Genre: Action
Developer: Bitmap Bureau
Publisher: Numskull Games

As is heavily emphasized on the packaging and in the game itself, Henk Nieborg drew the the jarringly fantastic Hi-Bit artwork on feature, which will be instantly recognizable to any "Flink" or "The Adventures of Lomax" fans: the sheer volume of animation frames, scrolling alpha channeled clouds, sprite scaling, and parallax scrolling make this look like something the Neo Geo would have produced if it had ten times the RAM. Unfortunately, the rather intense level of scaling not only means not much is visible on screen at once, but that the shading detail is de-emphasized.

Manami Matsumae isn't well known in this reviewer's circle, but apparently is recognized for her work on many popular titles such as the first couple of "Mega Man" titles. In this game she opts for vaguely Mega Drive-sounding samples, and although the compositions are perhaps a bit meandering, many of them strike some nice minor key goodness, and wouldn't have sounded out of place coming out of a 1990s arcade cabinet. Sound effects and voice acting are crystal clear, and fit Battle Axe's Hi-Bit sensibilities.

Commonly stated, Battle Axe is like a cross between "Golden Axe" and "Gauntlet"-- but to this reviewer's eyes, it's most similar to the 3DO's "Captain Quazar", minus the "Desert Strike"-like objectives: one or two players move around sprawling levels, battling foes with various attacks and special abilities. Like "Quazar", the camera is pulled way in-- perhaps too far in. There are only four stages, but the difficulty is quite high, but the levels are memorable enough that they can be memorized so that threats can be anticipated ahead of time.

Some games are fun to memorize and play through simply because the soundtrack and aesthetic are so beautiful-- think "Sonic the Hedgehog". Others are fun because the mechanics are so repeatable and chess-like-- imagine "Pac-Man". Battle Axe's issue is that it doesn't hit either height, instead straddling the line right down the middle. The secondary "infinite" mode attempts to err towards the latter formula, but just doesn't have the core gameplay formula to hit that mark. In the end, Battle Axe is a beautiful Hi-Bit two-player arcade game with a nice soundtrack, but without an extra "oomph" to take it to the levels of its forebears. It would be the perfect game for a sequel-- perhaps some day?