It's a on-rails alien ship shooter. A bit short, and very difficult, which seems to be the usual formula of the time.
Paraphrased from the manual: In the last years of the 20th century the world supposedly would lay down their weapons of nuclear doom and create peace, except for a madman who harbors dreams of world domination. That madman is the dictator of the (fictional) country of Sovinia. He joined forces with a huge alien force bent on world destruction and armed with impossible weapons, which the people of earth are powerless to resist. In the year 2008 (Ha ha) most of the world lies in ruins, allowing the aliens to turn on Sovinia and conquer even them, leaving a small human rebel force in the Amazon jungle allied with Sovinia's remains. They work together to create the only weapon they can: Strike Gunner. Only two can be built with the alien's human trackers closing in on the base, so two are built and sent against the alien's entire fleet.
The Gameplay: 4.5/5
First, head to options and give yourself maximum lives, you'll need them. Then start the game with either one or two players, two players is usually better since you get twice as many players and can combine the ships for heavy power, but you want to make sure your partner is a good player or you'll be left alone a lot (and if you're also no good, you'll soon join him). Next you choose your secondary weapon, all of which are limited by a meter on the side of the screen, and have various amounts of usefullness and meter usage. Some have a small amount of drain on your meter, such the laser cannon, a weapon that keeps drilling through enemies after hitting them without a lot of actual power, and the plasma shield, which makes your fighter completely invincible for ten seconds. Others drain a lot of power, like the Comrade Fighter , which gives you two little friendly fighters to ride alongside you for ten seconds to give you extra ammo and health, and the Megabeam Cannon that drains your entire meter to create a blast that kills everything from the first enemy to the final boss in one shot, if you can hit them. Unfortunately you can only refill your meter once a level, which makes conservation necessary.
After the selection phase you enter the playing field, where the object is to kill as many enemy fighters as you can while auto-scrolling and eventually take down the end-of-level boss. You can grab laser and speed power-ups, and eventually gain extreme power. You'll need it, as you die in one shot. There are eight levels, seven normal ones like described above and the final eighth level that takes a different turn than the rest of the game by sending you through a maze guarding the alien mother ship's power core. The game starts in your home base of the Amazon jungle and moves on over the ocean, the stratosphere, outer space, and eventually the enemy base on the moon. The enemies are of average difficulty (at least on lower levels) but make up for that with massive numbers and lots of weapons, all of which come at you without a hint of slowdown, which makes your eminent death(s) come that much faster.
Graphics/Sound: 4/5
This game looks fairly good for an early top-down SNES title, and more impressive is the ability to have dozens of ships onscreen at once without any hint of slowdown (that I noticed). The music is good and matches the levels, and the sound effects are fairly normal (Lasers, and things exploding, a lot of each). And the ships look good and fairly detailed, for what it's worth. However, there is an issue with a certain few power-ups, specifically one that flashes quite brightly when you use it, as it attacks the whole screen. Using it rapidly is likely worse for your eyes then watching a 3-D movie, so beware.
Difficulty: 3/5
A near-perfect example of a retro shooter, this game is far too difficult. It features four difficulty levels: Easy, Normal, Hard, and Maniac. They should be renamed: Hard, Harder, Hardest, and (practically) Impossible. As I said before you might get dozens of enemies, all firing at you at once, or five guns firing at you at once rapid fire. Or the lengthly maze that you nearly have to memorize. It is a hard spaceship shooter, but that's part of the fun of beating it.
Final score: 8.0/10 (not an average)
The difficulty makes up most of what makes this such a great game, as well as what will be turning away all but the most experienced (or enduring) gamers. However, anyone who enjoys one-hit shooters that take an hour to beat (if you don't die) will find much to like about this game for as long as they care to keep rushing through the levels at their chosen difficulty.