Metal Head was an early 32X game released by Sega in 1994. The 32X was a hardware expansion for the Sega Genesis that allowed for, among other things, texture-mapped 3D polygons. Metal Head took advantage of that creating 3D graphical detail that otherwise would not have been possible on the Genesis.
In the not too distant future, the 'World Federation' along with a Federation police force is established to bring peace to the world. It isn't very effective so wars and other kinds of strife still flourish around the world. The 'Metal Head' is a type of mech developed as a weapon to keep the peace. You play the role of a Metal Head pilot sent as part of a team to put down a revolution led by terrorists with their own mechs.
This is a single player game designed for use with Sega's six button controller. You pilot the Metal Head mech from a first person point of view from inside the head several stories up. The heads up display displays all the info you could want including energy level, time left in your mission, a map, info about weaponry and various other information. Game play is somewhat slow and deliberate and enemies are typically faced one at a time. Various camera views are available.
Metal Head takes advantage of the 3D textured objects that the 32X allows. The problem is that while the backgrounds are impressive and still shots look great, some of the animation leaves something to be desired. Explosions are glitchy, pop up is a problem, the pace is slow and the control isn't great. The sound is also mediocre at best with sound effects that come across as low quality samples.
Reviews of this game were mixed. It was greeted with a lot of excitement as an early 32X game and some of the graphics did look impressive when compared to regular Genesis games. However, these great graphics turn out to be somewhat of an illusion that becomes apparent when animated. The pacing of the game is pretty slow which I guess some people may like (I for one don't mind a slower paced game) but others do not. The bigger problem is this game's repetitive nature. Slow pacing is ok when coupled with a sense of suspense about what comes next. But when it is always the same thing, it can get boring fast. With Metal Head, it is too much of the same thing.
At the end of the day, Mech Head wasn't really one of the better mech games. However, it makes for an interesting tech demo of what the 32X could do and if you have a 32X anyway, there really aren't that many games to collect for it so you might as well add this one. As far as I know, the 32X offers the only way to play this Sega game (other than perhaps emulation).
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