Gameplay: Area 51 plays exactly like its arcade port. There's an alien invasion 90 miles away from Las Vegas, and the STARR team is on a mission to stop them from causing problems to our world. Some aliens have already killed some people and then become zombies inside a human body. Your job is to wipe out as many aliens as possible in this short, but action packed arcade game. Area 51 for the Saturn is an impressive port to take on the Saturn's power. You get everything that was featured in the arcade port, and that's it. The only extras found in this port are that you can adjust the difficulty, the credits you use, and you can turn off the blood and gore if you want. There’s also a practice mode, where you shoot aliens that pop out of no where on a fixed camera screen. This only lasts about a minute, so if you want to practice getting used to the game, it will help you out. Thankfully, the game does support the Stunner Gun so you can get the old arcade feel. Area 51 does also support the standard control pad too, but if you have a stunner gun for your Saturn, then use that, because you get a great Light Gun arcade feel. Area 51 has everything featured in the arcade port in terms of gameplay, along with new features, but all that won't be enough to make you come back repetitively. Graphics: The graphics are in FMV form. This means most of the graphics look like what you’d see in photographs. The Arcade port's graphics were sharp and decent, but the Saturn port lacks in clearness. The textures flash some pixels easily and the backrounds are hard to see with some pixel problems. However, everything else looks great, since they use the Saturn's powerful 2D Processor. But all in all, Area 51 is an average looking Saturn game. Sound: The music is not really interesting, but I guess it fits in the situations of the levels. The sounds of the aliens dying when you shoot them are downright mediocre sounding quality. The aliens have some fuzziness in their voices, which really compares horribly with the arcade version. Also, there are some sound effects that are a bit off tuned compared to the arcade port. So, the soundwork for Area 51 on the Saturn is nothing special, but tolerable. Conclusion: Despite the additional flaws in the graphics and soundwork, Area 51 is still a decent Light Gun game. It would be an elegant game to be added in any Light Gun game fan's collection. Although as mentioned, you don't get much else in this game. So the replay value of Area 51 is pretty short. But overall, Area 51 is an above average Saturn game. Pros: -Classic feel as a Light Gun arcade -Plays exactly like the arcade port -Extra rooms Cons: -Too short, even for an arcade game -Some bad pixeled graphics in the backrounds not found in the Arcade port. -Some sound effects are off-tuned from the Arcade port.
Game Title: Area 51 Platform: PlayStation, Sega Saturn Developer: Mesa Logic Publisher: Midway Genre: Light Gun Shooter Age Rating: 12+ BBFC Release Date: May 1997 -------------------------------------------------... Read Full Review
