Abstracting and replicating patterns in harmonizing ways are some of humanity's greatest strengths as a species. Everyone knows nothing is created and that it’s all transformed, but the way in which we apply this logic in creating media is what determines whether our names shall be salvaged by history books or left to rot alongside us. When a groundbreaking title, such as a videogame, is released, everyone wants to have a piece of their own, inevitably trying to subtract what was essential for its success and applying it in different areas, in the hopes of either improving the new established norm or trying to find some success with different audiences drawn out by its newly attained fame. We always fail to take into consideration however, that even the most revolutionary discoveries like gravity, needed some sort of apple like object from somewhere else, to be fully remodeled into a genuine theory.

Dodonpachi, the cult bullet hell from ‘97 didn’t invent the shmup wheel by any means, but it improved on it massively, to the point that the symbol of the game, a quirked up bee, slowly became a cult icon for gaming as a whole. Taking direct inspiration from what it worked previously from games beloved by the recently formed STG fans, it abstracted what worked from games made by Toaplan and Raizing, to produce what some consider to be one of the most important titles to the genre of all time. One of the areas in which Dodonpachi is really memorable, is the story which it tells, mostly because you are treated with no explanations ingame for what's happening until shit hits the fan. The style in which Cave would later adopt regarding exposition would improve in their subsequent titles, however the lack of questions answered in obtuse narratives was not only kept as an already established genre tradition, but was also utterly solidified as one, as the question "Why copy this part too, sir?" wasn't asked enough times.

A lot of classic 90's and 00’s shoot ‘em ups have stories that pass flashing by as remnants of a proper one, due to the nature of how arcade titles were consumed, and how expensive it was to produce cutscenes, usually being reserved for openings made solely to attract new players. What is happening to the characters during the screen flashes of ESP Ra.De? Who are they fighting for in Progear? What do Ikaruga passages between levels tell me about the world? Even games that try to be more in your face, without the previously established archaic arcade limitations, that uphold proper dialogue such as Zero Ranger, Radiant Silvergun and the Touhou series, still give a sensation that something you can’t quite point out is missing whenever you think about the grand scheme of things, almost as if you joined a movie in the second half. The narrative of a classic shmup game are most of the time just the aesthetics, and that's not necessarily bad.

By being exposed to small glimpses of the situation your character finds themselves in, only the pastiche of war stories such as Aces High or Secret Invasion, and other heroic warfare tales being told by shonen anime lenses, remain. In the end it wouldn’t make much of a difference, would it? Your very nature as a player of just assuming the position of an underwhelmingly small war machine, bravely dismantling a whole army just by yourself, requires no explanations, instead just being relegated to something similar as the climax of a mindless yet amazingly produced power fantasy movie. Of course, not all games need to have complex stories (or stories at all), but it makes me wonder if this was a deliberate artistic choice or one made to maximize profit. I believe this unpronounceable title to be the first legitimate subversive shmup story, but to properly explain that let’s talk first about this genre's conventions.

Both in game and in the menus, your eyes will be assaulted by 28 different symbols that substitute not only our usual aramaic alphabet, but our precious arabic numbers as well. Trying to understand what’s happening in the game might seem like an easy task at first if you ignore the dialogue, however eventually you’ll notice that the alien appearance of the game also extends to the way your trusty weapon works. You only have 2 buttons besides the one that pauses, one for shooting and one for switching weapons, which I’ll be calling the cross arrangement since it has no official name and because I think it sounds cool (also because until you master it, you better pray for it).

The way the cross arrangement works is that you’ll spend approximately half a second without shooting and the last input in which you pressed (moving, shooting or even doing nothing at all) will change your shooting pattern, from wide, to more focused, aimed backwards, X shaped, auto guiding… and so on. Early on you have 4 patterns to which you can transition easily, however you can find up to 24 more by shooting on the screen in some specific areas to unlock way more, expanding in your options. Ranging from a curse and a blessing, you might panic sometimes not knowing to which pattern you can transition from. It’s a very unique sensation that I felt during a desperate struggle to maintain control of my own weapons, in an increasingly difficult double edged overly complicated system.

There is a menu dedicated to leveling up, however because you can’t interpret what’s on screen, it’s a question of trying to decipher how far off from getting an upgrade you are. Even worse, if you gather points by playing solely the last levels, the algorithm doesn’t bend back to upgrade your early necessities, in an incredibly bizarre way that feels like you can only buy such upgrades if you have enough money, but not too much in your wallet. Applying and understanding how each and everyone works (except the obligatory life upgrade), is another challenge in itself, even after beating the game 2 times to make this review, I still don’t properly understand what they do. Googling for help the day before was hilarious, because not only I was trying to understand a really cryptic and specific tool in the game, but also I couldn’t find a way to look for the title’s name itself, as just searching ‘_____’ showed me results similar to the peculiar I’m Feeling Lucky button.

The way in which the story is told is not exactly what you think it is from such an offbeat shoot ‘em up. Riding through different planets with small transitions only to fight against seemingly similar enemies from the ones before, just to encounter a rival that fights using your own moves while speaking complete gibberish, is something that feels oddly familiar, even if you can’t point out a specific title that does it. The alienation to which we have been exposed to STG narratives existed even in its infancy in the 80’s, when it was filled to the brim with nonspecific all-encompassing space odysseys, striking back once again with added relatively modern shmup anime lenses from the 90’s and 00’s laid back game design choices of continuing in a multitude of ways, to the mix. The proper ending of the game made it all worth it, explaining not only the stylistic choices found in this peculiar galaxy adventure, but also the very nature of this game release, which I won’t spoil because I think it is particularly genius. Consider this a challenge to beat the game, for everyone who’s reading.

