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April 21, 2008
If you have a deep love for classic shooters, you should play Ikaruga.
By Jeff GerstmannI'll never be a great Ikaruga player, and that's fine. I've come to terms with that. But that doesn't mean I can't stand at a safe distance and appreciate it from afar. While some people would claim that most 2D overhead shooter worship comes from a very pretentious place that's usually reserved for wine snobbery, you don't need to be some high-falutin' games-as-art nerd to appreciate Ikaruga.
Ikaruga makes polarity fun!
OK, so Ikaruga? It's an amazing, museum-worthy masterpiece. Though when you break it down and start to talk about it in a mechanical fashion, it might not seem as immediately impressive. It's a five-level top-down shooter with no power-ups. The trick is that you can flip the polarity of your ship from white to black and back again with the press of a button. This is the game's key mechanic, as you can safely absorb same-colored enemy fire, which charges up a homing laser attack. Also, every enemy is colored white or black, as are your shots, depending on your current polarity. You can do double-damage to enemy ships by attacking them with their opposing color. It helps your score and end-of-round rating if you attack same-colored ships in a row, as you can chain together these kills for combo points.
Enemies and bullets come at you at a pretty constant rate, and there's a very maze-like quality to certain portions of the game, where you'll have to analyze the pattern of incoming fire, make sure your ship is the right color, and carefully maneuver your way through safely. This gets pretty hard. At the end of each stage, you encounter a boss, and even more bullets head your way, making you think faster to survive the hail of bullets while dealing damage of your own.
It's the chain combos that separate Ikaruga from your average shooter and elevate it to some kind of weird art-form. Watching replays of expert players achieve S rankings has an elegant, poetry-in-motion feel that makes you realize that your pathetic C+ ranking is the equivalent of a caveman banging on rocks with an Xbox 360 controller.
In fact, that might be reason enough for some people to pick up the 360 version, as it has the option download and show the highest-ranking replays from the leaderboards. So at any point you can go watch someone else play and realize how pathetic you truly are. The catch is that replays can only be saved using the game's default settings, so if you finally stumble your way through the fourth level, you won't be able to show your friends until you can do it without continuing. Yes, by default, continuing is disabled. But you can turn it on for three continues, and you'll earn additional credits as your overall playtime increases, just like the Dreamcast release.
Get used to seeing this screen.
If you're a crazed Ikaruga purist, you should know that the top player on the leaderboards has come out and complained about the accuracy of the 360 version, saying that some enemy placement has changed. And after watching his replay, well... he would know. But chances are you won't notice. The only real negative I can see comes from the online play, which can get stuttery on some connections, making an already-hard game practically unplayable.
The only serious obstacle, however, lies with you and your own personal taste for top-down shooters. Just because it's great doesn't mean it's accessible. So keep that in mind as you weigh your options for this $10 XBLA download.
9 Comments
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Arguably the best shoot-em-up ever made.
(GC)
Treasure’s Ikaruga, the follow-up to their legendary vertical shooter Radiant Silvergun, is a stunning example of the genre achieving a perfect balance between game design and design aesthetic. Ikaruga isn’t just another shooter – it’s a work of art; the result of years of experience creating excellent games in the ... |
2 out of 2 found this review helpful.
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PLAY THIS GAME!
(DC)
The game my seem tough as nails at first but you will soon find that the game has a great difficulty curve. Though the best part of the game is that the controls are so finely tuned that everytime you die you KNOW that its your fault and not the ... |
2 out of 2 found this review helpful.
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Not for the faint of heart
(XBLM)
A personal favorite of mine, Ikaruga is clearly not for the faint of heart. There was a time in my life where I thought there was no game that could best my skill and this was clearly before I played Ikaruga. The game seems simple at first. The color of ... |
1 out of 1 found this review helpful.
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General Information
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| Game Name | Ikaruga |
| Platform(s) | |
| Publisher(s) | |
| Developer(s) | |
| Genres |
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| Themes |
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| Original US Release |
April 15, 2003
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| Original US Release | 2003 know the real date? |
| Aliases | |
| ESRB |
ESRB: E
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| PEGI |
PEGI: 3+
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Related Games
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