I’ll be honest, I never really adopted the Genesis, it was a system that I bypassed as I strolled happily along with a Sega Master System before jumping on to the N64. One of the games that I missed on the Genesis was the beginning of the Rocket Knight series, given the fact that the re-imagination of the series by Konami is so damned good, I am a little gutted that I haven’t given it the time of day thus far.

In Rocket Knight, you play a Jet Packed Opossum whom has the flexibility and dexterity of Jackie Chan but turbo charged. The game is very much orientated as a platform brawler come shoot-em-up. The best way really to describe this is that it plays similar to the Astro Boy games in that you’ll transverse between one level of platforming to one level of flying and shooting. The difference between Astro Boy and Rocket Knight is the fact that Astro Boy’s emergence into the modern games console totally sucked and Rocket Knight stands in shining armour with an effort that is standing out as one of the best pick up’s on PSN/XBLA/Steam.

“In Rocket Knight, players assume the role of a courageous opossum named Sparkster who finds his home in a dreadful state after a 15-year absence. Employing Sparkster’s faithful rocket pack and indomitable spirit, players must fight against the destructive wolf army that threatens Sparkster’s homeland, the Kingdom of Zephyrus. As players progress through the game, they will encounter vast worlds comprised of vast platforming levels and thrilling rocket flying stages.”

How Rocket Knight stands out different from other platformer titles is the execution, on ground based levels your Opossum has the ability to use spin attacks, bounce off walls using his rocket packs and smack enemies, make use of long attack weapon along with multiple varieties of already existing attacks to chain moves together effortlessly. You never feel cheated by any poor mechanics and getting to grips with the main protagonist is the easiest we’ve ever come across since Super Mario. What makes Rocket Knight so charming though is the graphics, everything is in bold chunky colours, from luscious greens to sharp browns, it’s almost a HD throwback to yesteryear. Whilst many franchises return and keep to the 2D sprite roots (Megaman) Rocket Knight has embraced the graphical horsepower modern systems have and utilised it to make it beautiful in every way.

Flying missions are arguably weaker than platforming missions but there are still enough enemy variants to keep you interested and you’ll often have to dodge bullets and use charge attacks to get through the game without losing all of your health hearts. The games difficulty is well suited, providing an opening for the inexperienced but also retaining a challenge for ardent veterans in the end of level bosses. Speaking of the bosses they aren’t massive in magnitude, whilst they provide challenge and some strategy (such as deflecting dynamite) none of them really have a sense of empowerment or fear attached to them, you never really feel that at any point is there an arch nemesis.

Climax aren’t stupid, once you have progressed through the various stages in the single player, they have also attached to the game a time trial addition leader board, for those that anally retentive to want to score highly in these areas they will be dually pleased with the addition and whilst it doesn’t exactly scream anything innovative, it does given some added bite to the buyer.  Rocket Knight is a very good game, it has very little faults except for the odd texture glitch but we found this to help the user get back onto a platform as opposed to falling off it. As I write this I am literally yards away from the developers whom made this game, Climax. As I sit in the Starbucks below them I know that not only have they put their passion and drive into this game, they have added some much needed colour and verve into a genre that is becoming increasingly under looked into today’s current market.