Over Horizon (NES) Playthrough - NintendoComplete
265A playthrough of Takara's 1992 horizontal shoot 'em up for the NES, Over Horizon.
Over Horizon is a shooter by Hot-B (the guys behind The Black Bass and The Blue Marlin) that was originally slated for a wide western release, having even received a capsule review in Nintendo Power. However, it seems that the only non-Japanese version of the game that made it to market was the Takara-branded PAL-B version sold in Germany.
It's a shooter in the vein of Konami's Gradius, and it's clear that many elements of it were inspired by Konami's games, but it's not without its own innovations.
Before you begin the game, you are given the option to edit your weapons. Each of your weapons - the bomber ("bombar"), the laser, and the homing shot ("hommer") - can all be assigned one another's special properties to customize firing patterns to your liking. Want your bombs to home in on enemies? You can do that. Want to give your lasers a wide splash-damage effect? You can do that too.
You can also customize the behavior of your satellite shields. You assign them two separate positions which you can alternate between whenever you like, allowing them to be used both offensively and defensively.
Over Horizon's stage designs also tend to break from the norm. The first stage is covered in vines that sit in the foreground obscuring your view, while the third is filled with giant ice cubes that have to be pushed to create a path through. The bosses are also pretty impressive. Most of them are huge things with glowing weak spots and unwieldy appendages that'll chase you around the screen, and they're probably the most memorable part of the entire game.
The gameplay overall is excellent, though I do find myself wishing it had been a bit longer and harder. As it is, the game is way too easy to blow through - if you have some skill with shooters, you'll probably beat it the first time you play - and there aren't any difficulty settings. It's a lot of fun, but it lacks replayability.
That doesn't tarnish the game's quality, though. The controls are smooth, flicker and slowdown are rare, the graphics and music are excellent, and it all feels nicely polished.
(Well, okay, except for the music. The PAL version has a nasty bug in it - when a track loops, it seems that sometimes the individual channels lose sync with one another, creating a bit of a mess of the compositions.)
Overall, while I wouldn't recommend paying the outlandish prices that the game cartridge commands, I can recommend Over Horizon without reservation to anyone that enjoys a good shooter.
I'd still like to know what that title means, though. It's a creative use of English words, but I'm guessing the Japanese guys that came up with the name meant "over" as a preposition, not an adjective. "Over the Horizon," then? I guess?
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