also known as Android Assault - The Revenge of Bari-Arm
Sega Mega-CD
🇯🇵
Reviewed in 1992
80
✪ Reviewed on September 12, 2024
74
Android Assault is a very high-quality vertical shoot'em up on MegaCD. Impressive visuals, varied power-ups and sumptuous bosses. One of the best shmups available on the console. Essential.
Your verdict
Category
Shooter1 player12+
Description
A ship piloted by an android AI faces extraterrestrial invaders in this polished horizontal shoot'em up. Published by Renovation, released in Japan in May 1993. Horizontal shoot'em up with ship transformation into two modes, titanic bosses, high-quality CD soundtrack. Japanese edition.
Bari-Arm review
4/5
Art direction
★★★★★
"Striking"
4/5
Music
★★★★★
"Excellent"
1/5
Story
★★★★★
"Anecdotal"
The ship shifts form at will, from sleek fighter to humanoid robot, and that switch is drawn frame by frame rather than simulated. The enemies follow the same logic of articulated machinery: arms that unfold, turrets that swivel, bosses whose segments visibly open before firing, against orbital backdrops in cold metallic tones.
The CD tracks pull the shooter towards instrumental rock: saturated guitars doubled by synthesiser pads, drums pushed forward, and themes short enough to loop through a stage without wearing thin. The rhythmic breaks flag the boss phase changes as clearly as the display itself.
A vertical shoot'em up from NCS, known in the West as Android Assault, ranked among the Mega CD's best-regarded shmups for its visuals, bosses and CD soundtrack. This original Japanese release predates the Western edition and remains the version sought by Sega shooter enthusiasts. Its appeal rests less on raw scarcity than on reputation: a genuinely strong shmup on a format with few of them, with value sustained by enduring genre demand.
Is Bari-Arm still worth playing in 2026?
A horizontal shoot-em-up from Renovation, Android Assault offers a ship piloted by an android AI against waves of invaders, in a polished production leaning on the Mega-CD. The snappy shooting, the ship's transformations and the driving CD soundtrack make it a solid, readable shmup in the genre's good tradition. The content stays a bit short and the difficulty tough. A delightful pick for fans of retro horizontal shooting and the curious about the Mega-CD catalog.
