PixlBit

You guys remember Acclaim? They were a pretty big publisher in the SNES and N64/PS1 eras but fizzled out in the 2000s and eventually went bankrupt. And The Red Star, a game already finished by their Austin studio, nearly went down with the ship. XS Games picked it up and in 2007, three years after the death of Acclaim, this game finally came out.

The Red Star is based on a graphic novel of the same name about a fictional industrial Russia where magic and machines coexist. It's a cool setting. You play as one of two characters, a lighter fast one or a slower, stronger one (a third unlocks after beating the game). You have melee attacks and guns (infinite ammo but it can overheat) and a meter that fills for a special Protocol Attack as well as combos that incorporate them all. My favorite with the fast character (I haven't played through with the other) is to hit the bad guy a couple times, knock them into the air, hit a few more times, and them slam into the ground. But I could interrupt a combo with a big gun blast to knock the enemy away (knocked back enemies collide with their fellows, knocking them down too—a nice touch) or lock onto an enemy and do an attack to quickly close the distance or use part of my Protocol meter when hit to escape getting trapped in an enemy combo. It's really quite versatile.

The bosses are generally bullet hell affairs, which is both a nice break from the combat of the level and it also makes sense. If you're fighting a giant tank, it's going to be shooting at you and you probably won't be stabbing it, ya know? Some of these are quite difficult and due to the lack of checkpoints, dying at the boss means replaying the whole level, a pain for sure, though thankfully the levels are not too long. After finishing a level you receive a grade (I saw A, B, and C; I don't know if it drops to D or goes up to S) and receive a commensurate amount of points. You can spend these points on upgrades between levels. And here is one of my complaints: There are way more upgrades than points available. This playthrough I didn't even buy either of the additional guns but I still wasn't able to upgrade my starting gun all the way because it was so expensive and I did want other things too. I suppose you can make the argument that the game is forcing you to weigh your choices carefully and perhaps replay value is higher if you go a totally different way on upgrades, but it was still kind of frustrating. There's also no way to reallocate the points. Once you make your bed, you have to sleep in it!

But those things notwithstanding, I really enjoyed playing The Red Star. It gave me definite Treasure vibes (developer of classics like Gunstar Heroes and Ikaruga) and there are too few games that fit that bill. The game can be played co-op as well but make sure your partner has some serious action gaming chops. This one is not for the faint of heart or slow of thumbs.