Another week and another batch of Live games. But yet again there is a silver lining on the dark weekly cloud. This time it’s an old school 3D space shooter Aces of the Galaxy.

Unlike Sierra’s previous space shooter, Battlestar Galactica, this game is actually pretty good. The story is simple enough, you have taken a prototype ship from some rather nasty aliens and you need to fight your way to safety through numerous worlds and locations.

This is a classic 3D shooter taken straight from the styling’s of the original Starfox, just better graphics. In fact, after playing this game I have to say this is just as good as Starfox. Whilst not as solid, it does really well to hold up to the now classic Nintendo game. There are a few weapon styles available, your basic rapid fire, a lock-on cluster missile, torpedoes and also a radar that you can use to find hidden ships to destroy. You also have power-ups that you collect by flying through them, these will upgrade your weapons giving you faster fire or more cluster rockets, however you can only upgrade one item at a time so choice is down to your personal tastes.

Level-wise its also similar to the Starfox games, there are three tiers to play through, at the end of each level you are able to change tier if you wish. There are the usual fire planets, ice planets and asteroids, plus huge space battles that you zip through, a bit like Star Wars Episode 3 opening scene. At times the screen will be really full of lasers and enemy ships, thankfully rather then being cannon fodder you also have a roll button that can deflect the lasers.

This is a great game, however in playing it you do feel a bit of nostalgia for the old SNES classic. This is definitely worth a go.