Dos Madness | Secret Armed Force (1996) When a difficulty pads a game
12The developer's last sidescroller was released in the final days of DOS gaming. It gets rid of all the technical issues former Family Production games suffered from. Even the scrolling runs perfectly smooth, and there are real transparency effects, which are not too common with DOS games overall.
Although not a sequel per se, the game soon evokes memories of Interrupt, not only because the player once again takes place in a mecha. Instead of having to chose between two models, though, the machine in SAF unites the agility of the Ripple with the weapons and jetpacks of the Cyber-Troll and for good measure throws in the left & right fire buttons of the shmup sequences in Interrupt.
Weapons can be upgraded in two levels, and filling the upgrade meter above that unleashes a devastating special attack particular to that weapon. During the first four stages weapons get gradually unlocked. After the initial machine gun follow a frame thrower, a grenade launcher and a laser cannon.
Unfortunately SAF is one of those games spoiled by a completely impossible difficulty level. The mecha is so big that it gets hit all the time, but astonishingly fragile for such a huge hunk of metal.
Some of the standard enemies even take more hits. There are no checkpoints at all, either, no matter if a stage is fifteen minutes long. Worst of all, though, all one has to work with are two pathetic credits to continue, there's no saving, no password system, just starting over from the first stage again and again.