Power Strike

STORY / GAMEPLAY
Your planet is overrun by the meanest mutant vegetation ever created on a laboratory. This vicious being has taken over buildings, labs, fighter crafts or even people and every minute it's getting bigger and meaner! But it didn't take you over yet. Now you're setting yourself up on a mission to deliver a powerful strike! You have a special attacking ship with the capability to fire weapons you free from the ground; up to 8 different weapons can be found (including your default lasers) but all of them have limited ammo. Your ammunition will run out unless you collect another power up of the same kind. Those power ups will also take the strength of your selected weapon up to a greater level. The enemy ships attack in hordes, firing various projectiles and flying towards you. The difficulty here is particularly high but this doesn't diminish any of the addiction it causes. Known in Japan as Aleste, Power Strike, was released in America as a mail-only limited edition game.

GRAPHICS / SOUND
Level 1 aside, I was pretty amazed by the game's graphics (especially the backgrounds) and the smooth sprites animation! The screen scrolling is as fluid as water making the game very enjoyable to the eye! Those great graphics seem to excel the hard difficulty and the somewhat "loose" controls! The sound features a few nicely composed tunes along with typical Sci-Fi shoot 'em up sound effects (explosions, laser-fire and more).