Bio-Hazard Battle (also known as "Crying - Biological War") is a 1992 Horizontal Scrolling Shooter released for the Sega Genesis platform. On February 26, 2007, it was also made available on the Wii's Virtual Console. No relationship to the Japanese name of the Resident Evil franchise.
Story:
During G-Biowar I (the first global biowar), a powerful new form of retrovirus was released as a deadly reprisal from the enemy. The viruses unleashed biological forces which couldn't be stopped, leaving Planet Avaron filled with new and deadly forms of life.
Only a few survivors remain in suspended animation in O.P. Odysseus, an orbiting platform circling Avaron. The space station's purpose is to keep the surviving humans alive until Avaron is habitable again. The crew of the Odysseus have been frozen in cryogenic tanks for hundreds of years, and now the onboard computer has awakened them. Computer probes show that conditions on Avaron are hostile but livable. The question is; where can the crew of Odysseus set up a colony?
Gameplay:
The gameplay involves piloting one or two of four organic ships, whether it be the orange and blue, vaguely bird or sawfish-like Orestes, the scarlet and green, vaguely reptilian Elektra, the green, insectoid Hecuba, or the yellow and purple, ray-like Polyxena, to Avaron, flying over areas which the probes have designated least hostile, ascertaining planetary conditions and, ultimately finding a new home for the remaining survivors.
Bio-Hazard Battle features a 2D side-scrolling shoot 'em up style of gameplay and the character chosen by the player can be moved in 8 directions by the D-Pad. The player can move, shoot, dodge, and block. To block an enemy projectile, the player must place the power star in the path of the projectile. There is also an array of different weapons at the ships' disposal. The player travels through eight levels, each one increasing in difficulty, with the last three only being available on the harder difficulties.
Tropes used in this game:
- After the End: The game takes place after a deadly virus infests a planet with dangerous, deadly lifeforms, making the planet uninhabitable.
- Attack Drone: Each Biowarrior starts with a small bug hovering around them that fires their special weapons and can transform into a new weapon based on which Energy Seed they pick up. It can block regular shots, as well.
- Attack Its Weak Point: Many of the bosses, save for Stage 7's Multi-Mook Melee boss fight, have a weak point that must be exploited in order to damage them, such as the head of Stage 3's boss.
- Battleship Raid: Stage 6 pits your character(s) against an organic spaceship whose parts break off as you destroy them.
- Bee Afraid: Stage 1 and 2 have bee enemies that attempt to charge the player. Thankfully, they're not very strong.
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: Lots of giant bugs in this game. Hecuba and arguably Orestes are also insectoid in appearance.
- "Blind Idiot" Translation: The manual refers to the protagonists as the Bioships (their actual title being the Biowarriors as shown by the ending) and acts as if they have human pilots. The description for stage 3 claims it's a jungle in Asia despite the game not taking place on Earth. Coupled with the inaccurate cover art, this may be an instance of a sloppy Cultural Translation.
- Blob Monster: Stage 4 has blue blob enemies that hide within the cave's ceiling and floor and occasionally extend outwards to attack along with blue-green blobs that emit droplets from the ceiling. Stage 5 also has black blobs that move around both vertically and horizontally.
- Bloody Murder: One of the final few stages has you fight hearts with spider legs. They shoot out destructible homing blood cells that kill you on contact.
- Body Horror: The Pacman-Esque enemies that disable your weapons do so by turning themselves inside-out.
- Charged Attack: Each Biowarrior has a powerful charged shot that shoots out four green elliptical projectiles. The trajectory of the projectiles depends on your chosen Biowarrior.
- Collision Damage: Played straight against enemies, averted against walls (unless it crushes you against the screen).
- Covers Always Lie: The ship seen fighting Stage 3's boss on the boxart for the international releases of the game is not present in the game.
- Deadly Walls: Averted. However, if the you are crushed against the edge of the screen via terrain, you die.
- Difficulty by Region: Some of the enemies were stripped of their ability to fire projectiles in the English version.
- Easy-Mode Mockery: You don't get to complete the game in Easy mode, it ends after level 5.
- Everything Trying to Kill You: None of the wildlife in Avaron are friendly at all, as they will persistently attack the Biowarriors as they make their way through the planet on their mission to save it.
- Evil Is Visceral: Pretty much the whole game. Though in this case Good is as well.
- Exactly What It Says on the Tin: You battle bio-hazardous organisms.
