Jets and Guns Gold Game Review by Kenneth Andrews
Game Rating = 4/5 Balls
Once upon a time, all action games were like Jets n Guns Gold. Piloting a heavily armed yet highly manoeuvrable starfighter around unlikely structures in outer space and blasting seven shades of starlight out of all manner of alien beasties. Sideways scrolling shooters are back with a vengance.
Download Free Game Trial
Buy The Game Now $29.95
Storyline and Gameplay
There is a story behind the non-stop action in this game, but it boils down to saving the universe from the usual alien threat, and is relayed by neat cartoons. Jets and Guns Gold is intense, fast and refreshingly difficult from the outset. No tutorial levels here, your little spaceship needs to hit the ground running! Controlling your craft with the cursor keys and firing using the spacebar (just keep your finger pressed down), you need to fly around shooting as much as you can while avoiding: enemy ships, enemy fire and the ground. Power-ups and extra cash float around (you can upgrade your ship between levels), naturally.
Exploding alien ships frequently eject their pilots, and if you can destroy enough of the stick figure aliens at once, you also receive a cash bonus from ‘viewers at home’ – a ‘body count’ ticks over along with the player’s score. If you die, you get to restart from the last checkpoint, you can’t ‘lose’ the game definitively. It’s a difficult game, but not unfairly so.
Graphics and Sound
The game’s sound is amazing. An apparently original soundtrack plays in the background, sounding a lot like 80s hair metal with a few electronic tunes thrown in the background. The opening music sounds like Bon Jovi covering the Knight Rider theme tune. All the various flashes and bangs are effective, too, even down to the little groans of the dying aliens.
Graphically, Jets and Guns Gold is also strong, with well-drawn alien spaceships and explosion effects, and slick scrolling and animation. The game is also efficient with its graphics demands, running like lightning even on the most modest modern laptop.
Download Free Game Trial
Buy The Game Now $29.95
Creativity and Innovation
Given that sideways scrolling shooting games have now been with us for more than quarter of a century, Jets and Guns Gold manages to feel fresh. Perhaps it’s the nostalgia element. Or perhaps it’s the quirky sense of humour that has been applied to the game’s graphics – which results in adverts for weapons littering the levels, or signs saying ‘No nukes between 8:00 and 5:00′. Either way, Jets and Guns Gold feels like a new gaming experience and not just a rehash of past glories.
$29.95 is a significant price to pay for a game, but the sheer addictive difficulty of the game could lead to hundreds of hours of gameplay.
Buy Jets and Guns Gold if you:
* Like a challenge
* Want something uncomplicated and fun
* Enjoy brilliant music in games
Don’t buy it if you:
* Prefer a stronger plot
* Are squeamish about game violence
* Like more sophisticated gameplay.
