Magically beautiful and extremely approachable. I feel like this is my new fav shmup. Pretty easy to get the hang of and feels like it could be fun the master. Being able to upgrade at anytime is a treat but I feel like more could’ve been done to make your ship incredibly stupid (like 10 weapons slots and removing weapon overrides) but that would definitely ruin the games balance. A short and sweet experience though. Don’t come here for extremely hard bullet hell, its just a fun little treat for those who may just want to dip their toes in the shmup waters without getting too overwhelmed.

Pros:
+ PS1 era graphic style is distinctive
+ impressive backgrounds and partical effects
+ guard mechanic is a unique selling point that just works
+ boss fights are creative and frequently surprising
+ the missions never outstay their welcome
+ levels have frequent checkpoints
+ story can be quickly skipped
+ movement speed can be adjusted mid-game
+ option to disable collision damage with floors and ceilings
+ large amount of customization options
+ ships can be customized mid-mission...

Cons:
- ...but most weapons feel alike
- attacking backwards is only possible with certain upgrades
- second playthrough becomes a bullet hell
- dying is a double punishment
- restarts don't refill upgrades or smart bombs
- upgrades are generally too expensive
- smart bomb gets refilled too slowly
- enemy debris effects add a lot of confusion
- the tutorial only explains half of the mechanics
- default button configuration is useless

Playtime: 3 hours, two playthroughs on Normal difficulty. Roughly half of all upgrades acquired.

Magic Moment: Seeing each of the planetary backgrounds for the first time. Entering the Credits scene and being surprised by the story twist.

Blahgic Moment: Dying to a boss and realizing that death is a double punishment that makes progress extremely difficult.

Verdict:
Drainus is an old-school, arcade vertical shooter with a distinctive guard mechanic. While it offers high production values, it also shares the core issues that plagued arcade shooters since their inception: the difficulty is frstratingly high, deaths are often cheap or even unpreventable, and the punishment for dying is brutal. Loosing not only weapon upgrades but also your smart bombs is a frustrating double punishment that makes the game harder the longer you are stuck in a section, when it should actually be the other way around. The architecture of some sections and bosses makes it practically impossible to avoid damage on your first attempt, and the later levels and second playthrough devolve into frantic bullet hell parcours. Even though it is possible to change loadouts between and even inside of missions, most primary weapons feel alike, even though the shooting mechanics itself feel satisfying.

Play it if you crave the olden days of the arcades and like the art style, but one playthrough is certainly enough and there are many similar games that offer this type of experience.

Gli Shoot em Up sono divertenti e DRAINUS non è un'eccezione. Team Ladybug come al solito sforna Pixel Art da paura. La novità qui è che la navicella è in grado di assorbire proiettili di energia per un periodo di tempo limitato e rilasciarli in colpi ancora più potenti. La presenza di un sistema di potenziamenti con diverse opzioni tra cui scegliere offre diversi tipi di approccio per le numerose partite che si andranno ad affrontare , ma parlo per gli amanti di Arcade o del genere. La varietà offerta dai potenziamenti però mina sulla difficoltà del titolo , cosa che potrebbe far storcere il naso ai Fan del genere sempre alla ricerca di sfide più malate. Nonostante ciò un ottimo titolo accessibile per chi vuole approcciare il genere. La trama potevano anche non scriverla.

Fun game but I don't find the shield mechanic any more fun than just dodging shots and the backgrounds can be a little too ambiguous amongst all the detail so you crash into shit that looked normal.

It's one of those games where you are forced to take a hit if you don't have enough upgrades.

Beautiful game, I like the story too. The sound design is also really on point. The "Guard Gauge Max" never gets old

I barely play shmups so I've got no idea what separates a good shmup from a great one.

All I can say is that I had a hell of a time with DRAINUS. Its mechanics are fairly simple - around 90% of shots thrown at you you can absorb by turning on the shield and then fire back. Throughout the game you also get energy tanks you can spend on upgrading your ship in any way you like, from adding more options, weapons, or base stats, to upgrading your shields and bomb capacity.

With how little experience I have with the genre I went into the game on Easy, and I think this might've been a mistake. The game has 5 or 6 difficulty modes, with some being unlocked after completion, and it seems like the easy skill is basically just power fantasy. I think I died 3 times in total.

The game seems pretty forgiving: it doesn't kill you on the first hit, so I'd advise even new players to go for Normal (unless it's a complete hell later on, but the first stage seemed fine to me). Rest assured, I'll be replaying this game.

Thoroughly enjoyed Team Ladybug's schmup. Lovely pixel work, great music, and fun gameplay that feels a bit like Ikaruga with absorbing enemy bullets, but being easy enough (on normal at least) that you can actually complete the game without pulling your hair out. I haven't messed with the harder difficulties but I really enjoyed playing through the campaign. Short and sweet, but I still feel like I got my money's worth. Consider me a true Team Ladybug fan at this point.

