Otomedius Excellent (XBOX 360 Review)

[Sturmvogel Prime]

This is the third and last installment of the Otomedius series, and the only one released in the United States, unlike the Parodius games where the Gradius series are heavily spoofed, the Otomedius series takes the style to a atmosphere more reminiscent of Bike Banditz combined with a slight touch of Mecha-musume and magic-girls. But enough talk, let's go to the review and to quote Shamrock from Ace Combat 6 "I know it's dangerous, but it's time for me to dance with the angels!"

To begin with, i see the game name was unchanged in the US release, but for those who doesn't know why they've called it "Otomedius", the name is a word play between the japanese word "Otome" which means "Maiden" and the "dius" obviously comes from the Gradius series, but it was good they keeped the original name, i guess "Maidendius Excellent" doesn't sound good. But anyway, let's talk about the gameplay. I'll be unable to talk about the Multiplayer since i don't have Live Arcade service, so let's talk about the Story Mode, and let me tell you, this time i saw a well made Story Mode. Remember how i heavily criticized Triggerheart Exelica Enhanced due to its in-game interruptions?, well in Otomedius Excellent, this doesn't happen, your character, the bosses and Operetta can talk the whole game without pausing the gample for say something, it's kinda like the radio chatter in Airforce Delta Strike and the Ace Combat series but its good to see how well this can work in shmups, the radio chatter in Silpheed: The Lost Planet was a functional example of it.

The weapon array can be customized right after you choose your character, although they have unique weapons like the "Diagonal aiming" Options of Tita Nium, or Madoka's Bee-Unit, you can change the weapons you want to use for their missiles, double and laser. Like in Gradius V, there's no shield variety in this game (you know, choose between Reduce, Rolling Shield, etc), also not all the characters have the same "Speed-Missile-Double-Laser-Option-?" formation, example "S-L-O-D-M-?" this could be confusing the first time but its nothing you can't handle. Speaking of weapons, remember how strong was your normal bullets in Gradius V?, well, your bullets are the weakest weapon of your arsenal like in the old games, and also you can't shoot 4 bullets in a row, so now you're back to the 2 shots in a row, which it makes you vulnerable. But there's more weapons designed to help you during your combat against Dark Force, you have a "Bomb" like sub-weapon called Burst, this item can help you in desperate times, also the Burst Card item can only be located in some secret places, like in Stage 3. But the "Burst" isn't just your only special attack in the game, if you press and hold the Burst button you'll fire an alternate charge attack called "Platonic Break", which works more like an offensive attack, unlike the Burst which is more of a defensive type. Also, the Platonic Break doesn't consume your "Burst Cards", but it doesn't destroy the enemy's bullets.
Your weapons can be powered up if you have unlocked a "Lv. 2" or "Lv. 3" version of them, but there's a little problem: the weapon Power-up is just temporary, to give you an idea of how bad was that do you remember how your fully powered-up shots in Aero Fighters 2 were downgraded after a brief time?, here it's pretty much the same, but you'll notice it as a "white lined" timer around the "Hexagon" where the powered-up item is.
If you get hit you don't lose your options, they just split off so you can pick them up again, just like in Salamander and Gradius V.
When you die and continue you'll lose your score and it'll be reseted to 1 point like in a Capcom game (19XX: The War Against Destiny for example), and either if you die or beat the game on any game mode, you can earn experience points to Level up your character from "Angels" to "Archangels" to "Principalities" in your "Order" status which is a ranking system, like an RPG. The more you play, the more experience points you will earn, and your level goes up. This think is good only for the achievements, also when you get a high order like "Dominions" you can obtain a Weapon Card (example: Reaching the "Dominions" status with Diol Twee/Serenity Viper gives you a 7-Step Speed Up Card). Each Rank has 5 levels before advancing to the next one.

Here's the Order Ranks: Angels > Archangels > Principalities > Powers > Virtues > Dominions > Thrones > Cherubim > Seraphim > Adam Kadmon

The "Score Attack" Mode is like the "Instant Action" version of the game, because you don't have to pass through the opening animation of the stage, although most of the Story Mode dialogues are still there, but that's not the main part of this mode. Unlike the Expert level in Story Mode, you only play 7 stages and then the game will loop over and over again but more harder as you progress through the game. Also your weapons will be reseted when you start the next loop, which means trouble when you're on the third or fourth loop because as soon as you begin the enemies will drop bullets as soon as you hit them, along with the traditional difficulty increasing bullet hell, so having a shield will be a life or death priority, specially when this game mode doesn't have continues, lose your lives and that's all. This mode is good not just for reach the 10 million point "Top Gun" achievement, it's also useful for a fast level up in the Order Rank.

