Major Mayhem is a side scrolling 3rd person rail shooter from Adult Swim Games and Rocket Jump Studios. It’s in a similar vein to the typical arcade shooter… except without the light guns… and feedback… and did I mention it’s not first person like Time Crisis, oh and there isn’t a pedal so you can get out of cover or reload in cover… apart from that exactly the same as Virtua Cop, or whatever.

The gameplay is simple, you’re Major Mayhem and you either run and get to cover and then tap the screen on the baddies to shoot or sometimes you are running for a segment and there is no cover but you must still shoot or jump. There are times when you can’t really gauge if you should have jumped or you shoot too late and your shot was way off as you ran, it’s complicated, I know.

The story is that your president needs you to kill a bunch of stereotypical baddies i.e. dudes in turbans, ninjas, secret agents, riot police, a bear and a pair of chihuahuas, wait did I say stereotypical? By the way the bad guy has your girlfriend and who knows what he is doing to her right now.

So like the good mercenary you are you get through killing everyone except the scientists because scientists are always innocent and they give you armour bonuses when you deplete it or coins when you are so good you don’t even need fresh armour (you 1337 gamer you). Of course the idea is to get coins to buy new weapons like a minigun (ooooh) or a rocket launcher (more oooooh). Protip: just save 5K and buy the auto sniper, you’ll thank me later.

I picked up the game hoping to wile away minutes between doing things so I gave it a go for a day or two before I decided that the initial gun (a 9mm pistol of sorts) was very slow and I found myself dead very many times. This annoyed me so I kept playing and dying early on in the story until I got my auto sniper and now nothing, including those pesky Chihuahuas in tanks can stop me.

The graphics are good and smooth with really fore, back and mid ground items popping up out of their hiding spots, it does what it sets out to do on a mobile platform.

All in all and once you get the hang of the pace of the game you start playing better and before you know it minutes become large blocks of minutes by which time you battery is 1/4 down and for some reason your phone heats up like it’s been in the microwave which is both a good and bad thing.

Graphics: 9/10 – they look good and run smooth, that might be because you aren’t really controlling the action, but purpose people, purpose.
Story: 6/10 – It’s an update of the Mario Bros kind of story where you kill everything and stuff blows up and then you find your girlfriend… right?
Sound: 8/10 – Great soundtrack and effects the gun sounds are OK.
Replayability: 8/10 – You’ll come back to beat your score and get better weapons and collectibles and Outfits! Dress up like Walker Texas Ranger or James Bond on your next mission! The missions are not that varied so that is a little bit of a let down.

Overall: I enjoy. You wanted a score right? lol.

Major Mayhem is available now for FREE on the Google Play Store and iPhone App Store.