If I could make one criticism, I would have liked a colorblind option to change the color of the non-energy bullets to something other than pink. It was often extremely hard to tell them apart, and being able to change it to something better contrasting for me like yellow or white would have been nice.

One of the most approachable shmups on the market.
Despite losing progress when you die, checkpoints are plentiful and attempts are unlimited.
You can customize shots, bombs and shields your ship have at any time (it slows down the pace a bit at the beginning, but it's nice to have the option), you can also disable taking damage when touching ceilings and the ground. When hit, you only lose one upgrade, you only lose one life if you take damage and have none left.
What sets it apart from the others is the absorption mechanics. Enemy projectiles are physical or energy. Physical attacks must be dodged and energy attacks can be absorbed to fire a megashot.
After finishing the six levels, there is the "Dejá Vu" mode, perhaps it's more difficult, but at this point I didn't notice any change.

I made a build that made it absurd easier. I used an item that replenishes an upgrade (extra hit) in the place of the bomb. At the same time, having all upgrades, the last one activated is a shield, I used one that gave me 3 hits of armor for any type of shot. If I took more than 3 damage, I used an upgrade replenisher and gained the 3 hits armor back. I managed to clear it without dying. There are no trophies for this, but they're all simple and cool to do.

It's cool to have challenge in games, this game can be very tough if you want, but I appreciate it allowing to be broken like that.

Drainus is Team Ladybug’s stab at a classic home console-style shmup - it’s bombastic, visually gorgeous and also somewhat fascinating mechanically in ways that would be difficult to pull off in an arcade. First off is its central absorption mechanic - your ship has a “guard” meter allowing it to absorb a certain number of bullets. This makes the game somewhat more forgiving for newcomers, and also becomes a central traversal mechanic - there are several points where unavoidable lasers require quick use of your guard meter. On top of that, it takes inspiration from Gradius’ customizable power-up system with full-on RPG mechanics - as you destroy enemies you earn “energy tanks” which can be spent on new weapons and various other ship upgrades. Said weapons can be mixed-and-matched to suit your playstyle and develop a custom power-up curve until you’re running with a ship that’s an absolute powerhouse with max power-ups, which can be immensely satisfying.

Unfortunately the difficulty is rather off-balance - it suffers from the classic shmup problem of becoming much more difficult if you lose your power-ups, which here is exacerbated by how long some of the boss fights take and how weak your base pea shooter is. It can be deeply frustrating to make a few mistakes through a stage, lose all your power ups and hit a checkpoint, forcing you to start over or enter into the longest boss fight of your life.

Despite those frustrations I still had a great time. It’s a fun experience all the way through!

Team Ladybug has obviously wanted to make a shmup since like their very first game, and I'm glad they finally got a chance to. As someone who is usually really terrible at games of this genre I'm pleasantly surprised by how accessible this is. The drain shield mechanic mixed with the way the powerup/health system works gives you a lot of options for dealing with whatever they throw at you, and makes it not feel completely terrible when you inevitably do get hit.

The difficulty towards the end of the second loop got a bit rough for me (even on normal), but this seems like a pretty good jumping on point for people who want to get into shmups but keep bouncing off like I have. Would love to see Team Ladybug build on top of this formula like they did with their Metroidvania stuff.

Новая неожиданно выпущенная игра от Ladybug, разработчиков таких метроидваний, как Touhou Luna Nights и Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth, совершенно внезапно оказалась скролл-шутером, причём с очень интересными идеями. Как и в других играх этого разработчика, в Drainus впечатляюще плавная анимация объектов, в целом игра очень красивая.

Главная особенность игры - возможность поглощать вражеские пули и лазеры. Отпустив кнопку, можно направить поглощённую энергию обратно во врагов, что наносит очень мощный урон. Также в любой момент можно поставить игру на паузу, чтобы улучшить корабль - купить новое оружие, увеличить длительность поглощения или количество бомб и т.д.

Игра очень дружелюбна к новичкам - если получить урон, то будет отключен один слот вооружения, при этом поверапы, включающие слоты, на каждом уровне можно найти в большом количестве. После потери всех жизней рестарт идёт с ближайшей контрольной точки с восстановлением начального количества жизней. Также в любой момент можно вернуться на предыдущие уровни, а затем продолжить прохождение с последнего уровня. Для любителей хардкора есть открываемые аркадный режим с прохождением за один присест и сложность Ridiculous со смертью от одного касания.

Видно, что разработчики этой игры очень любят жанр - в Drainus есть отсылки к самым разным играм. А ещё в игре очень интересно обосновывается одна особенность жанра, но рассказать об этой особенности - значит проспойлерить сюжет. В целом достойный представитель жанра, серьёзно раскритиковать игру можно разве что за слабую реиграбельность - набирать очки в этой игре неинтересно.

На данный момент прошёл игру на сложности Hard, получил все ачивки.

After playing the game for around 6 hours and clearing both loops on arcade mode I finally feel confident in giving Drainus a review score.

