Project Starship (PS4)

For five dollars you are getting what you paid for with Panda Indie Studio's, "Project Starship". It's nothing large scale, or new-gen, but in it's flashy simplicity it harbors a surprisingly impressive replay value if you look beyond the lack of an online leaderboard. Said replay value coming in the form of high score opportunities that can be streamed for record sake. That and some easy to earn PSN trophies. With the noteworthy replay value you will also find randomized rogue-like features which will alter the experience in each of the given playthroughs making no playthrough exactly alike.

At base level Project Starship is a top-down upward auto-scrolling shmup of chunky proportions set in an Lovecraftian universe with rogue-like elements at play. A very flashy display of nonstop action filled with amateurish hand drawn art put into lightly animated pixel form. All accented by an oddly digitized voice inclusive chiptune soundtrack. It features two playable protagonists in the form of Garret, and Gwen who are each made available from the start alongside two distinct difficulty settings. These male and female astronauts who fly in their own blue and red colored spacecraft of the same build face the cosmic horrors before them as you guide them along through the lit up abyss.

Psikyo Shooting Stars Bravo (REVIEW)

Psikyo Shooting Stars Bravo puts the anime into aerial combat with six wacky wave based games centered around an unusual roster of characters. Included in this bundle is a mix and match of two well renown trilogies. Including that of Samurai Aces, and GunBird. Each sporting their own plots, settings, mythologies, and mechanics. All done up in both side-scrolling, and top-down shoot 'em up fashion. It's fast and frenetic gameplay with new optional bells and whistles to help you see each game through to the end beyond the staple quarter munching mockery, and seven different difficulty settings. If you are a fan of shmups, bullet hell, or even brick breaking of the retro kind this might just be the ultimate collection for you!

Azur Lane: Crosswave (REVIEW)

To say I was really looking forward to reviewing this game would be an understatement. I've seen images of the Azur Lane art over the years, and something about anime girls with battleship parts attached to them really seemed cool to me. Other than previously viewed character images though I never really knew what the story behind the fleet of leading ladies was. That all changed when I began playing IFI's "Azur Lane: Crosswave". Not only did the game tell the basic origin story of the girls of the four nations of the Azur Lane planet, but it also built upon said lore with a new deeply involved tale involving a new threat. It seems the girls with battleship rigs are known as Kansen, and their adversary within Crosswave, Sirens. The Kansen, which are class based ship rigged heroines who defend their own nations with an arsenal of weapons as well as special skills come face to face with the equally, or more well armed Sirens whose intentions are yet unknown. In a chance encounter during a training session orchestrated by Takao, Shimakaze and Sugura of the Sakura Empire stumble upon the invading Sirens, and their invading mass-produced fleet. Ultimately discovering new cube-like technology amid the wreckage, and a lingering question regarding the Siren's intentions.

Code Shifter (PS4)

Shifting from fighting games to fan service Arc System Works brings to us a gaming experience unlike any seen before in their gaming library. One that shows us a hands on side of game development while allowing us to tackle one of the biggest issues therein via platforming means. This game that is centered around action platforming is tied to the outside work of a fictional development crew run by a handful of studio staff members that are each experiencing bugs in their latest project. It seems a hacker or someone on the inside has infected their software with a transformative virus. In order to combat the virus, and get to the bottom of the problem a programmer by the name of Stella creates a code shifter program with an avatar named Sera that can enter the code, and correct any problems that are occurring. This is where, you the gamer, step in. You get to control Sera in avatar form as she gains help from other Arc System Works characters which she can transform into, and use as assists as she collects data crystals, breaks bug boxes, and destroys attacking viruses. This is a folder by folder or stage by stage ordeal with each of the staff's folders containing inner stages of varying difficulties that must be completed in order to unlock, and fully correct said folder's programmed content.