I have never really considered myself to be a shooter aficionado, however I must like them more than I think I do. Shooters are not exactly a popular category these days and companies are not exactly in a hurry to produce a lot of quality 2D blast-a-thons for the dedicated fan. Basically, when a classic style shooter actually makes it to the shelves, generally it's going to be pretty decent. It isn't like the early 80's where damn near everything was a shooter and most games sucked.

The year is 2004 and Irem is seemingly giving the venerable R-Type series a final farewell with the release of R-Type Final for the PS2. Whether this is indeed the last game remains to be seen but fans of the series deserve to play at least one last time. Thankfully, Irem did not disappoint.

Keep in mind that a classic shooter is a different type of game. They definitely are a throw back to the earlier days of gaming which spawned the genre. Twitch reflexed and pattern recognition are always the order of the day with some powerups and flashy effects as the side dishes. Shooters have traditionally been a little on the lean side for home conversions. The roots of the genre are in arcade games like Defender which used to pride itself in the fact that a single quarter would last mere seconds. Irem has given us a lot of reasons to come back and play aside from just trying to beat your high scores on a harder setting. Not only do we find branching levels and hidden courses, but we also steadily unlock a slew of new ships to use in combat totalling around 100. However, at the end of the day, the basic gameplay is still classic shooter all the way which will put off a lot of the typical gaming crowd.

Graphically, R-Type Final is not going to win any awards as the best looking game of the year. While the core gameplay is, in fact, 2D, the graphic engine is pumping out enough polygons to keep anyone happy. The enemy and ship designs are generally pretty nice. The baddies in the game tend to have a very techno-organic feel to them which will be instantly familiar to fans of the series. Throw in a couple mechs with jet packs and guns and we have ourselves plenty of great stuff to blast away at. Level designs were also nice and varied. One level may have you fighting over a crowded city complete with street traffic while another level late in the game seems like you are battling in cyberspace. Since there are a slew of levels to unlock and different conditions to get to them, chances are you will see some different things for a while when playing R-Type Final.

Overall, I liked the level designs, however I have a big problem when developers smear a big wavy filter effect over everything for a while level. If you thought the final boss fight of DoA3 was annoying, wait till you see the one level in R-Type Final. Yuck! Other then that, the graphics were fine. You even have the ability to customize the look of your ship by selecting the color scheme and such. It's a nice little bonus. Another nice surprise in the graphics department was the abundance of liquid effects in the game. Some levels let you dip under water and some battles have you completely submerged. One level has a really nice ripple effect as you guide your ship around that has to be scene to be appreciated. A lot of time people keep 2D shooters reasonably simple when it comes to effects such as reactionary liquids so it was surprising to see it here. The end result is an overall eye pleasing experience.

I wish I could say the same for the music though. The sounds are decent with plenty of explosions, laser and other assorted shooter staples, however the music could have easily used some more work. It isn't terrible really, but it's easily forgettable which is a shame. A lot of classic shooter have excellent, adrenaline pumping soundtracks which really get you into the game. Hell, I bought a special deluxe import edition of Thunder Force V on the Saturn just because it came with a soundtrack CD. I'd describe the overall soundtrack as 'ambient.' It is there, it's in the background and that is about it. The end of the game bursts through with a jarring at first song from the Blue Man Group. While the song does feel like it could fit the game, it just sounds a lot different than anything else in the game. Again, not a bad thing since most of the tracks were lackluster, but it's just odd considering this was only done for the US version of the game. I'm not sure why Eidos decided to make the change or license a song for a budget priced title. Perhaps the original Japanese track for the credits was just THAT putrid that they had to change it?

Soundtrack aside, the meat of the gameplay was excellent. In the basic R-Type game, you have two major focuses of the gameplay. 1) The charge shot and 2) the 'Force' orb which can absorb bullets, fire independently from your ship for some ranged attack in addition to attaching to either the front or back of your ship for extra firepower. In addition to the main features, you can also pick up 'bits' which are two mini orbs which give you a slight boost in either offensive or defensive power and missiles/bombs which we have seen in tons of side scrolling shooters before. The charge beam adds a lot of strategy into the gameplay since you can opt to charge up your beam while dodging fire in order to deliver one powerful shot or just pepper the Bydo empire a zillion shots while maneuvering through the waves of attackers. I love the charge beam though, it's like having a little mini "Wave Motion Cannon" from the old Star Blazers cartoon... and who doesn't like that!? The Force strategy also comes into play constantly since the positioning of the orb is generally key to surviving most engagements in the game. All in all, the game will give your thumbs a workout which is a plus for any good shooter.

One thing I noticed, though, was that R-Type Final seemed to slow down a little excessively at times. Now I know that forced slowdown is part of any decent shooter, but sometimes it happened when it didn't really need to. When the action slows down, the game shouldn't crawl. The most glaring example is when you were fighting a giant craft over a city scape. While the level is very well done and fun to play, I suppose they threw some extra slowdown in to make the ship seem really hulking and gigantic. It just didn't seem necessary to me and slowed down the pace a little too much. That isn't something that I should ever see in a shooter.

The gameplay modes and unlockable in R-Type Final are pretty impressive, especially for a shooter. Not only do you have over 100 ships to unlock, but there are branching levels, multiple endings, art galleries, ship museums, score competitions, and a very slick Tutorial mode to help out novice players or those of us who need a refresher course. The ship collecting is where a lot of people will lose their time. It's actually worth it to collect the different ships since most of them play very differently from each other. You have the basics such as ships which are more offensive than defensive but you also have subtle differences such as the powered up wave shot and force shots which the ships can have. Picking the right ship for the right level can really make your game a lot easier.

At the end of the day, R-Type Final is a classic style shooter. People who hate the genre are not going to all of the sudden love shooters because of this title. This is a game for the fans and I hope the fans realize this and pick the game up, showing developers that it's ok to kick out a couple shooters every once in a while. I can't play shooters all of the time like I used to back in the day, but it's been a while since Ikaruga brutalized us so R-Type Final scratched the itch nicely. If this is indeed the last we will see of R-Type, then I'd like to thank Irem for making the series go out with dignity. R-Type Final is a fine shooter that should keep any fan of the genre happy for a while.