I still remember when I was in junior high school, I saved my breakfast money and bought a second-hand GBA. After school every day, I would sit in the corner of the playground and play pixel-style battle games online with my best friends. At that time, the screen was full of mosaics, but the fingers holding the machine were hot. Later, I switched to PSP, and became obsessed with the gameplay of controlling tanks to collide with each other in a small map. Although the picture was simple, the tension and excitement made me laugh out loud when I think about it now - my youth was just turned into a memory by button after button.
Until yesterday, I was bored and browsing in the app store, and when I saw this game called "Chainsaw Super Mecha", I was immediately attracted by the combination of "chainsaw" and "mecha". I downloaded it and played it for half an hour. How can I put it... It's like the pirated cassette I secretly saved up to buy when I was a kid, and suddenly it feels like a genuine high-definition remake. Youth is back! 🎮
Let's first talk about the most intuitive difference compared to those old works played on handheld consoles before. It is “light”. In the past, mecha battles on the GBA were extremely complicated to operate. You had to memorize moves and manage energy gauges. You also had to memorize the keystrokes for a long time before fighting against humans. This game is an IO gameplay. You can control it with one hand with a vertical screen. You can choose a mecha and rush in. You can attack the car when you see it, and hide when you see the saw. There is no need for any complicated tricks at all. A handicapped person like me, who was abused on the PSP back then and had doubts about life, is now able to get into the top few in Brawl. This change is really emotional.
The painting style has also changed with the times. In the past, handheld consoles were all pixel blocks, and the mechas looked like stacked building blocks, and all the details were completed by brainstorming. Now this one has a simple vertical style, with a clean and neat picture. The mecha shape is full of science fiction, but if you look closely, it has a retro feel. I know some old players may dislike it as "not hardcore enough", but for me, I can see the kind of "super mecha" I imagined back then running flexibly on the screen of my mobile phone. Even if the operation is simplified, the enthusiasm in my heart still rushes up.
The gameplay aspect that irritates me the most is actually the tank modification system. In the past, modifications in handheld games were basically just changing the color or adding values. Unlike the current set, every component affects actual combat - if you replace it with a chainsaw head, it will really bring sparks and lightning all the way, if you replace it with heavy armor, it can withstand the melee. In order to get a "Saw Blade Flow" tank last night, I spent an hour buying parts. The satisfaction of upgrading my car by myself is honestly better than the feeling of accomplishment of cracking the archive and directly calling up the hidden body. After all, I saved it step by step.
Of course, there are also things that are not suitable for you. In the past, we connected through a cable plugged into the GBA, and we would curse and laugh face to face. Now, although we can match up with people from all over the world at any time, we lack the joy of having someone around us patting our thighs together. Moreover, in the free-to-play mode of modern mobile games, there are always gift pack reminders popping up every now and then. Compared with the buyout system in the past, there is always a gap between "I gritted my teeth and bought it out, but now I am trying to persuade you to spend money". But fortunately, props and weapons can be produced through the liver, so as a free prostitution player, I won't be unable to play.
To be honest, this "Chainsaw Super Mecha" is not a masterpiece, it is just a relaxing and casual io game. But its existence is like reminding me: Those eras that cannot be fully carried by GBA/PSP have actually changed their form and continue to beat in mobile phones. Every time I saw off a tank in this game, it was like making up for the last time I had failed to pass the level.
Brothers and sisters, if you have ever played with a mecha under the dusk of a handheld device, you might as well download and give it a try. Don't expect too much, just think of it as another reunion with an old friend. Anyway, my current state is - holding the mobile phone, raising the corners of my mouth, muttering "This saw smells like something bad". Youth will always come back to you quietly in a certain pixel or special effect. 😎