Steel Dragon Ex PS2 Review

Some of these games developers must think we have superhuman abilities with the amount of games that require a trained eye to avoid being blown up and everything ending in tears. Steel Dragon and its sequel aren’t particularly hard games, but that’s plainly down to the amount of credits, which might as well be unlimited. Like all other games of its genre, the screen is often filled with an almost unavoidable amount of fireworks.

In return for £14.99 you receive two titles on one disk. There’s the aging original vertical game, which for the record does still have beautiful psychedelic graphics, as the screen becomes busy with a mass of lights, lasers and explosions. The sequel is unsurprisingly the more modern of the two games and shifts to more of a 3D perspective, but we actually prefer the bright and colourful graphics of the original game as they boast a little more personality.

Both games play basically the same, simply choose a ship and shoot your way through the scrolling screens. Like other games of the ilk, you can increase the weaponry of your ship with finding power-ups and with the amount that is constantly going on, it’s almost a necessity. Extra firepower from another player is also a huge asset to have, and as two-player titles, both games are fun for a bit.

Not a single one of the two games is difficult in the essence that you are able to keep pumping credits into each title. Obviously it’s intended to make things as difficult or as leisurely as you feel, although it takes away the frustration too easily for our liking. For both games, seeing the credits shouldn’t be too much of a task for the majority of players.

Steel Dragon Ex isn’t such a bad investment at £14.99, although we do feel that there’s better scrolling shooters on the market. Don’t get us wrong, there’s plenty of bang in both games, it just seems to fizzle out a little too prematurely for our liking.

6/10