This is probably the SHMUP! equivalent of Oasis and Blur releasing a single in the same week, but Hikware - of Warning Forever fame – have put out their latest enormo-blaster, Cyclops, while we were still recovering from ABA game’s latest blast. And it looks like this…
Okay. I’m half-lying. They’ve been out for a few weeks now, but I wanted to wait until I had a chance to actually play Cyclops to actually put it into context. At least on my initial play, it’s not in the same league as Warning Forever (Which is the Shadow of the Colossus of the SHMUP! except with none of the tedious fucking around with the horse, and about as good as a freeware shooter gets), but it’s certainly its own creature. It’s primary mechanic is that you’re stationary, with enemies approaching from all side. Your weapon is an enormous beam-thing, which annihilates all and sundry. The “all and sundry” is the key bit – it also takes out incoming projects. Since after firing it needs to recharge and your turning speed is stictly limited, the game’s based around you priotising incoming vectors and all that. It takes a little long to get going for my liking – I’m of the Robotron-school of Arcade games, where if I’m not mentally exausted by level 5, it’s too weak for me – but I still think it’s worthy of a little attention.
Cyclops can be downloaded from here and if you haven’t actually played Warning Forever, for the sake of the eternal Arcade Fire, get it from here.
