Macross Shooting Insight is a very special game.
Putting aside what the game is, this is a major step forward for the series, and something that will go down in gaming history forever.
Why?
Because a Macross game has finally released in the West!
The Macross series has a long complicated history. It was originally created by Shōji Kawamori, who began the series by inventing a transforming jet robot. This robot, along with many other designs, would later be used in creation of the Transformers series, while the jet itself would not only be used for Jetfire, but it would also be the foundation for his own series called Macross.
Macross would go on to air its first season in Japan, and would be picked up by Harmony Gold in the US. Harmony Gold however would take Macross, alter the story slightly, and air it as Robotech, which also borrowed elements and stories from two other anime series as well.
It is due to Harmony Gold releasing Robotech that Macross got locked in a massive legal battle, which spanned decades, and prevented future Macross content from releasing outside of Japan. While OVAs like Macross Plus managed to make it over (and featured Bryan Cranston as one of the lead characters), the series in general remained Japanese exclusive. That is until now.
With the recent release of the majority of Macross on Hulu and Disney +, also came the release of Macross Shooting Insight. Again, despite many Macross games releasing over the years, this is the first to ever receive an official English Translation!
I would be lying if I said I preferred it over games like Macross Ultiamte Frontier, which is a full 3D mission based action game, but for me this one especially hits close to home. Despite the series not releasing in the US, I've spent many years importing and playing the Macross series, with my first ever Macross game being the Game Boy Color title Macross 7: Let's Reveal The Galaxy's Heart. This game was a side scrolling shoot em up featuring the cast of Macross 7, and despite being short, I loved it! So for Macross Shooting Insight to be my first official English release title, it feels like the series has finally come full circle for me.
You see, Macross Shooting Insight is also a shoot em up, but there's quite a bit more involved as well. There are three distinct gameplay styles, with all three being a different take on the shoot em up genre. So despite it being different, for me personally, it still feels great being able to go back to where I "began" this journey into the Macross game series. However, it isn't pure nostalgia that is fueling my thoughts on this title, nor is it fair for me to compare it to my past favorites. There are some undeniable truths when it comes to this game when compared to the past, but Macross Shooting Insight itself is a game that stands on its own, and that makes it an even better starting point for fans and newcomers alike.
So with all of that being said, I am happy to finally say here is my review of the first official English Macross game! This is Macross Shooting Insight for the PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, and PC!
I'd also like to thank Red Art Games for providing me with a free early review copy of the PlayStation 5 release! I greatly appreciate it!
The Story:
To be completely blunt here, the story of Shooting Insight isn't anything special, nor will it make a lot of sense to newcomers of the series. Even long time fans of the series might not find a lot with this one, but there are some cool throwbacks and references throughout. While this may be a let down to some, the reality is... This is a game you play for the actual gameplay, and not the pieces of plot in between the stages.
That being said...
The story of Shooting Insight sees a large chunk of Macross protagonists being pulled into a single point in time, with some of their friends mysteriously missing. Enemies from different eras of the Macross timeline are also here, and pilots are sent out to take down the big bads and figure out what is happening. There are ten stages, with cutscenes between each stage, and dialogue during the missions themselves. Each of the five characters have slightly different cutscenes and stage dialogue, and different side characters to go along with them. It takes beating the game as all of the main characters to actually unlock and see the full plot, but again, it is mostly fan service.
Since the game is Japanese dubbed, dialogue will need to be read while playing the stage, while the actual cutscenes feature little to no voice acting; just grunts and a few words here and there to accompany the text. Character images are also still with little emotion, making the overall presentation pretty basic. The actual references and pieces of fan service are cool however, with some characters finally getting to meet face to face. Characters who were fans of Fire Bomber in Macross Frontier get to meet Basara, and then you have characters like Sheryl Nome who realizes Mao Nome from Macross Zero has the same name as her grandmother.
It is little things like this that can put a smile on the face of fans, but do little for someone who isn't familiar with the series at all. Thankfully this also means that Shooting Insight doesn't spoil anything major for newcomers, and might even encourage them to go back and watch the series.
The down side to the game's story is also the fact that a part of it is missing from the Western release. Roy Focker appears in the game because he was a part of Macross Zero, but Hikaru Ichijyo (Robotech fans know him as Rick Hunter) and other SDF Macross characters are missing. This means the English version has been reworked compared to the original Japanese release, making edits where required. It doesn't matter too much in the long run, but there is no denying the fact the story has been cut a bit shorter.
The Gameplay:
Macross Shooting Insight is broken up between multiple modes, and three gameplay styles, with a limited fourth one.
