
In any case, I've often seen Metal Slug's lack of diagonal aiming singled out as a bone of contention, but as well as contributing to that odd shoot-em-up feeling of the game, I feel the game is designed in such a way that you won't really miss it, and in fact it encourages players to approach things a little differently and experiment with the mechanics available to them.
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It's also a departure from Gunforce II's double-guns approach that gave you full diagonal control, and I understand why Nazca moved from that- although a neat way of allowing diagonal shooting, it also feels a little clumsy and imprecise, especially since special weapons are only given to one of your two guns. According to an interview with Kazuma Kujo in Retro Gamer Issue 98, this was an intentional design decision to make the game feel closer to a shoot-em-up, which of course many Irem staffers would be intimately familiar with, rather than other games in this genre. For a start, while the controls are mostly as you'd expect- fire, jump (tap briefly to short-hop) and limited-use grenades thrown in an arc- the game famously has no diagonal aiming for weapons. Marco and Tarma must recapture those Slugs, either using them to fight Morden's troops or ensure they're destroyed, rescue any P.O.W.s they find along the way, and ultimately put a stop to the Rebellion Army and "Devil Reborn" Morden's reign of terror across six treacherous missions! In other words, shoot everything that moves and don't get shot.Īs this is the very first Metal Slug, it may be a bit prudent to go over the very basics, as while on the surface you may wish to compare it to the likes of Contra or Sunset Riders, it is in fact quite a different kind of run-and-gun. His Rebellion Army have taken various cities over the world and, more critically, gotten their hands on the Regular Army's cache of a new kind of battle tank- the Super Vehicle-001, nicknamed Metal Slug. Setting a trend for the series, Metal Slug actually has a lot of plot going on, but you'd only ever know this by studying ancillary materials like the manual, so this may be all new to you! 1st Lieutenant Marchirus Dennis Rossi and 2nd Lieutenant Tarmicle Roving III- better known to you and me as Marco (P1) and Tarma (P2)- are part of the Perigine Falcons special forces unit, waging a desperate counter-attack in 2028 against the force of General Donald Morden. With our historical context out the way, let us begin.
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In any case, Nazca had worked their way up to this project, and their trademark level of sprite detail was allowed to flourish on the Neo Geo hardware, creating a landmark title for the system, and establishing a series that would soon become synonymous with SNK. This was indeed the version location-tested at Osaka arcades in August 1995, but due to its mixed reception, the game was retooled to have playable human characters instead. In fact, the very original concept for Metal Slug was, in its own way, another play on In the Hunt's idea of a purely vehicle-based game, just with a tank instead of a submarine. Just a cursory glance at these two games shows they would be a starting point for what would become Metal Slug's graphical style, but as we'll see later, there's a few other bits and pieces from these games that would work their way into Metal Slug, so you can see it as a culmination of Nazca's work up to that very point, their own magnum opus. As that page spells out in detail for you (and we offer credit once more to Youloute for a lot of help with Nazca's history) Nazca Corporation was formed after Irem's arcade division closed in 1994, consisting of ex-Irem staff with many games collectively under their belt- critical for our discussion today are the two titles pictured above, Gunforce II /Geostorm and In the Hunt / Kaitei Daisensou (although we can't pin down specific names for Gunforce II, it has been confirmed staff from it went on to Nazca). Veteran readers of our site (you poor, poor people) may remember one of our more research-heavy articles in Let's Gaming Tat, Nazca Staff. The build-up to the debut of the strongest tank in the world. Metal Slug: Super Vehicle-001 is a very important and special game to me.īefore we get started, though, we'd better set the scene. Ah! Did I just use a tilde? Must be going soft in my old age. You should probably read this one first, actually.Īlso, a special thanks go to Kimimi and HokutoNoShock who checked over this for us before we put it up~. Unlike the other Metal Slug articles on this site, you don't need prior knowledge of the series. What's next? Ghosts n' Goblins? Sonic the Hedgehog? Mega Man?

The ultimate sign that Gaming Hell has lost its way.


Metal Slug: Super Vehicle-001 - Blast away and go, go, go!
