Cyber Citizen Shockman was a series of 2D action platformers back in the 16-bit days.  They starred a pair of superhero cyborg teens (a guy and a gal) who were created by a crazy professor.  They would fight intergalactic baddies with their swords and beam attacks.  The first two were on the PC Engine, which was the Japanese version of the TurboGrafix-16.  The third game was on the Turbo CD, and I reviewed it a couple of months ago.  The last game in the series was on the Super Famicom, which is the SNES in Japan.  I don’t know if the characters are the same, but they might as well be.  Gameplay is kind of a mix of Power Rangers and Mega Man X.  And now you can play it on modern consoles, but reviewed on PS4 here.

The game is one or two player simultaneous, which is cool.  One small problem I had was that in past games, you could choose to play as the guy or gal, but here it doesn’t seem like you can.  Unless I just haven’t figured out how to do it.  I’d much rather play as the pink haired sword wielding lady over the guy with oversized boxing gloves, but oh well.  You can move with the control pad or stick and jump with one button and attack with the other.  And that’s pretty much it.  You’ll run through stages, fighting a boss at the end of each one.  Defeated enemies leave behind items that you can get for points.  Which are important here because when you get a high enough score, you’ll level up and get another notch on your energy meter.  Collect a battery to refill one notch.

My only main problem with the game is it gets way too hard too quickly.  But luckily you can activate cheats if you are having trouble.  You can also switch between the Japanese version of the game or a newly translated version, which is nice.  I still liked this game because the SNES is my number one favorite game console and I enjoy playing games on it I never had a chance to before.  This definitely would’ve been something I might’ve rented back in the day.

Kid Factor:

Cyber Citizen Shockman Zero is rated E-10 with ESRB descriptors of Fantasy Violence and Mild Blood.  I didn’t notice any blood, and you punch and slice cartoony robot enemies that just fly off and explode when defeated.  Some of the text has some slightly crude humor, though.  But I grew up playing games like this and I turned out OK.  The cheats and two player option make this one good for all ages.

Tags: Game Reviews