Silpheed INFO BOX SYSTEMS Playstation 2 RELEASE DATES Japan - 09/21/00 NA - 04/23/01 Europe - 05/11/01 PUBLISHERS Capcom (Japan) Swing! Deutschland (Europe) Working Designs (NA) OTHER TITLES Silpheed: The Lost Planet Silpheed - The Lost Planet Genre: Shooter - Vertical / Traditional Platform: Playstation 2 Developed by: GameArts / Treasure Published by: Working Designs Released: 2001 Reviewed by Joseph Burchell In 1986, videogaming was virginal, and long-running, well-known franchises such as Final Fantasy and MegaMan did not even exist. It was in that year GameArts created an easy to play, but difficult to beat shooter called Thexder for the NEC PC8801. The player controlled a transforming mech that changed into a ship. Sure, in 1986 ( the year of Tetris and Super Mario Bros. ) the graphics weren't exactly good, but shoot-em-ups were already making their mark. Thexder did well enough commercially to warrant a sequel in 1988, called Silpheed. Still developed by GameArts, it was published in the US by Sierra for the PC ( DOS). 5 years later, in 1993, Silpheed had a follow-up for the SEGA CD. The technical capabilities of the SEGA CD allowed for brilliant sound effects, full-motion video, polygons, and best of all, wingpeople who could communicate with you during missions ( you could even see them dogfighting in the distance ). For the first time, shooting fans wouldn't feel so alone. Unfortunately SEGA CD's iteration of Silpheed didn't catch on as well as it should have. Why? That same year, a different shooter came out for the SNES. That shooter was Starfox. With the 'Super FX chip', SNES games could pull off pseudo-3D play as well as actual polygons. Thus Nintendo's SNES continued in its prominence, and marked an early end to the SEGA CD. In 2000, after finding success with such games as the Lunar and Grandia RPG series, GameArts dove back into the vertical shooter arena with a new Silpheed, and they brought the absolute gods of shoot-em-ups; Treasure ( Radiant Silvergun, Ikaruga, Gunstar Heroes ) with them. The game was released in North America by Working Designs with increased difficulty, analog support, and the removal of much of the slowdown. Improvements considered, let's see if Silpheed: The Lost Planet earns a high score or falls to game over status... It's been 31 years since the previous human civil war, and humans thought it would be a time of peace and tranquililty. But a new threat surfaces. An organic-looking battle cruiser emerges over colony planet R-72 and destroys it. All inhabitants perish. So it's time to brush up on your dogfighting skills, as this alien threat must be brought down at all costs. I realize the plot is cliché, but cutscenes and mission briefings flesh out the the story a bit. Silpheed: The Lost Planet's scoring system is unique, and was probably the product of the minds at Treasure, who always know how to make a scoring system unique. The gist of it is that if you really want to optimize your score, you have to achieve multipliers. This is done by being as close as possible to an enemy when you destroy it. Ding so will multiply their point value by up to 16 times. Different weapons are unlocked depending on how high your score is, but the major downside to combat is that there are no screen-clearing bombs, or any sort of power-up for that matter. Instead of frantically avoiding bullets due to one-hit kills like most shumps, your ‘Silpheed' craft can take 5 or 10 hits, depending on the setting you choose. This feature has excellent potential because players are able to locate power-ups and bonuses easier, instead of worrying about losing lives. Brilliant, if only there were power-ups! Another thing what really irks me is that there are moments when no enemies are present on screen for up to 15 seconds at a time, evidently allowing you to view the game's environments ( which are indeed very stunning, especially for their time ). But vertical shooters were meant to be fast-paced fire-a-thons, and Silpheed lacks that aspect. These drawbacks are a real shame, because this game had potential for something much greater. Overall, Silpheed's sound is excellent. The music composition fits the game perfectly. Your fellow pilots have individual voices and report in on their situation every once in a while ( but oddly enough, you seem to be doing all the destroying, because unlike the SEGA CD version, other ships don't appear in the distance providing cover fire ). Sadly, the voice acting isn't on par with the rest of the game's sound, but hell, just drown out the speech by firing bullets. Silpheed's visuals are some of the best to ever grace a shmup. Explosions are lush and brilliant, particle effects are bountiful and best of all, as mentioned earlier, the rampant slowdown from the Japanese version was removed by US publisher Working Designs. On one hand, Silpheed isn't an exceptionally superior shooter, especially considering the two companies who put it together. But on the other hand there aren't many other shooters on Playstation 2. Hardcore shmup fans and Treasure fans alike should pick this game up provided it is at a good price ( usually USA $15 or less ), but PS2 owners looking for a more noteworthy trip down memory lane may want to skip it and head for R-Type: Final or Gradius V.