Camponella (Type: Game)
The 17th game in the 50 game collection UFO 50! I would have included UFO 50 itself on this list since every game in that collection is a banger, but I decided I would use this opportunity to go in depth with one game, instead of quickly skimming through fifty of them.
Camponella is the first in a trilogy of games (hexalogy if you count Planet Zoldath, The Big Bell Race, and Pilot Quest.
If you cound Planet Zoldath, Camponella would actually be the second in the series, though...), and while the rest of The
games in the series are great (except Planet Zoldath), none of them are really as appealing to me as the first game.
Camponella follows our protaganist Pilot (unseen in this adventure) as they fly their UFO, the Camponella, through 5
different worlds, each containing 9 levels, a bonus stage, and a boss. Pilot must carefully manuever their UFO through
tight corridors, while defeating enemies to refuel his ship. This game is tough, but there are plenty opportunities to get
extra lives, if you're daring enough!
I've been wanting to make a game like Camponella, so playing it for the first time was like seeing my vision becoming a reality,
though Camponella is much sillier than the game I had been imagining. That's probably one of the reasons I love it so much! it
also feels very authentic to retro games of old. When I was young my dad installed a bunch of SNES games on our Xbox, and Camponella
really does feel like it could be among that collection. UFO 50 in general is very nostalgic, reminds me a lot of looking through the
large collection of SNES games and finding something weird that I have never heard of before.
I don't have much else to say about Camponella besides that it's really fun, and super replayable! I got the cherry disk on it
already, but I'll be sure to keep chasing higher scores, and quicker times!