You are Snake Logan, top CIA operative, awesome in name and all other respects. After you parachute out of the plane you were flying to do recon, you find yourself in the thick of it, in the city. You have to stop Dr. Mangle(oh, like Mengele... that fits pretty well), who's unleashed countless untold horrors upon it.
Though this is called Bio Menace, you go up against robots, in addition to the genetically mutated. They walk, run, hop, fly, drive. In patterns, at you. Ranged, up close, kamikaze. Lasers, energy, explosives. You can use those, as well, in addition to bullets. Once they spot you, a lot will remain focused on you, which is something you have to be ready for, and can take advantage of. Same goes for the fact that they and you can attack something that isn't on the screen as it moves centered on you.
If you don't have special ammo, you will fire in bursts(from your thankfully infinite supply, since you'd be out of luck without it), otherwise, you may be able to use the fully automatic nature of your rifle. You can aim left, right, and whether you are or aren't crouched or stationary. Never up or down, and not from ladders, though those could be incredibly useful. Your throwables are, and you have to use them in this order when you have more than one of them: the Landmines that you typically have too many of for how relatively, well, useless, they are. To be fair, they can take the brunt for when you're really being rushed, and some enemies can't be taken out with your gun. You *can* kill anything that moves. Incendiary, meaning they spit out a few flames, and then plain old pineapple, grenades. Careful when something goes boom... you'd be surprised how much of it can hit yourself, too.
This uses the same engine as Captain, sorry, *Commander* Keen: Secret of the Oracle. And, The Armageddon Machine and Aliens Ate My Babysitter!, , since it's the same. He even makes a cool cameo at one point! Stating he's on his way to, once again, teach Mortimer McMire who's boss(1 point higher IQ, my butt). Well, Id Software? You promised it here, in 1993, and then you didn't deliver until 2001! And then it wasn't even you who developed it! Cancelled for the sake of Wolfenstein and Doom, pfft... I demand you feed my addiction for Billy Blaze adventures! Here, though, you can't grab ledges. It sacrifices saving anytime(now only at the start of any given level), in favor of a replenishable health bar rather than contact meaning insta-death, which is now reserved for the toughest foes. While I miss the original way, here, hey, we do have VG's that way, and this is another flavor, and, in the immortal words of Cameron Poe("you... have been...near death... the entire... trip?" Con Air for life!), it tastes good.
And then, there's, of course, the adult tone. We've gone from Goonies and Flight of the Navigator to Commando and The Terminator. Giving a headache, complete with stars flying around the head in cartoony fashion? Nope! Let's blast them apart like it's StarCraft. Gore is plentiful in the corpses strewn about, as well. You die, you won't bounce out of sight, looking like you're in pain. No, you turn into a skeleton that then falls apart. Yeah, you'll wanna keep the kids out of the room for this one. They'll just try to yank the controller from you, anyway. From my cold dead hands! The story is paperthin, and yet, wonderfully, takes itself very seriously and is played straight. Twists aplenty, you'll have to go through all three episodes to see it all, and, thus, to figure out what is even going on, behind the scenes. Remember, you'll miss some if you don't click F1, in all 3. You can also use PageUp and, well, down, to look above or beneath you. Why did they move them from the arrow keys? ...well, you got me.
In order to complete any given section, you, well, uh, reach the exit. Except for the boss fights, which, to a greater extent than the rest of this, increase exponentially in how difficult it is(you may want to settle for Easy of the three settings), this means rescuing a hostage. They have the keycard that lets you leave. Why did they bother capturing anyone, when they annihilated everyone else with seemingly no regard for who? Hey, evil master plans are complicated, OK? It'll all make sense when you realize that...look over there! Of course, they're not merely tied up. Some including to a chair, which they hilariously kick back and forth with no impact on how trapped they are. No, there's a beam of electricity between them and you. Don't cross the stream. It'll need turning off, with a crystal. And you may need at least two to progress. They grant passage to an area you hadn't been to.
They're hidden inside doors. Of course, there are tons of those. And every last one of them requires a key. You will find a seemingly endless series of ones that don't have anything of the sort. Instead, they have point items. Not power-ups, such as health and armaments. Those you get elsewhere. So you spend a lot of time seemingly not getting anywhere.
It doesn't help that clearly, you're meant to know where to go and what to do, or you'll have to adjust inhumanly fast, based on where sources of your demise are and how you interact with them. So it may be useful to redo a portion after you've done it once. Inflating how long it'll take you, annoyingly. You already have a high score table. Which once full of players, not the standard it comes with, will grant you a scene of your character knocking off a small group.
