.shot ( Dotshot )
.shot, or 'Dotshot' is a throwback to the good old days of handheld gaming when graphics were composed of black and white bricks, assembled to the form of space ships, race cars, pong paddles, or whatever else suited the game's content. Yup, .shot is probably one of the most ancient looking games ye'll find around these parts outside of the ASCII graphics of Nethack and Rogue; which means that the gameplay'd have to be purty durn god in order for it to attain it's 8/10 score and Editor's Choice award. And it is. What .shot lacks in graphics is made up for with sheer originality. Yes, it's a shooter, and yes, it's an aesthetically outdated shooter at that, but what this means is that the designers wasted less time on graphics, and instead spent their time well on the gameplay, which is almost flawless. The difficulty is perfect, the collisions are perfect, the sound is fownky -and maybe even a bit strange, when you hear such fownkiness coming from such an 'ugly' game, and levels are as kick-tushie as I've ever seen in a shooter; they're originally designed, with obstacles that you must maneuver around and some of the best enemy patterns in any shooter out thar to date. Don't be put off by the retro look of the game, if you like shooters at all, .shot deserves a download.
To download the Mac version of .shot, go to the author's homepage, accesible by clicking the game's title in the heading of the review; click on the 'Products' link on the sidebar; click on '.shot' from the list of games; and then just click the link that says 'Mac Version' or sumptin'. There, it's downloadin'.
No, I don't think you're all stupid (not -all- of you, at least)but the web site is in Japanese, and thus the step-by-step to the download link.
0-Stinger
0-Stinger does not feature anything that has not been seen before. However, what it does have is executed very well. When the game starts up, you'll be able to select one of three characters - Jane, Sanpauro, and Lilian - each with their own unique attributes and weapons. [z] and [x] are your weapons, as is the Japanese custom. As you progress through the various levels, you will find barrel-like things containing power-ups that upgrade your weapons. Instead of the upgrade being so large that it changes the feel of the weapon and ship as some other shooters do, it merely strengthens your weapon and/or let's your lasers fly in a different direction (say, diagonally). While the graphics are not stunning (2D, very dull explosions), I found the shadows of the lasers particularly impressive. The sounds are not the highlight of this game, to be sure. They are almost too old school for my liking. I believe I've heard better sounds from my Atari 2600.
The Bottom Line: A solid shooter that suffers from a lack of originality.
THE REVIEWER ALSO RECOMMENDS THESE SIMILAR GAMES: RayGing Blue [7/10] REVIEWED BY Da_Goat Creature Jungle [8/10] REVIEWED BY Aguydude
3105 A.D.
3105 A.D. is a pretty dull vertical shooter. You use the arrow keys to move the ship and just hold down the space bar to fire. The levels are long and boring, and the graphics are not very good. The only things that stopped this game from receiving a rating of 1 were the cool bosses and the enjoyable music.
Alien Onslaught
Alien Onslaught has good graphics and sounds, and a nice user interface. If you want to access all the features of the game, you have to sign up for a free account of THEODOS. This allows you to purchase new weapons for your ship from your account (using fake money of course!). If you don�t sign up to THEODOS, Alien Onslaught will be like every other shoot-em up game you have seen.
Note: This game borderlines the shareware domain, but we decised to define it as freeware: Some of the weapon upgrades in this game are available as a pay-option even though they are also completely integrated in this full-version freeware release, which you can access if you have reached the skill level necessary.
PC REQUIREMENTS: Pentium II, 32MB RAM, 20MB HD space, DirectX 7
NO DEMOS 
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ADWARE
EDITOR'S CHOICE
CHILD-SAFE
VIOLENT
SOURCE CODE
SINGLE-PLAYER
MULTI-PLAYER
NETWORK / INTERNET
ASCII/TEXT GAME
