REVIEW---1942 Joint Strike

The most recent title to hit the Xbox LIVE Arcade from Capcom and Backbone Entertainment (the same team that bought us the awesome WOTB-Commando 3) is a remake of the arcade classic 1942 Joint Strike. 1942 Joint Strike retains the same great pick-up-and-play feel as the arcade classic but you do not want to underestimate this Xbox LIVE Arcade title,the game can be difficult and demands the player to show some skill with the control stick.
Right from the start of the game you will notice the impressive visual quality going on during gameplay. The different planes you can control are small but that is not where alot of your attention will be,definitely what will be getting the most attention on screen is the overall scope of the environments and the action going on around you. You will find yourself getting bombarded with enemies in the air and on the ground as well. The ground where alot of your enemies are looks nice and has a good level of detail and the enemy planes,especially the boss planes (which are huge) look very nice with an obvious high attention to detail put into them. The clouds that you will be flying your little plane into and around look very real,and was really one of the graphical elements that made me say to myself,"wow!" honestly.

Like I said at the start of this review,the controls are easy enough for you to be able to pick up and play without having too much to remember,but that does not mean the game is easy by any means. 1942 Joint Strike demands a keen eye and quick reflexes for the player to dodge in and out of enemy fire and fly around to grab the various power-ups in the game without taking any damage. Up to 2 players can play co-op either locally or over Xbox LIVE and the game offers four difficulty levels "Penguin'","Slick Sleeve","Dragon Fly" and the hardest level "Wing King". All of these levels however are no "walk in the park".
The game starts you off with 3 planes to choose from,"The Lightning","The Mosquito" and "The Shinden" with each plane having their own advantage over the other. The planes have ratings in health,speed,power and missile categories. So make sure to choose an aircraft that matches your preference in ability. There really is no big problem with 1942 Joint Strike. The graphics are slick,the frame rate is solid and never skips a beat,the controls are easy enough to get the hang of pretty quickly. The amount of different weapons in the game is impressive. Of course your base weapon depends on what plane you choose but there will be power-ups for your weapons that you can find during gameplay.Some have basic machine gun types of shots and then some that I have found seemed almost like a laser type weapon,which of course takes away from the realism factor but I don't believe that was what the developers were aiming for and it works well that way.So let's say that you are shopping around the Xbox LIVE Arcade and you are wanting a challenging,fun and overall beautiful remake of an arcade classic,you really need to consider Capcom's 1942 Joint Strike. Capcom seems to be on a roll here lately with Wolf of the Battlefield,1942 Joint Strike and the upcoming Bionic Commando Rearmed. So you can pretty much place a safe bet that a Capcom Xbox LIVE Arcade title will be a winner,and 1942 Joint Strike is no exception. The title's graphics are impressive,the fun factor is intact,the controls are not at all complicated and the sound of the gun fire and explosions are loud and realistic enough to immerse you right into the action. The game costs 800 msp ($10.00) and for any action arcade game fan it is $10.00 well spent.

GRAPHICS-9/10
SOUND-8/10
CONTROLS-9/10
FUN FACTOR-8/10
OVERALL-8/10