Bangai-O HD: Missile Fury: X360

Developer Treasure is a name unfamiliar to many, but those that recognize it knows what they're about. Over the last couple decades they've made some of the best bullet-hell shooters (shooters known for filling the screen with enemy fire) ever. For many the very words Bangai-O are enough to get you excited, as the series has consistently delivered intense and absurdly fun shooters. And you should be excited – Bangai-O HD: Missile Fury is as awesome as it is insane. Bangai-O HD is not a standard bullet hell shooter. Each level plays completely differently. The layouts vary from standard left to right designs, to closed in arenas ala Geometry Wars, to hectic close quarter fights, to vertical levels where enemies rain down.

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The levels have different objectives, though they all revolve around destroying everything in sight. The level design is great and Missile Fury plays like a very untraditional shooter. Some missions require you to use only a specific powerup or move. In one mission I had to dash into giant soccer balls to get them to ricochet into enemy robots. It was rad.

Bangai-O HD: Missile Fury is overwhelming. This is usually a good thing, but it is occasionally confusing. There's so much crazy crap on screen that at some points it's impossible to tell what's going on. On numerous occasions a coworker walked by my desk, stared at the screen and asked, "What the hell is happening?" And every time I could only respond with, "I don't know!"

Normally a game like this is something I can only recommend to the masochistic, but Bangai-O HD doesn't punish you for sucking. The game progresses linearly, requiring you to complete missions sequentially. However if you lose three times in a row, the game opens up the next level. You still get punishing difficulty, without the frustration of halted progress. And for bullet hell fans, three rounds are the right amount of tries to beat most of these levels.

In addition to the lengthy single player, every mission in Fury mode can be played cooperatively with another player either locally or over Xbox Live. There is also a level editor that allows you to create your own stages. I didn't have the patience to suffer through the unintuitive and clunky design of the editor, but the tools are there to make massive levels and share them online, which is pretty awesome for those who have the skill and patience. The previous Bangai-O inspired some incredible user made stages, many of them more fun than the game's built in levels, so I can't wait to download more this time around.

Closing Comments
Those of you that know of Bangai-O are probably already playing Bangai-O HD: Missile Fury. For the rest of you on the fence, this game works because it doesn’t restrict you, despite its intense difficulty. The co-op features can make a lot of the levels easier, and a lot more fun, too. The game is confusing, and hectic, more so than other Treasure shooters, but it's also one of the funnest bullet hell (missile hell? Laser hell? Soccer ball hell?) shoots I've ever played.

by:Jack DeVries

Posted in: Shooter