The Red Star First Look

Pleasant surprises are always the best kind, especially when you have no particular preconceptions about what you're going into. That's the thought that struck us today when we got a first look at Acclaim's new action game The Red Star, which the company hasn't shown before and about which we therefore knew next to nothing. The game is based on the independent comic book series of the same name that imagines a very different Russia from the one we know today. In development at Acclaim's Austin studio and due for release this September, The Red Star impressed us with what appears to be a noble devotion to old-school game mechanics and depth of play.

The universe of The Red Star focuses on an alternate-history version of Russia in which magic is as accepted a weapon as guns and bombs. In fact, powerful magic users are the cornerstones of the armies featured in the fictional nation, which is called the United Republics of the Red Star. Comic creator Chris Gossett told us that he feels Russia has been conspicuously underrepresented as a fighting culture in popular entertainment, and so The Red Star pays tribute to the nation's history of war while introducing some fantastical elements to keep things interesting.

Magic in The Red Star's universe will make all kinds of crazy things happen, and Gossett gave us a few examples of this: Thick tank armor can be made light as a feather for personal use, entire armies can be deployed through teleportation, and flying battleships called sky furnaces will dominate the skies. For those unfamiliar with the comic series, the game certainly presents a novel take on the typical modern military setting.

The gameplay in The Red Star is made up of equal parts shooting and melee combat. You'll play as one of three characters from the comic book series: Kyuzo, who is a massive, burly brawler; Makita, the nimble and speedy fighter of the group; and Maya, a capable magic user who's attained the rank of sorceress major in the military. We got to take control of both Kyuzo and Makita today (Acclaim isn't showing off Maya just yet) and play through a hectic portion of the game's first level, in which you fend off an attack from a rival sky furnace aboard your own ship.

When you first play The Red Star, you'll probably note what a throwback it is to old side-scrolling action games--everything from Final Fight to Contra to Ikaruga is represented here. Each character has a standard melee attack and a standard shooting attack, and you'll have to use them intelligently to get past all the enemies the game throws at you. You can lock onto your opponents so you can hit them more easily, and while fighting with your melee weapon you can do a number of combos based on how you control your character. We managed to make Kyuzo impale an enemy soldier, hold him up in the air, and then bash him into the ground repeatedly, which looked pretty cool.

There will be a lot of options for fighting your enemies, since each character can get new melee and ranged weapons throughout the game. Kyuzo started out with a standard rapid-fire energy weapon and a flame thrower, for instance, and he had several different double-bladed melee weapons to choose from. You'll be ranked at the end of each level based on your performance, and you can buy these new weapons and other upgrades with the points you obtain. The many varied attack methods among the three characters plus the extensive number of new weapons to buy should help give the game a lot of replay value.

The ranged weapon you're holding also influences your character's special attack, which is referred to as a protocol attack. Kyuzo's starting protocol attack was a concentrated energy beam that did massive damage, while Makita could slam the ground to damage nearby enemies. The game is of course playable by yourself, but players are highly encouraged to play through the game with a friend, since you'll be able to chain your protocol attacks together for even more damage. Your experience will be altered significantly in two-player mode as well, according to the game's designers.

Visually, The Red Star is looking pretty impressive. The character models are nicely modeled, and the backgrounds sport a lot of detail and (more importantly) feature a cohesive aesthetic that makes them fit nicely with the look of the comic book. We got to visit the art department at the Austin studio and see how the team is working with the comic book artists' concept designs to build the game's world, which is no doubt lending authenticity to the look of the game. It's still a work in progress, but so far The Red Star's graphics are really shaping up.

Based on what we saw and played today, The Red Star is going in a tried-and-true action-oriented direction that we unfortunately don't see a whole lot of anymore. This may be one of those games that really tests your mettle as a gamer--just in the first stage we fought a couple of large mechanical minibosses that had us dodging hails of bullets and lots of crazy laser patterns--so it should prove satisfying to the gaming elite that cut their teeth on the punishing action games of yesteryear. We'll bring you more on this promising-looking action game in the coming months.