Silpheed: The Lost Planet

"Difficult to work with is an understatement..."

Continuing on with the shooters for the Play Station 2, you run into games created by Working Designs that have brought us other feature games such as Elemental Gearbolt {Play Station} and Gungriffon Blaze {Play Station 2}. Although Gungriffon Blaze is nothing special and really a rushed title, you’ll find that Silpheed brings some pretty impressive visuals and a world of challenge to the table. With constant action that moves in several different directions and a full array of scoring and weapon gaining possibilities, what could possibly be wrong with this title?

Well, the first thing that you’ll find a problem is that the game is extremely difficult and there isn’t any training mode to run through. Because of the extensive enemy formations and the need to use different weapons for different effects, you may find that the two options of difficulty {Normal and Hard} may be a little too much to get used to! Another small problem that the game has is that when you’re roving through some of the stages, if you’re not careful with the way that the obstructions are placed on the screen, you’ll incur more damage than you may expect.

The game play that you find here is fast and furious in some places, but seems to be broken up in others. Through the use of a various weapons attached to your ship, you may find that the game takes on another challenge by forcing you to find the correct combination of weapons for your ship. While you may be used to shooters that give you the ability to change your shots, this game forces you to stick with your originally selected weapons until you reach a certain point on the stage and you can change armament. This adds a small bit of annoyance, simply because the break in the action comes at mid-point between stages and if you’re not properly prepared, it’s a wasted shield recharge!

Through the various stages, you have to work on a point system that will ultimately unlock more weapons for you to use in your missions. While the scoring may not seem all that hard, you’ll have to really work with the game in order to get the desired effect that you’re looking for. I’m not sure how the score multipliers work, but when you’re playing through the game, you need to shoot everything and get a chain of enemies in the same volley. Confusing, but ultimately fun if you really don’t try too hard to earn the weapons and simply stumbling into unlocking them through mindless shooting play.

Control is another feature in this game that happens to work out fairly well. Because there aren’t really any special maneuvers that you have to work with, or anything really important that you have to perform, its basically a button depress and movement of your ship around the stage. Power ups and other various things are nothing that you have to worry about collecting and you’ll find that the analog stick works near perfectly to keep the ship moving through the enemy shots. Tight quarters combat will be a little difficult to work with, but nothing that veterans can’t perform and beginners can’t learn.

Visually, the game is eye-candy from start to finish from the introduction of the game to the intermissions between stages. The action that you find throughout the game is simply gorgeous to look at and with the multi-directional backgrounds, you’ll have a constant three-dimensional effect where ever you may go. Weapon blasts and otherwise look well designed and well presented, with the exploding enemies littering debris all over the skies above your location. There really isn’t much here that you might complain about other than the game camera with the backgrounds screws you from time to time and you’ll never be sure of where you’re able to fly!

Audio wise, there is a pretty good pace keeping soundtrack that will keep you flowing with the game throughout the various stages. The music never repeats from one stage to the next, and that is a vast improvement over most shooters. Voice acting is done to bring the story to life through the reading of various reports between the stages and even the intermissions movies are filled with voice. Sound effects are something standard here and although you’ve heard it before, the crisp laser blasts and explosions right down to the calls between your team ships sound great on a good stereo setup.

Silpheed isn’t a bad game by any means, but it is an extremely tough shooter that requires both practice and patience. If you’re looking for a shooting game on the Play Station 2, then you’re pretty limited to games such as this, Gradius III & IV and Fantavision. However, if you can’t stand a tough shooter and you’re put off by extreme challenge regardless of how well the game plays or looks, then you may want to try another game such as Galaga! For Play Station 2 owners, you really can’t beat the twenty dollar price tag, and if you’re into games such as this, then it is a solid buy, but for everyone else, you may want to rent before you own simply based on the frustration that comes along with playing the game the first couple of times.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 01/27/02, Updated 01/27/02