Xenoblast

Rapid-Fire Galaga-Style Shmup with a Techno Score

French developer Parallax Factory is devoted to bringing retro gameplay to the modern age, and with Xenoblast (the successor to their earlier XNeo) they succeed admirably.

Innovations in gameplay? Well, no, not really; this is a straightforward smup with aliens attacking from the top of the screen, but with your ship moving in four directions. Ten large levels, 25 different enemy ship types, a boss at the end of each level. Pretty standard shmup fare, but nicely and attractive executed.

What's different about the game? Well, like XNeo, it features adaptive difficulty--meaning that if you suck, the game gets easier, while if you have mad l33t sk1llz, the difficulty ramps up. The net effect is that virtually anyone can "get in the zone" in this game and keep going.

Additionally, the Parallax folks are tres branché (i.e., way hipper than we are), and the fast techno score makes you want to get up and dance, albeit it's going to be hard to keep your hands on the keyboard if you do. And you can play it multiplayer--not over the net, but with two hands on opposite sides of the keyboard, or even with four players connected via game controllers, if you've got such for your PC.

The Developer Says

Like shoot'em ups ?

This new Parallax Factory creation takes place in space. Adaptive difficulty will keep the challenge at your level every time you play. Play it alone or with 3 friends. It handles 4 game pads, 2 on the keyboard, or with the mouse, your choice. This game is the second of our series of shoot'em ups (shmups) for the fans, and thanks to our player profiling, for a less hardcore audience.

This is a qualitative leap from XNeo. This game really rocks...

Feature 10 unique environments, more than 30 enemies, and hours of fun...