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GC

North America

Ikaruga

by Bakudan Yoshinoya - September 20, 2002, 9:00 am EDT

I was excited to find out Ikaruga was going to be at TGS. It was not a very big attraction at the show, with only one kiosk on the floor. At least I got to hog the game for a bit...

I was very excited to find out Ikaruga was going to be at TGS. It was not a very big attraction at the show, as there was only one kiosk available. There was no line and no waiting. At least I got to hog the game play it for a bit.

For those that are new to the title, Ikaruga is a vertical shooter that was popular in Japanese arcades early this year. It featured the innovative system of switching your aircraft from dark to white. When you are dark, you are invincible to dark projectiles and enemies. Likewise, when you are white, white projectiles and enemies fly right through you. If you are able to hit the enemies with the respective colors, you can earn combos.

The controls were not complicated – a button for firing, and another button for switching between the colors. I started the game, but found myself dead within two minutes. The game is difficult, as it is not just about dodging projectiles, but also trying to switch to the proper color. To dodge all the projectiles without switching colors is near impossible. I say this because at almost every instance of the game, the screen is filled with black and white projectiles. So far, I have not encountered much slowdown. The stages are designed very intelligently with nonstop action that keeps you focused on your objectives. Between areas in each stage are very nicely done cut scenes. They are not your typical cut scenes though; basically you lose control of your spacecrafts, and you see them blast off and maneuver to the next area.

One of the things that I did not know previously was that Ikaruga features a 2-player co-op mode. I only saw it in action briefly (remember the steep learning curve), but it seems to be running smoothly. With two players, the screen gets much more crowded, which brings up a very important issue – the modified game screen.

The Dreamcast version has been out for weeks now, and many have criticized how both sides of the screen are cut off to match the vertical screens of the arcade. The end result is like playing videogames on a widescreen TV with standard 4:3 resolution. The same problem still very much persists in the GC version. The screen feels very compressed, and it takes time to get use to it. If you can look beyond this flaw, it is a great game. And if you are a shooting fan, this is definitely a must-have.

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Ikaruga Box Art

Genre Shooter
Developer Treasure
Players1 - 2

Worldwide Releases

na: Ikaruga
Release Apr 15, 2003
PublisherAtari
RatingEveryone
jpn: Ikaruga
Release Jan 16, 2003
PublisherAtari

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