E3 2011: Centipede: Infestation Hands-On Preview

Any gamer worth his or her salt would recognize the shooting madness known as Centipede. Because Centipede is a rather memorable classic, and seeing as games are always in the trend of reiterating themselves, Atari will be releasing a revamp of the classic shooter, subtitled Infestation.

We checked out both the Wii and the 3DS versions. While the controls are obviously different (nunchuk and remote combination for the Wii, left analog and face buttons for the 3DS), the core gameplay is the same. You have to shoot down a set number of bugs and insects until a giant centipede boss shows up. The action is tense but frustrating in the demo, as main character Max dies with one hit. The Atari representative told us that developer WayForward is fixing that issue by giving Max a life bar in addition to a few extra lives. However, hardcore gamers can choose to play the "one hit and you die" mode as an option, presumably the hardest difficulty level.

You also get to use different weapons during a bug hunt. We had a choice of a flamethrower, a toxic gun that shot green puddles, and a machine gun with rapid fire. While powerful, they can be used for only a few seconds before they disappear, and you can lose them if they get hit. You can also shoot down mushrooms that can spawn gun turrets. These turrets fire at the enemy, but they can be hurt by enemy fire and attacks, so you will have to protect them if you wish for extra firepower.

Gamers looking for a sci-fi shooting fix can look forward to playing Centipede: Invasion later this year.