Burai Fighter Deluxe

The evil Burai have created annies of nasty robo-mutants in order to conquer the universe. Your mission: stop them. To save everything from the Burai you'll have to blast your way through five levels of horizontally and vertically scrolling action, penetrate the five Burai bases, and destroy their supermutant guards. Burai Fighter Deluxe is an excellent translation of the popular Nintendo game of the same name.

Triple the Firepower, Triple the Fun

At the beginning of this outer space shooter you only have a simple gun, but you can quickly arm yourself with one of three special weapons by grabbing weapon power-up symbols. Each of the three weapons-the Laser, Missiles, and the Ring Shot-has three power-up levels that you reach by grabbing as many power-ups as you can. Other weapons to snag include a rotating Pod that obliterates enemies that enter its deadly orbit, and the Cobalt Bomb, a "smart bomb" last resort that destroys every enemy onscreen.

The gimmick in this game is the way you shoot. Keeping the fire button pressed down enables you to move in one direction as you shoot in another. This makes for some fancy moves.

Bases Loaded

Each of the five bases is littered with hazards and obstacles, including falling platforms, revolving pillars, underwater caverns, volcanic fire spouts, and dead-end passages. The game's automatic vertical and horizontal scrolling make some areas especially tricky by scrolling one way and then abruptly scrolling back in another direction. If you're not paying attention, you'll be trapped like a mutant rat.

Each level is populated by increasingly tough legions of Burai super-mutants. These mechanical droids fly, squirm, and even swim their way towards you in ever more deadly hordes.

If you succeed in maneuvering through this gauntlet of metal mutants, a big, bad Burai boss lies in wait for you at the end of each base. You must defeat this final menace in order to advance to the next level. A password option enables you to skip the big guy next time around.

The Final Frontier

Burai Fighter is a tough cart, but you can make it tougher. The game has three difficulty levels so that experts can enjoy the action. The VS. Mode enables two players to compete head to head to complete a selected level. So, strap on your proton pack and get set to fight the toughest bunch of robo-mutants to invade the universe in years.