God I loved this game. It certainly bares first and foremost an uncanny resemblance to Blade Runner but, really, the time spent playing Einhänder was pure ‘90s geek culture euphoria. Everything from the anime films of Neon Genesis Evangelion and Ghost in the Shell to techno-electro music and American cyberspace fantasies like Johnny Mnemonic and Hackers... all honed into a single, intense scroll shooter with sweet-ass 2.5D paneled graphics, liquid motion, superior detail and high-tech sound effects. Stepping away from the lameness of real life and reducing your existence to a single fighter craft where the sole purpose is to upgrade your gunpod and blow shit up makes for near spiritually liberating experience. Even the title and that start menu image of an X-rayed hand evokes a universe of strange cyberpunk wonders. As simple as the gameplay may be, I always got sucked into the future world of Einhänder, projecting onto my fighter craft its own unique personality and imagining myself between battles flying through the cityscape and all her endless stories. Good times.
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