Drainus is a surprise dropped, weirdly-named horizontally-scrolling shmup released by Team Ladybug - the studio which you may recognise for Touhou Luna Nights. Ladybug's works are known for extremely high quality sprite art and polished presentation, and Drainus definitely lives up to the studio's reputation in this regard, if not raising the bar even further.

Seriously, this game looks great already in screenshots and it's even better in motion. The mix of highly-detailed sprite art and 3D effects gives Drainus a distinctive visual style, and the game is just filled with spectacular setpieces from beginning to end (such as the stage 1 intro sequence, which truly does not get old no matter how many times I see it).

I've seen some people complain about the soundtrack being bad which is a complaint I don't understand. While the music isn't quite as good as the visuals, it's still a very strong soundtrack (good enough for me to have purchased the soundtrack on steam, in fact). Many of the songs are catchy and overall the composition nails the Gradius V-inspired progressive techno, semi-orchestral vibe they were going for. Maybe I'm just a shallow person, but the utter glory and confidence of the presentation is enough to make me overlook the many flaws within the moment-to-moment gameplay experience, at least to an extent.

Another thing to note is that Drainus has quite a hefty amount of storytelling (at least, for shmup standards) if you aren't playing on arcade mode. While the story in Drainus is a fairly generic "underdog hero defeats the big evil space empire" kind of narrative, and the main characters involved are quite one-dimensional, it's still communicated to the player pretty well through stage intermission cutscenes and discoverable audio logs. There are some moments of genuinely good foreshadowing and emotionally-satisfying narrative payoffs for those paying attention. The trend of modern shmups developed by indie/doujin and other smaller studios dabbling further into storytelling without disrupting the flow of gameplay required for the genre to work is a trend that I think is healthy and should be encouraged.

Now to talk about the actual game mechanics of Drainus, which is where things get a bit more dicey. The main gimmick of Drainus is that you have a shield which can absorb all non-physical projectiles and reflect them back against enemies for more score and/or damage. This shield is tied to a guard meter which recharges when you aren't using the shield. This mechanic works quite well and the creative stage designs and bosses do a good job at mixing things up in regards of where and when to ideally absorb bullets. It kind of reminds me of the much older doujin shooter RefleX or maybe even something like Mars Matrix.

You also have a ton of other resources besides the absorb shield, which is where the game's balances takes a big hit. As well as the absorb shield, you have an Axelay-style health system where the amount of hits you can take before dying is equivalent to the number of power-ups you have equipped, powerful i-frame bombs tied to a separate also recharging meter, conventional shields which can soak up extra hits for you without losing any power-ups, and more extra lives than you can shake a stick at since you get a score-based extend every 100,000 points without exception. This makes the game feel way too forgiving and most of the time you feel close to unkillable when you're fully powered up.

It's not much of a surprise that many genre veterans are dismissing this game as being too easy even on the highest difficulty. Although I think the lack of difficulty in Drainus is being kinda exaggerated by some, it is true that the mechanics are balanced way too much in the player's favour here.

The way the powerup system itself works is also a cause of contention. Throughout the game you'll be acquiring power-up modules by absorbing bullets and destroying enemies, and you can use these modules to purchase upgrades and change your current loadout in wait-for-it a PAUSE MENU. Yes, at any point of the game you can pause the game and spend your time buying powerups and equipping them in a kind-of cumbersome loadout menu. This kills the flow and feels quite "euroshmup"-ish, doing a disservice to the otherwise very tight and focused design of the moment to moment gameplay.

Arcade mode mixes things up a bit by limiting you to one visit to the upgrade screen per stage and limiting your selection to 90 seconds, but it still doesn't feel like enough. I appreciate this kind of upgrade system as a way to make the game more approachable for beginners, but I would have preferred it if arcade mode used a more traditional or even Gradius-style powerup system instead. The game already takes enough inspiration from Gradius V as is so this kind of mechanic would make a lot of sense to me but it just isn't there.

There's also some stuff in Drainus that's just weirdly broken. For example in story mode (which includes the highest difficulty called Ridiculous mode) bosses can't time out which makes the scoring system pointless as certain boss patterns could theoretically be milked for score infinitely. Another broken thing is that there's an "emergency power up bomb" which you can use instead of a more conventional bomb. This bomb will, as the name suggests give you a single power up refill instantaneously. Since shields are tied to the power up system. You can just emergency bomb the moment your shield is disabled, restoring the shield back up to full power for free. Good use of this would make even Ridiculous difficulty a joke once you have the perfect shield unlocked.

In conclusion, Drainus is a good first shmup from Team Ladybug, and is just a few balance patches away from being a great or even fantastic shmup. Despite all the flaws of Drainus, there is a genuine love for the genre expressed in this game, which can especially be seen in the title screen for arcade mode, which looks very authentic as an arcade game and even has multiple attract screens. At it's finest moments, Drainus feels like the closest we're ever gonna get to Gradius VI or some other new Treasure shmup, but unfortunately those moments are at least for the time being buried under some questionable design choices.