Get onboard for the first Sony shooter with Philosoma on the PlayStation. In dedicating precious development time to a fast-disappearing genre of videogames, one that was as prominent as fighters once upon a time, this disc seeks to ignite a renaissance as Silpheed once attempted. Does it perform well enough to revive interest among seasoned games players? Though it presents no groundbreaking engineering or choice polygons, this space shooter does have much to offer. It compiles a huge variety of modes and perspectives to liven up our interest, shifting views from overhead-style to side-scrolling, to front and rear. The programmers at G-Artist took advantage of the PS-X processing power to generate fast and furious gameplay.

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Your flying machine is equipped with a standard Vulcan spread gun, a blue laser beam, a Ray-B back-shooter, and a screen-decimating bomb. Each weapon can be powered up three times aside from the bomb and missile pick-ups. Its above-average gameplay stylings aside, the whole of the package is a mixed bag. The visual design, albeit graphically impressive for a shooter of this breed and rife with engrossing movie-like cinemas, is nowhere near as innovative as the multi-view play modes. It is also painfully short; a facet made more obvious with Philosoma's lack of sharp difficulty. Elsewise, the play control is solid, and the story is serviceable. Shooter fans will surely enjoy it.

Printed in Issue #33, January 1996