If you have played Metal Warriors or Cybernator then you are going to feel right at home with Gigantic Army. This arcade side scrolling shooter somehow managed to go under my radar, but I’m thrilled that I managed to find it and play it.
Gameplay
The movement and aiming in Gigantic Army is a bit sluggish, but it’s bearable due to the fact that you are piloting a massive robot. Before you start your mission you can choose from three different main weapons, an assault rifle, a shotgun, and a grenade launcher. I prefer the grenade launcher, although it is slow, it definitely gets the job done. You also get to choose between one of three bomb weapons, such as a cluster bomb, a rocket pod or a massive laser. Be careful on which combination you pick, because your bomb weapon ammo could be hindered to a single use.
The boss fights are really cool, seeing as just about every one is a monstrous robot about ten times the size of you. Each boss has a certain rotation of attacks, which is good to memorize if you want to advance into the harder difficulties. Beating normal was hard enough, but hard mode? Forget it, I can’t even pass the third level. There is even a difficulty above hard mode called insane mode, which I’m pretty sure I will never get to.
You essentially only have one life, but you get three continues. So if you make it to the last boss of the level and die, you have to start the level all over again, frustrating, but challenging at the same time.
You are also timed on each stage, even though there are only six stages you have about three minutes to complete each one. This aspect really brings out the classic arcade style, which I love.
Story
You’re not going to play Gigantic Army for the story, that’s for sure. The gameplay is where it’s at. I noticed that the journal in the game has a lot of typos, letters missing, words misspelled, and weird characters in certain locations. Such as “It&s” Although the story behind Gigantic Army is that you are an engineer who must save the human race from robotic aliens who are trying to stop the humans from progressing into space.
Overall
Gigantic Army is a lot of fun for an indie arcade game. For only $5.99 it’s a pretty good deal. Even if the game is really short, I find myself playing it over and over. If you miss the old Super Nintendo arcade games like Metal Warriors and Cybernator then you definitely should not pass up on Gigantic Army.
A copy of Gigantic Army was provided by Nyu Media. Gigantic Army was developed by Astro Port and published by Nyu Media. Gigantic Army was released via Steam on March 6th, 2014.
