Final Zone
System: Genesis
Release Date: December 1990
Developer: Wolf Team
Publisher: Renovation Products
Genre: Shoot ‘em Up
The New Age Power Suits are back again in Final Zone! After playing Final Zone II on the TurboGrafx, I saw this coming up on the Genesis and thought, “Cool, the first game is coming up too.” Then I did some research to find this is actually the third game in the series! You play the role of Captain Bowie as he takes on an enemy army all on his own through 14 stages of run and gun action.
The first glaring detail is the view point is now isometric. The stages also play out in waves, where you walk around the battlefield, searching for specific enemies. What ones you’ll encounter is shown before the level starts. You’ll be blowing them away with your primary weapon, fired with the A Button. Just hold that baby down and let rapid fire do all the work. But, I suppose you need to be aware that you can’t change the direction you’re facing while you’re firing and you’re going to want to change directions a lot.
The B Button fires your secondary weapon. Unlike the primary weapon, which has unlimited ammo, this one has a limited capacity that is shown at the top of the screen. For the most part, they are more powerful or more specialized attacks than the main weapon. In Final Zone, weapons are your hit points. By pressing the C Button, you can see all of the weapons you have collected. Pressing the A or B Buttons will equip them to that slot, while pressing the C Button will bring the highlighted weapon to the top of the reserves. Weapons at the bottom are lost when you get hit, so it’s best to leave your least favorite down there.
More weapons are earned by finding transport enemies and destroying them. I couldn’t figure out if there was a trigger for finding them outside of just walking around the stage. I tried counting the number of the constantly spawning drones I was killing, but that didn’t seem to be it. I was hoping to farm my way back up to full hit points, but there seemed to be a set amount of transports per stage. I liked weapons that shot missiles, though I don’t know if they were really more powerful than anything else. The heat seeking missiles were my MVP weapon of the final stages. I read about a rope gun that makes the final battle trivial, but I never got it in my playthrough.
There were a couple of times that I would see the shadow of planes on the ground, but these are something to be avoided, as they drop bombs that kill you instantly. If you feel the need to speed around the level a little more quickly, you can double tap a direction to turn on your boosters. This makes maneuvering unruly, so I don’t recommend it. The second part of each stage is a boss battle. These require you to find patterns, but a good secondary weapon is quite helpful. The very last stage is an escape where I hope you have a rapid fire weapon equipped so you can take advantage of the slowdown created to avoid laser beams.
Graphics: 2.5
Everything looks pretty good, but the play area is far too zoomed in to get a good handle on your surroundings.
Sound: 2.5
Music is pretty decent, but the overpowering weapon noise can be kind of annoying.
Gameplay: 3.0
Controls work pretty well, though the boosters can mess you up. There are a lot of different weapons for you to choose from each with an infinite primary fire and limited secondary fire.
Difficulty: 3.0
After getting accustomed to the controls, I was able to use different weapon tactics to get through the levels without a ton of trouble. The bosses can catch you off guard and take one of your five lives, though.
Fun Factor: 3.0
I feel like I enjoyed myself quite a bit. It’s not the best in the world, but it was pretty good.
Overall Rating: 2.8
Final Zone earns a B. I thought Final Zone II was a better game, but this is a playable alternative for the Genesis if the TG-16 isn’t your console.