Developer: AlfaSystem Publisher: SCEA Release: 08/09/96 Genre: Rail Shooter
Virtua Cop revolutionized the light gun shooter genre in the arcade with its 3d graphics and dynamic camera angles. Like Virtua Fighter and Virtua Racing it would inspire many games that would follow in its footsteps. But where Namco was able to provide an analog for those two titles for the PlayStation they did not have a rail shooter ready, at least at first. Sony would step in with Project: Horned Owl. With its anime aesthetic it certainly stands out compared to its contemporaries. But its premise is wasted on rudimentary gameplay that fails to hold your attention.
The story in Horned Owl is simple. As one of two members of the Horned Owl mechanized police unit you battle the forces of a terrorist organization known as Metalica. The reason Horned Owl was so unique is because of its art direction. The characters and mechanical designs were designed by Masamune Shirow. While Ghost in the Shell might come to mind first in actuality the game resembles a video game version of Patlabor. Animated cutscenes progress the plot between levels but it is nothing you have not seen before. I respect the effort however.
The presentation in Horned Owl has its good and bad points. As I said before the art direction is great. The mech designs are exceptional and the world is 3d enabling smooth scrolling not possible in a 2d game. However the enemies are 2d sprites that look good but animate poorly. They have two or three frames of animation and pixelate when up close. The visual disconnect between the environments and sprites makes the game look inconsistent. The bosses are polygonal but this was the early days of the PlayStation and they look ugly rather than impressive. The game’s art and world deserved beter.
When Horned Owl released there was no official light gun for the PlayStation. As such the game provides a variety of control options to compensate. You can use Konami’s Justifier which makes it play like an arcade as it is accurate. For the more esoteric the PlayStation mouse is compatible. I am going to be completely honest, I did not even realize there was a mouse for the system when the game was out. You can also use a regular controller and it is surprisingly playable. The cursor moves pretty quickly and most enemies do not fire immediately. The game is also predictable with its spawn points meaning you can prepare in advance. The late game becomes pretty frantic and you might need to replay those stages to memorize enemy locations to succeed with a controller but it is doable.
Project: Horned Owl has good art direction, cool character designs, and animated cutscenes which is unique for the genre. So what is wrong? The game is boring. Simply put the gameplay lacks the dynamism of the more recent rail shooters like Virtua Cop and is predictable. Whether that is because of the sprites and their lacking animation is beside the point. You can easily see all of its action beats coming a mile away. The developer’s idea of raising the stakes and creating intensity is to throw wave after wave or repetitive enemies in your path. But rather than bringing excitement it quickly becomes tedious. Considering how long the levels are and that there are five stages in contrast to the usual three you will lose interest long before reaching the conclusion. It is sad as the game had promise.
Compared to most light gun shooters Project: Horned Owl is easy. You have a lengthy life bar rather than the standard three to five hits. The game is very slow paced and due to its predictability you can easily cruise through most levels taking few hits. You have so many bullets in each clip you rarely need to stop and plan when to reload due to the lackadaisical action. The only reason you might die later in the game is because the stages drag on too god damn long. You only have three credits but that sounds generous all things considered. Going back and beating your high score is not an enticing prospect as the game is just not interesting overall. That is one of the areas that light gun games derive their replay value and unfortunately this one has none.
In Closing
At its release Project: Horned Owl received mixed reviews across the board. Going in to it I had middling expectations but was still willing to be surprised. Unfortunately the reviews were on the mark. When you play Horned Owl you are going through the motions. Whatever excitement the art direction and world design might provide is diminished by lackluster gameplay. That is saying a lot considering how simple this genre is. You are missing nothing by ignoring this game sadly.
