With Headlander the player gets the best of two worlds: they enjoy the features of both the Metroid and the Castlevania series. It is a retro-style game with a large number of psychedelic effects and bright colors.
There are features where the players can make the robots dance if they so wish – but this isn’t where the fun stops. The Headlander even has a flying head within the game. It is a playable character and can attach itself to different robotic bodies within the game.
While Headliner is packed with personality, there are lots of technical issues that mar the fun of the game. Players who have tried the game have found it promising, but they have also felt that Headlander is a bit weird. For starters the players can use a flying head as a playable character!
When players start their game with the flying head, they are introduced as a player who can knock off the heads of some of the robots and attach themselves to the bodies, thereby taking control of the robot.
The flying head might have the potential to knock down other robots and replace their heads with the one that the player is using, but they don’t have any other powers. It is only after they take control of the robot’s body that they manipulate the world.
The flying head can’t do anything apart from sucking in things with the help of the vacuum drive. This feature allows the flying head to suck in the heads of robots and replaces them. Once they are in control of a particular robot body, they can use teleporters and open doors.
The head mode in Headland also allows the flying head to acquire abilities to power up switches in the later stages and create a shield to protect the head. They even get to use a boost for a short while.
Headlander’s head mode allows the flying head to take control of two kinds of robots, one of them being the civilian robot and the other being the security robots. The civilian robots that the flying head can attach itself to include the robot dogs, who have a downloadable portion of the map stored in them. Apart from this, the players can also get the flying robot to attach itself to cleaning robots.
The head mode works best when the flying head can get control over security robots. These robots can shoot and punch. The shooters have a firing pattern, and they can take some laser shots.
The melee robots are the ones that have wheels and can be used to cross electric floors. The third kind of security robots are the lizard shaped ones that let out a beam of energy.
While it might seem that getting control of the robots is one part of the game that is done, Headlander isn’t that easy. The robots that the flying head can attach itself to are color coordinated, which means that they can open only those doors that match their color. The purple robots have the power to open any doors and hence are difficult to gain control of.
Headlander follows a story where the humans have transferred their bodies into robots. However, Methuselah, the computer that would control the robots, has got an evil streak and is turning the robot bodies against the human minds that occupy them.
The game requires the player to try and prevent Methuselah’s plans from coming to fruition. The story might not be riveting enough, but then it works for the duration of the gameplay.