Possibly the best $10 you'll ever spend on a game.
The first thing I noticed about Super Stardust HD was that the game simply looks jaw-dropping. At times, it's almost hard to concentrate on the gameplay - the backdrops are simply that well done. The planets actually look like living, breathing worlds, and the particle, weapon, and damage effects are extremely satisfying.
There's not a lot of exposition in Super Stardust HD. None, in fact. You simply hit the X button a couple of times and you're off and running. We can gather that you're some kind of attack ship, defending various planets against meteor and alien attacks, but the "story" is largely meaningless. What is meaningful is the sheer amount of destruction that your tiny ship ends up being capable of.
The difficulty is just right. As you progress through the game it grows more and more challenging, but it never feels like the game is being unfair or that you don't have the tools necessary to succeed. The weapons are clever, and figuring out what weapon works on which boss feels like a mild throwback to the days of Mega Man; before the internet gave us instant access to FAQs for every game known to man, our old friends Trial and Error were the only ways to push through a game like this. Word of advice - resist the urge to look up strategy guides for this game. It's far more satisfying getting those perfect runs on your own.
Super Stardust HD will more than likely appeal to older gamers in the 25-35 range - those of us who remember standing in line for games at the arcade where the only "achievement" was putting your three initials next to a high score. Truly, Super Stardust is a throwback to that sort of gaming - while it has a wide range of trophies, the real meat of the game is in pushing that score multiplier as high as it can go be executing near-perfect runs through each planet. Die once, and your score multiplier drops back down to 1x, effectively kicking you out of the running for the top spots.
Super Stardust HD is the type of game that challenges you to simply be fast and accurate . In a sea of mindless point-and-click "adventures", or twitchy, gimmicky first person shooters, it's a welcome change.
At $10 this game is an amazing bargain - I'm glad I stumbled across it. If this is an example of things to come from Housemarqe, I'm looking forward to a full-fledged title from them.