Ai Cho Aniki/Super Big Brother of Love - Masaya/NCS 1995 (PC Engine CD)

Ai Cho Aniki is one of those games that apeared in the 90's , stired up some wind and gave birth to a mostly dying franchise that never achieved the same pinacle as it did with this installment  , at least that is what most people will tell you .

The game itself is so far the only one to fully feature the brothers Samson and Adon , featured on the cover above , as the main heroes . Sure in the PSP version they're there , but as options , like they were in the first game (Cho Aniki) and in prety much any other , except the Wonderswan RPG (which I can't play given it's entierly in Japanese) . Ironic , seeing that these two are prety much the first thing anyone thinks of when the franchise comes up .

For those not fully aware of the nature of this game , a quick wrap up :

The game is a flying horizontal (for the most part) shooter , with a thong wearing man flying through space , killing giant faces and thong wearing snowmen , set to the tunes of classical opera and gregorian choir .

The story is , you have to fight the Neo body building empire . You travel along the four stages , each with three areas , ranging from town streets , space , and forest . The locales may seem a little uninspired like this , but it's what populates these screens that gets your atention . Yes , those two gigantic  , hugging men are enemies in the game .

The game is legendary for alot of imagery that is considered homoerotic . Well , that is sort of true . But certainly that is not the only quirk in the game . It ranges from gigantic stick monsters , to evil snowmen , flying faces of all possible shapes and

This guy . He showed up in the first game too , and is in fact a playable character in the aforementioned Wonderswan RPG title . He even apears in Gynoug , another bizzare , quirky game by the same designer .

It's stil kind of hard arguing against the "gay game" rumours with images like these though :

Stil , the game is prety fun , though criminaly short and I managed to beat it without cheating on my second playthrough . If I only found out how to do that damn men's beam .......

Controls are simple . Attack button fires homing shots , back , forward and shooting fires deadly starts , and you can keep the attack button pressed for continous star sprinkling , but you have to continue moving . There is also the flex attack , which is not that powerfull and I have no idea how to do , and the giant "Men's beam" shot out of your head (that's what the hole is for) , which is extremely powerfull , but no place on the net specifies just how to do it . Your other button allows you to ballet across the screen , avoiding all enemies and projectiles , except for the final boss . However , you can't just skiddle your way through this game on high heels , because you're on a timer , and the bosses recquire quick defeat .

The game itself has no lives system , so you can die as many times as you want as long as you finish the given stage on time . Run out of time once though , even on the last level , and it's all the way back to the begining .

Finaly , the music is just awesome and the tracks themselves are varied and are rumoured to have actualy outsold the game at one point .

Playing this game is almost a must , as it is a near life changing experience .

If I have to rate it , I'd say 4.5/5 Farrokh Bulsaras .