While River Raid and Blue Max preceded it on home consoles, most gamers' first favorite arcade vertical-scrolling shooter was Capcom's 1942. Most recognize it as the first quality vertical shooter of its kind, treading a new path for the wealth of similar titles in the eighties. While it got a sequel years back, with 1943, the World War II shooter makes its first appearance on Xbox Live Arcade with a revamped look and cooperative play.
The core gameplay remains exactly as you fondly remember it. You play as a warplane in the midst of the battles in the Pacific Ocean during World War II, tasked with blasting through various enemy planes and ground vehicles until you reach the 'boss' at the end of each level. To thwart your foes, you have three different weapons: standard guns, joint strike missiles, and bombs. Your standard guns actually have three different firing modes to choose from, which you select by picking up weapon upgrade drops throughout the levels. Each of the upgrade drops provides you the choice of which mode it is for, if you are patient. Drops do not leave the screen right away, and instead float around the playing space cycling through the three firing modes every few seconds. The mode you pick up is the gun the plane switches to, until you pick up the next drop. The same is true of the drops for health/bomb pickups. The cycling drops give you some nice choices as to how you tackle a level.
The joint strike missiles and bombs are more stringent as to their use, at least in the single-player campaign. The joint strike missiles fire off a handful of homing missiles, attempting to intelligently aim at your enemies. You only receive a limited number of these dangerous weapons each time you start a new life, so use them wisely. Fewer in numbers but more damaging are the bombs your plane is equipped with. These thumpers do the most damage of all, killing all the one-hit enemies you have on the screen and doing massive damage to tougher enemies. Even a full arsenal of bombs will not solve a boss battle alone, though.
As you pull up to the end of a level, the screen wisely flashes 'Danger' at you before providing a blueprint of the boss you are about to face. The rough schematic circles the weak points in the vehicle, which are typically anywhere it is firing bullets or missiles. The bosses are all hulking planes or tanks with multiple firing points to avoid. They are the biggest threat in the game to your stockpile of lives, as avoiding the swarms of bullets takes nimble fingers and a fast plane. The mass of bullets also destroys your hopes to get through the levels with bonus metals.
As you make your way through the levels, you will occasionally notice a series of three metals falling toward the bottom of the screen. Pick them up before they fall off the screen, and you get a nice score bonus. Sadly, when you die, you loose them; and more frustrating, you need to have them with you at the end of the level to get full credit. If you have several, the game graciously delivers one or two for you to pick back up with your new ship, along with a weapon power-up, if you had one. The levels themselves are far too short, lasting only a few minutes each. They are jam-packed with enemies to shoot down, but since you are thrust back to the first level when you run out of lives, the short levels do you no favors.
