This game is...okay.
Story: 7/10
- Air Fortress has a fairly typical alien invasion storyline: the people of the planet Farmel, having recently gained the technology for space travel, eagerly explored the galaxy only to find a herd of monstrous "Air Fortresses" moving in their direction. Like the creatures in the later movie "Independence Day", the Fortresses behave like interstellar locusts, consuming all of the resources and living things in their path. The Space Federation sends their mightiest fleet, but they are quickly eliminated by the powerful Fortresses. In a final gambit, they send a single warrior (Hal Bailman), outfitted with a shielded spacesuit, powerful weapons, and small lightship to infiltrate the Fortresses and destroy them from the inside out. So the storyline is pretty good.
Gameplay: 6/10
- As Hal Bailman, the player infiltrates the progressively more challenging Air Fortresses. Each Air Fortress has two levels: the Air Base and the Fortress itself. On approach to the Air Fortress, Hal Bailman battles the enemy from his lightship. The gameplay is that of a side-scrolling shooter. During this phase, the player has three attempts to successfully reach the Air Lock that grants access to the Air Fortress. Along the way, the player must dodge a variety of flying enemies and space station parts. The player also has a chance during this phase to collect energy and crash beam bullets--more powerful ammunition, but one of limited supply--that can be used inside the Fortress. Inside the Fortress, the game becomes an action-adventure game. The player now has more control over where they go--in fact, some later Fortresses are massive internally, making navigation one of the major challenges of the game. The player must navigate through the maze, fighting off enemy robots, security devices, and spacemen with their beam weapon, find and destroy the central core of the Fortress, and find their ship to escape. The last is perhaps the most difficult part, since the Fortress explodes shortly after the core is destroyed; leaving the player with a small time window in which to find the exit, and the exit is never the same place as where the player entered the maze. So after all, the gameplay is... okay.
Graphics: 6/10
- The graphics are average; meaning it is not bad nor good, but okay for a Nintendo game.
Sound: 7/10
- The sound effects of when you shoot is good and the explosions are nice for a Nintendo game. The music is also good, I like it.
The reason I reviewed a Nintendo game first is because well... the Nintendo system came first than the Sega Genesis, the Super Nintendo, the PlayStation, and onwards, and the reason why I reviewed the Air Fortress game first is because I am going to start doing this only in alphabetical order. So anyways overall, I give this game a 6 1/2 out of 10 because the game is average which mean the game is not all that but it is okay though. I hope I get better at this kind of stuff, especially with all those ellipses I used in this review. So, you could tell I was nervous doing this.