Major Mayhem Review

At first glance Major Mayhem (originally known as Get to the Chopper) looks like a cover shooter. The titular Major is always hiding behind an object, dodging fire while liberally returning it. But the game is actually much more closely related to Time Crisis & other stop-and-pop modern light gun games. The game's 45 stages are all on rails, and play out more like frantic shooting galleries than normal FPS stages. Gun-toting enemies pop up from seemingly nowhere, and players must frantically tap their touch screen to return fire and dispatch them. The game sports a great cartoony art style and matching sense of humor, adding to the fun factor.


Major Mayhem's smooth shooting action grabbed ahold of me right from the first level. Light gun games are a perfect fit for iOS, but their short length has always been a problem. By repeating environments and only including a few enemy types, developer Rocket Jump was able to focus on blowing out the amount of content, cramming in an impressive 45 levels. This does mean that Major Mayhem is very repetitive, however. It is best played in short bursts. A bit more enemy variety or a few more types of weapon power-ups would have been very welcome.


Major Mayhem is one of the best rail shooters on the App Store. At $0.99 the app is a steal – hopefully Adult Swim has developer Rocket Jump hard at work on the fresh level pack teased during the campaign's conclusion. Certain iOS accouterments like Game Center support & achievements are missing, but the core shooting gallery action feels so right that these exclusions ultimately don't matter. Buy it!

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