Thunder Force VI (PS2)

[Sturmvogel Prime]

Bad sequels are common everywhere: movies, cartoons, games, etc. If the word "Black Sheep" could be applied in shmups, then Thunder Force VI is the Black Sheep of Technosoft's franchise, i just can't believe what Sega did with this game.

Why is this disgrace a Vasteel-spawned letdown of Thundering Proportions?, check this review:

Gameplay: 4/10
The first thing is the difficulty settings, unlike other games where the difficulty doesn't affect the number of continues, here each difficulty has a limited number of continues, the hard difficulty has barely enough continues for beat the game and Maniac only has one continue, making the idea of beating the game something "Next to Impossible".
You can also change the number of lives but guess what?, if you have more than 3 lives you can't put your name in the high scores, same if you continue, that's a cruel punishment with inhuman restrictions.
Let's go with the game, like in Thunder Force V, you can select in which stage to start, then you'll be sent to the game (if you don't have any unlocked ships) and this is where the real crap begins, to begin with you have all your weapons and your CRAWs as well, and if you're killed you'll not lose it, so where's the challenge in that?,well that only happens when you play with Phoenix and Syrinx.
If the weapon thing was bad, the Over Weapon is just the worst thing in this game, check why.
First: The Over Weapon system is different from Thunder Force V, it doesn't depend of your CRAWs, so the CRAWs are just Power-Ups for your firepower like the Options in Gradius.
Second: You can't use it in a "controlled" blast, so like in Broken Thunder, you are forced to a Full Blast.
Third: If in Broken Thunder the Over Weapon was turned into a Bomb-like format, here it's basically your Bomb, and the only way for refill it is grabbing green "Energy Cells", a total rip-off of the Newalone particles from Metal Black, i think this game needs a Black Fly instead of an RVR.
And the Mother of all the problems: Everytime you use your Over Weapon, your ship is forced to reduce the speed to 25%, making you vulnerable 99% of the times when you use it, what kind of stupid idea was that, in Thunder Force IV, the Thundersword pushes you back, in TFV the Over Weapon worked fine and functional and here your special attack makes you a "Sitting Duck" instead of help you.
Another thing that really sucks about this game is the lack of a Brigandine stage, during the Opening sequence you can see the Phoenix using a Brigandine, but it's not playable, Come on Sega, that was the cool thing on Thunder Force how you can miss that!?


Graphics: 7/10
The graphic department could be the best part of the game, the opening movie is quite good, there's a lot of references to the previous games, as well some new and original ideas like using Tangut script for the Galaxy Federation and Mongolian terms for the ORN empire, the stage design is just amazing, but the ship designs are barely recognizable as RVR's or Fire LEOs, Rynex-R looks like a fusion between Styx from Thunder Force III and the Peplos from Blazing Star, the RVR-00 Phoenix doesn't look like the RVR-01 or the RVR-02, it looks like a mix between Phalanx and Axelay, the only Thunder Force like ship is the Syrinx which looks more like a "RVR-01 Gauntlet Mark II" of some sorts.
If the ship design was bad, the boss design is even worse, Gargoyle Perfect looks like a homage to Gargoyle Diver from TF IV, but when its full bodied it looks more like a rip-off of a Zoid or the Quantasaurus Rex from Power Rangers Time Force (Did Ransick worked for the ORN empire, i don't know?), Cherub Purple looks more like a Pokemon, B3 (Barbaric Berserk Beast) is a Triplechanger Transformer (ORN Empire, More Than Meets The Eye!), Flame Maiden really looks like a successor of Iron Maiden, and Vasteel Nocht is another good one, a homage to the previous Thunder Force ships: Styx, Rynex and Gauntlet (i expected to see more ships like Exceliza and Vambrace), but the worst boss design is the final boss: The ORN Emperor, before telling you take a guess of how it looks like.

a) A Giant Battleship
b) A Super Computer
c) A "Digital" Alien like Khaos Ascendant from Thunder Force V

Anyone of this options would be great, but unfortunately, the ORN Emperor is a three form letdown, first it starts as an embryo freak like Brawshella from Blazing Star or the Zentraedi fetus from Macross Scrambled Valkyrie, then it becames a flying three eyed monster that doesn't look like a Thunder Force boss, instead it looks more like a rejected freak of Contra Shattered Soldier, then it becames a gory giant head with 4 legs and that's it. Fighting a boss like this will be like if in Super Mario World you have to fight against Ver'mith Ennda instead of Bowser.