- Flunky Boss: The Final Boss, a strange machine responsible for the virus that created the hostile lifeforms, summons said life-forms to attack the player. The bosses of stage 3, 4 and 5 are also accompanied with smaller enemies that shoot at the player.
- Flying Seafood Special: Two of the Biowarriors, Orestes and Polyxena, are somewhat fish-like in appearance. Also, the very first stage pits your ship against flying squid.
- Giant Enemy Crab: One of the minibosses in the jungle stage is this. It uses its claws to try to kill the player while spawning smaller crabs that fire at the player.
- There are also oversized mantis shrimps in the deep sea stage.
- Giant Spider: Stage 7 features giant spiders with hearts for bodies that crawl along the ground.
- Harder Than Hard: The highest difficulty available, aptly called "Hardest", has the enemies fire shots a lot more often, and incredibly quickly, too.
- High-Altitude Battle:
- The first stage has your Biowarrior descend from the O.P. Odysseus to planet Avaron, fighting off Avaron's hostile wildlife as you do so.
- The sixth stage, where your craft fights a partially organic space shuttle amongst the clouds in a Battleship Raid fashion.
- Homing Lasers: Your homing laser weapon, given to you by the red power-up. Only two of the four ships can get it, though...
- Improvised Armor: The fourth boss covers itself in mud as an armor that helps it absorb damage.
- Industrial Ghetto: Stage 7 takes place in an abandoned industrial factory.
- Jungle Japes: Stage 3 takes place in a jungle.
- Living Ship: The four playable characters are this. Stage 6's boss could qualify as well.
- Mook Maker:
- One of the minibosses of the jungle stage is a giant leech that produces smaller leeches until killed. The other Mini-Boss is a Giant Enemy Crab that spawns smaller crabs that fire shots at the player.
- Large blobs of slime that hang from the cavern in the underground stage continuously drop smaller blobs of slime that move around and shoot at the player.
- Sponge enemies in the final stage spawn destructible black bubbles that fire shots at the player.
- Multi-Mook Melee: One of the bosses consists of nothing but a lot of mechanical-looking things trying to fly into your ship. In Hard and Hardest, they fire shots A LOT.
-
Nintendo Hard: 8 levels of pain, no less. There's a very good reason why the game is also known as "Crying". - One-Hit-Point Wonder: Each of the Biowarriors can only be hit once before losing a life. being hit by an enemy or projectile or getting crushed causes them to disintegrate.
- Organic Technology: The player character, as well as many of the enemies.
- Painfully Slow Projectile: Only for the first few levels, and if you're not playing on Hard or Hardest.
- Personal Space Invader: There's an enemy in the final stage that does this to the player's Attack Drone, by encasing itself around the drone and preventing it from firing until the drone's attacks destroy it.
- Refuge in Audacity: The jungle stage has mini palm trees which sprout out of the ground, then spin like helicopter blades and fly at you!
- Roboteching: The red weapon for two of the characters allows them to fire out homing lasers from their Attack Drone.
- Sealed Good in a Can: Having succeeded in clearing the planet of hostiles in the ending, the Biowarriors are placed back in their cryogenic containment in case humankind ever needs them again.
- Segmented Serpent: Many of the enemies are these. Some of them can only be damaged in the head, such as the boss of the third stage.
- Theme-and-Variations Soundtrack: A recurring 7-note melody that plays at some point in many pieces of music throughout the soundtrack. The only tracks that don't reference it are the ones for the title screen, level 7, the boss battle theme and the short jingle that plays when you clear a stage.
- Threatening Shark: The boss of stage 5 is a shark-like organism that shoots lasers from its mouth. It's accompanied by skeleton fish, too.
- Under the Sea: Stage 5 takes place entirely underwater and and features all sorts of underwater creatures for enemies, even having a shark-like fish as its boss.
- Wake-Up Call Boss: The second boss who you fight in stage 3. It's a Segmented Serpent stuck to a large skeleton on a tree that tries to crush you with its body, and it can easily trap and kill you if it extends out too far. Furthermore, it's accompanied by annoying butterfly enemies.
- Warm-Up Boss: The first boss, who you fight in stage 2. It shoots junk at you, but it is easy to avoid. Aim for his tail (which is HUGE and sticks out like a sore thumb).
- Your Size May Vary: The protagonists seem to get smaller as the stages progress. In stage 2 they're around the size of an airplane, but by stage 7 they're the size of a toy airplane. Either this, or Avaron's chain-link fences are taller than its skyscrapers.