At its core, the game is a scrolling shoot em up similar to arcade classics, and infamous Japanese "bullet hells." The screen constantly moves, you move your mech around to dodge bullets and shoot down enemies, you have a limited screen clearing special attack if you get into trouble, picking up items increases your attack power, and you have a lock on homing missile attack as well. All of this is pretty standard for the genre, but the game also includes a dodge roll button that lets you clip through attacks without taking damage.
This becomes key with some attacks that cannot be physically avoided otherwise, and requires some perfect timing to actually make it work; simply mashing dodge is just going to get you killed.
Besides the basics, the game also features five characters to pick from, and each has a different type of gun, and different type of missiles to shoot at enemies. They also have different stats, making some faster, while others stronger. This means that players should be able to find at least one character who fits their style, but all five are required to beat the story and unlock all content.
The characters themselves, are as follows: Shin Kudo from Macross Zero, Isamu Dyson from Macross Plus, Gamlin Kizaki from Macross 7, Alto Saotome from Macross Frontier, and finally Hayate Immelmann from Macross Delta. Again, Hikaru is left out of the Western release, but is available for anyone who imports the original Japanese title.
Once a character is selected, it is finally time to move onto the actual game.
The Gameplay Styles
The three main gameplay styles consist of vertical scrolling stages, horizontal scrolling stages, and open top view stages where you are free to move in any direction. The fourth style puts the camera view behind your Valkyrie (the name of the transforming mechs in this series), and then asks you to move up/down/left/right to dodge enemy attacks and take out your target. This part of the gameplay its not fleshed out however, it can be difficult to judge enemy attacks, and it is only used a few times during a single run through of the story. It is a bit similar to the on rail sections in FromSoftware's Another Century's Episode: R (which also featured Macross), but even more awkward and rarely used.
Putting aside the fourth style... The other three feel great, and mostly offer fans of the genre exactly what they want.
Although there isn't a wide variety of enemies, stages are filled with bullets flying everywhere, and a non stop stream of things for you to shoot. Both the vertical and horizontal stages are pretty similar, with the screen either scrolling from the top or from the right, and you simply have to navigate around incoming attacks and shoot back to stay alive. The free range stages offer a bit more as you can go anywhere, but they are typically timed with a handful of targets you need to take out. Of course these stage sections too are filled with enemies, but this is also where the dodge becomes very important. Free range stages have attacks that cannot be avoided without dodging, so it is very important that you master it early on.
By default your Valkyrie has very limited health and can die in no time, and there is very little healing during a default settings playthrough. These stages become brutal fast, and slipping up early on means completing a playthrough will become impossible; especially considering bosses all have different tricks up their sleeves. It is a VERY hard game, and memorizing the stages and attack patterns is the only way you will survive. Normally, that is.
Customizing the Difficulty
The default difficulty for the game is Normal Mode, without healing. This can actually be changed before starting up a level, but doing so will make it impossible to upload your scores to the online leader boards. That being said, it is worth it just to be able to get through the game, and to learn more about it. This is not a game you will be a master of from the start, and you will fail over and over and over and over and over again. Unless you get a little help that is.
One of the major options is to enable regeneration. This can either be set to slow or fast (which still isn't that fast), and allows you to regain health by not getting hit. It is a great way to actually see all of the stages, and get prepared for a run without it if you wish to play normally. Even then however, normal mode still offers quite the challenge, and you can still die faster than your health will recover you. A few hits and you are down, and it might take a few minutes to even get back to full again. This isn't enough to completely save you, but thankfully there are two other options that can help with this.
The first is to switch down to Easy Mode. Easy Mode still allows you to unlock achievements, and is viewed more as the game's "real" Normal Mode. Very Easy on the other hand IS fully easy, and rewards are limited when playing with this setting. If players still struggle with Easy (or Very Easy) there is one additional setting that can be modified, and this could be a matter of life and death for those wanting to tackle on the modes without difficulty settings.
Hidden in the options is a slider which lets you increase your max health, and the special bar for the screen clearing attack. You can double both in size, or bump them up slightly just to give yourself a little bit of an edge, but doing either will also turn off the ability to upload to the leader board. These sliders are also a great way to practice Normal or even the harder difficulty modes however, with stages you've cleared once also being unlocked in the Arcade Mode.
Again, this game is all about learning how to play it, memorizing the stages to know what is coming, and practice practice practice until you can actually beat it. And that will take a lot.
Music
One unique aspect to Macross is how it handles music. It is a little known fact, except by fans, but Macross is the series that kick started the whole "virtual idol" craze. The original series had Lynn Minmay, and she became famous not only within the in series universe, but within the real world as well. Many years later we would see virtual idols such as Hatsune Miku take the stage, but if it wasn't for Minmay who knows if she, or the others out there, would even exist to this day? Of course Minmay wasn't the last Macross idol, as every series since SDF Macross has contained at least one, and each one of them makes an appearance in Shooting Insight.
