Two Fun!
Great arcade games have not gone out of style, as evidenced by Mutant Storm Reloaded, one of the two-dimensional shooter games you can download on Xbox Live® Arcade. Rated Everyone, this game provides several single- or two-player modes (offline only). It challenges you to survive 89 levels in which mutants, their allies, and their mother ships all attempt to destroy you.
The company that developed the original game and its second incarnation, Mutant Storm Reloaded, is actually comprised of only two guys: Miles Visman, the yang master of coding, and Michael Michael, the yin master of graphics and sound. The name of the company is PomPom, and it has a macho robot in a cheerleader outfit as its mascot. I knew I was in for some fun with Mutant Storm Reloaded when, to my heady amusement, the robot cheerleader welcomed me to the game.
Blast through hordes of enemies.
Two Modes
Choose from two different modes in Mutant Storm Reloaded. Adventure Mode takes you through the levels progressively. You have to clear one in order to unlock the next. The game presents you with a series of 89 psychedelic rooms, each with its own special challenge.
Mutants come at you in all sizes and from all directions. Shoot them—this isn't brain surgery. It does require amazing hand-eye coordination and fine-tuned twitch reflexes. You determine how difficult you want it to be overall, but each room gets progressively more challenging as you advance and increase in skill.
Earn belts as you progress through the game, in the tradition of martial arts. The more prestigious your belt, the more troublesome your enemy. If you're like me, you'll find it easy to while away the time repeating, "Just two more. Just two more!"
I found myself shouting at the screen and
unable to walk away from the game.
Once you've unlocked a level in Adventure Mode, you can then play that level in Tally Mode. Your objective changes from simple survival to racking up as many points as you can. Score fast and score high; your scores go up on the leaderboard. The difficulty factor you set impacts your score. Obviously, the more difficult, the greater the number of points you can tally.
Two Multipliers
Mutant Storm Reloaded has two types of multipliers to earn. The first relies entirely on point accumulation. A bar at the top of the screen fills as you whack mutants. Every time you fill it, you gain a multiplier. The first increase raises your scoring to x2, doubling your points earned for each kill.
Scoring shoots through the roof with each new multiplier. Bear in mind, however, that when you die, you lose a multiplier and have to work to gain it back.
I personally have not achieved this distinction, but the other multiplier uses your belt ranking. Rumor has it that when I make it all the way through to the end of the eighty-ninth level, I receive a multiplier based on how many belts I earned. For each belt, I get an extra multiplier. At that point, I return to the beginning, but at a higher difficulty appropriate to my skill level. As you can imagine, this makes for nearly infinite play.
"Just one more level …"
Two Power-Ups
Watch for the two types of power-ups that come your way in the game—defensive (blue) and offensive (red) power-ups. The mutants drop them, and they float around the screen until you touch their peripheries. You have to go after the power-ups, which isn't always convenient. Often, you have to shoot your way through the enemy in order to get to them. Furthermore, they disappear after a short time if you don't pick them up quickly enough.
Defensive power-ups do just what you'd expect: They shield you, generally from a single hit before dissolving. Offensive power-ups are the fun ones. Weapons in Mutant Storm Reloaded come in a variety of flavors.
- The three-way gun fires a wide arc of three streams.
- The laser slices through anything in its way.
- Missiles have heat-seeking smart qualities and will even go around solid objects to get to your target.
- Spinners (my favorite) surround your ship with buzz-saw goodness and allow you to plow through groups of mutants wreaking havoc.
Two of the best things about Mutant Storm Reloaded are its replayability and its adrenaline rush. You can't quantify these things, but I can tell you from personal experience that I found myself shouting at the screen and unable to walk away from the game until I absolutely had no other choice. As of mid-January, it's among the top ten best-sellers on Xbox Live Arcade.
Article by Angel Leigh McCoy
