• Intense 2 Player Split-screen action!
• Compatible with the Dual Shock Analog Controller
• Set traps to destroy the enemy!
• 36 Deadly battlefields!
• Killer soundtrack!

Discussion
Here’s a flashback for you: do you remember the NES game Spy vs. Spy? Cool, say hello to Atlus’ version of it. Just bring a gun…

In Trap Gunner, you pick a character and essentially have to outfox the other player or computer character. There are only 5 or so traps to use along with a firearm and a physical attack. Your physical attack is essentially a defense, as it does practically nothing in damage. Same with the gun under normal circumstances, but what it also provides is where Trap Gunner’s gameplay mechanics shine. If you’ve ever played Deception, and I don’t mean Mortal Kombat, you know where I’m going with this.

If you want to succeed in the game, you will need to know how to combine various traps together to form chain explosions, or at least chain maneuvers. For example, you have mines, which explode upon contact. You also have bombs, but they don’t explode by touch, they explode when exploded upon. So if you plant a bomb next to a mine, you’ve just doubled the damage. You can also have a trap play off another one. Set up the launch trap to send a person flying in the direction it was laid, and let them land against nothing or right into a giant pile of bombs. As mentioned earlier, the gun also plays into the trap set-up. If you shoot someone while they are trying to disarm the trap, it sets the trap off, adding injury to insult.

Disarming a trap is also interesting; besides being still lethal, you must slowly uncover them using a sneaking-like method, and then enter s random button sequence to turn it off and remove it from the play field. The amount of buttons you must press is determined by the severity of the trap.

While all this is going on, there are also a special weapon and additional trap weapons to pick up. The terrifying weapon of the game comes in the form of a pulse cannon. Essentially you have three chances to use it, and it fires a single, charged shot that ill chase the intended victim until you avoid it, have it smash into a bridge you’re under, or you take out the shooter.

With all that said, it’s not as frantic as you’d think it would be. It plays more like a weird chess game with only two pieces (i.e. the players) constantly moving. I’ve gone two or three minutes (trust me, it feels long) without a single trap being set off, or even finding one of the enemy traps to disarm. This is weird, because the play fields are tiny – maybe two to three screens tall and wide. The ‘space’ you’re truly fighting in is where the traps will be set, and the computer isn’t too dumb. I watched it disarm half my traps in one round, but then watched it walk into platform full of mines and lose 90% of it’s health in one shot.

Probably the oddest part of the game is the character designs. For an essentially ‘party’ type game like Bomberman, Trap Gunner’s characters are cut from serious and black humor lines of cloth. While playing the main character’s story mode, the game describes, but does not show, how he put a gun to one characters head and pulled the trigger, and in another describes how he watches his victim melt. I was caught off guard the first time I read it. I think they were going for a cyberpunk attitude, but it doesn’t gel well with the game play vibe.

Trap Gunner is one of those absolutely niche titles that you’ll either get a kick out of or not even notice on the shelf. If you spot it for about $10, it makes a neat diversion.



 

• I feel kind of bad that I didn't know about this until I did this page. Trap Gunner comes with two quick reference cards. Both are the same sheet, double sided. One has the moves of the game, the other side the character bios. I have provided a scan of both sides below for reference.
  
  
   
• The female in the top banner starts off huge in the game. It's only after you beat her that she shrinks to her pictured size.
   
• The game's gun has a multi-floor auto targeting system. If you're on the top floor and the opponent is on the bottom floor, you'll still be able to hit them.