[Marcuz]

I love Xenon II.

I could play it up to the end of level 4, start of 5, with a TAC2 with no autofire.
By comparison, I could barely finish level 1 of Power X and Disposable Hero (and I like both of them) with a newer joystick and autofire; never finished level 2 in either.

Up to that point, the 15 years old that I was could accept that Xenon 2 was difficult, but thought that was great game design; level 5 was imho just too punishing. I thought that then, I stil do too now.
You had to plan your play through the game buying and selling stuff in the marketplace, and there was a lot of trial and error.
But it was extremely fun to play.

Oh, and by the way, it was the first game like that I ever played! It came with the Amiga 500 and Lotus Turbo Challenge one xmas, so, I was, and I am, not a fast player, I can't win arcades and shoot em ups.

On the downside, once you beat the game once (I never did without cheating) there is no incentive to play again, with the game ending abruptly and you loosing all your upgrades: that's a bad design choice. You could not get to try or see different configurations of your ships, you could only see one of the possible maxed out versions of it with the Super Nashwan Power, that's a pity.

But as game, beautiful visuals and well designed and defined themes and music, clever bosses, wrong paths, great playability, to me.

Xenon 1 never interested me much, tried it once or twice.