Metal Torrent

Genre: Bullet Hell Shmup

Players: 1

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Review:

Metal Torrent is a Bullet Hell Shmup first released on the Nintendo DSi via the DSiWare service in 2013, which was later grandfathered into the Nintendo 3DS eShop when the Nintendo 3DS released.

The presentation here is mostly quite good, with both the player and enemy ships represented with 2D art, bullets absolutely filling the screen, and with a nice-looking 3D corridor in the background, with this action backed by a decent synthesized soundtrack. Really, the biggest issues I have here are that I wish there were a bit more visual variety in the backgrounds, and also that there is some noticeable slowdown when the action gets particularly intense.

For the gameplay itself, you have two ships to choose from before starting the game, and each one will give you a completely different experience.

The first ship makes this game feel like Baby’s First Bullet Hell Shmup. Your gunfire seems to cover half the screen, your special “bomb” move removes all bullets from the screen, and your screen-clearing bomb move happens automatically whenever you’re in danger of taking a hit, removing that danger without you having to lift a finger. Technically, this move requires a recharge, but usually the bonus you get from clearing the screen will handle most of that recharge for you.

On the other hand, the second ship forces you to face the game without a safety net, attacking with a more narrow spray of bullets, and no defensive move – your special attack is simply a more-powerful forward-facing laser. As such, those swarms of enemies that the first ship would have easily taken out with its spread now start to pile up, and you go from essentially being able to take an unlimited number of hits and keep fighting to only being able to take a few hits before you use up all of your lives and lose the game.

There are other issues here as well. This game is only 15 minutes long, and while I know Shmups are generally fairly short, this is pretty ridiculous even within this genre. Furthermore, while Bullet Hell Shmups tend to be very generous with how close you can get to enemy bullets without getting hit (usually in other games, they have to strike the dead center of your ship), this game takes that to whole new absurd levels, with bullets that seem to need to hit you perfectly dead-center to do damage… and with some of the thicker gunfire later in the game, you can literally have your entire ship covered with enemy gunfire and escape unscathed.

I’m frustrated that Metal Torrent’s problems are so severe, because playing through the game using the easy ship is quite fun, even if it feels like it’s basically the game letting you win. But the absurdly disparate difficulty levels at extreme ends of the spectrum, combined with a few technical issues and an absurdly short length, all result in a game that I can’t really recommend unless you truly do want a 15 minute game that hands you an effortless victory.

tl;dr – Metal Torrent is a Bullet Hell Shmup where players select one of two ships – one ship is so overpowered and features automatic defensive systems that amount to the game essentially handing you a no-effort victory within fifteen minutes, and the other ship likely means you’ll be so swarmed with enemies you’ll die within a few minutes of starting. As fun as this game can be, it’s hard to recommend when it’s so short and when the difficulty levels in the game are so absurdly extreme on both ends.

Grade: C

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