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Action Fist! Review

Rating:

Action Fist! is an impressive, action-packed tribute to Action Platformers of the past like Megaman and Gunstar Heroes. It might not be for everyone, but it's going to make someone very happy.

Full Review

I was a bit too young to enjoy the kind of games Action Fist! pays tribute to. Only years later have I been able to understand the dense cultural inspiration that it takes from these older games, with it's impressively retro audio, chunky pixel graphics, and difficult gameplay.

One level asks you to ride a quad bike which strangely follows you along as you jump. If you are immediately reminded of Gunstar Heroes' classic mine kart stage, then you're exactly the kind of person who's going to enjoy this game.

On a very basic level, it's a platformer with lots of shooting. It's linear indoor environment's take a cue from the 8-bit Megaman titles, and it's shooting takes liberal inspiration from the previously mentioned Gunstar Heroes. Your guns shoot coloured bullets, which deal extra damage against the corresponding coloured bad guys. You only have two weapon slots though, which you can also fill with shot effects (spread, double shot etc.) or more general character stat upgrades (faster movement, more health etc.). The equipment system isn't very well explained, but it's easy to come to terms with.

The colour bullet system is what seems odd to me though, there are only three colours your gun can use in the game, but you can only switch between a maximum of two. It's also not immediately readable which colour your character has equipped; the gun that shoots red is not red, the gun that shoots green is not green, and so on. It's a system that seems needlessly complicated for the kind of fast-paced gameplay Action Fist! relies on. I'm not saying it's particularly complex in itself, only that it could stand to be more streamlined and transparent for a game that requires quick reactions like this one.

Aside from that I deeply enjoyed it, and I suspect anyone who has a thing for its new-retro design aesthetics will also. It's free and it takes about an hour to complete, so I see no reason not to give it a go. Download the game here.

Posted by Joe Gribbin on April 16, 2010 Comments (6)


Zach Tan said at 2010-04-19 15:35:

Addictive game, the down side is that it doesn't seem to have a save function so you have to complete it in one go. I still can't get past the last boss though, its a tad hard.


Zhou Xuanming said at 2010-04-19 16:26:

That's a lot better than me, I didn't even get there. Maybe Joe had better luck with it during his playthrough. :)


Tach Zan said at 2010-04-20 08:43:

@Zach Tan It saves automatically, in fact multiple times throughout the stage.


Joe Gribbin said at 2010-04-21 02:56:

Yeah, the final boss is super hard. It's weird because the boss just before that is almost ridiculously easy.


Zach Tan said at 2010-05-03 20:58:

What i meant was, once you quit the game (closed the application) its not saved anymore.


Wei-Meng said at 2010-05-24 02:22:

Action Fist! started out enjoyable but got frustrating for me in the end. Two points:

(1) As you mentioned, there are three mob colours but you can only have two weapons colours at a given time. There's no way to plan ahead to take advantage of the colour weaknesses, even through a process of trial and error. Knowing what colour enemies are coming up are no use if you can't change your weapons just before that!

(2) The game just keeps throwing a non-stop stream of enemies at your, despite the fact that you completed the objective, like standing at a switch long enough to lower a barrier, etc. This is just Nintendo difficulty at its worst. Shouldn't the game give you a breather to go get that item box now that you've cleared the objective?

Other niggling issues include the lack of crouch, and the trying-too-hard "TEA TIME!" random pauses in gameplay. It was also annoying that the screensaver kept activating in the midst of the game. I was using a gamepad, so that might be the cause.

I played up till the Artillery Zone (?) Act 02 before I gave up.

Maybe I come from a generation of gamers that's too spoilt, but meh. Gunstar Heroes didn't have this rock-paper-scissors bonus damage mechanic, the different weapon types just gave you a different style to play with. For the record, I'd always used the blue laser and green homing arrow to form the homing laser to clear Gunstar Heroes. :P