Phelios Playthrough | Megadrive/ Genesis | Real Hardware
2Review - This game seems simple at first but soon turns into a brutal shmup. You can either shoot single shots or a charge shot, with the final level giving you a special charge shot which is super powerful. Charge shot is what I used mostly in this game but some parts required the single shot, which the game badly needs an autofire function for. Fortunately, to get around not having autofire, all 3 buttons on the control pad are assigned to fire so you can ‘piano’ the buttons to get a decent fire rate.
The graphics are nice and there is a lot of enemy variety. All of the levels are distinguishable via different backgrounds and enemies not repeating in other levels.
The checkpoints are fair and it’s nice that you can take 3 hits before dying. Although on some sections, 3 doesn’t seem like a fair amount. There are a few sections where I got through by sheer luck, even though I knew the parts pretty well. I could either get through with one life, or take many attempts, as I did through the 5th level in this playthrough.
The power ups are pretty pointless in this game. Actual weapon power ups are very rare, some only seen once per playthrough. One of the power ups is S for speed, which is unnecessary because every time you die and lose your speed, you are immediately given the opportunity to collect the Speed power up. There is never a time that you don’t. You always get given an Option power up upon each level. This gives you an additional shot. So, you always have 2 shots, but if you make it to the next level, you will collect a second option which gives you three shots. As long as you have enough hits left, this is very useful because it clears more of the screen, and the charge shots are more powerful to take down the bosses quicker.
Talking about the bosses. Wow these are hard. The first one is a brutal lesson in twitch reflexes. The bosses get progressively harder until the 3rd boss which is insane. It’s a hardcore task in concentration where I had to continuously ‘piano’ the buttons so that some of the projectiles could be destroyed, but this makes killing the boss a lot slower process. I would say this is the hardest boss in the game due to the length and the concentration needed. The other bosses get easier which is fortunate but getting past that 3rd boss is a real brick wall.
The 5th fire boss is similarly long. So, it’s another lesson in extreme concentration as every time you shoot at the boss, you have to put yourself in extreme danger and then go back to the safe space by the wall. But the wall is made of fire so if you touch it, it’s a one hit kill. Pair this with the number of shots that the boss is able to absorb, this makes a very long fight which can be incredibly frustrating if you die after fighting for a long time.
The other bosses are easy enough once you know how to do them. The last boss is easy right until the very end where it gets too close to you so you have to manoeuvre around the screen to dodge it but the space is so tight and if you touch his body, its another insta-kill. This can be frustrating due to the length of time it takes to get to this part, which is easy enough but I died often at this last part. At least the game throws bonus lives at you so if you get to this boss, you are pretty much guaranteed to complete the game.
Special mention to the girl in the cutscenes that your character is rescuing. Normally I don’t care, but she is drawn so beautifully, I fell in love with her, so I actually wanted to save her.
One thing that should have been done to improve the game would be to refill the player’s health after each level. You usually start with one hit point left after fighting the previous boss so attempting the following level is pretty pointless as you will most likely die, so intentionally dying at the start can save you having to replay the level.
Rating – 8/10
Difficulty – 8/10
Original JPN game played on PAL Megadrive modded with 60HZ region switch
Picture split between CRT TV for my own viewing and OSCC scan converter with 2x line doubler, upscaled to HDMI for recording
No cheats/ save states used
Game cart pic in thumbnail from my own collection
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#megadrive #genesis #Phelios