As someone who, oddly, never actually played Black Widow back in the day, I want to be up front that unlike many classic arcade refreshes in this case I have no potential for rose-colored feelings over this redux. In some ways that’s a shame, since I think it’s at more of a disadvantage than its Recharged brethren, but since it’s ultimately a twin-stick shooter I’ve still obviously got thoughts. I like the use of the theme, with you playing the part of a spider in her web, and you’re shooting at various assorted bugs who pose a few different threats to you which you’ll have to quickly recognize and react to accordingly to stay alive. The randomness of the power-ups you’ll be able to leverage really crank up the arcade unpredictability factor, sometimes bailing you out when you need a save, and other times not so much. The addition of the challenge stages, consistent with the Recharged series, also adds nicely to variety and longevity as it will throw different objectives at you to conquer. In the end, for a budget price, it’s reasonably good, but I would be remiss not to note the preponderance of great twin-stick shooters out there on the eShop and though this has a novel theme I wouldn’t say it breaks away to distinguish itself among its competitors. One comment I will make is the one-life style of it makes for some frustratingly brief runs where you have no opportunity to bounce back, a bad break lingering near the edge without helpful power-ups you may just end up needing to start over. ****/2021/10/mini-reviews-october-22nd-edition.html