Review: Psikyo Shooting Collections

Developer Psikyo is not a household name to gamers, even retro gamers. They mainly produce 2D shoot'em up games like Strikers 1945, Gunbird, Cannon Spike, and Zero Gunner, to name a few. These games are some of my favorites. The company's previous incarnation was Video System Inc., and they produced the Aerofighters series. If you play an Aerofighters game and then play Strikers 1945 you will immediately see the resemblance.

While hard core shoot'em up fans may deride the Psikyo games as too simple, I find them to be perfect. My appreciation for shoot'em ups is a bit different than that of the hardcore shmup fan. I find many modern shoot'em ups to emphasize the sheer number of bullets, resulting in a tapping strategy that is claustrophobic. Old school shooters rely on waves of popcorn enemies, environmental hazards, and lack of weapon power. Psikyo strikes a balance right in the middle. I like the Psikyo games because they are a blend of old school aesthetics with lots of action, minus the blinding clouds of bullets for the sake of having clouds of bullets.

A common trait that Psikyo shooters have is the charge shot, bomb/defense attack, and power up system. Once you pick up a power up, you increases your firepower and gain an option that has its own unique attack. Some fire missiles, some fire lasers, some drop bombs, some home in on enemies, etc. When you hold the shot button, you charge a shot. Every plane/character in these games has a unique charge shot and vary in power. Some are more powerful but take longer to charge, for instance. The bomb attacks all have some defensive aspect, like ascending up into the sky briefly to drop an enormous bomb, or calling in a calvary of support craft that create a defensive barrier for you.  The replay value increases tenfold due to trying out all of the characters and their attack patterns.

Monkey level difficulty is a thing

Another feature that is in all of their home ports is the ability to customize the game settings, such as number of lives, difficulty, etc. This makes the games far more approachable to newcomers (try the monkey setting!) while still offering insane difficulty on the higher settings.

In recent years there has been a resurgence of retro collections for modern consoles. Psikyo decided to get in on the action and release two collections for the Nintendo Switch. Each collection has four games.

Collection 1 features Strikers 1945, Sol Divide, Samurai Aces, and Gunbird.

Collection 2 features: Strikers 1945 II, Tengai (Sengoku Blade), Dragon Blaze, and Gunbird 2.

Each collection is about $35 USD. To be honest I think all eight of these could have been in one collection, but the developers have to eat, right? I would have paid the price of a modern game to get all of the games in one package, and I think everyone in the target audience would do the same.

This is all great, but there's a snag: the games are not released domestically. They can be purchased from Playasia.com. It's a reputable online company, I've ordered from them in the past and had no problems, but you are subject to lengthy international shipping times.

The gameplay is pretty faithful to the ports on the Saturn and Playstation. I haven't played the original arcades so I can't comment on those. The accuracy is inherent in the simple gameplay design. The games are simple enough, that there's not too much to screw up. I don't mean simple in a derogatory sense, I'm just commenting on the complexity of the programming. I think this is a shining example of simple is better.

The Flipgrip is a must for those who enjoy shoot'em ups on the Switch

Currently the collection is a Switch exclusive. I would have preferred it on the PS4. There is one fantastic feature that the Switch takes advantage of: Tate mode. Since these were all originally arcade games, they were designed with a tall vertical orientation in mind. This can be experienced to its potential by using a Flipgrip adapter. This fantastic accessory allows you to rotate your Switch screen 90 degrees, and reattach your joycons so that you are in Tate mode, and fully utilizing all of the screen. I don't know if Psikyo knew this was a thing, and kept that in mind when porting the games, but it is a game changer. I have never been much of a fan of hand-held systems, but this is changing my mind.

The only real extras in the standard editions are the gallery modes, which contain cover art, adds, and arcade instruction stickers.

So these collections are intended for shoot'em up fans that own a switch, and are willing to import. Many of these games have been ported to the Saturn, Playstation, and PS2, but primarily in Japan. Some have never been ported to anything at all.

If I have one complaint, its that the Switch had only analog sticks and no directional pad. For 2D games like these, I prefer the precision of digital input over the unnecessary analog input. I looked into the d-pad joycons on the market, but they need to be connected to the Switch directly, as they do not support Bluetooth connectivity. This means I can't use them with the Flipgrip or while hooked up to a TV. Bummer.

Playasia has announced a Shooting Collection Volume 3 to be released this summer, which will contain Strikers 1945 III, Gunbarich, Sengoku Cannon, and Zero Gunner 2. I think this will be the final collection, as that's about the extent of their meaningful catalog (unless you want to delve into mahjong games). I preordered this as soon as I heard about it.

Right as this post is published, I see that Psikyo is reshuffling all 12 (4 from each shooting collection volume) games into two "shooting libraries" that contain 6 games each. This is odd and annoying. Good news for people that did not take the plunge yet, but bad news for people like me who already purchased volumes 1 and 2. That's beside the point, I guess.

All in all, I love the Psikyo Shooting Collections, they're a great way to experience the shooters from this under-the-radar developer. Highly recommended!