Axelay (USA) (Sample) ROM

A standard space themed shoot-em up. It does have a few interesting differences from a standard shoot-em ups.

The scrolling alternates between horizontal and vertical when moving to the next stage. (I could be wrong as I find that this game is pretty hard, even on the easiest difficulty, and haven't been able to get past the third level.)

Instead of weapon upgrades being picked up when they float around the stage. You need to beat a level to unlock a new weapon on one of the three weapon types.

Axelay, is an okay game with some interesting features but I would recommend Darius Twin as a better shoot-em up with a more novel weapon power up system and better implementation of changing between horizontal/vertical scrolling within a stage.

Pros
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The vertical scrolling stages are a different and interesting visual addition.

Controls are smooth and game play is decently paced.

Graphics on the vertical scroll stages are great and the horizontal scroll stages are on par with other space shoot-em ups like Gradius.

The backgrounds that scroll by are nice to look at. The first level is an ocean with enemies that you can see moving under the water. The second is flying through the inside of a space station with its spinning habitat with buildings and a sea.

Cons
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Vertically scrolling stages are cramped. Enemies will attack from the top and bottom, which will mean less time to react as the vertical distance on a monitor is less than on the horizontal.

Instead of a single hit = death some hits will cause you to lose the currently selected weapon. During a level, death is the only way to recover lost weapons during a level.

Limited continues, 6 on Easy and 3 on Hard, that start you at the beginning of the level. This is rough when you lose all of your lives after making it to the boss of the stage.

Vertically scrolling stages have a curve at the top as you move "up" the level that makes it difficult to tell if your shots are hitting enemies.

Every weapon selected has two fire modes. A main gun and a missile/bomb. Both are fired with a different button. It seems like it would have been easier/better to have both firing options mapped to the same button.

Movement speed could be just a little bit faster. On the vertically scrolling levels it was noticeable that my ship moved at the same/slightly slower speed as the enemy ships.