[quote name='zyblorg']I'm relieved to read this and other denunciations of Gunstar Heroes -- and of shoot'em ups in general. Gunstar Heroes is one game I bought because of the raves online -- all the others I bought because I had enjoyed playing them in the past. The chaos of Gunstar Heroes doesn't appeal to me one bit. It's like an overcaffeinated child -- with an endless arsenal. No thanks.[/quote]
Let me put Gunstar Heroes in perspective for you.
The Genesis was a great machine. I owned one for quite a while before I got an SNES too. But it was limited, and this was especially apparent after the SNES came out.
The SNES had more colors, better sound, and hardware scaling and rotation. Almost without fail, put a Genesis and an SNES game next to each other, and the SNES would be prettier and sound better. It didn't always play better, but there were times the Genesis looked and sounded awful in comparison. I own both. I love both. But it's true.
Enter Gunstar Heroes. Bright and colorful instead of muddy or dithered, and loud with sounds and music instruments had never been heard before. Right off the bat, with the rotating Gunstar Heroes logo, it was clear that Treasure had thrown out the Genesis programming manual and done something amazing. The Genesis couldn't rotate anything, yet there it was.
The Genesis didn't do 3D, much less have bosses made out of 3D cubes apparently walking in three dimensions. The Genesis had slowdown problems with a lot of stuff on the screen, but here were enemies, lasers, and huge vehicles all over the place. The Genesis didn't have large, colorful bosses rotating and scaling. And yet there it all was.
But, as amazing as the graphics and sound were, it wouldn't have meant anything without a game. Did you know that there weren't a whole lot of cooperative 2 player games at the time? Did you know that anything that looked like anime was marketing poison at the time? Did you know that the idea of a board game in the middle of a shooter was unheard of and years before Mario Party?
Gunstar Heroes' design was years ahead of its time. Being able to choose the stages, loads of colorful and amazing boss fights, constantly changing enviroments and situations -- these things were not everyday. In a side scrolling shooter, you were lucky if you got stages that looked different, much less ones that played completely different.
I, for one, don't really care for shooters. But I love Gunstar Heroes. There's so much to discover, new things around every corner, and a good dose of humor and charm. It's like a huge bomb of creativity exploded in all directions.
Gunstar Heroes is hyper and loud and bright and jangly. There's nothing else that looks or sounds like it on the Genesis, and that was the point. But underneath all the color and stuff flying everywhere and music that's initially ear-splitting, there's a good, fun, and deep game.
Maybe you had to be there to appreciate it, since all the flash and graphics are antiquated and ho-hum now. Two player cooperative games are plentiful, anime is everywhere, board games are commonplace, and games are so much bigger and diverse now that even something as adventurous as Gunstar Heroes now seems quaint.
I do think there's more than nostalgia at work. There are Genesis and SNES games that I would consider unplayable and unpalatble now. Gunstar Heroes is not one of them.
(Shaq-fu!) I hated that game. Worst game I ever bought.
