Planet Bob - Hard'n'Heavy

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Hi there!

 

Move over Sisters, here come:

 

Hard'n'Heavy (1989):

 

 

Programmer: Armin Gessert

Graphics: Manfred Trenz, Andreas Escher

Musician: Chris Hülsbeck

 

Ratings:

Zzap! Rating: N/A

Lemon64 Rating: 7.7

 

Now, Hard'n'Heavy is a tricky one. Remember when I said that Nintendo forced Giana Sisters off the market? Well, Hard'n'Heavy is the inoffical sequel to it. In fact, it is so inoffical, that it wasn't even released under the Rainbow Arts label. Still, all just camouflage. It's a full blown Rainbow Arts title, that was supposed to be Giana Sisters II until those legal issues hit it like a roadblock.

 

The credits I list above are a bit guesswork. When playing you can immediately tell that it's the same engine/framework than Giana. Even the players "Hard" and "Heavy" just look like Giana and Maria with helmets. The only source of Credits you can find within the game is the Hiscore list, that has "Chris", "Armin", "Andreas" and "Manfred" listed, so I think I'm safe to assume it was the original Giana team, plus Andreas Escher helping with graphics.

 

The game was then handed over to ReLine who didn't ever get in trouble with bigN as far as I know. But then again, the game was neither as good, nor as popular as Giana.

 

The game itself differs from Giana in one major point: You don't crack the destructable bricks with your head, but by shooting them. For this the two robots are always equipped with some bouncing balls that effectivly work like harder to aim shots, not unlike Marios fireballs.

 

Other than that it has some futuristicly updatd graphics, 20 something new levels and a few new enemies and obstacles, that one way or another are to be found in other SMB games as well, like Flame-wheels that circle around bricks and stuff like moving platforms. You can also collect some shield and smartbomb thingies, which can be activated via the keyboard whenever you feel you need them.

 

Fun in 2007:

I didn't play it much in the past, but I forced myself from start to finish this time. I can't rally recommend it, as it is an overall mediocre experience. It feels a bit rushed, a bit soulless, even a bit buggy at certain spots. The kind of game that's driven from marketing rather than heartblood. Considered that it came out two years after Giana, it doesn't show any improvement over it. In fact Giana seems to do everything a bit better, be it graphics, music, gameplay or content.

 

Greetings,

Manuel

 

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