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HISTORY
OF THE MARS REVOLUTION
Mars
Matrix, like many other sci-fi shmups, is set on Mars (Ta-Dah! Surprised?).
The basic idea is this: after centuries of peaceful colonization (a
necessity, since Earth was overpopulated), something goes bad and Mars
government officially declares its independence...but there's a suspect that
some other entity, related to the "infinity technology" (probably
an alien artefact found decades before the setting of the game), is using the
planetary network system for its own purposes. At any case, Earth sends an
interplanetary force to take down this coup d'etąt, and they decide to test
on the field the new warships...The Mosquitoes.
Mars
Matrix is the second shmup of the Takumi/Capcom trilogy, together with Giga
Wing and Giga Wing 2.While Takumi is one of the companies that rose from
Toaplan's ashes, designers Choco and Sh@rp (their real names escape me know)
were hired to create the game's "world" and mechas: their most
famous work is Xenogears,to my knowledge. The game was originally a Capcom
CPS-2 game, and it was ported on Dreamcast with a lot of extras and some
changes. I will write specific notes on the differences between arcade and
Dreamcast in the proper sub-sections, while i'll list and review the extras
here.
Extra
features
The
Dreamcast port has a lot of nice extra features. Before you can trigger them,
though, you need to play and accumulate points: These points will count as
money, money that you will use to buy the extra features. The most important
ones are the replay videos and the score attack mode. The replay videos are
not the best you can find on the game, but they're pretty useful in seeing
how to play the game and have a good idea on the system. The score attack, on
the other side, grants you the possibility to practice the single stages,
which is very useful in order to learn patterns. You also have a lot of nifty
extras like an image gallery, different colours for pictures and backgrounds,
other interesting stuff like the ability to change your Mosquito's speed and
various other things. Not only that, you get an entire extra mode, i.e. the
same backgrounds but different enemy sequence and thus a sort of unofficial
sequel. Not bad, I'd add!
Let's
then proceed to the main review, then!
GFX:
8++
Ok, i
just have written that design was cured by Choco and Sh@rp, of Xenogears
fame...but i have to admit that they didn't worked at their best. I'd add that
must have designed the vehicles only... the game has nice settings, the way
Mars has been drawn is interesting, but the quality of drawings isn't
costant. Let me explain better: the backgrounds are sometimes nice (stage 2, stage
3 to some extent, the satellite part of stage 1), but sometimes they're a bit
generic (stage 4 and 5).This is not really a big issue, though, since they're
still well done. A complain can be done on vehicles, tough: it's obvious that
Matsumoto (Leiji, the guy behind Captain Harlock and Galaxy Express 999 ) was
the main source of inspiration behind most of the vehicles on the game, but
sometimes generic drones and ships are just...generic. Our ships (the
"Mosquitoes") are well drawn and animated, like some other enemies
( bizarre, but mostly mid-bosses or carriers/big enemies) and bosses. It must
also be noted that all enemies are pre-rendered, and this may turn off a few
people who dislike such kind of graphics. Other graphical aspects are very
well done, instead: for example, The "score report" screens you get
between stages are also very good, and you even have short 3D movies shown in
one angle of the screen, to simulate the pilot's cockpit that receive
informations on the next mission. Bosses, as i said, are also well animated,
especially the third stage one (a giant red scarab): except for first and
second baddies, they also are pretty interesting in design. The Dreamcast version
also features a nice intro movie, which is excellent and exploits the Dreamcast's
3D abilities very well. It has to be said that the Dcast version doesn't look
exactly like the arcade version, thanks to Capcom making a small mess with
resolution (to my knowledge, this is common to all of their 2D ports to
Dreamcast). This doesn't affect gameplay, so it's a minor nuisance (unless you're
a silly graphics-junkie).
SUMMARY
OF SUBSECTION
Graphics
are well done, vehicles are pre-rendered though, and this may turn off some
people. Backgrounds and minor vehicles tend to be a bit bland, but big enemies
and bosses are well done. Extra features like the intro movie are also
excellent, and the overall aspect is good.
BGM:
9.5
The
original arcade soundtrack was pretty good, but the author (Yasushi
Kaminishi) decided to remix it for the Dreamcast port. This has been a good
idea, since the original arcade songs were all a bit too short and simple, or
better: they were 1-minute loops repeated a couple of times, to match with
the stages' length. The Dreamcast version has instead more elaborate tunes,
which are actually longer than the stages they're associated to (but this is
something you will discover by listening to the soundtrack, of course). Once
said that, a few notes on the OST itself. Basically, it's your
"usual" techno/trance BGM, but it's very very good and, like many
other shmups soundtracks, it is better than many "club" music you
may listen to. The BGM can be easily divided in more fast, techno-ish tracks
like "Armed Satellite Phobos", "Descending to Mars" and "True
Darkness pt.2" (stage 1, 2 and fifth boss), whereas other are more slow
and trance/ambient-like, for example "Forbidden fruit"
"Surprise attack" and "True darkness pt.1" (stage 6, 3
and 5). Both styles contribute well in creating an atmosphere of fast action
and impeding doom, perfect for the game and its style. Another excellent song
is "Mosquito", which is the tune that accompanies the introductive
movie: it really gives a nice "extra-terrestrial" atmosphere, with
its trance grooves and the short bits of communication between the Mosquitoes
and the main fleet!
