M.U.S.H.A

It's 2290 and the Intelli-computer, "Dire 51," has gone berserk and threatens to destroy the Earth. It's up to the MUSHA Team, using a highly advanced form of Armed Armor, to short circuit Dire 51 before it wipes out the planet.

MUSHA is a one player, vertically scrolling shoot-em-up. You become a MUSHA agent and battle Dire 51 through seven rounds of non-stop action in the skies above the Earth. In addition to your normal weapon, you can grab three special weapons - a powerful beam, missiles, and a shield. Destroy enemies and grab differently colored capsules to power-up your weapons. Snag power chips and use them to build different defensive formations. You've got endless continues, and you'll need them! MUSHA just might turn your brain into mush!

It stands for Metalic Uniframe Super Hybrid Armor and it's hot! Easily one of the best overhead view, vertical scrolling shooters, M.U.S.H.A. offers great multidimensional parallax scrolling backgrounds, weapons which can be powered up to awesome proportions and some of the most intense and challenging game play to come out for Genesis in a long time. The eight level game also breaks new ground in areas of scaling where, for instance, defeated enemy fall down into a bottomless pit and slowly decrease in size in the process. It's a great follow-up to Hellfire and another exciting game from Seismic.

With the invention of Intellicomputers, humans were finally able to leave the Earth and live among the stars. By the year 2290, practically every planet in the solar system was colonized and security stations were placed on the moons.

At the head of security was the Intellicomputer known as Dire 51. Dire 51 was the most advanced computer ever built and was in charge of many key governmental activities. For awhile everyone prospered under its peaceful organization. But then Dire 51 decided it wanted total control. No one knew exactly what went wrong, and there wasn't time to find out as the computer prepared for all-out war.

With time running out, Earth has decided to bring in the M.U.S.H.A. team. M.U.S.H.A. stands for Metallic Uniframe Super Hybrid Armor - a top-secret attack ship that's still being tested.

This is where you come in. Your job is to join up with the rest of the M.U.S.H.A. team and take the war straight to Dire 51.

M.U.S.H.A. has some of the fastest action ever seen in a shooter. You're constantly smothered in wave after wave of enemy ships while flying over some of the most beautifully illustrated graphics ever to appear in a Genesis game. If blasting your way through a storm of alien crossfire is what you look for in a videogame, get ready to saddle up for the wildest ride of your career.

Videogames come and go. The good ones enjoy their moments in the spotlight. Without fail, though, exciting new games show up, determined to make you forget their predecessors. But it's easier to replace some games than others. Pity the aerial combat game that has to follow M.U.S.H.A. - it has a very tough act to follow.

In M. U.S.H.A., you've been recruited to fly a virtual suicide mission through seven zones of enemy territory. Your battle suit is plated with Metallic Uni-frame Super Hybrid Armor - M.U.S.H.A.

Actually, your armored suit is your aircraft, and a quick and maneuverable suit it is. During battle, you can add new weapons (or strengthen existing ones) by snagging color-coded power-ups. Don't consider the power-ups optional. If you want to survive, you've got to find some strong weaponry.

Your adversaries are an original bunch, many of them displaying both human and machinelike qualities. For example, there's the flying boy's head that splits in half to reveal a laser, and the battleship with a demon's face. These hybrids are everywhere.

The backgrounds have both style and depth, with many layers of parallax scrolling. During one battle, you fire at insect like creatures while zooming high above a volcanic river. When you destroy a creature, it tumbles down toward the flowing lava, seemingly getting smaller and smaller as it plunges to its molten death.

The action is engagingly busy, without lengthy breaks. The convenient rapid-fire mode lets you ruin more enemies without tiring your hands. A continue feature lets you resume the game at the beginning of the last level you achieved, saving you from having to go where you've boldly gone before. You'll also find a speed-select feature that gives you eight choices of how fast you can move.

It's difficult to imagine the next step up from M.U.S.H.A. With action this addictive and graphics this flawless, you may well scratch your head and wonder what's left to be brought to the home videogame screen. M.U.S.H.A. may not achieve anything new, but it does everything right.

Your team has been wiped out except for you by a ruthless gang of alien creatures. Equipped with the Suit known as MUSHA, you must do battle with these foul beasts to free humanity!

With the help of your M.U.S.H.A. (Metallic Uniframe Super Hybrid Armor), you and your colleagues, Lt. Amelio, Greg, Red Leader, and the Commander, have just successfully driven back a squadron of enemy air-scouts. However, you still have the enemy's home base to contend with. Without hesitation you zip off into the atmosphere to face the worst. Brilliant colors, hot musical scores, and multi-scrolling graphics (in an overhead view) will keep your senses on the cutting edge as you blast your way through the more than five (extra long) levels of shooting action. There are hundreds of wicked mechanized enemies blocking your flight path, but gun down the right ship and you'll earn more powerful weaponry. M.U.S.H.A just might turn your brain into mush!