Mind you, it isn't a DIFFICULT shmup. Well, all things considered it isn't too bad. And its actually a decent game with a really neat premise. Decent music, cool level designs, good graphics for the system, solid enemies and good boss fights... everything a shmup-o could want really.
So whats the problem? Why is it torture to play?
Well, you see, the system its on drains blood from your eyeballs to feed its unholy red display. Playing this system for more than 10 seconds induces seizures, massive migraines, mild brain damage, temporary(possibly permanent) blindness, and probably a whole list of other things.
And if you haven't figured it out... yes, I'm talking about Nintendo's ill-fated Virtual Boy.
Oh don't let them fool you. The power button? Pointless. As stated earlier, the only thing creating the red objects and levels you see is your own blood slowly funneling into the system and amassing on the tiny pagan altar thats somewhere in the center, where the images you see displayed, not on a screen, but in a tiny contained portal to a godless dimension, depend on the eldritch tablet you inserted into the system.
"But JP! If I look on from a little distance, I can still see a display!"
Thats because, before they were shipped, a sacrifice was made to every single Virtual Boy, and the blood of that innocent soul was poured into the system for reserves so that people wouldn't catch on. Batteries dying? Power button? AC adapters? All a facade. And hell, Nintendo even warned us. Remember the commercials? Giant Virtual Boys with legs shooting the controller out, entangling cavemen, and then pulling them to the visor thing? Yeah, Virtual Boys killed a lot of cavemen, and then had to go into hibernation because they didn't want the food supply to run out. Nintendo was in league with them, but Nintendo got greedy, and didn't realize people wouldn't pay TOP DOLLAR to suffer. And so thankfully, the great Virtual Boy rising was stamped out by capitalism, a tool the poor cavemen did not have (then again, back then the Virtual Boys didn't have to be incognito, so they just walked around, grabbed people with controllers, and proceeded to feed).
But I digress. Yes, this evening, I braved the abomination and struck at the sole Virtual Boy shmup, a fun little title by Hudson, Vertical Force! And here is my tale...
It started off simple enough. Lots of red. Lots and lots of red. From the get-go I was given two Wideshot power-ups, each on a different altitude. Ah, yes, in Vertical Force, since its on the VB and VB loves 3D, you can change the altitude. There's only two areas... but you can be high up or down low. So I quickly snagged them seeing as how they make the levels a lot easier. I also saw some Ls (laser shot) and some Ss (shield), but I decided to stick with W. Kinda like America. Now, in Vertical Force, you can level each weapon up 3 times. But if you grab a DIFFERENT weapon, well, welcome to level 1 with that weapon. 'Tis teh suck. So... yeah. Thought you would want to know.
Anyways, level 1 is pretty cool. You're in space fighting well choreographed lines of alien ships (like most shmups) but you also get to blast turrets off of big space ships. So its cool. At some point I picked up small fighter. Basically, small fighters will fly around the screen and kill everything. You can have 3 in stock and one on screen at the same time. There's three different kinds: Wide shot, laser, and one that heals you. So its always good to have a healer on board! But this one was a wideshot, and man was he going to work! I mean, I'd fire one volley and he'd have all the lines of aliens, turrets, etc. dead. I mean, this dude had a straight vendetta against these guys. So I'm going to give him a little story:
His name is John. He grew up on a small farming planet, and his farm was attacked by a line of aliens when he was a teen. His father died in the attack, so John swore vengeance!! So, despite being too young to enroll in the "Help the one guy fighting everyone!" brigade, he managed to sneak in, so now he not only has a score to settle, he has something to prove!! And once he kicks alien ass across the galaxy, he'll go home and help his Mom with the family business, and laugh about the blast he had up amongst stars.
So, John and I are blasting away at this alien menace. I go to change altitude to take out some alien space ship, and I totally hit the wrong button and self-destruct John's ship. So... John is dead. And... I pull out the next ship in the que, but from now on I just let robots pilot them so I don't have to explain to 20-some odd space mothers that, "Well, the "kill your teammate" button and the "change your altitude" button are right next to each other, and they're the same color! One's listed as A, one's B. Neither letter screams "kill the help!" or "change altitude" to me, so... yeah. I know saying I'm sorry won't bring back your dead son... but... I'm really sorry. My bad." Ya know? So backgroundless, souless, robots from here on out.