SUMMARY
OF SUBSECTION
Excellent
Dance/techno BGM, albeit the original arcade soundtrack was less polished and
elaborate. It complements flawlessly the alien atmosphere and has a few
memorable tunes, which could easily work wonders in clubs and discothčques.
GAMEPLAY:
10
For an
in-depth analysis of the game you can
check
the ST i wrote. In short: the game is built around one simple mechanic,
the mosquito system. You can absorb bullets and "spit" them back at
the enemies, and this will grant you two things: the ability to destroy the
baddies with their own fire-power and a lot of experience cubes. Instead of
power-ups, you get an experience level system that works in this way...
All
aerial enemies, once destroyed, will release said experience cubes, whose
value varies with size (+1,+5,+10,+50). Reflected bullets are transformed to
+1 cubes, too. Once you get a cube, you will start a chain: in the upper left
corner of the screen, below the score and the experience points score, you
have a bar : as long as it has some energy in, it means that every cube you
take will increase in value and extend the chain's duration. An example: if
you take a +1 cube, your bar will start flashing (and will go down and expire
after one second). If you take another cube, you will get the timer back to
one second, the cube itself will be worth 2 exp points (the value increases
progressively) and add 2 points to your experience total. This means that if
you take 7 cubes worth +1 without breaking the chain, you will get
1+2+...+7=28 experience points. If you take a +5 cube after that, the next
cube will be worth +12 points, and you will get 28+5=33 points. If instead
you get all +1 cubes, going from +7 to +11 in value, you will get
28+7+8+9+10+11=73 experience points. This means that the most rewarding
chains are the ones where you take a lot of small +1 cubes and get to high
values (like +1,7k). The advantage of getting bigger exp. cubes is that they
give you more time to chain, though. For instance, the +5 cubes will give you
2 seconds, whereas the few +50 cubes around will give you 5 seconds (the
chain bar will be completely full!).
This
will help you in getting power-ups for your main gun: you basically power-up
(and morph the ship) up to level 8 (please read the ST for the correct
values), and get one extra life at level 4.Also, the experience points value
will act as a multiplier for your score, so you can end racking up billions
of points!
Now,
once you know how the experience system works, let's explain the attacks.
You
have four attacks at your disposal:
1) Normal shot (tap button);
2) Pierce cannon (don't shoot and it will automatically charge);
3) Mosquito reflection (hold down button);
4) Gravity Hole Bomb (hold down button until the energy in bar in the lower
right corner gets depleted);
The
latter two can be thought as "defensive systems", at the beginning.
However, considering how many bullets the enemies will throw at you, you will
soon learn to think of them as your best offensive devices.Their mechanic is
simple: hold down the main button and a gravitational field will be
triggered, consuming energy in the meanwhile (the bar is in the lower right corner).
Once you release the button, the bullets will be released and go in a
straight line, which is the normal line to the field in that point: this
basically means that they will go in the reverse direction of your movement.
If you completely deplete your mosquito energy, you will release a gravity
hole bomb (or just a bomb, in short), which will damage everything in a given
radius (which is half of the screen's height). The mosquito energy will
obviously be replenished when you don't use it.
SUMMARY
OF SUBSECTION
The
gameplay focuses on reflecting bullets with the Mosquito system, creating
experience cubes that, if chained, will grant you a lot of experience points,
necessary to power-up your ship and increase your score.It's a bit difficult
to grasp at first, but once done, it rewards the player with an extremely
ductile system.
LONGEVITY:
9.5
Mars
Matrix is one of those games that has a virtually limitless replay value.
This derives from the game itself and from the extra features offered on the
Dreamcast port. One thing you will notice, if you get proficient at the game,
is the sheer brilliance of stage design. All stages can be chained in more
than just one way, especially if you master the Mosquito system; unlike other
games based on chaining, Mars Matrix allows you a good degree of
"improvisation", since you can create cubes at will and thus keep
your chain going in more than just one way (once you master the system, of
course!). Not only that, but you also have two ships, which play in a pretty
different way, and this means that you can have two styles of improvisation,
even if you will probably only like one.If you're tired of the normal game,
you can also play the arrange mode, which also features an excellent design
and gives room for creativity as much as the original version. Not only that,
but you can also play the score attack mode, which feature a special mode
which will give you a shower of experience cubes every time you pierce an
enemy!
SUMMARY
OF SUBSECTION
The
game has a lot of replay value, since you can approach stages with more than
one method to get long chains.It also features an extra "arrange
mode" and interesting score attack modes.
SCORE: 9.5
 
 
 
 
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