PLATFORM: PC, PS5, XBOX SERIES (REVIEWED) | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
Every shoot-em-up needs a gimmick, otherwise you’d just be flying around shooting things willy-nilly and every single shmup would be the same as all the others. Cygni brings an almost overwhelming amount of ideas to the table, seemingly trying its best to be one of the most comprehensive big-budget shoot ’em ups seen in years.
Your Primary weapon works exactly the way you’d expect it to – firing forwards in a straight line to take out enemies directly in front of you. Your Ground weapon, as you might imagine, destroys units on the ground, and can be fired in either locked-on or free-fire mode, and missiles can deal damage to all units as well as any enemy projectiles that might be heading your way. When destroyed, enemies can drop Energy Points which can be collected to automatically fill up your shield. Your weapon power can also be increased with energy points, but only by manually taking points from your shield and adding them to your weapon. Taking away your defence to increase your offence is often quite risky, but with energy points dropping at a fairly decent rate, it isn’t too tricky to beef up both your shield and weapon at the same time. A fully powered-up weapon gives access to a variety of unlockable firing types which can be cycled through at the push of a button, and various other upgrades are available as you progress through the game’s seven missions.
Juggling between shields and weapons, keeping track of your stock of missiles, swapping between firing types and attacking enemies both on the ground and in the air all at once, Cygni demands your full attention at all times and can be a bit tricky to get to grips with. Once mastered though, it feels incredibly satisfying to play, and the gameplay is challenging enough to lend itself well to repeat playthroughs at higher difficulties. It looks and sounds as good as it plays, too, with a movie-quality soundtrack, some dazzling visual effects, highly-detailed environments and even fully-rendered cutscenes between missions (something of a rarity for the shoot ’em up genre). Excellent stuff!
