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Genre: Game - Arcade

Developer: ABA Games

Mac Port: Shinichiro Hamaji

Price: Freeware!

Gradius, Raiden, Strikers 1945, Galaga: hardly anything can be considered more retro than the 2D shoot-em-up. Fans of the genre generally tend to make up some of the oldest dedicated gamers around, and while titles like Ikaruga (released for Dreamcast and Gamecube) may make a splash here and there in the public consciousness, the fact is that this genre is largely populated by people who have transformed it from an ancient curiosity to an art form. And if it's an art form, Kenta Cho of ABA Games is our Michaelangelo. For the past few years, he's been releasing games that stretch the boundaries of the conventional 2D shoot-em-up ("shmup"). His latest, Gunroar, is no exception.

Gunroar's first gameplay twist comes right at the beginning of the game; unlike most shmups, which give you control over some kind of exotic airplane or spaceship, Gunroar hands you the reins to a gunboat. Rather than artificially subject you to a preset gameplay pace, Gunroar scrolls vertically ever so slowly on its own, effectively surrendering the game speed to your own whims. You may take Gunroar as quickly or carefully as you choose to take it...though of course, the game provides a score incentive for living on the edge and taking it quickly. To some, this may sound absurdly minute; all I can say is that you have to try it for yourself. I've never played a shmup that forced me to continually balance speed and safety like Gunroar does, and the change of pace from forced-scrolling shmups is reason enough to check Gunroar out.

The next twist comes in the control schemes. Gunroar (at the moment of this writing, anyway) has two gameplay modes that are different enough as to make it two separate games. Normal mode has you control your boat with one hand and fire with the other. By default, I use my right hand to control the boat with IJKL and fire with the left hand. But unlike other shmups that use this control setup, Gunroar doesn't lock your boat so it's permanently facing forwards. Instead, you are always pointing the direction you're moving in unless you're firing, in which case your direction is locked to aim at whatever you were aiming at when you started firing. Now one might think they would be willing to simply lock themselves firing forward and play through Gunroar's Normal mode like a normal shmup anyway. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. Not only are enemies strategically placed behind fixed objects (islands) so that you usually have to change your direction to blow them up, but Normal mode also gives you control over a spiffy secondary weapon called the Lance, which fires a brief burst of concentrated asswhoopin' that penetrates through whatever enemies it contacts, meaning that finding the ideal angle is necessary for plowing through your enemies efficiently. It's not enough just to mindlessly blast everything in sight; Gunroar makes you think.

Gunroar's second gameplay mode, Twin Stick, is my personal favorite. It mimics the dual-joystick gameplay of the arcade classic Smash T.V., meaning you control your boat with one hand (WASD) and fire independently with the other (IJKL). This makes controlling your boat much easier, since you have simultaneous control over the direction of your weapon and the direction of your boat, However, you don't get the Lance secondary weapon in this game mode, so while you may be able to speed things up by blasting through enemies with less regard for geometry than in Normal mode, you don't pack as much heat. Either way, Gunroar makes for some awesome shmup gaming.

All of this is complemented by the mood-setting electronica and abstract visuals that are standard fare for an ABA Games title. Unlike most shareware developers, who aim for cartoony 2D visuals reminiscent of older arcade games, ABA Games titles are designed with the same general mathematical love of polygons in mind. The graphics are heavily inspired by Rez (Dreamcast and PS2), which was in turn inspired by the works of Kandinsky and his experiments in synaesthesia. You are not a detailed sprite shooting detailed sprite bullets at another detailed sprite a la Deimos Rising; rather, you're given control of a boat that looks kind of like a pentagon, and you shoot green rectangles (as well as a big blue one if you're using the Lance) at other abstract representations of boats. To any gamer who's experienced an ABA Games shmup already, the visuals will be nothing new; if anything, compared to earlier works like rRootage and Noiz2sa, Gunroar is less abstract, because it actually kind of draws out the islands and some of the gun emplacements with colors that look like a really low-resolution satellite photo. It's hard to explain; suffice to say that the first few times you dodge through Gunroar's bullet hell, you will be in awe of your own ability.

All in all, Gunroar presents an alternative take on the shmup genre that is built upon a deep understanding of the conventions that we take for granted when we play through Raiden Fighters or R-Type, and wraps it in the wonderfully unconventional mishmash of polygons and dots that is par for the ABA Games course. Those out there who love the 2D shooter, do yourself a favor and grab Gunroar, and to those who aren't so fond, watch out; playing Gunroar puts you at risk for falling deeply in love with them.

Download Gunroar for free.