Every stage in Shooting Insight will have a moment where one of the singers takes the stage, and begins playing their song. This song will buff you and make it easier to take down bosses, and achievements are awarded for listening to the song to the very end. Most of the series receive two songs, with Macross 7's Fire Bomber taking the stage with Totsugeki Love Heart first, and Dynamite Explosion later on. The latter being the opening theme song for the Macross Dynamite 7 OVA series, and the former being one of the main songs the band sings. Other songs included are none other than Lion, the final opening of Macross Frontier, Seikan Hikou, from the same series, and more.
Sadly the songs are not the full songs, but it is still great to hear them, and they get reused for the ending credits as well. They are sure to put a smile on the faces of fans, and are a great way to introduce newcomers to their new musical obsession.
The Gameplay Modes
As previously mentioned, the game contains multiple gameplay modes, but the actual gameplay itself remains the same in each.
Story Mode lets you work through the stages complete with in game dialogue, and cutscenes between levels.
Arcade Mode is similar, except without the story content, and mirrors that of an arcade shoot em up. This mode is great for those who want to replay stages, or simply experience the game without being slowed down by the characters talking.
Boss Rush lets you take on every single boss in the game, with minimal healing between. It is a pretty standard mode where you shoot for the high scores, and it ends when you either die or actually complete it. One unique feature however, is the fact that you can pick which boss you want to start on, so it can even be used to practice bosses without having to go through entire stages. Again, this is a part of the learning process, and it is one of tools the game gives you to do so. However; there is one difference... Boss Rush doesn't contain musical buffs like in Arcade and Story Mode.
Ace Battles are very unique, and VERY challenging. By beating the Story Mode, special challenge bosses become unlocked. These Aces are key characters from the different series, and are insanely difficult to take down, with a very large health bar, and crazy attacks that will shred you in seconds. Some can be beaten by simply surviving long enough, but even that can be more of a challenge than just chipping away with your own attacks. These are not for the faint of hearth, and can be very rage inducing compared to the rest of the game. They are called Ace Battles for a reason (and they personally took me a LOT of tries).
Area Survey is the final mode, and is a simple stage select. It is separate from the Arcade Mode, but is basically the same. It allows players to try different stages, without the in stage dialogue. There honestly isn't too much more to it than that.
These modes are what make up the entirety of Macross Shooting Insight's main gameplay, with everything else being unlockables.
The Gallery:
After spending countless hours playing the main game, the Gallery is an extra feature that rewards you for everything you've done. However, there isn't a lot to it overall, and it requires a lot of extra grinding to actually complete it.
Valkyries
The Valkyrie section of the Gallery is for viewing the different models of Valkyries featured in the game. This includes the main character's, along with side characters that appear in the story. You get to read a brief description of what each one is, and you can freely rotate the model around, and transform it between it's three different modes. These are unlocked by simply playing the game and seeing them in game, so it doesn't take too much to see everything. It is a cool way to get a closer look at these mechs, but there isn't a lot more you can do here.
Artwork
Like with the Valkyries, Artwork is unlocked by playing through the story mode. It is mostly made up of general character art for each one appearing in the game, but you can also obtain the key art for each anime series, and unlock special CGs at the end of each story.
Macross Memories
Possibly the worst unlock within the entire game; the Macross Memories are a group of twenty screenshots from different episodes within each Macross series. Prior to clicking on a series, the game gives a brief description of what that particular series was about, and selecting the series is what lets you view the images. While the images themselves are perfectly fine (although with some spoilers), it is how you unlock them that is an issue.
Macross Memories are only unlocked by beating the Ace Battles, and to unlock all of them, it means you have to beat each Ace twenty times in a row. As these fights are so challenging, this isn't an easy feat by any means. I personally grinded them out while remote playing to a handheld device, and watching TV. It took roughly an hour for each one, but by the end I had mastered the fights and memorized the all of the enemy attack patterns! Was the reward worth it? Not really. But I'm a sucker for any Macross 7 content, and I wanted to unlock all its memories first! If it wasn't for watching TV while doing this? I'm sure I would've burned myself out in no time... And that isn't a good thing.
Akashic Collection
Similar to Macross Memories, the Akashic Collection is a group of random items from each Macross series, and are picked up while playing through the normal stages. There isn't much to these items either, as they are simply 2D sprites of objects like boom boxes, and other "iconic" objects seen in the anime. Ultimately they are just extra collectibles, and ways to earn extra achievements on the platforms that support them. There's no sugar coating this, they really don't amount to much, but at least they are very easy to obtain.
