TRIGGERHEART EXELICA

     Triggerheart Exelica isn’t just a normal scrolling shooter; it’s got a neat gimmick added in that allow players to grab ahold of most enemies and swing them around to use as a shield, or as a weapon to create a chain-effect of death. Depending on the enemy, grabbing it may be a near instant thing, or you may have to wait several seconds before you’re able to latch on, leaving you open and vulnerable to any attacks until you’re finally able to weild your target as armor or a weapon. That forces you to pick and choose when you use that skill wisely. You’re also able to collect yellow pellets around the screen as you kill off enemies. Collecting them allows the player to rack up multipliers, increasing the amount of points that you get as you destroy your enemies. Both aspects add a tiny bit of depth to a scrolling shooter that is already fun on its own. There’s also an option to use a bomb, which basically deals damage to everything on the screen while also eliminating all bullets visible at the time too.

     On the topic of modes, Triggerheart Exelica has three different modes to play (unless you count Training Mode, in which there’d be four): Arcade Mode, Story Mode, and Arrange Mode. All three modes are esentially the same game with minor differences. Arcade mode is basically the basic version of the game. There’s no story here, just shooting goodness. Story mode is mostly the same game, except with a few extra boss battles tossed in along with a little bit of a story, complete with pre-level dialogue. Arrange mode is for the folks who have mastered the other two modes. In Arrange mode, you can’t adjust the difficulty of the game and there are no continues...It’s an overall more difficult experience than the other modes by far, but it’s a decent addition, especially for folks who like to master games; it’ll add a lot of replay value for them.

     Graphically, Triggerheart Exelica isn’t exactly impressive for a 2007 Dreamcast game. I mean they’re not terrible or anything, and some of the light and explosion effects are pretty, but for a game released so far along in the console’s lifespan, you’d think that they might try to push the limits of the system a little more....2D game or not. As far as the ol’ audio goes, the audio fits the action pretty well. It almost sounded like it could have been music from an old 8-bit NES game that the programmers found on OC Remix or something. It’s not necessarily memorable, but hearing it did make me feel a little nostalgic for the gaming days of old. Overall, I enjoyed the audio a decent amount. The graphics could have used a little more polish, in my opinion, but they’re not terrible by any means...And quite frankly, with how many bullets fill the screen here, you’re probably not going to be spending a whole lot of time taking in the environments anyway.