The Running Man
For one thing the storyline in the arcade didn't make much sense so I won't bother talking about it. This is how the storyline goes for the Genesis version it really sounds a lot better: In this game you are Chelnov the son of a russian scientist, one day you go on a jog but then the mansion is attacked. Chelnov finds his father dying, and his father warns him that it was an ancient evil alien race before man that has attacked the mansion, kidnaped Chelnov's sister, and are bent on reclaiming the earth and ruling over humanity. His father then tells Chelnov about an atomic superpowered suit that he has constructed for him all of these years to combat the aliens, it enhances his agility which can make him run fast as well as jump high. So Chelnov puts on the suit and kicks butt to save the world and his sister. Wow, pritty heavy storyline for a platform shooter (let alone the storyline sounds uncannily similar to manga/anime series "Guyver") but that one of the reason I commend this game.
There is just a lot I love about this game, for one thing the graphic they really improved just the detail on the ancient ruin backgrounds which have both an ancient and yet otherworldly quality to it, down to the Statue of Liberity. Even the enimies from your usual flunkies, minibosses and main bosses are just as supurbly designed. Soundtrack is supurb it just sounds beautiful and catchy which fits like a glove for a game like this.
You get a wide varity of weapons (my favorates the mace balls and bomberangs) as well as can stomp on your enimies by jumping on them another advantage. The controls are soild, they might come of as just a bit unforgiving at first but once you practice for a while you'll get the hang of it and you'll have no problems.
But what really makes this game unique among many platform shooters is the fact that your character is in constant motion which makes the pace just a little quick which cause the player to think fast and stay on alert 24.7 because the chanages will hit you fast and hard before you even know it, so you can also guess this amps it's difficulty so this game is not for beginners. Either master the controls and think fast, or get left behind.
These levels you can actually get though smoothly sometimes without dying once. However if you haven't played the game enough it's going to take some practice, like with most platform shooters to get though the levels you have the right timing and movements in the right places.
I remember when I was a kid I wasn't that good at first in this game so I died a lot in this game and the reason for it was usual because I misstepped. And that's another reason I love this game because when you die it's your own fault and it just teaches you more to do better the next time around as well as just simply practice a bit more and harder.
This game by today's standards has actually aged well, it's still a lot of fun to play and just goes to show that this cult classic has plenty of atomic energy to keep it running.