Music: 4/10
There's some people who loved the music of this game and others who don't, and i'm of them, if you heard the music of Thunder Force V you'll be really disappointed, since Tsukumo Hyakutaro didn't composed for this game, Sega hired various composers like Tamayo Kawamoto, Motoaki Furukawa and Go Sato, they're good in their own games but unfortunately they don't have what it takes for Thunder Force, if this game have "Good" songs, they're the songs used on the Vasteel Nocht boss, which are remakes of the openings of the previous Thunder Force games, so goodbye possibilities of hear "Rising Blue Lightning" or "Steel of Destiny".
The Opening theme was composed by BETTA FLASH, a choral song for Thunder Force, if the song was more like in Darius Gaiden i would forgive it, but a calmed choral song that sounds more like Zone Of the Enders or Neon Genesis Evangelion, i don't think so. So once again we have another non-fitting song on a shmup, and that was 6 months before Ayane's "Gravity Error" in Triggerheart Exelica Enhanced.


Replay Value: 6/10
The game has some Replay Value, but not as much as TF V, the game has a Time Attack and a Neo Mode, let's talk about the Time Attack, in this mode you can't select which boss you wanna fight first, you can select your ship and go directly to the game, once you begin, the game is basically the same as your normal game you only have 3 lives, unlike in TF V where you can die as much as you can pay the "-15 seconds penalty" and start with a shield.
The Neo Mode is basically the same game, the only difference is the Over Weapon can't destroy the bullets
You can also unlock the Rynex-R and the Syrinx ships, along with "Reports", yeah your reward for beating the game are just text files, there's no CG Gallery like in TF V, and that was a nice feature, so the Replay Value in this game ends up hanging on a thread.
There's no gallery in the game, but you can change the background image on the Main Menu, just exit to the title and enter again, exactly like the Dreamcast version of Triggerheart Exelica.


Pro's
- 2 Unlockable Ships.
- 2 Extra Game Modes.
- You can increase the Overweapon Power.
- You can select your starting stage.

Con's
- No Brigandine stage.
- Keep the weapons if you die.
- Gameplay is a Metal Black rip-off (That green things are the "Newalone" equivalents)
- Speed Slowdown when you use the Over Weapon.
- Free Range is not the same as in Thunder Force V.
- Music is a letdown.
- Boss Design is a letdown.
- No unlockable gallery.
- Lives and Continue Restrictions for Rank In.
- Time Attack went through unnecesary changes.


Errors and Curiosities
- The designation number of the Phoenix is way too wrong, it should be RVR-03 instead of RVR-00, calling it "00" sounds more like a prototype before Gauntlet instead of being a successor of the RVR-02 Vambrace.
- How do the ORN Empire known about the existence of the RVR-01 Gauntlet?, it demands an explanation.
- Syrinx is not a Fire LEO or an RVR, since this ship is the result of the merge between Phoenix and ORN Faust core after the fight with Vasteel Nocht.
- Speaking about Vasteel, how the ORN Empire known the existance of the word "Vasteel", that was the Earth name for Rynex, a name like Orn LEO would be more appropiate.
- In the official Site, Rynex-R's designation number is Fire LEO-04 Kai, instead of Fire LEO-04C
- The reason of why the ORN Emperor doesn't look like a TF boss is because it was a character from the manga Yokozuna Dai Shacho made by Zolge Ichizo (the Director of this game), the manga is non-related with TF VI. Ichizo made the whole game as a publicity stunt for himself (and personal satisfaction), in other words, this game is a Commercial mention for a japanese manga author, THAT'S AN INSULT FOR THE GAMERS!


Conclusions
A mediocre attempt of a Thunder Force sequel, i guess they should call it How Thunder Force VI Should Not Be, because that's what it is, an example of how NOT make a game: Publicity Stunt for an author, bad music, horrible gameplay, etc. The best thing that i can do is consider Thunder Force V as the last entry of the series, and leave this one as one of the worst mistakes on shmup and videogame history.


Thunder Force VI's Final Score: 5/10