It's quite a blast.
Would you believe me if I told you that I hated
Blaster Master: Blasting Again at first? Whenever I buy retro games, since most of the time I have to purchase them used, I give them a try to make sure they work, and when I first put Blaster Master's disc in...
I hated it. I got out of Sophia, the vehicle you drive, and started shooting at flying enemies and it was so sloppy. I hated it. But finally, it was time to sit down and give it the old college try, and I completely changed my mind on it:
It's really good.
Blasting Again is a sequel to the NES originals, although you play as the son of the hero of the first game. The game's plot does this
weird thing where it completely ignores the Japanese version and makes the USA localization canon, as well as bringing in a character from a novel into the fray. Our hero's name is Roddy, and he drives the Sophia-J7, a miniature
tank like vehicle, in order to defeat aliens, and he gets back up from his sister, Elfie, as his navigator. The story is pretty bland, and the voice acting is laughable, but it gets the job done. As for the game, it's an action/adventure hybrid that lasts about 8-9 hours, depending on how thorough you are with your exploration. The world of Blaster Master BA is divided into 5 sections, a Hub("Ground") and four different zones: Lava, Plant, Water and Cave, and before it's over and done with, you'll visit every zone twice and fight their bosses.
While combat is an important part of the game, and I'll get to it
eventually, exploration is equally important, and it does have a few light Metroidvania elements. For you see, most of the bosses you defeat will give you a new ability. The first boss lets you switch between four different sub weapons, which is pretty neat, but the next boss gives you the ability to climb on very
specific surfaces, and it's probably the least used ability in the game. And then you get the submarine ability, and while the game won't tell you what to do then, it's quite obvious that you should revisit the Water land. And you could simply walk into the new areas you can reach with your fancy new ability.... or you could attempt to
explore the areas you couldn't on your first time through. It's
not mandatory to back track, but you can get nice permanent boosts to your subweapon ammo capacity, so it pays to backtrack when you get new abilities.
Although you might just as well wait until you get the Hover ability, since by then 90% of game opens up to you and you'll limit aimless backtracking to see if your new ability lets you reach unexplored areas.
Thankfully the automap is pretty decent, so it's easy to tell if there are exits you couldn't reach before.
Platforming in the game is iffy. When it comes to driving Sophia, for starters, you can't rotate the camera, so you have to
hope that the angle the autocamara reaches is good. Although a quite a few times I would've loved to be able to pull the camera downward to see what was below me. Regardless, even once you get used to the camera, there's another issue... Sophia is a bit slippery. A few platforming sections can become a bit
tedious since you have to be careful that Sophia doesn't slide off the platform once you land. If you're playing with the analog stick, I
suggest you turn it off and do your jumping with the directional pad. If you press select and get out of Sophia, you'll discover the Roddy has better jumping capabilities... but he
barely gets platforming challenges! Oh, and he can rotate the camera in 90 degree increments which at least is
something. Regardless, Roddy is frailer and weaker so you'll probably want to limit your exposure to the elements only when you reach doors that only Roddy can go through, and these sections tend to have an
unfavorably zoomed in camera, so... it takes a bit of getting used to.
Combat is a bit more fun than it
should. Square is your basic shot that you can rapid fire, L1 and R1 are funky side jumps and R2-L2 switch between Sophia's sub-weapons, changing how she
looks in the process. Bosses are probably the game at its best, it was
fun side jumping around while holding down the square button and trying to sneak in sub-weapon attacks. Roddy's sections are not as fun, he has no sub weapons, but rather, a weapon upgrade system that increases its strength the more pick-ups you collect, while randomly losing power when you get hit, requiring you to find another pick up. In an
hilarious twist, the final upgrade is a short-range flamethrower that's not nearly as useful as the longer range rank that came before.
Thankfully, it's incredibly easy to lose by getting hit once or twice. He also has infinite bombs and a napalm-invincibility move that recharges over time. Roddy's stages are a bit duller than the more open areas you explore and fight in as Sophia, because the zoomed in camera angles don't really help you when you fight enemies on
tight corridors and concealed spaces.
Once you get used to the game's
flaws, it's actually quite fun. Exploring every area becomes very entertaining, as you search for permanent power ups and defeat enemies on your way. I'd say Sophia's section play better not only because the fighting flows better, but because the puzzle elements are kept to a minimum, while Roddy's puzzles can get a bit
too labyrinthine for my tastes. That said, the final level is a chore that kills the game pacing, for you see, it's the largest area in the game that feels more like a maze than anything and.... has you fighting every boss
again. I mean... what a poor way to end the game, the most
boring level and a repetitive filler boss-rush.
Blaster Master: Blasting Again is really good despite its various flaws. Thankfully it's
easy to get used to the poor camera and slippery platforming in order to enjoy the game. While Roddy's sections are not as good as the on-vehicle segments, they don't last nearly as long, so in a way, they are a
welcome change of pace that prevent the brunt of the game from getting old. Overall, I think it's a few steps away from being a hidden gem, but it's not a bad purchase for PS1 aficionados.
7.5 out of 10
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