved it when I played it in the early 90s too - I guess I was just surprised at how playable it still was. And is.

3 other G titles that might be interesting: 
Great Giana Sisters - Mario rip-off, actually banned from sale.
Gradius V - A little bit of Treasure, a little bit of Gradius - it could not go wrong. As brilliant a horizontal shooter as you can imagine.
Gungrave - Cel-shaded action from Sega that wasn't Jet Set Radio.