For a title to have such a unique and hard way to find, it sure was made by a studio that covers itself with unusual stylistic choices aimed directly at those who end up stumbling on the title, like someone who just found out a secret pile of gold. Just to give some small context about Platine Dispositif, they had a game vanish from Steam, in which you had to unlock the ability to walk. Obscurity by choice in a game that plays itself as being an abstracted version of repeating the genre’s usual staples while still carrying purposefully unfamiliar visuals and mechanics that forces you to abstract the genre’s conventions on your own, is what some may call ‘art’. Being inventive even in the way in which it was released, as to having such a name that the only video I could find about it attached a "?" to the game’s title, is a very unfamiliar sensation in the medium of video games. From a regurgitating genre full of familiar sameness, this unpronounceable title shines, in the bottom of everyone’s obscure radar, as a certified shmup ultra obscure classic.

Now, pray and tell me oh local Backloggd user.

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I so desperately want to give this a 3 and a half star rating, but I can’t. It may be a good step in some ways, but it’s so regressive in others. The animations and visuals and physics? They’re all there, and the game is a joy to control and look at. The new emerald powers are neat and on the fly, and can sync pretty nicely with level design. The first 7 zones and Frozen Base are actively very fun, but there’s a caveat. It should never be 60 dollars for this game, especially with its issues. Boss design is terrible. Whether it’s long I-Frames which, while I understand them in a multiplayer context, do not belong in single player, or extremely long patterns to simply get a hit in, that is present here, and to a worse extent than it is in other games guilty of this, like Rush and 4 Episode 2. This hits a crescendo with the Golden Capital and Egg Fortress bosses, being about 5 minutes long a piece with no checkpoints and filled with attacks that can blindside you. Level quality also just, takes a big hit after Press Factory. Golden Capital is absolutely a fine zone, but it’s another pinball zone and thus, doesn’t feel unique. Cyber Station, however, is just bad. Be it through pace breaking gimmicks like the squid game and mouse sections, or circuits dropping frames when you exit them, which seems to be intentional, it sucks. Frozen Base’s Phantasy Zone homage is a bit jarring, but mercifully benign and short. Egg Fortress is a fine zone on paper, but there are clear collision issues here that led to me being crushed when I wouldn’t have been. I really enjoyed it until it fell off, in spite of the bosses, though. Soundtrack wise, I’m going to echo the same complaints as everyone. There are good, great songs here, even if there’s less cohesion between act 1 and 2 themes than I would like. However, Jun Sunoe’s tracks are mostly abominable. They’re fine compositions, but use horrible fake Genesis synth and drum instrumentation that’s actively hard on the ears. For example, Speed Jungle’s Sonic act has a genuinely excellent song! You’re not going to hear it though, because Fang’s theme, a horribly synth infested track, interrupts it regularly. Perhaps worst is that when I went to configure the game’s sound, as I do when I get any new game as I’m audio-sensitive, I got blasted by the menu theme, which sounds like a Sega Genesis panting for help. So that was great. It’s a shame that the only track to use this instrumentation well is Sky Temple Zone. Otherwise, it’s other composers doing the heavy lifting, and admittedly producing some bangers. Listen to Speed Jungle Act 1, for example. Tee Lopes has still got it. I’m glad to see a character like Fang return, but I’m sad it’s done with such a bad boss fight and theme. He deserved better. The new character, Trip, is great. You’ll never hear me say otherwise. I think she fits so naturally with the classic cast and aesthetic, and seeing Naoto Oshima design a Sonic character again after 28 years has me beaming with joy. The tragedy is, I did enjoy myself, but the boss fights and probably 1/3 of the OST make replayability feel very slim for me, and that’s a shame when Classic Sonic games ride on this. If some of the jank is patched, I’ll gladly bump this to a 3.5. My heart wants to say it’s a good time beyond the bosses and OST harming replayability, but those issues bled into the level design. I need to make it so crystal clear, I enjoyed a lot here. A simple fact is that my gripes just mounted, and the part of the game I consistently relied on as enjoyable, being level design took a hit in the last 1/3 of the game. I know to many this game is a step forward for the brand, and I get that, but I’m also tired of tolerating steps forward that are littered with flaws, like this and Frontiers. I did enjoy them, but where do we draw the line and get tired? This could have been one of the best Sonic games, and was on track to be a pretty solid 3.5-4/5 rating for me, but still lost the plot. Mania got the formula perfectly, and I swear, with some tweaks, Superstars could have too. I’ll gladly up my rating if they patch some things, but as it stands, it’s just decent, with moments of greatness and some moments of immense frustration. Don’t get this at full price. It shouldn’t have been a 60 dollar game to begin with, especially when other 2.5D retro revivals like Mega Man 11 are 30 at base and are more refined. Just wait for a sale, and maybe even updates before you buy. If nothing else, a solid formula is here, but what needs refining needs to be refined severely.