The Final Word game review

Philosoma -- Sony

Following a number of mysterious disasters on a distant world, your ship has now received part of a communication which indicates some form of invasion has occured. Your starship is on what may be its last tour of duty, and your mission is to investigate the distress call and take appropriate action. Philosoma is the new multi-view shooter from Sony for use on the Sony PlayStation.

Ferrari Man
With the recent release of Viewpoint, I saw the comeback of high speed shooters. Philosoma is the second in this comeback -- and one heck of a title. The game has enough camera changes to make you motion sick, and enough enemies to make you run home screaming. I loved it. The difficulty was just right, and the graphics are worth a second look. Although no title for strategy/RPG fans, to any high speed shooter lover this is a must have.

R.I.P.
I've had several people ask me what this game is like, and the best description I've been able to muster is "it's every shooter you've ever played in your life." And, to be honest, that's about all it is... when I say "every", I mean just that. This game has side-scrolling (near and far), top-to-bottom scrolling, forward view, rear view, woah. And surprisingly it even had a couple of modes that I hadn't run into in a shooter yet. While this game is reasonably difficult, I would say that it is no harder than your stock Hudson style of shooter (heck, most of it is your stock Hudson style shooter). This game does use the multiple shooter styles as a gimmick, and it does it well... So, while the cinemas are fantastic, and the music is ok, I figure only die-hard shooter fans are really going to get the full value out of this game. Also, while I enjoyed some of the audio effects in this game and would have normally scored it high because of them, I do have to note that the most annoying thing in this game is the mindless radio chatter of the other pilots (ie: "Roger!" "Roger!" "Roger!" "Roger!")... grrrrr... then it became a matter of the audio effects being the only thing keeping me from turning off the sound all-together.

>>>>> 42.0/50 <<<<<		Ferrari Man	R.I.P.
Graphics		4.5	4.5
Sound		4.5	3.0
Gameplay/Control		4.5	4.0
Longevity/Playability		4.0	4.5
Overall		4.5	4.0
Total		22.0	20.0

(02/96)