SHMUPS Roundup: October 2019
Autumn is here and there’s a chill in the air. With the nights drawing in, the early part of October was looking as bare of shmup news as the trees of their swiftly turning leaves. Fortunately, the second half of the month stepped things up in a big way and to find out all the releases, announcements and news that dropped in what eventually turned out to be another busy month, read on.
Syder Reloaded – First up we have Studio Evil’s announcement on the 10th that their euroshmup inspired hori Syder Reloaded will be making its way to the Switch. No release date has been given as yet, but the wait’s unlikely to be too long for this one.
Hyper Gods – Difficult one to describe this (so please check the trailer below), but, also on the 10th, Ground Control Studios announced their self-described 2D cinematic shooter Hyper Gods will be joining the shmups on Switch line-up too. Again, no date as yet.
Horgihugh – A crowd funding campaign to bring this cute-em-up hori to Switch was started back in August and, despite looking like it wasn’t going to make its goal just a few days before its deadline, a late flurry of donations gave it a final push and on the 13th it skipped over the line. This Japanese developed game already has a Steam release and with the developers showing interest in getting a physical out, it’s sure to be another welcome addition to the Switch shmup library.
Rolling Gunner – On the 18th, the Rolling Gunner official Twitter account revealed the game will be receiving some “additional content”. Quite what this refers to we don’t yet know, but it will be titled Rolling Gunner Over Power and is most likely some kind of DLC package. Whether this has any connection to the physical release – about which we’ve heard little since its initial announcement – is unconfirmed, but with the base game receiving near universal acclaim when it first arrived at the start of this year, this is most definitely worth getting excited about.
Vortex Attack Ex – Kaleido Games, the developers behind 2018 hori Beekyr Reloaded, brought their unusual looking shmup Vortex Attack Ex to the eShop on the 24th. Already released on Steam as simply Vortex Attack, this Switch version promises an upgraded experience and is available now.
Ghost Blade HD – Arguably the Wii U’s best shmup, Ghost Blade HD hit the eShop on the 24th. This bullet hell vert has been up for physical pre-order from PlayAsia since the middle of last month, but for those of you who can’t wait or – shock horror! – don’t care for physical releases (sorry JP, but such monsters do exist), check out the below video review to see whether HuCast Games’ effort is worth a purchase – or maybe even a double-dip.
Sturmwind Ex – It had been radio silence since Sturmwind developers Duranik surprise announcement on Facebook that their 2013 Dreamcast release’s arrival on Switch was just around the corner. Finally, right at the end of the month, this critically acclaimed hori popped up on the eShop with a release date of the 8th of November.
Rival Megagun – First Press Games announced on the 28th that they would be giving pixelart PvP vert Rival Megagun a physical release in January 2020. This one’s been available digitally for about a year now and, while its main focus is local or online deathmatches a la Twinkle Star Sprites, it also includes a single player arcade mode as well as CPU controlled versus battles.
Other – Not a game this time, but a heads up that a Switch Shmups Wiki is now complete and available to aid anyone feeling overwhelmed by the task of keeping track of the avalanche of releases we’ve been seeing. The project’s been headed by Shmup News and, while all entries now have basic detail at least, further contributions are always welcome. Check it out here.
So, after a slow start, we’ve ended up with another slew of announcements on our hands. Which are you most excited for? Which took you by surprise? Let us know, and let’s hope for more of the same next month.
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