Maybe Moon Cresta wasn't enough to astonish the worldwide videogamers at the beginning of the Eighties... maybe Terra Cresta wasn't yet enough to make them even happier five years later... of maybe game designers at Nichibutsu's needed one more videogame in order to complete their most famous shoot'em up saga. So here it is: the third, final chapter is named Terra Force, and this time the story comes to a real, shiny ending... or not?

The background story to this videogame is the most unknown we could imagine. By watching at the animated intro appearing in demo mode, we can simply figure out that as an interstellar ship pilot you get off in a hurry, pointing to some mysterious planet, in order to fight a huge number of enemy crafts, mostly having mechanical/robotic aspect.

Battle is engaged everywhere, both in the skies and the underground, even in the depths of underwater abysses. This is probably possible because your starship fears not any environment, and can swiftly become a fast submarine.

Power-ups can be acquired by destroying entire waves of colourful enemy crafts, and the kind of pick-up depends on their colour: red (laser), blue (bombs), green (speed). Each value can be powered by three times, after which you'll get different icons worth bonus points instead of additional power.

You'll eventually want to grab really peculiar power-ups as the necessary blue shield (graphically terrific), the rare "drones" which multiply your ship's shooting capability, and the classic smart-bomb which disintegrates all the on-screen enemy crafts in a nano-second.

Let's now talk about the strongest point of the game. A first-level bomb is powerful enough to open a crater in the ground/sea, and allow your ship to enter the dangerous planet's innermost caverns. Bombs are almost useless when flying in open-air stages: they won't hurt any enemy, and their sole task is opening craters leading underground. By flying over the "IN" icon, your ship enters and scrolling direction and gameplay change completely!

I said not just scrolling direction changes: combat style must then fit the newly started condition where more enemies attack, the "safe area" is reduced in size, enemies come from any directions and they resisist much better to our laser shots. You can finally use your bombs properly, which acquire a darn powerful offensive capability against ground-moving enemies (explosions do have a real impressive aspect!).

Passing from a vertical phase to a horizontal one (and vice-versa) isn't always left to the sole player's choice. Finding yourself at the end of a vertical phase and seeing an earthquake opening the ground and sucking your ship inside is not uncommon at all; it might also happen that your ship is blowed outside of a horizontal cavern soon before or after encountering an area boss. Either way, you'll be able to exit a horizontal phase anytime, since cracks often appear in the top of the caves, leading your starship to the sunlight.

A few words about game design. Such a powerful video hardware, capable of rendering 320x240 pixels at 11-bit colour depth (2048 colours), is a real paradise for shoot'em up designers. Scrolling works perfectly and parallax is always there, often featuring two or three scrolling layers.

Enemy ships, bio-mechanical creatures and backgrounds are great both in design and animations. The coloured ships fleets bringing power-ups, and the "transformer" robot appearing in the caverns are especially well-animated. Backgrounds vary from deserts to oceans, from subterranean electronic bases full of spores to synthetic/organic environments recollecting the Giger's style.

The audio part of the game is a real state of the art. If your cabinet/PC is provided with a good hi-fi, and basses are fine-tuned, well sound effects acquire an incredible quality: explosions are the most possible real you can figure, and the sound of lasers cutting the air and power-ups jingle fit perfectly this genre of videogame! Tunes are deeply immersive, their rythm is great and pleasant melodies hold a perfect atmosphere. Furious action is in fact greatly accompanied by adequate sounds.

The videogame itself is much attractive, and I have to admit the changing of phases increases fun a real lot! Two different ways to fight the same battles actually offer an endless challenge due to the variety of possible combinations. Also, action never stops: no in-game cuts, no pauses, no satisfacion is brought to the player after beating a boss... the game has to be tasted as a continous whole from the beginning to the end but... there's a little prize for the braves: the ending sequence offers nothing but a short animation leaving all to the player's imagination and a bad taste in his mouth. What a pity...