Banpresto's diversification efforts into other gaming genres continues this week with Aubird Force. The gameplay in AF thrusts you into a theatre of conflict that takes place in space. Outer space. I thought at first that this was another Starblade or Galaxian3 style interactive shooter but I was pleasantly surprised to find an interesting strategy game where you manage an armada of space craft, develop new fighters and of course, go into battle with your adversaries. The graphics look very good and are comprised of polygon figures that explode with impressive looking effects when a missle or laser beam makes contact. As you can see from some of the pictures, the camera pans around to show a variety of angles as the action takes place. One new addition to strategy games that AF offers is the ability to attack in more than just two dimensions on the battlefield. For example, your fighter moves within a 3-D galactic playfield and you can attack [or get attacked by] ships that are above you, below you, right next to you or to your immediate lower left. This gave a good sense of flexibility during the battles and added a new dimension of planning and strategy to the game. Fans of resource management/accumulation games will enjoy Aubrd Force. The 3-dimensional real time battles enhance the total package and give the player some great looking action sequences.

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