John Zeitler

So, Deathsmiles. Let’s set aside the whole “Aksys is populated entirely by highly motivated perverts” thing for a moment and look at the gameplay first. DS presents itself as a fairly straightforward danmaku shooter, which is to say that you’re going to find the screen filled with about seventeen zillion lethal bullets by around the third stage. However, like most bullet-hell shooters these days, the game provides unlimited credits, so seeing the endings is mostly a matter of patience, and the skill comes in gaining score; an antiquated notion, to be sure, but I’ve always liked having personal challenges like that. While nominally a side-scrolling shooter along the lines of Gradius or R-Type, DS switches things up a bit by allowing you to shoot either left or right (but only one at a time– they’re mapped to different buttons) and by scrolling the screen vertically or in a zig-zag pattern. The game doesn’t feel cheap or unfair– most bullet patterns have an obvious or non-obvious path, and when they intersect the character’s hitbox– her heart– can usually take a light grazing. The scoring system is based on collecting items dropped from certain fallen foes, and by using the familiar (an option-like firing drone) to convert certain types of bullets into those scoring targets. Once that count reaches a maximum of 1000, shooting down foes provides massively-valued targets which also deal in a multiplier. Taking damage will force you to sacrifice a percentage of your count, while getting shot down yourself will reset it all to zero. The enemies are fairly varied as well, and the bosses are sufficiently big and menacing, and with suitably ridiculous attack patterns to evade. Overall if you decide to go through it with all five characters you’re looking at maybe eight to ten hours tops (there’s achievements for choosing either option during the ending).

As for the characters… I’ll be honest, I’m not all that into EGL. I do find that, when it’s executed well, it’s quite visually appealing (after all, I am a male and I am breathing, so of course I’m going to get a little excitable around well-dressed ladies). Obviously the youth thing (and that, y’know, they’re not real) makes it more of an aesthetic attraction and strictly platonic, but it’s not exactly a secret that the character designs are not made with that sort of thing in mind. There’s a very, very fine line between coquettish and co– er, ahem, deceptively provocative, and the girls of Deathsmiles are all over the map in that regard. I don’t want to turn this into a discussion on whether or not the phenomenon of moe is inherently good or bad (it’s all art to me, and the merit of art is all in how one reacts to the emotions it stirs), but from playing through the story mode, it’s sort of obvious that these girls could be dressed in pretty much anything and the plot could remain unchanged. Ultimately the EGL thing is just another facet of the game’s aesthetic, and while it’s fairly well-executed here (sometimes), it’s mostly just window-dressing and completely unrelated to the fantastic gameplay.

But there is no way in hell that I will put that faceplate on my 360.