Big Bang Mini
Review
Classic arcade gaming is back in fashion
by William Thompson
reviewed on NDS
Special features (cntd.)
Visually, Big Bang Mini does an admirable job. The game is full of psychedelic color, which goes well with the retro feel of the game. Each of the areas have some nice backgrounds representing their locations. The enemy characters too, represent their locations with Rio having Carnaval drummers and sombrero hat enemies, while Hong Kong features festival dragons. These enemy characters are depicted in a cartoonish way that does not perfectly fit with the rest of the game, but does a decent enough job.
It’s just like New Year’s Eve
Of course, the best part of the visuals is in the firing and explosions of your weapons – the fireworks. And seriously, who doesn’t like to watch (and listen to) a good fireworks display? As is the case with the visuals, the audio has been created with each location in mind, and helps give the overall feel of being in that setting while battling your combatants. The musical tunes (all originals) are rather catchy and do nothing but enhance the quality of the game.
With 90 levels in standard play there is certainly enough game time to be had for most gamers. But there are other modes of play to keep the game going for longer. Challenge mode requires the gamer to score as much as they can within a period of time and then enables gamers to post their high scores to a worldwide leaderboard using the Nintendo WiFi connection. Other modes of play include a Versus mode, a Mission mode (which requires certain missions to be completed such as completing a goal within an allotted time frame), and even an Alarm Clock.
Bang for your buck
Overall, Big Bang Mini is an extremely polished product. It is one of those rare games that anyone can get into. Newcomers to classic shoot’em-ups should have no trouble learning the controls, and there is enough variation and innovation to appeal to experienced, more hardcore gamers. The levels never feel stale despite the rinse-and-repeat ‘dodge, shoot, dodge’ aspect of the gameplay. The variation in both the enemies and special abilities enabled in each area further enhance the freshness. The various modes will keep gamers playing for hours. And of course, the intuitive use of the stylus in this type of game will get people wondering why it hasn’t been done before. Big Bang Mini certainly gets two thumbs up from me – or should that be two fireworks, up? Either way, I’m getting back to it, so I can party like it’s 1979.
8.0
fun score
No Pros and Cons at this time
