Castle of Shikigami III

"Take Contra's difficulty, remove the konami code, make it a scrolling shooter, add in an anime twist, and you've got Castle of Shikigami 3."

Castle of Shikigami III (Wii) Review

*Note: This is my first review, so please be a bit easy on me, thanks.*

I would like to start off this review by saying, Castle of Shikigami III will not appeal to everyone. It's a scrolling shooter, and While newcomers to the series won't really understand what's going on in the story, and while it's not the best looking Wii game to date, it's really fun, it's quite addicting,
its text/spoken dialogue is humorous, yet a tiny bit cheesy at times, and it may give some early 1990's gamers a feeling of nostalgia.

... I forgot to mention, this game is damn hard.

I've played quite a few scrolling shooters before in the arcades, but none of their difficulties even come close to Castle of Shikigami III. Even on Normal mode, the game is extremely hard to get by. (I know there are other shooters that are way harder, but the only ones that I know that are harder, are Japan-Only)

There's five levels in the game, and each one is divided into two sections, each one with a mini-boss, and a regular boss. Each level has an assortment of enemies that will fire lasers at you in hopes of taking you down, and some levels have hard-to-dodge obstacles, limiting your movement while you're dodging the large array of lasers coming at you.

You get a few continues, but once you run out of continues, it's game over, and you're back to the main menu. There's no in-game saves to help you out, so if you want to beat the game, you have to do it in one sitting. You will have to memorize what things are coming from where, what obstacles are where, how to defeat a certain boss, and such in order to progress well into the game, and end with a high score. There is also a practice mode to help you if you have trouble on certain parts of the game.

There are ten different characters, and each one has its own unique regular attack, 'shikigami attack', and 'special attack'. The regular attacks vary among characters, some with stronger ones, others with weaker ones. The Shikigami attacks are a bit stronger than regular attacks, but some can only be used well with practise. Finally, each character gets their own special attack. For example, one character's special attack can temporarily freezing time, allowing you to shoot everything on screen before time runs out. Another character's special attack, is a powerful, yet short-ranged laser.

Some special attacks are more effective than others, but they can all be effective when used properly. Just note that your special attack is limited, and you can only use it a certain amount of times.

When it comes to graphics, I have to say, some of the art is really good (Some of it is very sexy, in my opinion), but for the actual game, it's quite disappointing. Enemies are re-used in multiple stages, and the background textures are a bit bland. Bosses look pretty cool, and the player's attacks have very, very cool, flashy effects to them, but the rest of the game is pretty boring.

The sound is alright. Some songs are re-used in certain parts of the game, but they work well in the levels they're in. You can select different soundtracks from different Castle of Shikigami games, if you want. As for the voice acting, it's a bit cheesy, but at times, it can be really funny (Never in my video gaming history have I heard a girl scream 'owwie owwie owwie owwie owwie!!!' when she was shot).

So, what is there to do once you beat the main game? Well, you have Extreme mode. If you're able to beat that, then you can play Extreme II mode. If you somehow beat that, you can play Extreme III. All the difficulties are unlocked at the start, so if you think you're good at scrolling shooters, you can head straight for an Extreme mode.

There's boss rush mode, where you fight every boss in the game in record time, there's a jukebox, if you wanted to listen to any tunes from the game, and if you want to look at any of the artwork in the game, you can go to the Art Gallery to view any images you've already seen. As already mentioned, if you want to perfect any parts in the game, you can go to practice mode, and really, that's about it.

There is multiplayer, but it's not really the best game to play with a friend, unless of course, you're both into scrolling shooters. Its really high difficulty may frustrate your friends, if you don't
forewarn them.

If you're not into scrolling shooters, you might not want to pick up this game, as it won't change your view on scrolling shooters in any way. In fact, its extreme difficulty may just make one hate scrolling shooters even more. However, if you have a craving to play any scrolling shooters, this is probably the best scrolling shooter on the Wii to date, and I would highly recommend it. There are multiple difficulties, a bunch of characters to master, multiple options to enhance your game, and just having the urge to beat your old score makes this game awesome.

I really wanted to give this game an 8, but the mediocre graphics, O.K. sound effects, little variety other than scrolling shooting is provided, pretty weak story if you're new to the series, little extra content, and 'meh' multiplayer prevent me from giving it an 8, so, I'll give this game a 7 out of 10. If you love scrolling shooters, or if you just want to see how hardcore of a gamer you are, bump the score up to an 8 or a 9, and go grab this game right now.



...By the way, did I mention that this game is hard?

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 06/24/08

Game Release: Castle of Shikigami III (US, 05/13/08)