NES Challenge - Xenophobe in 46:25 then Max Score! [214/714]
0Blasting aliens, YEAH!!! This is a great game for young kids, especially once they learn to jump over the enemies. 2 player is where it's at for cooperation and really going deep into the game. It's really good for taking a break from games which may be frustrating and you just need something different.
I feel this is Sunsoft's version of phoning it in. It's like they built the basic layout of the port and were told to stop, this is good enough. The music is fine, sound effects are ok, but it is really missing the polish they are known for and some background music. The graphics do the job, but it is what you would expect from an LJN game. In all honesty it could have been much worse. The split screen feels like a bit of a waste on single player, but it remains semi faithful to the arcade experience except there you got 3 players and would have required yet another split - thankfully they didn't go there.
Overall the game experience is fair. The bombs are useful, but I wish the gun drops would occur more frequently or at least appear after you completed a specific task - say kill 10 of the same alien in a row; preferably the larger ones as they appear the most frequently, or kill 2 aliens per room and explore all rooms. Really that seems to be the big reason I hit the time limit for the 8th level vs killing 41 aliens. Finally having that time limit on display, maybe between the screens in the middle would have been a big help. You could focus on destroying aliens vs exploring and have the choice to sacrifice health vs wasting time jumping or going after harder to hit enemies.
The Xenophobe experience is a joyful one even if the fun dies off due to repetitiveness from the arcade and high score style of play. However due to the lack of polish, I'll place this in the 300-400 range of game ranking.