Arcade Archives: Mega Zone

This week's Arcade Archives release is... Mega Zone (Konami, 1984)

Arcade Archives (previous-gen consoles)

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Arcade Archives 2 (current-gen consoles)

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Just the one ROM this time, and no Preference Settings either. I was a bit confused by the year listed though, as the title screen says 1983, as does arcade-history. However, this book, often cited as a reliable source, lists the game's release as March 1984 rather than 1983... In Japan, at least. This is unsourced, but JP Wikipedia lists the European and American release as 1983, specifying October 1983 for the US. Hamster themselves do, on occasion, get the year wrong too- Dragon Buster is officially listed as 1984 but that released early in 1985 (Namco gets this wrong too IIRC)- but seeing as they're likely to defer to the Japanese release date, we'll keep it as 1984 for now. Arcade release years (and release territories too- never say a game was only released in Japan unless you've got rock-solid proof) are confusing!

Once again, shmups are my area of weakness, but as ever, I'll do my best to bumble through. Another game saved from having its only home port being in the Microsoft Game Room, Mega Zone is a completely fine vertical shmup where you control a floating tank, making its way through enemy hordes to destroy their base. It's got a few things of interest that you didn't really see too often at the time. For a start, there's obstacles like walls and bushes that don't destroy you on impact (only if the scrolling of the screen crushes you against them) and this plays into the branching path system, as sometimes these obstacles force you to pick the left or right of the screen. Once you do, the path splits (and sometimes even scrolls diagonally, fancy!) and you'll take a different route, so you won't see the whole game in one loop. Once you do reach the end of the game (which has a gigantic face as the final boss- shoot out its eyes then take out the core!) you do repeat the game, so you can try the routes you missed if you're good enough to get that far!

There's not much in the way of power-ups, but eyeball turrets drop objects that clear the screen and give you a big points bonus, and energy pellets found in the riverbed (that I assumed were landmines the first time I played so I avoided them, oops) spawn a MEGA sign (truncated to just MEG in-game) once you collect enough, and grabbing it doubles your tank's size and triples its firepower at the cost of one of your spare lives, a bit like the Double Fighter from Galaga. It even lets you take a hit without having to respawn, but being twice the size does make your hitbox larger, so be careful. I think some of the enemies are pretty interesting too, like the missiles that fly diagonally to catch you out, the installations that fire bullets between them and only get destroyed if you fly between the gap (according to the manual, they eventually transform into the wolves from Pooyan!), eyeballs that need to be shot directly in the eye and the walls that appear directly ahead of you that you need to react to quickly. I don't have a lot else to say about it but it's, like, completely fine. It is a shoot-em-up you can play, and enjoy. I think that about covers it, sorry I can't say much else~