OK! So we're blasting along in outer space, sometimes having to weave through a docking bay, and suddenly we're attacked by some little robot guy with guns on his arms. Well, I shoot his guns off and he runs away. What a space pussy. So me and the help continue to fly through the level killing spacehips, not really taking on much fire, and suddenly we're attacked by an elevator in the middle of space!
One half of it shoots a laser spread. The other shoots bullets. And they alternate when one is high and when one is low. So I take the laser one and I let Mr. Robot take the bullet one. We kill both, and meet up again on the higher altitude. Only now, the elevator has united! And now it shoots a giant shockwave at us and changes altitude to make sure we can't hide above or below it. Its all good, I'm quick! I get my shots off, change altitude, and keep ahead of of the elevator. I even kill it before it kills Mr. Robot. But who cares? He's a robot.
On to level 2! Level 2 takes place in a desert. You primarily fight turrets on the ground, and... lines of aliens! Level two occassionally forces you to change altitude though to avoid objects, so thats cool. Halfway through the level I encounter the robot from the previous level again, only this time, he has bigger guns. Fine, I guess I'll name him. His name will be... Cal. So once again, I blow Cal's guns off his arms, and he runs away. What a bitch.
So I proceed to fly through the desert. I have to duck under some ruins and fly over an ole' space port, and there's just sand everywhere. Suddenly, I see two mounds of sand moving around. And then two big crab robots shoot out of the ground! One takes the high altitude the other stays low. I tell Mr. Robot I'll take the higher one, but he doesn't care, he's a robot.
Now, the crab up top shoots an 8-way bullet spread, all while moving about the screen clockwise. The crab down below shoots homing missiles, and moves in more of a "graph of the sine function" kinda way. The fight takes a little bit, and the top grab crashes into me a few times, but I persevere and take out the top crab. But I'm heavily damaged, and my laser wielding friend Mr. Robot is taking a beating down there! Those homing missiles are nasty! Slow... but nasty! And dodging the crab is a problem too! So I switch out Mr. Robot with... Mr... Healbot. I repair the ship, and I dive into the battle below, and unload all my weapons (lasers at this point I think) into the crab, all while dodging his homing missiles and moving in the pattern of the graph of the cosine function so that I can get a good shot (duh!). But like, I'm moving slightly ahead so we don't collide (ha!). At any rate, eventually I kill it, and pull away from the Virtual Boy to take a break.
I feel lightheaded. I go to rub my eyes and get blood on my hands. Great. Thankfully Nintendo put in the option to pause between stages. Otherwise someone would probably go blind playing the damn thing. So after a quick breather, I plunge into Stage 3!
Stage 3 is the ocean. And not much else. Honestly, I don't even remember much about stage 3. I think it had some docks in it you could fly under and some pillars to avoid. Oh, Cal showed up again, and I kicked his ass... again. And he ran away... again. So I blast through the level, and at the end I'm faced with a giant serpent. Only this serpent can split itself up, and half of it circles its head up top and the other half circles down blow, and each piece is shooting at me! And sometimes, the serpent just swings its body around trying to hit me. I lost Mr. Robot due to this. I mourned his death much during the break between Stage 3 and 4. Oh, the serpent would also shoot a straight triple-laser shot and 7 way bullet spread. Yikes! But I managed to outmaneuver it. Focusing all my firepower on its head and of course Mr. Robot didn't die in vain, for he too blasted the shit out of the serpent. Eventually, the serpent fell, and it was on to stage 4.
Took a break. Pain. The world around me was red. My head was starting to hurt. I'll miss Mr. Robot.
Stage 4 had a cool opening sequence. It shows you valiantly flying towards the enemy base, ready to destroy the fiends that are sending lines of aliens across the galaxy! Fuck them!
Stage 4. Stage 4 is your typical final level. Robotic, turrets, pipes going across the screen FORCING you to change altitude, fight against Cal, only this time he tries to be a MAN and fights with his fists, but I kick his ass anyway and he runs away again. The whole time I'm blasting whatever's ahead and skillfully avoiding the shots from the sides and the ships flying from behind me. Some formations are tricky and change altitude when I least expect it, but they too fall to my laser! And Mr. Robot2 is, of course, kicking ass. He's so much cooler than Mr. Robot.
Towards the end I see this platforms with little grids on them. Apparently, these are the things creating the alien ships! Enemies just materialize and fly at me from these things! Yikes! I dodge 'em, and suddenly I'm faced with a giant grid.
And suddenly a robotic skull materializes on this grid.
