A little help with a Star Soldier writeup

[szycag]

I'm reviewing the VC version of Star Soldier and I wanted to make sure everything here was accurate. Much of the background for the series I learned from Wikipedia articles and Youtube videos, but I want to tighten everything up. Here is what I have:

Star Soldier
Publisher: Hudson Soft
Type: Vertical

Hudson Soft’s premiere shooting game series might not have started with this game (Star Force preceded it) but this is the installment that started the “caravan” shooting craze. Hudson would take it’s caravan across Japan and hold big competitions with Hudson related prizes for the winners. Picture a bunch of young children to early teens huddled around rows of televisions, the time counting down as they mash the buttons as hard as they can, competing for the highest score. These two and five minute modes came to be known as the caravan modes, and were the staple of the Star Soldier series and it’s spinoffs. However, these modes weren’t present in the home version of the first Star Soldier, only the competition cart. The Virtual Console version is the unmodified home version. Without this background information, and a chance to experience the original caravan mode, it’s hard to tell just what made this game unique at all.

Star Soldier and it’s sequels are perhaps the most deserving of the title “shoot-em-ups”. Shooting objects, as quickly as possible before they disappear, is the primary objective, where other games are more focused on dodging enemy bullets or meticulous chaining. Shooting out two eyes simultaneously, or letting a ring’s pieces collapse around you so you can rapidly destroy it from within, are just two examples of special bonuses that originated with this game. There is also the main boss, Star Brain, that will get away and send you back to the beginning of the stage if you don’t defeat him fast enough. The game is all about hammering on the fire button as fast as you can (this game is pretty much the reason turbo-fire controllers ever came about.)

Star Soldier was never the hit in the USA that it was in Japan. It just wasn’t possible to promote the game the way it was promoted in Japan. For the best impression of the series, you should start with any of the TG16 sequels. This game can be quite fun, but you’d be missing much of the historical context and would likely be a bit frustrated by some of the nuances. Including the caravan version with this re-release would have also been a good move on Hudson’s part. Nevertheless, it is nice to see where the series started, and if you’re intrigued after cutting your teeth on the other entries, you should go ahead and complete your collection.

Verdict: Not Recommended

[Ghegs]

Star Soldier's rather like that, yeah. Some of the design decisicions (hiding behind the backgroung? WTF?) are really weird and don't hold up today at all. Just the other day I stumbled upon StrategyWiki's page on the game and there's whole lotta secrets in the game, which is good, but to access some of them you need to do some stuff that is either impossible to figure out or you need the original Famicom's microphone - meaning that part is impossible to do on any of the many emulated/re-released versions. Hudson really experimented with the genre with this game.

Still, I do wish I'd have been there for the Caravan. And I do wish I'll someday find that competition cart. For the heck of it.

Brain fart edit: somebody-->someday

[szycag]

Going behind the scenery is so tough to describe properly in only a few words, especially when it's not that integral to the gameplay and just sort of random. Tough game to write about. You helped a ton though Ghegs, thanks.

Note to self, change USA to "North America" Or just "the west". (I'm writing for a canadian site)

[Shatterhand]

Holy shit, I never knew this game had SOOO many secrets! I wonder if they are on the MSX version too? (AFAIK it was released at the same time as the NES one)