Thank you NIS America for sending us this game to review!

While I don't consider myself particularly good at them, I've long enjoyed shoot 'em ups. The simplicity of moving your ship and firing to blast away enemies flying towards you as they try to do the same is a style of game that has stood the test of time. Raiden is one of the great arcade classics, first released in 1990 as a solid and very fun vertical shooter. Raiden IV was originally released in Arcades in 2007 and then on Xbox 360 in 2009. Later, Raiden IV: Overkill was released for PlayStation 3 and Windows; the license expired on that release last year, and NIS America picked it up and released this remix title, with likely more Raiden games to come in the future (Raiden III x MIKADO MANIAX has already been announced).

It must be said up front that if you already own Raiden IV: Overkill on Steam, and you're happy with that game (some complain of unresolved bugs), then there is not much new content here outside of the remixed music of this release. I do not own the previous Raiden IV: Overkill release, but I did spend time researching this and learned about the differences based on the testimony of others; I have not personally validated their statements. Of course this is the first time Raiden IV is on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4/5, or Xbox One/Series.

Like many shoot 'em ups, there is technically a story, but it's very easy to miss. Earth is being attacked by an alien race called the Crystals who wish to take it over. You pilot powerful air/spacecraft that you use to defeat the invading force. There are lots (and lots) of enemies coming to shoot you out of the sky, and each level has a boss for you to defeat at the end. I found the action engaging, and it was hard to put down.

There are three ships to choose from. While the game itself doesn’t seem to actually name them, they are the Fighting Thunder ME-02, the Raiden MK-II, and the Fairy (from left to right on the character select screen). The Fairy looks remarkably out of place in a world where everything is mechanized, but it’s in there. Each ship has some strength. The Fighting Thunder has a powerful bomb that clears the screen of all enemies and bullets, and seems to move at a medium speed. This is the best fighter for new players, I think. The Raiden MK-II has more levels of weapon upgrades available and generally does more damage, but its bomb only hits a portion of the screen after a delay, and seems to move a bit slower. The Fairy moves very quickly, and some of her shots have a slightly random-ish trajectory. Her bomb clears the screen from the top down, instead of the bottom up like with the Fighting Thunder ME-02.

Depending on the pickups you choose, each ship has three weapon types. You have your primary fire, missiles, and the bombs I already explained. The primary fire, which can be one of three types, is based on the color of the pickup. You can increase their power by grabbing additional pickups of the same kind; five to max out the Fighting Thunder ME-02 and the Fairy, and seven for the Raiden MK-II. First you have red, which offers a type of spread shot. This one does less damage to bosses than the others, unless you get really close to your target, but it's effective at clearing the screen. Then you have blue, which is a type of laser. This makes clearing the screen a challenge, but can really wreck bosses quickly. The final type is purple, which you might call special; you can pick one of two beams for the ships, and the Fairy shoots bubbles that move slowly, but there are lots of them. For the ships, there are two types that you pick when you start the game. The first is the Proton Laser; this one is a beam (or three) that moves in the direction your ship does, and kind of leans towards enemies. It's useful for clearing the screen, and does decent damage also. The other option for purple is the Plasma Laser. This one is unique; it shoots a noodle of sorts down the screen towards the top, hitting enemies in its way, and arcing in circles to hit them again, while also hitting anything in the way that the noodle hits. It's hard to describe, but it's very effective, as the same enemy can be hit multiple times at once.

The secondary weapon for every ship is missiles. Like many (most?) shoot 'em ups, these are rockets that shoot out from the sides of your ship and then fly towards enemies. All missiles reach their maximum power level after grabbing three powerups. There are three main types, labeled 'M', 'H', and 'R'. 'M' are powerful dumbfire missiles that shoots above you with a slight spread. 'H' are homing shots, that do much less damage than the other kinds, but will easily hit harder to reach opponents, like those off to the side. 'R' are kind of a hybrid; they do more damage than 'H', and aim towards their target and then launch; once sped up they don't continue to home in anymore. Missiles are common to the genre, and offer nice cover fire or additional damage.

