It discourages an improvised playing style, instead placing emphasis on rigorous routing and execution at any level of play. In general, Ikaruga is considered to be a very methodical shooting game. Ikaruga enjoyed critical and commercial success for the genre’s standards and over the years it has been ported to multiple home consoles (Sega Dreamcast, Nintendo GameCube and Switch, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4) and online platforms (NESiCAxLive and Steam), with varying features and fidelity to the original version. When asked about the inspiration for this game mechanic, game director Hiroshi Iuchi spoke of its connection with the defensive system of Sega Saturn’s game Shinrei Jusatsushi Taromaru, to which he contributed to some extent. Ikaruga is famous for its polarity system: enemies and bullets are either black or white, with the player’s ship being able to switch between the two colours. During development, the game was referred to as ‘Project RS-2’, owing to its predecessor Radiant Silvergun, and as such it is considered to be its spiritual sequel, even though the two games differ considerably in terms of mechanics and visual style. Ikaruga (斑鳩) is a vertical-scrolling shmup developed and published by Treasure in December 2001 for the Sega NAOMI arcade system.

Ikaruga physical