Assault Heroes 2

Still, for the most part the additions to the Assault Heroes template are positive enough, even if they're hardly laden with imagination. It's still not quite enough to elevate the rote material to the point where excitement might start to build up though. Much like the original, this is decent but nothing more. The graphics are full of detail and clever little physics moments, but despite this the tiny characters lack charisma and the act of mowing down a dozen enemies with your cannon curiously lacking in impact or spectacle. I've actually been playing this concurrently with Capcom's upcoming and broadly similar Commando 3 and, at the risk of spoiling that review, personality really does go a long way.

Tom complained that the original was too short, but I'm going to confuse everyone and complain that this second effort is too long. It's almost twice the length of the first game but, blighted by the same uninspired level design and often repetitive gameplay, the effect is to turn the game into a long-winded slog. This is especially true of the game's second half, set on the alien mothership, in which you scuttle around an apparently endless series of identical corridors for over ten interminable levels. Rather than an expertly conducted crescendo of excitement I reached the final stage on auto-pilot, in the sort of distracted fugue state that uninspired blasters always seem to conjure up.

This problem also afflicts the boss fights. The bosses are undeniably more impressive than last time, including a giant robot scorpion and a giant robot tortoise. There are even giant robot elephants which, confusingly, aren't as giant as the scorpion and tortoise. None are particularly hard to defeat though, since their enormous flashing weak spots mean that success is simply a question of dodging the onslaught long enough to wear them down. This can be a thankless, drawn-out process and, just like the game itself, it carries on too long after you've mastered the formula, leaving you going through the motions, draining your excitement as it goes.

This sort of frag-happy shooter can be deliriously entertaining, but only if the developer understands how to pace the action. Despite wrong-headed gamers judging the value of every game based on how long it goes on for, brevity shouldn't be a dirty word - particularly where this sort of action-packed experience is concerned. It's no sin for a game to be only a few hours long provided those hours are thrilling, memorable and endlessly replayable. Assault Heroes 2 has no such pacing - it just keeps on going and going, repeating the same elements over and over, until it suddenly stops and you're rewarded with one screen of text (and no Achievement) for your trouble. For all its relentless action and constant shooting, the engagement that comes from a truly great and balanced arcade game remains frustratingly elusive.