Who’s That Flying?! PSP/PS3 Review

Publisher – Mediatonic – Developer – Mediatonic – Genre –  Action – Players – 1 – Age Rating – 12+ – Other console/handheld formats – N/A

Whilst on the surface, Who’s That Flying?! (also known as the rather suggestive WTF, which gives you an idea of the playful sense of humour running throughout the game) may appear to be a standard shooter; it’s not like most others of the genre where, when the screen becomes crowded, evasion of your enemies often becomes a key tactic for success.

Wiping out your enemies in quick succession will result in a chain, whilst killing enemies will also charge up your three stage Super-Beam meter, the third tier grants you a powerful laser beam ability, which is activated by pressing the square button when the situation calls for it.

Like every other enemy, the bosses aren’t able to kill you, though must be defeated within a certain time limit, whilst Ravagers will still try to get into the city.

So Who’s That Flying?! still has an emphasis on shooting enemies and watching your score satisfyingly rise, but since it marries both the action and tower defence genres, alongside the frenetic shooting there’s also the fresh aspect of preventing any enemies from slipping off the screen to take into consideration.

Another twist is the fact that making contact with any of the standard enemies won’t injure the lead character, the Guardian of the Earth, but instead will see him ripping them apart with his bare hands, whilst attacks from stronger enemies will slow him down, allowing the smaller ones time to attack the city.

As the little guy you take charge of doesn’t possess a health bar, the only way that failure comes about in Who’s That Flying?! is if so many enemies manage to escape, destroying the city in the process.

It’s only the standard Ravager’s that are attempting to get past you, whilst the bigger ones merely exist to slow you down. When you defeat these ones, they act similarly to smart bombs destroying much of the enemies on the screen, granting a degree of strategy to the game.

It’s the lack of variety in the standard enemies that is Who’s That Flying’s?! most predominant flaw. Different enemy formations and boss encounters ease the issue somewhat, but there’s no getting away from the fact that repetition occasionally sets in and it would have benefited from additional variety that would have called for a wider array in your tactics.

The visual style is fairly unique and grants plenty of character to the game.

Who’s That Flying?! has a fairly impressive amount of options for a £3.99 priced game. There’s an infinite mode, of which sees you taking on infinite hordes of Ravagers and attempting to protect the city for as long as possible. Upon completing the game, you’ll  also unlock a challenge mode, consisting of 24 bite-sized stages with varying objectives, for instance preventing any Ravager from escaping, or completing a stage within a certain time limit.

Who’s That Flying?! brings some of the best elements from both the shooter and tower defence genres together and creates a fresh and interesting concoction. Though the repetition of it takes away from this somewhat, Mediatonic has still crafted an immensely enjoyable game, which, with a bit more variation, could have been something truly special.

7/10