Replay Files
And the final part of the Gallery is none other than the Replay Files. These are recordings of your runs! You have the option of saving them, and you can then go back here to review what you did and why it got you killed. (Or maybe how you actually succeeded against all the odds on the hardest difficulty?) Whatever the case is, this is your own personal movie theater, and it is up to you to decide what you save and what you get rid of. It is a cool feature, but it isn't quite as useful as replays in fighting games. (It could possibly help you learn the stage layouts though.)
And with all of that being said...
Should you play Macross Shooting Insight?
I am going to be completely honest here. I am a HUGE Macross fan, and I love the fact that this game released in the West. It is a game I had a lot of fun with, and it is a game I will keep installed on my PlayStation 5 to go back to from time to time. There are still trophies I want to earn, and I want to get better at the game and complete the harder difficulties. That is going to be a long road however, and I honestly don't know if I will ever be skilled enough to pull it off. This game is HARD, and it will take a lot of work to get to that point.
The thing is though, this for sure isn't the best Macross game out there, nor is it the best shoot em up you can play. There are a lot of better options out there, and it is hard to recommend Shooting Insight over some of those. It isn't a bad game though, and there is plenty here to keep players busy for quite awhile; especially if they want to actually do everything the game has to offer. For the right price, it is for sure worth picking up if you have any interest what so ever, but it is important to know that it does have flaws.
From a Macross standpoint, it is a bit of a let down that you cannot freely transform your Valkyrie. What form it is in is fixed to the part of a stage you are currently working through, and there is nothing you can do about that. The character selection is limited to only five "main" pilots, but other characters do appear in game during the story. Sadly the lead character of Macross 7 Nekki Basara isn't playable, but it also makes sense considering he refuses to attack or kill anyone. He sings his songs until enemies lose the will to fight, so he's classified as a "diva" within the game. (Although past Macross games where he was playable let you shoot speaker pods into enemies, and sing until their will to fight is gone. Shooting Insight doesn't have unique character specific mechanics like this however, so not going this route is understandable.) Putting aside these issues however, there is quite a bit here for Macross fans to enjoy.
The music is great, the characters we do have are nice, and, despite the generic story, there are some nice callbacks throughout. Although the game doesn't technically need the Macross skin to be fun (non-fans can still enjoy this), it does add to the overall experience. Those who are familiar with the series will for sure care about these characters and songs a lot more, and that does add quite a bit to the overall enjoyment of the game.
Putting aside the game being Macross, the gameplay is strangely addicting as well. There isn't a large amount of enemies, and there are only ten stages with ten bosses, but there is something satisfying about blasting through waves of enemies and launching non stop missiles. It is something fans of shoot em ups will for sure understand, and that is enough to carry the game. Again, there are for sure "better" ones out there, but that doesn't make Shooting Insight any less fun. The difficulty settings for sure help with anyone who struggles with the game, and the harder modes and settings allows bullet hell fans to torture themselves as much as they want! There is a "happy middle ground" as well, but it really comes down to what you as the player want the game to be like, and that will require tinkering with the settings at least a little. Of course playing too much could lead to burnout, or it could go the other way and turn into a full on addiction; it depends on the person, and how much they find themselves enjoying the game. I am one of the latter.
At first one might think I am only saying this because it is the "only"
Macross game in the West, and that I'm simply a fan "starving for
Macross content." But this isn't true at all! At the time of me writing
this review, I have yet to start up Macross Triangle Frontier, or finish
Macross Delta on the Vita. Macross Ace Frontier and Macross Ultimate
Frontier were two of my all time favorite PSP games, with Triangle Frontier being
an even better follow up to those two. As for Macross Delta, it is simply a
game I haven't had a chance to go back to, despite really enjoying it. So even though I have two really great Macross games to go through, I still keep playing Shooting Insight.
Overall, I feel like Macross Shooting Insight has a lot of missed opportunities, but it still manages to be a fun game with the content it does offer.
Again, there are better Macross games out there, but not in English, and there are better shoot em ups out there, that are in English. Even so, I found myself enjoying this game for what it is, and I will keep coming back to it for years to come. It has a lot I like, but it also has disappointments. I love the music, but I also wish they added at least a few more tracks. I like the characters, but I wish there were at least a few more. The stages are fun, but I wish we had more than just ten.
It is a very mixed game for sure, that I also really like, and I'd recommend if it at least sounds somewhat interesting to you. I just ask that you make sure you know what you are getting into, and don't expect the greatest thing ever. Just play it just for the sake of having fun, and don't set your expectations too high. If you do that, you'll most likely enjoy it too.
Once again I'd like to thank Red Art Games for providing me with an early review copy, and an extra shout out to Flora for helping resolve the little hang up we had at first! You're awesome.
Disclosure: I received a free review copy of this product from https://www.keymailer.co
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