 I get irritated at games that can't make up their mind what their real title is. Here we have Doomtroopers, or is that Doomtrooper? Or Mutant Chronicles Doomtroopers or Doomtroopers Mutant Chronicles? Whatever it is, believe it or not, this game is based on a card game called Doomtrooper as part of the Mutant Chronicles franchise, but this plays like any other side-scrolling run-and-gun game. And for the purposes of this video, I'm just going to refer to it as Doomtroopers. Once you know, that's what the box says, while the Mutant Chronicles is just kind of tucked into the corner there. One glance at this game gives off a distinct impression, hey sweet it's Donkey Kong Country but with automatic weapons and explosions and gore. Well kind of, it's clear they're going for the same pre-rendered look that Donkey Kong Country had, but it doesn't always work. The second level here with the spotlight and the missiles firing at you from the background is a cool touch, but everything looks kind of blurry. And check out this boss fight with this skeleton dude puking on you, but he only has a few frames of animation, as opposed to one of your two playable characters who move fluidly. In fact, most of the enemies in this game have shoddy animations, so the imbalance here really sticks out. In addition to that, Doomtroopers really starts out poorly from a gameplay standpoint, like the first level for instance, share the animations of enemies losing their heads and then exploding into a mess of blood is pretty cool, the first few times you do it. But it's the same enemy type over and over, there's hardly anything else to do, and there's none of the platforming or exploration that comes in games like the Contra or the Turrican series. It's just move from enemy to enemy, from station to station, shoot to kill, it's pretty boring. There is this morbid section here where you jump on dead enemy vessels to cross this waterfall, but it's still just stand there and shoot. It kind of reminds me of the Super Nintendo version of Robocop vs Terminator. Everything feels sluggish and the action is monotonous. They do throw in these hidden areas now and again, but sometimes, like in the first level here, it sends you all the way back to a previous area and you got to work your way all the way back, destroying the same enemies, boring. But hey, the second level introduces two kinds of enemies, how about that? The idea of this level is cool, but enemies can fire at you from off-screen, and that's a cardinal sin right there. There's eight total levels, but even when the game starts to get a little more interesting from a level design standpoint, the platforming here is pretty stiff, like the third level here that makes you do a lot of jumping, and a lot of these jumps are a bit dicey. This is one of those games where they felt the need to have your knees bend before you jump. So there's always a bit of a delay, it's really annoying and I wouldn't be surprised if this is the point where most people decide to turn this one off. But this game isn't totally broken, the button layout is at least handy, with the R button serving as an aim lock so you can fire in all directions, and the L button functioning as a punch so you can push enemies off ledges, you know so you don't have to stand there shooting them a hundred times waiting for them to finally die, or you can use up to ten missiles that you can find here and there. There are two playable characters, but I'm not sure there's much of a difference between the two, or at least not enough to recommend one character over the other. And there is two player co-op here, which is nice. You start out with only one continue, but you can earn more as you progress, and there is a password system to save your progress. I'd have to say that Doomtroopers is a good example of a contra clone that plays much better on the Sega Genesis than it does on the Super Nintendo. For one thing, the wider resolution on the Genesis allows you to see more of what's ahead, and gives you more time to dodge projectiles. Also the game just plays faster, so the action is way more intense instead of a slog like it is on Super Nintendo. Yeah, there's still the same enemy types throughout the game unfortunately, but it's just a better experience on Sega Genesis. So yeah, Doomtroopers is pretty flawed. While the death animations are cool, the sound design is pretty well done, the music is decent, it's multiplayer, and the backgrounds and environments are nice looking. Doomtroopers plays like a bad version of Earthworm Gym. It's okay as a game if you can get past how stiff the platforming is, and you get used to holding the R button down to aim, but it's really not any better than stuff like Time Slip or Realm, both of which I looked at a few months ago. And honestly, I think I'd rather play Realm than this one. Doomtroopers may look like Contra meets Donkey Kong Country at first glance, but don't be fooled, keep your expectations in check here.