Mercs (Genesis/Mega Drive)

ATTENTION: THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN RECLASSIFIED AS BEING 'A BIT CRAP'.
You can find my second look at the game here instead: Mercs (Arcade).

I predict shooting.

Hey, nice beach. Well okay maybe it looked nicer in game, when there were too many people shooting me for me to scrutinize it for too long.

Here's an example of good game design I think. You want the player to destroy an object to proceed, but you can't figure out a way to make it look obviously destructible, then don't just say 'ah, whatever... they'll figure it out when they get desperate enough to shoot all the scenery'.

Instead, give the player a damn clue! In this case it suits the style of the game to just put a sign on top saying 'SHOOT'. It's a step up from making me stumble across the solution by accident at least.

Hmm, those mountains look a bit glitchy. But hey, this narrow bridge ought to help direct the flow of enemies into my stream of fire.

Something's behind me isn't it?

The plane goes down, and look at my health... not even a scratch! There were a couple of close calls along the way there though, a few times the incoming fire knocked me a little senseless and I hallucinated the words 'CONTINUE YES/NO?' floating in the air. But I soon snapped out of it.

It would have gone a little smoother though if the guy hadn't kept hovering out of my range, forcing me to walk into his gunfire to get a hit.

Sup guys, I'm in a truck now! Truck beats goons. Wow, that's a pretty minimalist looking building over on the left there.

Oh damn. Tank beats truck. Those are actually some pretty well pixelled tanks there. And really unfair too.

Boss beats hero. It was going pretty well until he decided to run me over. And then shoot me some more. Oh well.


That is definitely a game crying out for an 'insert coin' button. Just because of how incredibly difficult it is, not because I personally want to keep playing it.