Act: Jets'n'Guns [by Rake in Grass]

Game Review:  Jets'n'Guns
Release: November 14, 2004
Genre: Action
Developer: Rake In Grass
System Requirements: Windows 95/98/ME/NT4/2000/XP, Pentium 500 MHz, 64Mb RAM, DirectX 9.0b+, 32MB Video Card
Players: 1
Price: $19.95
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The television displays vivid images of a heavily armed space ship approaching a heavy-metal concert, firing its heavy lasers and plasma cannons into the audience. Bodies, or what’s left of them, fly everywhere, burning advertisement blimps crash violently into the raging crowd. The space ship is sometimes hidden behind fountains of blood. Your ship, to be precise. You also brought the television cameras, because it’s a good additional source of income while you perform your strafing run on that Machinae Supremacy gig the nasty pirates from last mission are hosting on a different planet. Later, on a space station, you hear from a crazed survivor: “Dude! This was the best party ever!”

Okay, what is this about? It’s Jets’n’Guns, the new sideways scrolling shoot’em’up produced by Rake In Grass. And it sure lives up to its motto: “The ultimate bloody and fiery experience.”

The setting is a trashy mixture between 1950’s, 1980’s and science fiction elements. Your plane resembles a World War II fighter, its armament does not. Your enemies come in the form of flying buzz saws, biplanes, helicopters, tanks, foot soldiers, and assorted alien specimens. The story is shallow and negligible, and if you take the time to read the briefings, you will see that there is a lot of sick humour hidden throughout the game.

You are a federal hero, and start out with a small space ship in the Stardonald’s Fly-Thru, where you can buy some upgrades for your ship before you go on your first mission to expunge a gang named “The Chemical Brothers” from the local asteroid belt. Two missions later, you already find yourself fighting your way into a “FeX” Federal eXpermentation Laboratory to steal a better space ship – one of the hardest, yet most compelling missions in the game, because the second half of it you will be towing a ship almost twice the size of yours, while dodging enemy fire without your precious cargo getting blown to bits! More and more weird characters appear, and, after about twenty levels, one including time travel to ensure your daring heist in level three becomes possible in the first place, you will meet the big, bad end guy.

What sets Jets’n’Guns apart from other side scrolling shoot’em’ups is its presentation on screen. The game resembles a pyrotechnics display on steroids, with lots of fire, blood, and explosions to spare. The levels are extremely well-designed and detailed, so are most of the enemy sprites and weapon effects. The menus where you can upgrade your ship between missions are nice and functional, and also full of side blows against TV advertisements and computer games. This game looks great, and the action is so furious that you’ll find yourself playing some levels again and again just because they are so cool and have so many Easter Eggs.

And, of course – the music. Jets’n’Guns has, hands down, the best soundtrack among all the shoot’em’ups I have played in the last decade. It is a furious mix between retro C64 and Amiga synthesizer sounds and rock hard heavy metal. The soundtrack is over 60 minutes long, performed by the Swedish band Machinae Supremacy, who are famous for their kind of music in the retro gaming and game remix scene.

True, Jets’n’Guns is an arcade game, but it is definitely not suitable for kids. There is a lot of political incorrectness and graphic, exaggerated violence. You can buy an accessory for your ship that allows you to hack into machinery in some levels and use that to mutilate helpless people on foot while you rake in the cash using another accessory, the television transmission set, which will regularly grant you bonuses in the form of shopping credits for “Multi Kill”, “Carnage”, “Inhuman Brutality” or “Total Holocaust” types of massacres. As mentioned before, during one mission, you get to drop bombs into densely packed crowds at a heavy metal concert, and you fry everyone with napalm at the “2nd Annual Killer Zeppelin Start Fest” during another.

If you can tolerate this – or if you appreciate the entertainment value of fiery orgies with lots of splatter effects – Jets’n’Guns is perfect for you.

Graphics: 10
Wonderfully detailed, smooth-scrolling levels with lots and lots of Easter Eggs, the enemies are made of large sprites with decent animations, and your ship will show almost every single extra that’s installed in-game – including a selection of paint jobs, ranging from daisies to skulls and crossbones.

Sound: 10
I confess – I’m a great fan of Machinae Supremacy, and have been one for several years now. This game took me by surprise, and I absolutely love the music. It’s perfectly recorded, and there’s a different track in every level. Most of the pieces are great hard rock or heavy metal style music with added “chip tune” samples from 80’s arcade games. Outstanding! A must-have!

Game Play: 9
It’s a shoot’em’up, but one that blends together the best ideas of so many previous games I’ve played, I can hardly count them all. The choice of weapons and upgrades is seemingly endless. You get tips for each level in the mission briefings, and usually, it’s sound to heed them. The game allows you to save between missions, and also allows you to abort and restart each level as often as you wish – without any penalties. Also, you can sell your weapons for the same price they cost you when you bought them, encouraging you to experiment with different weapons configurations. However, I think the difficulty level fluctuates a bit too much between missions. A few are really easy, and some are very tough and you find yourself desperately trying to find the right weapons load for the job. Also, the game is a bit short – you get to the end in two evenings on standard difficulty, and the end guy is disappointingly weak. Some extras are much, much better than others for the same price. But in the end, it’s a great game.

Value: 9
The game is short, but it offers a lot of replay value, both because of its innovative missions and because of the sheer endless possibilities you have when outfitting your ship. Rake in Grass plans to release a mission pack in the future, but no release date has been set.

Concept: 9
Jets’n’Guns does almost everything right. It’s the best, most furious arcade shooter I’ve played in a long time. It brings the “old days” from the home computer age right back to you here and now, and it makes sure you notice how games have matured since then. Be it the “Mastermind” type of mini-puzzle you have to solve when trying to pick the combination lock of a sealed cargo container you snatched from the battlefield, or the way you can adapt your ship to your preferred style of play. Asking Machinae Supremacy to produce the original soundtrack for the game was nothing short of an ingenious move.

Fun: 8
Deduct some points here if you think firing machineguns into crowds and reducing people to skeletons by blowing up acid tanks next to them is not fun. Add some if you do think that this can be humorous. Overall, this is a great shooter, but it has to be said that despite the comic nature of its splatter elements, this is still very graphic violence and certainly not everybody’s taste. If you enjoyed Wings of Fury, you will love Jets’n’Guns.

Overall: 10
I personally think that this is an excellent game. The music and graphics are great, and so is the game play. If you’re a grown-up and longing for a game where you can mow people down for no other reason than that they are space pirates – get Jets’n’Guns now. Arcade games sure won’t get much better than this!

Added: January 25th 2005
Reviewer: Moritz Voss
Score:
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Language: english