I recommend this to any fan of action platformers. 7/10
Though this is called Bio Menace, you go up against robots, in addition to the genetically mutated. They walk, run, hop, fly, drive. In patterns, at you. Ranged, up close, kamikaze. Lasers, energy, explosives. You can use those, as well, in addition to bullets. Once they spot you, a lot will remain focused on you, which is something you have to be ready for, and can take advantage of. Same goes for the fact that they and you can attack something that isn't on the screen as it moves centered on you.
If you don't have special ammo, you will fire in bursts(from your thankfully infinite supply, since you'd be out of luck without it), otherwise, you may be able to use the fully automatic nature of your rifle. You can aim left, right, and whether you are or aren't crouched or stationary. Never up or down, and not from ladders, though those could be incredibly useful. Your throwables are, and you have to use them in this order when you have more than one of them: the Landmines that you typically have too many of for how relatively, well, useless, they are. To be fair, they can take the brunt for when you're really being rushed, and some enemies can't be taken out with your gun. You *can* kill anything that moves. Incendiary, meaning they spit out a few flames, and then plain old pineapple, grenades. Careful when something goes boom... you'd be surprised how much of it can hit yourself, too.
This uses the same engine as Captain, sorry, *Commander* Keen: Secret of the Oracle. And, The Armageddon Machine and Aliens Ate My Babysitter!, , since it's the same. He even makes a cool cameo at one point! Stating he's on his way to, once again, teach Mortimer McMire who's boss(1 point higher IQ, my butt). Well, Id Software? You promised it here, in 1993, and then you didn't deliver until 2001! And then it wasn't even you who developed it! Cancelled for the sake of Wolfenstein and Doom, pfft... I demand you feed my addiction for Billy Blaze adventures! Here, though, you can't grab ledges. It sacrifices saving anytime(now only at the start of any given level), in favor of a replenishable health bar rather than contact meaning insta-death, which is now reserved for the toughest foes. While I miss the original way, here, hey, we do have VG's that way, and this is another flavor, and, in the immortal words of Cameron Poe("you... have been...near death... the entire... trip?" Con Air for life!), it tastes good.
And then, there's, of course, the adult tone. We've gone from Goonies and Flight of the Navigator to Commando and The Terminator. Giving a headache, complete with stars flying around the head in cartoony fashion? Nope! Let's blast them apart like it's StarCraft. Gore is plentiful in the corpses strewn about, as well. You die, you won't bounce out of sight, looking like you're in pain. No, you turn into a skeleton that then falls apart. Yeah, you'll wanna keep the kids out of the room for this one. They'll just try to yank the controller from you, anyway. From my cold dead hands! The story is paperthin, and yet, wonderfully, takes itself very seriously and is played straight. Twists aplenty, you'll have to go through all three episodes to see it all, and, thus, to figure out what is even going on, behind the scenes. Remember, you'll miss some if you don't click F1, in all 3. You can also use PageUp and, well, down, to look above or beneath you. Why did they move them from the arrow keys? ...well, you got me.
In order to complete any given section, you, well, uh, reach the exit. Except for the boss fights, which, to a greater extent than the rest of this, increase exponentially in how difficult it is(you may want to settle for Easy of the three settings), this means rescuing a hostage. They have the keycard that lets you leave. Why did they bother capturing anyone, when they annihilated everyone else with seemingly no regard for who? Hey, evil master plans are complicated, OK? It'll all make sense when you realize that...look over there! Of course, they're not merely tied up. Some including to a chair, which they hilariously kick back and forth with no impact on how trapped they are. No, there's a beam of electricity between them and you. Don't cross the stream. It'll need turning off, with a crystal. And you may need at least two to progress. They grant passage to an area you hadn't been to.
They're hidden inside doors. Of course, there are tons of those. And every last one of them requires a key. You will find a seemingly endless series of ones that don't have anything of the sort. Instead, they have point items. Not power-ups, such as health and armaments. Those you get elsewhere. So you spend a lot of time seemingly not getting anywhere.
It doesn't help that clearly, you're meant to know where to go and what to do, or you'll have to adjust inhumanly fast, based on where sources of your demise are and how you interact with them. So it may be useful to redo a portion after you've done it once. Inflating how long it'll take you, annoyingly. You already have a high score table. Which once full of players, not the standard it comes with, will grant you a scene of your character knocking off a small group.
I recommend this to any fan of action platformers. 7/10
