SUPER UFO FIGHTER Review

In the future, the hottest competitive game in the universe is Shwoop UFO. Shwoop UFO has two different ships in a contest to find the special golden prize that is hidden in one of the falling capsules. The top of the screen will show you exactly what it looks like; discover it first and drop it into your chute to win that round. Super UFO Fighter sounds easy enough, but having a competitive opponent will make this task more challenging.

The UFOs will have to break open the prize capsules that fall from the top of the screen. They are full of items like cats, Famicom game cartridges, busts, and even weapons like guns or swords. You have a tractor beam to transport these items to your side of the screen where your chute is. The more things you drop, the lower the barrier you have to clear with your items will be. It is beneficial to get that barrier down as low as you can, as most of the time, the golden objects you need to win are big and heavy, so it takes more work to get them into that chute. It becomes even more difficult when you fight with the other UFO for the golden item. You can smash into them to push them around or get above them and use your punching ability to hit and stun them. Hitting them will allow you to grab that special prize and try to get it over to your chute as fast as possible. They will undoubtedly be trying to do the same to you!

Super UFO Fighter is an adorable-looking game with pixel sprites. From the colour palette to the items you find in the capsules, it screams cute. This charm extends to the variety of vehicles you get to control; one looks like a rabbit, one a cat, and another a hedgehog — I never thought I would think a UFO was endearing! If you play through the Campaign mode (essentially Story mode), you will fly all the different crafts available in the game. Some of the vehicles are more fun to pilot than others; they are not all clones of each other, which is nice to see but annoying when you have to fly one of the slower aircraft. Besides looks and speed, the way they attack/break the capsules differs. Lulu has mechanical fists, Acute shoots music notes, and Ning-Ning uses ninja stars, which all work well, but it gets more challenging once you control Dr Gaw's ship. His attack is throwing explosive bombs shaped like dog bones, they tend to fly in random directions, and his UFO flies slower than the others, so it was not my favourite ship to control. Most of the battles are whoever gets two wins first, but when you get to the last fight for that character's piece in the story, it will require three wins to be victorious. Most of the time, the battles were relatively short and would last less than two minutes, so if you are controlling a vehicle you don't enjoy, it usually is for a short amount of time.

Each of the characters in Super UFO Fighter have unique music — For example, Acute the idol has an electronic pop feel which makes sense for her character. The Campaign Mode has an upbeat tune that sounds like something you would hear playing in the background at an arcade. Before each battle begins there is some air horn tossed in for good measure like at a real sporting event! After hearing this same music on repeat during the story while the characters were talking, it got a bit tiring after a while; I couldn't wait to get back to battling just so the music would change! 

Super UFO Fighter has a variety of modes to play; some are solo, but others like Hot Potato and Target Battle allow you to play with two players locally. In Hot Potato, a bomb block is dropped in the middle of the stage, divided in half by a dotted line. The bomb has a clock counting down from 20; once it hits zero, it will explode, and the player with the side it explodes on loses. Players must try to push it to their rival's side of the screen, or you can increase the time displayed by using your tractor beam to pick it up. If the block hits the outside edge of the screen, the timer will drastically go down, making it more liable to explode.

The other multiplayer mode, Target Battle, has you playing head-to-head with another player locally to have a capsule match where you are looking for the target golden item. You can change the settings for the number of wins required to be victorious, if your UFO is at full power or if picking up power-ups will be necessary. I found this mode more challenging than playing against the computer in Campaign Mode. It was always fun to fight over the golden thing you needed for the win, and trying to bash your opponent to steal it was so entertaining! Although I guarantee when you need one more win to be victorious, the required item would be the huge Tutankhamun casket that would manage to land sideways and get stuck blocking your chute. It's hard to move it when your opponent constantly pushes and hits while trying to steal it away from you! If you don't have any way to play with someone locally, you can also play against other players worldwide or with friends who have the game.

I had a lot of fun playing Super UFO Fighter; collecting all the unique items was addictive because I wanted to have at least one of each! Especially prizes like cats and videogame cartridges, you can never have too much. Well, you can't have too many videogames; there is definitely a limit on cats. Super UFO Fighter is a title you should check out if you love super cute, addictive titles that are easy to learn and can be played against other people. It only took a couple of hours to complete the Campaign Mode, but once completed, you will unlock an Endless Mode that will let you smash capsules and try to be victorious over the other in-game characters as long as you can. Play continues until you lose two rounds in a match. Once that happens, your win streak record will be recorded, and you start over again. It was nice to be able to select the UFO that I wanted to be instead of being forced to pilot vehicles I didn't like. Super UFO Fighter was an enjoyable time that, no matter your age or level of gaming experience, you can enjoy.