Raiden Trad
System: Genesis
Release Date: September 1991
Developer: Micronet/Beyond Interactive
Publisher: Micronet
Genre: Shoot ‘em Up
Aliens have appeared and you need to repel them in Raiden Trad! The year is 2090 and invaders from outer space are attacking. The world is uniting together and have put together a supersonic fighter called the Raiden. Only one pilot has what it takes to pilot this thing, and that’s you! There are eight stages that stand between you and victory. Can you pull it off?
This is an incredibly standard vertical scrolling shoot ‘em up. I’ll even go so far to say that is is bare bones. Most games of this style give you a number of different weapons to choose from, with some being better than others in certain portions. Here, you have two choices. The red spread gun or the blue laser. Sure, they power up and spread farther or become more concentrated, but that isn’t doing a whole lot for you. There are also missile powerups. There are two choices here, as well. The nuclear missiles are powerful, but straight forward only. The homing missiles will track enemies around the screen.
Speaking of the screen, it can go a little left or right from center. Enemies are either ground or air based. They will shoot projectiles at you and they are the same color as yours, which I do not like. Bosses will blow a lot of bullets at you and it can be real difficult to avoid, but your ship’s hit box isn’t egregiously big. If you’re worried, there are also bombs you can drop. These negate all bullets and do big damage, but they are limited and few and far between.
If you die, you’re typically gifted a level of powerup, which is nice, but not nice enough. Getting through all eight stages send you to the credits and then drops you off in a bonus level that even with copious use of time travel, I couldn’t get through. Oh well.
Graphics: 1.5
Graphics are alright, but the frame rate is pretty low, leading to stuttering.
Sound: 1.5
Sound effects are overpowering the decent musical score.
Gameplay: 1.5
Bare bones is the best way I can explain this. It’s not bad or broken, just missing a lot.
Difficulty: 1.5
Enemy bullets blending in with your own is a no-no in my book. At least you get a ton of continues.
Fun Factor: 2.0
It’s a standard time. Not good, but not bad, either.
Overall Rating: 1.6
Raiden Trad earns a C-. There are already too many examples of better vertical scrolling shoot ‘em ups. This one is kind of unnecessary.