Project S-11
Reviewer: Piccolo
System: Game Boy Color
Developer: Paragons, dist. by Sunsoft
Year of Release: 2001
Genre: Space Shooter
Number of Players: 1
Save: Yes, Password after each stage
ESRB Rating: E

With today's PC and console action games, your senses are overwhelmed with 3D graphics and rich sound. Sometimes, I long for a simpler style of game, back in the era when a game only needed two dimensions to be successful. I often go into my library of games for older systems, or I'll load up an early 90's shareware game on my PC. While I enjoy such retro gaming, sometimes I thirst for something new in the same style. Project S-11 fills this need, combining fast action with some of the best graphics available on a handheld.

Project S-11's automatically vertical-scrolling gameplay was obviously inspired by the shooters of old. Enemy ships come in intelligent patterns and waves, far more interesting than the Space Invaderesque Galaga but not so difficult that you will become completely trapped. Your single ship has five different types of upgradeable weapons, and its solo mission is kept that way as you will not be able to add on any helper ships as in the Gradius series. Weapon pods are randomly left from destroyed enemies, as would be expected, however the pods cycle through all the game's weapons at an even pace and allow you to keep your favorite weapon throughout the game if you wish. These weapons for under the most part into three categories: standard straight-ahead fire, spread, and rapid fire. As you upgrade these (by collecting the same type of weapon again), the standard lasers become more powerful, and the spread covers a wider area. The rapid fire weapon in this game is completely original -- a flame thrower. While you may have seen flame throwers in other games, I have not seen one that behaves quite like this one. A stream of flame particles are fired from the head of the ship, and fall back down the bottom of the screen. This creates a volcano-like effect, which I liked a lot, and is useful for blowing up ships right in front of you, or behind you at the sides. As you hold down the fire button, the stream slowly sinks back down until the peak of the 'volcano' is right in front of your ship. If you upgrade this weapon, the peak will extend further onto the playfield, and will stay out there longer. This creates a bit of strategy, as you don't want to pound the button like with your regular weapon, but you want the stream to last for some time. This flamethrower is perfect for beginners, but as you gain skill in this game, you will find other weapons more to your liking. I prefer the fully powered up standard laser - holding the gameboy steady and pounding on the B button as enemy ships' wreckage falls down the screen is quite exhilarating. The only weapon I really don't like is the missiles, as they cause a lot of damage but fire very slowly. You also have a secondary, emergency weapon: nuke bombs that have a wide, long lasting explosion. Any ship caught in the vicinity of this will either be instantly destroyed or take heavy damage. You have a limited supply of them, and they take a second or so to launch, so use them only when you have to.

At this point, it may sound easy -- lots of ways to destroy the enemy fleets. But every good shooter game has bosses, and this game has its share. There are 8 stages, each with a miniboss and another half-screen filling boss at the end. The fast-moving minibosses will probably kill you a time or two until you overwhelm them with strategically placed bombs, and evasive maneuvering of your ship. If you play it safe, you will still have some lives left over for the stage boss. The first four are a piece of cake, but the last half will require you to memorize their patterns and attack at the right time. Some bosses will ram your ship and then retreat, causing you to fire off what shots you can before zooming off to an ever changing safe spot. Other bosses take the layered approach, staying still but forcing you to take out their defenses and weapon systems before exposing their weak point.

About 1/3 of the screen is taken up with your futuristic looking display, showing your shield, number of ships and nuke bombs remaining. I think this is a way of trimming down gameplay screen size to keep the rich graphics moving, and it does it well. You'll soon forget about your squished screen and focus on the action. At times there will be over a dozen ships on screen, and there is not a bit of flicker or slowdown. The ships themselves are rather detailed, but the backgrounds is where this game really shines. They are almost 16-bit in quality, using dithering well to create a sense of depth and transparency. SNES-like special effects are seen as the background ripples away to reveal the giant stage bosses. In between the action, there are a few cut scenes, and while the artwork is rather shoddily done in my opinion, it provides a needed break.

The sound effects are nothing spectacular, but the music is worth mentioning. It is authentic-sounding techno, different from the Japanese 8-bit shooter games.

There are some things about the classic gaming era that we would like to forget. Bad box art and sloppy translations plagued many games back then, and Project S-11 just so happens to carry those aspects over today. First, let us examine said box art. To the untrained eye it looks decent, but as you look closer you may notice things stick out. The whole thing is pretty much some blurred game screenshot for a background with some ships that some guy drew up in Photoshop. The 'explosions' look more like dabs of color pulled apart with a smudge tool. I know this game had some financial troubles, but come on! Next up is the translation. The menus and stuff are ok, but the dialogue thrown in during the cutscenes seems like an afterthought, and the sloppy translation reads like so many NES games. I can't deny a small bit of charm coming from these aspects however, and I'm glad they spent more time and money on developing the game itself.

In conclusion, this game is great for those of you who enjoy old school action gameplay but want something new to sink your teeth into. If you're a gamer on a budget, try to find a place that has this unpopular game for rent. You'll probably beat it in the time you have it. I'm not really one to play through a game many times over, and unfortunately this game has little replay value to me. But I do own it, and think someday I would like to go back and give it another play through. Shooters are not for everyone, but if they're your thing, then give Project S-11 a try.