BIRDCAGE - Normal S-Rank No-Damage 1CC - 437,589,593 Pts (Halcyon)

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BIRDCAGE is a new and highly artisanally crafted indie shmup with the presentation of old Treasure and an aesthetic that evokes old Metal Gear Solid.
It's a really fantastic and unique audiovisual flair that's very aesthetically pleasing, it's also really cool to see a new shmup in like a Saturn/PSX visual style for a change.

The gameplay loop has a great emphasis on sword play.
Sword does more damage, gives more score and also cancels some bullets. You can aim it in any direction, but unlike a certain Radiant Silvergun, you can also throw it.
You're kinda expected to use the right analog stick to aim the sword, but it works perfectly fine without it. The recommended control scheme gives you some auto-aim and that's all you really need.

The game opts to have a Story Mode and an Arcade Mode.
In Story mode you get a bunch of cutscenes, flavor text and optional Codec calls.
Bafflingly though, these Codec calls happen literally in the middle of dodging bullets. They pause the game and cover up the screen, and you're likely to immediately crash into a bullet as soon as the dialogue ends. It's like the worst possible way this could have been implemented and it's very bizarre. Arcade mode basically strips the game of all these story elements, but it kinda hurts the presentation.
Both options are like extreme opposites. Personally I would have liked to see more of a balance of both. Integrating non-intrusive story elements into an arcade shmup without compromising gameplay is not impossible, just look at Aka to Blue or Flying Red Barrel. Story stuff could happen on the sides of the screen during play, there is plenty of room there after all.

Midbosses drop a ring of powerups, however unlike Cho Ren Sha 68K, you can only pick one. These are:
An Extra Life.
Repair one HP hit (or get a single-hit shield if max).
Bonus points (lives give more score, so this seems NEVER worth it???)

What's pretty unique here is the global stage timer.
You get a set amount of time to beat a stage, and the next enemy wave spawns as soon as you kill the previous one. It's like a reverse Caravan style where instead of spawning bonus waves for speedkilling you just end up beating the stage faster. You basically have to choose what to milk and for how long. I guess this might also facilitate speedruns alongside scoreplay?

The scoring system is a little silly.
On paper it seems fine, you get more points for sword kills, you can keep up a combo of enemy kills and bullet cancels give score items, there are even some secrets to find.
The catch however, is that you're dealing with the dreaded GAME-LONG CHAINING™.
It's not too bad though, since chaining itself is a non-issue and a shield can eat a hit without breaking the chain. Since every midboss can drop a shield, it's more like you're allowed 1 hit per stage.
The problem is more that score items are so lob-sided towards the end of the game, that in practice you just get 70% of your score from the last two bosses alone if you bring a full-chain there, making that the only thing that really matters.

I never actually figured out what's going on with sword kills from enemies.
Sometimes I get lots of medals, sometimes only three, and sometimes nothing at all.

The hitboxes can be a little suspect, there were some moments where I got hit where I feel like I really shouldn't have gotten hit.

The game is very cool, the presentation is awesome, you can have lots of fun with the various setpieces and mechanics, but ultimately it doesn't quite match the dense and satisfying level design and mechanical complexity of some of the more popular titels it draws inspiration from.
Part of it is also that it could use more variety. Patterns and enemy formations get repeated _a lot_. Like most of the final boss is just the previous bosses again, it's _lame_. The boss of stage 5 is also just two midbosses at once, like what are we doing here.
Game feels very much like a doujin game. It lacks a little of the polish and budget needed to make it truly great, and suffers from some really baffling design decisions. Clearly this needs an Exa Arcadia remake to bring out its full potential, like with Earthion.

Like make chaining stage-based but bullets cancelled from hypers add to the combo as well. Make grazing increase your hyper meter. I dunno.
Also it's wild to me that the chain carries over between stages but not your hyper. It annoys me that you'll never be able to hyper that first zako rush in stage 4 lol.

There is a 2nd playable ship that sure exists.

Buy the game on Steam here:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/21...

00:00 - Intro
01:31 - Stage 1
05:13 - Stage 2
08:36 - Stage 3
12:02 - Stage 4
15:58 - Stage 5
19:43 - Stage 6
30:30 - Ending & Credits

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