Final boss time! Wooooo! I could always make it here as a kid, but this guy ALWAYS laid waste to me. He's really hard. He has 3 satellites that circle around on different altitudes firing at you, sometimes one will shoot a laser that goes across the screen and forces you to change altitude. It also shoots enemy ships from its mouth! Its crazy! So I sick Mr. Robot2 (who uses a laser btw) on him while I try to dodge the satellites up top. Mr. Robot2 dies pretty quickly, and now I'm finding myself frantically changing altitudes, taking whatever shots I can, and fleeing from the hell this skull is unleashing upon me. The fight feels like it takes hours, I'm constantly cycling through Healbots repairing damages, my weapons are damaged though and now I'm just shooting the regular shot, but I unload all I have into the skull, and finally... it dies.
VICTORY!
Then, in a very cool looking moment, my ship flies into the skull's mouth.
...
Fuck.
I mean, EVERY good shmup-o knows that, if you fly into the mouth of whatever you just killed, there's gonna be another level. I mean, I can't think of a game where, at the end, you fly into the mouth of your downed enemy and the game says "And the hero lived happily ever after inside the final boss. The End." I mean, don't get me wrong, it could make sense. You know, add insult to injury. "Oh yeah, I kicked your ass. And now... I'm gonna LIVE IN YOU! And you know what? I'm gonna put up some sun curtains around your eyes, and you're gonna look STUPID!And then I'll pin a fucking welcome mat to your chin! A frilly fucking welcome mat, that reads, "Welcome to the final boss, wipe your goddamn feet!""
But no, a new level begins. A level full of wavey goo in the background. I'm given a new helper fighter and 3 of each power-up before the fight though, so at least its a boss fi--...
Oh... its Cal.
So Cal shows up with FOUR guns. Two shoot bullet spreads and the two big ones shoot homing missiles. I out-maneuver his missiles and take out his side guns first, then I blast his smaller guns. Mind you, I take some damage, so I'm back to the standard shot. And of course I'm cycling through ships because they can't dodge anything. Once his guns are gone though, Cal makes a final stand. A pathetic one though. He just shoots a slow, lazy, easy to dodge pattern while moving back and forth like a pendulum. *sigh* So I blast him, and he dies. Cal finally dies. Hurray.
... and the level continues...
I snag another healer ship (now I have 3 in stock) and I power up my lasers. Suddenly, a GIANT ship with a bunch of guns attacks me!!! But my lasers tear through its weapons in no time (all 6!), and now I'm fighting the ship itself! Its bullet spread isn't a problem though, so even the ship goes down. Only to reveal a giant mech! With no arms or legs! So I dodge the bullet patterns this mech is throwing at me and I blast it to pieces. Huzzah! Only it doesn't die... it just grows legs and arms!
SHIT!
Now its filling the screen with bullets and giant laser blasts! I'm dodging the best I can, but occassionally I have to pull out a healer bot and repair myself while focusing on dodging! I manage to blow up the legs! Yay! I blow up the arm! Wait... oh, I blew up the glove shooting homing missiles. Now I gotta blow up the arm shooting bullets! OK, done! Yay! Rinse and repeat, OK, other arm is down, woohoo!
Now the mech is pissed! It starts flying after me shooting crescent shots at me! Its making turrets appear that line the screen and shoot at me! Its raining giant lasers of death on me! I'm frantically dodging, but the more damage I inflict the more it gets pissed off! The attacks speed up, and finding a safe spot to go repair is becoming increasingly difficult! But I continue on... I WILL 1CC this game! I WILL NOT sacrifice my vision again! I unload all my weapons on it, and after what seems like ages my bullets stop affecting it...
... and it explodes.
I win! I win! I win! The credits roll, I pull away from the daemonic device and laugh as I reflect on the battle I have won. I watch from a distance as the credits role, and I finally see what I've needed to see ever since I was 13 and got my Virtual Boy...
"The End"
I win. Vertical Force is a 1CC I can put under my belt. Huzzah!
"Psssh! You're so full of shit JP! How do we KNOW you 1CC'd Vertical Force? I bet you don't even have a picture. Typically when you 1CC a game lately you have a crappy picture from your crappy cellphone camera! Where's the proof JP!?!?!? Huh!?!?!?!"
'Tis right here:
AHAHAHAHA! I totally somehow took a picture of it. I'm cool! It says:
Time: 23:18:33
Score:550,220
w00t! Vertical Force is down!
Edit: I put this in Off Topic because I wasn't sure if it really belonged in the shmups forum or not...
And thanks for the compliments. I got another one in the works, though it may just be a straight review. 
