Screenshots from VG Museum

Year released: 1993 (Genesis)

Number of Players: 1 to 2 simultaneously

I know this game has a story. I just don't know what it is.

Graphics: Pretty good. The scenery in Gunstar Heroes doesn't exactly look realistic, but it doesn't look cartoony, either. Good guys and bad guys are short. There's not a lot to be said about the graphics; they're there, they're not bad. It's quite enjoyable and detailed, it's just that there's not a lot to say.

Play control: Jump with B, shoot with A (or something else... you can figure it out on your own in the options screen, can't you? ;) ). Press the jump button again in mid-air to go into a mid-air attack. Press the shoot button whenever to shoot. Hold it down to continue shooting in rapid succession. Use the d-pad to aim where you shoot as you shoot. You can either set it to let you move around while shooting, or you can set it to make you stay in one place while shooting. You can shoot diagonally, up, down, or side to side.

Sound: The music is somewhat akin to techno, and it fits the game. Enjoyable stuff. However, you also get to listen to a lot of explosions, which aren't exactly realistic, but they aren't far from the mark in video game standards.

Challenge: Big range. You get different types of guns. Some can track down enemies, while some don't shoot as often as others, and yet others stay in front of you until you let go of the shoot button, and the shots fly off. Okay, well, maybe those aren't the best descriptions in the world, but you get the idea. You can choose different types of guns (when you start your game) that do different things, and depending on which gun you choose, it provides a different challenge level (either having to adapt to the gun, making it harder, or the gun adapts itself to you, making it easier). There are guns that just shoot wherever you tell them to like normal guns.
Most of the challenge is derived from watching the entire screen for enemies. You'll be shooting left and right, and jumping wherever possible to avoid enemy fire. When not engaging in swift gun fights, you're facing big bosses that can give damage and take it, too. They have patterns that are somewhat easy to learn, but you will never learn how to battle some with ease.

Gameplay: You get frantic action, rapidly firing your gun at whatever and whoever tries to knock you down with their own guns or machines. As fun as this is, it would get old if not for the special Treasure touch. (If you didn't know by now, a company called Treasure made this game.) They provided enough variations on levels to keep you on your toes and keep up with the frantic style of gameplay. For example, in one level, you jump upwards through a series of platforms, then board a plane, run along the plane, run into a weird mechanical boss, run along the plane some more, then climb onto the wings of a jet for a boss fight, all the while watching for enemy fire.
Platforming isn't important in Gunstar Heroes in the same way as it is in Mega Man. It provides different battlefields and different settings for fights, meaning you are adapting to the environment to fight.

Bottom line: A great game that works any time. Different guns provide different challenges in an already diverse game. If you are interested at all in Mega Man games, but wish there were some game where shooting was more important than platforming, Gunstar Heroes is for you. I'm not sure what the Game Gear version is like.

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