Another thing to criticize is the loading times, even for enter the Main Menu takes like 20 seconds, i know the XBOX360 games are DVD's but i saw games with faster loading times (Ace Combat 6 for example), so there's no excuse.

Graphically, the game is better than its predecessors, Konami's decision of hiring the anime artist Mine Yoshizaki (Keroro Gunsou, Mobile Suit Gundam 0079 Card Builder) was a good idea, when i mentioned Bike Banditz at the beginning of the review, i said it because of the Ride Viper idea, it might look like some Mecha-musume armor, but actually is like a flying bike, that's where the game reminded me of Bike Banditz, along with the detail that the girls have a "Mahou Shoujo" (Magical Girl) like change when they put their "G Costumes", this can be seen in the game opening.

Something that i saw of the US version is the fact that was released "Uncensored and Unedited", the head patting and breast touching feature in the character select screen is there, so there's no "Family Friendly" censorship, the opening and ending themes are unchanged, so the animated introduction, the only difference is the translated text and lyrics in the game themes. Yep, the japanese voices are there, something quite unusual on the US releases.

The music it may not sound too much like Gradius, but there's some tracks like the Old Big Core theme and the "Ball-like" Core in stage 6, as for the rest of the music, there's tunes that fit quite well with the stages like a summer/beach beat in stage 1, but it still have an action filled rhythm that makes it fit right with the game, or the jungle themed music in stage 4, adding a balance to the music department. During the Opening animation you'll hear the song "Fly" and for the Ending theme you'll hear a song called "Otometic". The vocals were made by the seiyuu's who voiced the characters from the game.
The Game Over tune it might be the funniest one in video game history, because it doesn't sound like if you failed or something, it sounds more like a "see you later" kind of thing.

The replay value is (in my opinion) hanging on by a thread, first, most of the characters are already available and ready to play: Aoba, Erul, Madoka, Diol, Tita, Arnval and Gesshi. After years of gaming i've realized that if you want to play with more characters you have to unlock them, again let's compare that with Ace Combat 6, you start with the F-16, but you can unlock more jets (and weapons) as you progress in the game. In Otomedius Excellent, there's 3 unlockable characters (Aoba Anoa Hyper, Esmeralda and Poini Coon), but there's other 2 that are unlocked via XBOX Marketplace (Strarf and Kokoro Belmont), along with more weapons, upgrades and different outfits, it could be a nice idea, but i still prefer the good old "Beat the game to unlock it" format. There's more unlockable stuff like the Gallery which helps a little in the replay value, also the "Controls" of the gallery are very similar to those of the "CG Viewer" of the Digital Viewer option in Thunder Force V: Perfect System, you can zoom in, zoom out and scroll the pic.

UPDATE: I've got an update for this review, and it's about the instruction manual. Unlike those good old booklets with plenty of pages and colorful screenshots and artwork, this game's manual only has 5 pages, yeah. Just five pages, 1 for the story and contents, one for the controls, starting the game, game modes and warranty. Then it repeats in french and later on spanish. That's only 15 pages of an instruction booklet, and the artwork?, it's only monochrome (black and white), and the artwork really scarce, only a chibi Operetta on the "story" page and Aoba and Gesshi on the upper part of each page, only the front and back cover of the manual are colored. As i said before it could be much better, comparing this with a videogame manual from the 90's, but apparently it seems like manuals are no longer made like before.

Pro's
- The US version is "Uncensored"
- Customizable weaponry
- Good variety of characters
- Burst Attack, a very useful item that helps you
- Platonic Break "Charge Attack"
- Well developed, "Non-stopping" Story Mode
- Ambient-fitting music that goes with the theme of the stage
- Anime-style artwork by Mine Yoshizaki

Con's
- Long Loading Times, even for go back to the Main Menu
- Most characters are already playable
- Strarf and Kokoro Belmont are downloadable characters
- Some Weapon Cards and outfits are download exclusive
- Temporary Power Up
- Burst Attack items are quite hard to find
- Default bullets are weaker like in the old Gradius games
- Booklet design could be better

Curiosities
- Arnval and Strarf are characters from Busou Shinki, a mecha-musume figure toyline made by Konami.
- Hikaru and Akane, the rocket riding bunnygirls from the Parodius series re-appear as Ruby and Cobalt in Stage 6
- The Heaven's Gate pilot Shiori Fujisaki is a character from the Tokimeki Memorial series of sim-date games.
- Gesshi Hanafuuma's Ride Viper "Hadouken" is based on Axelay, the ship from the SNES game of the same name.
- Ryukotsuki is based on Ryukoki, the Devil Dragon from Getsu Fuuma Den, a japanese Famicom game.

Despite of its minor flaws, this is a pretty good game, a nice combination of shmup action, good ol' Gradius gameplay and some laughs along the game's story. Another must have for your collection.