Aero Blasters for TurboGrafx-16

Image: MobyGames

Aero Blasters

aka Air Buster

Genre: shooter - horizontal

Publisher: NEC

Year: 1990

System: TurboGrafx-16

Gameplay Score: 3

Gameplay Notes:

Slow movement and no speed boosts No screen filling weapons. I never felt powerful. Power-ups are launched from a ship that you blow up and they fall out in an arc so quickly that you can't really pick which one you want to end up with so you often get weapons that are a downgrade from what you're currently using. It's pretty annoying. Pressing I lets you fire a shot and II is auto fire. The peashooter is fast but you'll want to get a weapon quickly. Options come with some weapons but not all which again is obnoxious. Many enemies take a whole lot of hits and steer you toward parts of the screen where other enemies will just appear and kill you. Cheap hits in a shooter are lame. Enemies move way faster than you do.

Level Design Score: 4

Level Design Notes:

There's a bit of variety the first level is your standard flyover a city and see it get destroyed. The second level takes place in tunnels with a lot of tight spaces like in Gradius. Level 3 takes place in the skies. Enemy waves also has variety so it's not a game full of repetition. Nothing really stands out but it's mostly good stuff.

Theme Score: 4

Theme Notes:

The theme is a standard story of you against aliens, I think. The weird generic anime characters from the Genesis version are gone.

Art Style Score: 4

Art Style Notes:

Fast, colorful, and dynamic. The sprites aren't terribly interesting but the copious parallax scrolling makes up for it. Brighter than the drab graphics on the Genesis. There's a lovely sense of speed, especially compared to R-Type and its many clones.

Audio Score: 3

Audio Notes:

Your shooting sound is straight out of Asteroids on Atari 2600. Other sounds are similarly archaic sounding. For example, when you're hitting an enemy that doesn't go down immediately. It sounds like rain on a tin roof. It sounds a bit better than the Genesis version but is still unremarkable. Music is well composed but uses minimal sounds so it isn't terribly interesting.

Overall Score: 68

Review ID: 1426