Deathsmiles Review

Deathsmiles from CAVE Interactive CO.,LTD studios.

The core story mode of this game is more than you expect from a videogame from this genre.
When you play shoot ‘em up videogames, what you mainly do is shoot your enemies and try to dodge all bullets in your screen. It’s usually not about the story mode in a SHMUPS videogame like Deathsmiles. Just try to survive and to get the highest score. Keep in mind that these videogames in the '80s and' of the 90s were made for players to spend money on the arcade cabinets where you could play them. Beside that point, this game has a really fun and weird story mode.

What’s fun about this is that you can make your own choice about what road you choose and this gives the story mode a small variation everytime you play it. I’ve played some shoot ‘em up videogames over the years and I really can appreciate this indie videogame, but it is short. As most casual shoot ‘em up’s are 30 or 40 minutes each round. It’s a sweet mix of arcade bullet crazy action with an anime touch to it that reminds me of Parodius and Cho Aniki. It has a lot of big variation to it because of the different game modes: story mode, time attack mode for the more advanced players and training mode for the beginners. About the graphical part, they did an amazing job because of the highly detailed art that they used for the characters and backgrounds.

You can play the story mode with multiple characters, all of these have their own special powers. Ultimately, this doesn’t affect the story but it’s fun to have some variation. Time attack mode is an option for when you are done with the story mode and you are searching for a new challenge in the game. It can be a little redundant because you play the same levels over and over again, trying to beat your own records. It’s just the same as playing with yourself.

What really appeals to me about this game is that it’s really forgiving because normally (in most arcade shoot ‘em ups games) the rule applies one hit and it's over. Because in most of these shoot ‘em ups, you will die when you hit a bullet or even sometimes touch the bottom of the stages. Compare this to other shoot ‘em ups from the ‘90s era this is easy enough to play. If you are a casual player you really need to practice a lot to beat most of them. Despite that it’s a pure arcade action videogame that can give you some variation because of the co-op mode and the different modes that it’s offering the player(s). It has some pretty simple play mechanics as you expect from a game like this. What they did in this game is that you are being attacked from the left and right side of the screen so you will need to switch and that makes it a little bit more challenging and chaotic. Overall this game is as suitable for beginners as it is for advanced players.