Some of you might remember this game from the contest hosted on here on Destructoid a little while back. Or worse yet the winning entry is still scarred into your retinas, but the game is finally out and I had a chance to play through it.


Can you get a better cover than this?

Story
When you first start up the game this is the only mode available. You have your choice of Normal or Hard difficulty and playing as Little Red Riding Hood or some other guy named Momotaro. (he's from some Japanese legend, but no one should care cause this is America! (The inclusion of this character is made odder since the developer is Spanish)) As far as I can tell there is no difference between the characters beyond cosmetics. Why anyone would choose not to play as LRRH is beyond me. Starting up the game I went through a short tutorial then onto the meat of the game. LIke most arcade style games there is very little in the way of story or cinematics. (You'll probably want to go back to the title screen to watch the intro video to get the backstory) That being said the little that is seen of a plot is told through the two main character's dialogue which also yields some nice character drawings. In her quest to stop the zombie outbreak LRRH will travel every where from the woods to grandmother's house to the North Pole, encountering such fairy tale creatures as the Three Bloody Little Pigs and Sleeping Beauty, hell a certain green monster even makes an appearance. The story mode suffers from being too short and then giving the player a half-ass, "please play through on hard to get the complete ending." The real flaw to this is the player can probably already guess who the final boss is and then he's blatantly shown in the ending credits. Upon completing the game on normal I received absolutely nothing for my efforts.


Sadly the only decent picture I could find of the actual LRRH model, no longer the blond that she was from early screens.

Gameplay
The player uses the stylus to direct LRRH's fire, dodge attacks, change weapons, and fire missiles. LRRH can only move along seven panels at the bottom of the screen which can be done with either the touchscreen or using the D-pad. The touch screen has the benefit of faster movement, but the player loses the ability to shoot and move, I opted for D-pad movement. Tapping on LRRH activates her dodge maneuver and double tapping activates missile; my complaint with this is often I'd end up moving instead of dodging due to an imprecise touch and wasting a missile when I just wanted to fire my gun. I rarely found myself using the few powerups scattered throughout the levels and didn't seem to suffer from not using them. Overall, the controls aren't bad, but did lead to some deaths.

Each level is broken up into three stages --- the third of which is a boss battle.The stages are on rail and often LRRH moves and at a snails pace laterally, often stopping to check out the surroundings as zombies spawn. If the player dies during a stage then they are sent back to the beginning of that particular stage, with no checkpoints. With each new level new enemies are introduced and some latter levels become quite hectic, quite true to SHMUP form. Some levels also introduce interesting gimmicks to make navigation even more difficult.


My Grandma, what rotting flesh you have

Graphics and Sound
Starting the game I was immediately greeted by either a cockney or bad Aussie accent reading the title, followed by the subdued voice of LRRH. By the end of the first tutorial stage I was sick of hearing "Ok," and not too much further into the game I was sick of the voices all together, not that there are many. The music is forgettable, but it works; sometimes hinting at a metal score that would really make the game even more awesome, but it never reaches this. The graphics are interesting; the player character models look like crap, but the enemies aren't too bad looking. Some enemies are very 2D and hand-drawn looking, while others are rendered in 3D. The 2D enemies can be shot to pieces, but this doesn't have any effect besides visuals. LIke the music, the graphics are adequate, but nothing memorable.


I just thought this pic was cute, note the blond LRRH

The Good
Fun Gameplay
Awesome title
Some funny moments

The Bad
Short
Only one mode unlocked intially
Lame ending

Bottom Line
If I were to rate this game purely based on it's title I'd say Game of the Year. If playing through a game multiple times in different difficulties then the length of the game is lengthened. For $19.99 it's hard to go wrong with LRRHZBBQ if you're a fan of old-school shooters. I can see this game either being a cult hit or bottom of the bargain bin, I hope for the former as I'd love to see a fleshed out sequel.