Last Alert (1989). Play online

Summary

Last Alert, called Red Alert overseas, packs a top‑down shoot‑‘em‑up onto the TurboGrafx‑CD with a surprising amount of depth. The CD lets the game boast full voice tracks, a CD‑quality soundtrack, and animated cutscenes—features that were rare in 1990. Alongside a limitless pistol, you can pull out a flamethrower, grenades, or a hovering turret, then work your way through weapon upgrades from an M1911A1 to a rocket launcher as you earn experience points and level up your health. I find the blend of RPG‑style levelling with pure arcade shooting surprisingly refreshing.
The map’s colored markers hide three mission flavors: blue stages are straight‑forward boss runs, red missions force stealth because every stray shot summons more foes, and yellow missions add special goals like hostage rescues, all under a ticking timer that kills you instantly if it hits zero. Critics at launch loved the graphics, music, and snappy controls, though some called the gameplay linear. The goofy Japanese voice acting even earned a spot on EGM’s “Top 10 Video Game Blabbermouths.”

Storyline

Last Alert opens on November 20, 1988, when American commando Guy Kazama’s Special Mission Unit is lured into a jungle and ambushed by a helicopter. He survives as the Force Project—a coalition of Colonel Jim Kadat, mobster Tommy Lee, Chairman Steve Lloyd and physicist Dr. Che Garcia—reveals its plan to dominate the world.

CIA director Harvey Leonard, acting on President Allman’s orders, finds Kazama mourning his fallen teammates in a cemetery and tasks him with destroying the Force Project’s operations. Kazama infiltrates the Blue Rhinos base, rescues the captured agent Spartan, blows up stealth bombers and escapes on a runway bomber after a tank showdown.

Leonard then sends Kazama to the frozen Republic of Flett, where the President’s plane crashed. Scaling Mount Alt, Kazama frees the president, defeats Colonel Douglas Dark and later tracks down Colonel Kadat, slaying his three bodyguards and finally the whip‑wielding colonel himself.

The final act pits Kazama against the remaining heads of the Force Project. He wins Tommy Lee’s tournament, eliminates Steve Lloyd on a cruise ship, and boards a lunar station where Dr. Garcia’s super‑computer Indra threatens global annihilation. After destroying the biomonster and the cyber‑enhanced Garcia, Kazama blows up Indra, escapes in a capsule and contacts Leonard for rescue.