Mr. Heli no Daibouken!

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I'm enjoying the Random Game button in the Repo, let's see what it's got today!

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Fuuuuuuuuuck YES.

Mr. Heli (“You will address him as SIR!”) is a 1987 Irem shooter that *isn’t* R-type, but don’t hold that against it. This was the heyday of the genre in arcades, with Gradius, Darius, and the aforementioned R-Type collecting loose change and lunch money like a schoolyard bully working double shifts to provide for his family.
The game got a port to several home computers, even the ZX Spectrum (and I’ll bet that looks like ass), but blessedly I rolled the PC Engine version from 1989. That consoles drowning in arcade shooter classics, does Mr. Heli no Daibouken stand out from the crowd? Will I fail to clear the first level and punch something defenseless to feel better about my life? WOULD YE KNOW MORE?
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Look at his little feet!

The game has you choose Normal or Arcade Mode, but it’s just a difficulty selection. In Arcade, you die faster. (Near as I can tell anyways.)
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From Top Gun to Gundam, the take-off sequence has international appeal.

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Right out of the hangar, you can feel how responsive this little orange killer is. Fittingly for a helicopter, you can adjust height quickly, and you can land and take off as you please, his feet are actually functional. Button I fires horizontal lasers, Button II launches vertical missiles, but it’s context sensitive, if you’re walking he’ll drop bombs on the ground instead.
Blowing up blocks like seen above, as well as shooting certain enemies and obstacles, dislodges crystals, your source of income. The games power-ups are also uncovered, you reveal signboards in set locations with posted items and prices; flying over them with enough coin buys the reward in question.
Your money carries over from stage to stage, but if you die? Your ass keeps nothing, cash or power-ups. Consequently, the name of the game is to get a good start, and then maintain that advantage by hitting enough money to top up your health whenever possible. Put another way, Don’t Die, Nerd.
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There's five stages, split into two, with a boss at the end and a mid-boss, predictably, in the middle. Here’s the first one.

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The second half of each stage turns into an underground section, and confusingly starts in total darkness? You can illuminate the area by shooting, and you have to "feel around" till you find the right door to shoot and progress. I genuinely thought the game had crashed on me at first, and reset and tried again with a different emulator assuming this was a bug. Weird!

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The games worst mistake? You can't travel through the tunnels the mole mechs make, what the hell.


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The bosses are a mixed bag, this is maybe the coolest looking guy in the bunch. It looks like someone sicc'ed a facehugger on a Spiny from the Mushroom Kingdom.

(The second boss, in particular, is such a piece of shit oh my god.)

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...annnd here's the final boss, a relatively uninteresting alien face with lasers. Shockingly, the big red eye above is *not* a weak point, he swaps out faces and only a small point of one upper face can be shot. Half the difficulty of the fight is just figuring out which part kindly accepts bullets.

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Go forth, young brave, your song is yet sung!

Full disclosure, I had to cheat to reach that ending, save states make repeating tricky sections manageable but I don't know if I could beat the second level boss fairly.

It's solid! The music isn't too memorable, and the sound effects and visuals never really convey the "punch" you like in this sort of game (not that I'd ever play something in my shared space as loud as an arcade cabinet), but it's short and easy to jump into.

Give it a shot!

(Pun, tragically, intended.)
 
I won't play any game who's protagonist is so clearly a ripoff of Opa-Opa from Fantasy Zone! UGGGHHHHHHHHH! *flings scarf over shoulder, leaves the room*

Just kidding, this game looks aces! Those graphics are nuts for 1987 (for reference, that's the same year Zelda 1 came out), and I really am getting a Fantasy Zone vibe from that UI, which is never a bad thing. I'll give it a shout if I'm ever in the mood for PC-Engine games that don't have the words "Bonk" or "'s Adventure" in the title.
 
gargantuan effort, I myself had only played it for 5 minutes and concluded that it's one of the goats and that I'm too old for this shit
 
What charming fella this Mr. Heli, definitely gonna give it a try on my portable before bed. Always a treat to see another gem for the PC-Engine.
 
I won't play any game who's protagonist is so clearly a ripoff of Opa-Opa from Fantasy Zone! UGGGHHHHHHHHH! *flings scarf over shoulder, leaves the room*

Just kidding, this game looks aces! Those graphics are nuts for 1987 (for reference, that's the same year Zelda 1 came out), and I really am getting a Fantasy Zone vibe from that UI, which is never a bad thing. I'll give it a shout if I'm ever in the mood for PC-Engine games that don't have the words "Bonk" or "'s Adventure" in the title.
*flings considerably larger scarf over shoulder in response, blinded, walks in traffic, dies*
gargantuan effort, I myself had only played it for 5 minutes and concluded that it's one of the goats and that I'm too old for this shit
I mean I needed save stats and eventually outright cheating to clear a couple parts, the days of clearing Contra in one credit are damn well in the rear view mirror for my ass.
What charming fella this Mr. Heli, definitely gonna give it a try on my portable before bed. Always a treat to see another gem for the PC-Engine.
He is so charming.
 
I tried save stating and still couln't do it with my random pick
young souls may cheat, old farts must quit
Whenever I play these retro games I either play them with a gg code for infinite lives active or do a quicksave at every checkpoint in game, just cause I enjoy a more casual time with my retro games and infinite lives allow me to learn and adjust to the games design better so that eventually I can play it in one go with no saves or codes!

Obviously if it's something like run saber or streets of rage/rival turf/whatever console beatemup where when you lose a life and continue you immediately pick up back where you were no being sent back I just play it vanilla since the game already throws me enough of a bone to adapt and learn to it lol.


God I love Run Saber so much,..,,.,,.,.,
 
The fact they haven't made a cuddly Dobkeratops plushie yet makes me immeasurably sad
I was just looking for that and a Jeff the Shark plush and I came up empty-handed for both, damn.
Good stuff, dude, good stuff.
Thanks! I'd actually already written it for that Random Game Challenge thread, buuut no one bumped it and I didn't want my already useless time to become more worthless.
 
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Wow, nicely done man. This is inspiring. I’d love to try to beat the game I get from random select. This is a real review!
 
Yes! absolutely enjoy Mr. Heli no Daibouken, it was also one of my first Hu-card purchases (besides Bravoman) I did manage to finish it a few years ago and wrote a small review:

"Excellent free-roaming action shooter game. Rewarding currency and item system. Overall average difficulty although final boss on stage 2 is tricky to defeat unless you have a mid-high health because of its frantic pattern and touch of death. Multi-directional stage layouts and variety of enemies and unique boss battles. Gameplay is comparable to Atomic Robo Kid but with more freedom in stage design. At the end of the game you continue playing a 'Special' mode, I'm not entirely sure what the difference is since it starts at the beginning of the game with your power-ups intact." -RSMAV5- August 30, 2021
 
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