There are four main modes of play, along with an unlockable Boss Rush mode. The first is Arcade Mode, covering the original five levels, with an option Light Mode that is much easier for new players. I recommend starting here. The next mode is Additional Mode, which is Arcade Mode with two new additional levels. OverKill Mode is a new mode with the previously mentioned additional levels, along with a few bonus missions where you rescue Fairies, or destroy asteroids. There is also a different scoring system, where you can earn additional points by continuing to shoot many enemies past their destruction after which they drop score bonus pickups, hence the OverKill. This is the craziest mode and it's a lot of fun. I also really enjoy Boss Rush; it's just fighting bosses, but it's a quick way to get to the best part!

The last two are for more competitive players. These include Score Attack Mode, and World Rankings. Score Attack is primarily for chasing the leaderboard locally, and also for practicing every level, as you can choose any of them, including the bonus stages you can't normally directly access. World Rankings lets you try to rank on the worldwide scoreboard, and the game has restrictions on how many lives you have how many bombs, and so on to have a level playing field. You also can't choose your difficulty level.

Most modes offer difficulty levels that range from 'Practice' (no bullets) to 'Very Easy', 'Easy', 'Normal', 'Original' (Arcade original difficulty), 'Hard', 'Very Hard', and 'Ultimate'. I found 'Normal' and 'Original' both plenty challenging, so only the best players need apply to the higher modes.

On the non-ranked modes, the game is generous with progress. Once you complete a stage for the first time, you can choose which level you wish to resume from. While there are only five levels in Arcade mode and seven otherwise, in order to complete it, you need to play the levels twice; first there is 1-1 through 1-5/7, then a set of 2-1 through 2-5/7; after these 2- levels there is a final boss stage (that is also unlocked for replays if you wish). I wouldn't say there are a ton of levels, but I found each to be well designed and fun to play, and I didn't find replaying them to be bothersome while going through it. It's also nice that the game is quite accessible to both novices and skilled shoot 'em up players, as it has modes to accommodate everyone.

The 'remix' part of the title does not relate to game modes, but instead to music. The Raiden IV soundtrack is honestly pretty great, and both the original Arcade and OverKill as well as this new remix music mode is available. I didn't hear a single track I didn't like, and some of these rock really hard, with some killer guitar riffs. If you enjoy hard rock tracks to get your blood pumping while blasting away aliens, you won't be disappointed.

Graphically, it's a top-down shooter with mostly 3D-rendered objects. The graphics are by no means cutting edge, but ships look good and explosions are convincing. Everything seems to render at a higher resolution if you use one, but jaggies can still be seen, and the polygon count is low.

Once you defeat enemies in a game mode, you also unlock their 3D models to be viewed in the Gallery. I like seeing stuff like this in games, as you can also figure out what they are called. There is a Replay mode, and after every game you can save your latest replay. Unfortunately, you can only save one replay per mode, which is a rather significant oversight in my opinion. While I can understand a limitation like that on consoles, my hard drive can hold countless replays. I hope they consider allowing you to store more than one. It doesn't help that it's really easy to overwrite your best game since it prompts you to save your replay every time, and defaults to 'Yes'.

One final thing to note: this is a vertical shooter, and the game has support for screen rotation. If you wish to turn your monitor 90 degrees so you can play the game full screen vertically, you can do that from the options. Always a welcome feature!

Morally, it's mostly clean with a notable exception. Your ship shoots and blasts your space foes and they explode. Pretty standard stuff. The Fairies don't wear anything, and their hair covers the necessary parts. It's a silly unnecessary bit, but if you choose to fly one of the two spaceships, you will only see the Fairies in OverKill mode as a pickup or during a rescue bonus level, as they are absent from Arcade Mode unless you choose to play as a Fairy.

Raiden IV x MIKADO remix is a really well done port of an Arcade and Xbox 360 classic for modern platforms. It also helps that this game plays great on Steam Deck and Linux from what I tested, in addition to its supported Windows. It's a fun game from a highly-regarded shoot 'em up series, and has stood the test of time for good reason - it's a blast. Recommended.