So, my Quality Control for this issue is Cobra Triangle from Rare. This is, basically, a speedboat racing/shooting game. There’s no story to the game. Basically, you go through a series of about 25 stages, cycling through a 8 different stage types: Reach the end of the stage with boats trying to stop you, reach the end of the stage with obstacles (like whirlpools and log jams) trying to stop you, reach the end of the stage while jumping over whirlpools, (and for variation) collect as many power-ups as possible within the time limit, keep as many people as possible from being taken by enemy boats within the time limit, hit as many targets as possible while making your way to the end of the stage, take a number of mines to goal within the time limit, and defeat a boss within the time limit.
Being that 5 of these level types require you to either kill things, or have you fending off attack while completing the goal, the game is kind enough to give you some power-ups, using a Gradius-style power-up bar, with options for a speed boost, missiles (which actually work a little more like a split attack) and temporary invulnerability, among others.
The controls of the game are interesting. The game uses one of the face buttons as a dedicated accelerator, and the other as the fire button, with Select used to activate the highlighted power-up. It works okay, but the controls are rather imprecise. This is aggravated by the fact that the boat steers, well, like a boat. When you try to turn, inertia carries you a little further forward in the direction you were originally going in, before you start accelerating in your new direction. Normally this isn’t a problem, but there are occasions in the game, particularly the boss fight and the obstacle race where I found myself in need of a little more precise control, didn’t have it, and died. (I’ll have video forthcoming once YouTube finishes getting it ready so you can see what I’m talking about).
Is It Worth The Hype:
No. It’s not particularly good from a shooter standpoint, just decent. It’s nothing special from a racing standpoint – just decent. I’d reccomend picking up a better NES racing game, possibly even Rare’s earlier title, RC Pro Am, in favor of this.
