Have you ever wondered what would happen if Asteroids and Missile Command dropped a load of acid and then had a baby? Neither had I until I popped Numskull Games cart of Akka Arrh into my Switch this week but I now know the answer to this quandary.
Jeff Minter, a legend of the shmup scene since the early days of video games, has unleashed his goats and llamas on us again and the resulting onslaught is a Steppenwolf-style carpet ride of colour, vectors and mega-tough shmuping.
Before we jump into what Akka Arrh is and how it plays, it’s worth noting that this game isn’t meant to be pleasing casual fans or those who like to dip in and out of genres. Akka Arrh is a hardcore, frustrating, difficult barrage of craziness that will have you scratching your head at first but once the mechanics start to click and the levels ramp up in difficulty you will start to wonder why you deserve this glorious punishment.
After all this is a Jeff Minter game, and he wants you to delve deep into every ounce of gaming skill you have. So what exactly do you do? Firstly, you control a central turret from a top-down perspective and your goal is to kill everything before your life count is depleted. You have a main area that you shoot from and a secondary layer underneath that you must dive to if any of the critters come from below.
Now, it sounds simple. Shoot the guys on top then dive below to take out the sneaky ones. And for the most part, this is correct except for the complexities around how you can kill enemies. Firstly the standard enemies can be killed by either your standard shot or by deploying chain-reacting bombs. To get the best score you must deploy the bombs perfectly and keep the chain reaction going.
The other type of enemies can only be defeated with standard shots and are impervious to the bomb blast. This all creates a double layer of keeping the bomb chain going whilst fending off the stronger enemies with your blaster. Then, once in a while, dive down to destroy the underground ones. Yes, it is confusing but stick with it, and what you have is arcade bliss, dare I say arcade perfection.
Akka Arrh is all about beating that high score, it’s tough, you do get overwhelmed at times and your lives deplete quickly. For this playthrough, it took me quite a while to get beyond the tenth level and try to finish the 50 included. I still haven’t finished, or even attempted the hard mode I randomly unlocked. However, what I know is this is a pure game that doesn’t pull any punches and forces you to learn the mechanics. There is no hand holding, continues, restarts. This is the arcade at its absolute best.
Hopefully, I’ve not scared you off by proclaiming how hard Akka Arrh is. Hopefully, I’ve explained that this is a game for those wanting a real, tough challenge alongside pure gameplay without all the fuss of modern gaming. You just dive in, you won’t know what’s going on for the first half hour, but this is my kind of game. I want to be challenged and you owe it to yourself to test your gaming skills.
Thank you to Numskull Games for providing a physical review copy. The box contains extra stickers and some fun arcade cabs to build out of cards. You can also purchase this digitally for Switch, Xbox, Steam and PS4. The llamas and camels are calling you to Akka Arrh!
