Subsumed. Immersed, but not immersed in a world, immersed in a thrill. EVERYTHING IS SPRAWLING, it barely lets, up. Where games would you pause, rest, the game just ante ups. If MOP vocal bombastic energy were in a game it would become Sin and Punishment Star Successor. Its just adrenaline , and more important you contribute to it. Where other games make you feel like you on a thrill ride, your skill affects the feel of the thrill. Its that dynamism that takes the things I loved about Sin and Punishment 64 but makes it more impressive. Consider how in stage threee its the gact that parts of the death traps are propelling towards you in asidescrolling part and the only way is to shoot it in between shooting the enemies. Like You are pushing against the stage itself. In stage 3 there is a boss around movement and destroying blocks like a puzzle game in between shooting back at a giant monster. The entire boss battle is this big set piece around movement. It’s sprawling, it can be exhausting and I admit my reflexes are slow, so while I say its hard to keep track of all the bullets, it changes not the feeling that the immediacy of jumping back in to beat the boss that whooped you ? WOO. You don’t sulk in loss, its one of my fave elements. One of the things I havevn’t decided if its too exhausting.

Like in between boss losses, I am putting down the controller trying to redo sole self. In terms of my hand hurting because I AM ALL THE WAY IN. And when I say dynamism bosses FUSE AT THE END OF STAGES. The Komodo’s dragon boss with the switch?!? That’s real design, you have to damage the environment, can’t hover in the air, then get normal shooting galleries in between. I am a sucker for a hell of a set piece where you use your environment to damage your boss. Any moment of a boss that just gets more and more subbosses? Like that amazing boss births two other boss fights! It’s unrelenting pace is immaculate. This game is able to string together consistent action that the frenzy is perfect.

I think that the only thing that failed the game is me? I could only play on easy so I know that ending boss wasn’t as amazing as other set pieces because it should feel more stressed out, but I def couldn’t step up to the task. This is def a game I would replay because the best bosses are mind bending, the dual boss you faced before the main boss? It asks so much of you, so much to attend to. You can’t let up. The game is smart to only let up to give you a fun shooting gallery. You totally forget that between the bosses the normal moment rail shooting is so fucking awesome, that you wish there were just a few more . This game only lets up, to let you catch your breathe to give it your all again. This game is spectacular, if it’s end sequence only felt as special as the first, this game would be perfection

Sin & Punishment: Star Successor absolutely RULES holy shit this game is so good. It's a constant barrage of challenging boss fights and it controls like a dream. The Wii pointer is perfect for an adrenaline pumping rail shooter like this. The music is good as well and it keeps the spirit of older Treasure titles. Now, story has never been a strong suit of Treasure games, but I will say that there's a plot point that recontextualizes the story in a pretty neat way. But it's all about the gameplay here and it is so damn good. I couldn't put the game down after I started it.

Best rail shooter I've ever played.

THE MVP

THE GOAT

THE SWANSONG OF TREASURE

A good bullethell time with the classic control scheme of its predecessor or (recommended!) nunchuck+ wii mote aiming.
awesome and challenging bossfights bundled in stages mish mashed of 3D and 2D environments.

Unlike the first game you can move freely about in every direction, with enemies compensating for your flexibility with extra barrages of projectiles amongst some rather spongy enemies designed for you to use your charged shot, which takes a bit of time to get back.

You have your neutral shots, lock on feature with weaker bullets and a powerful close range attack whenever you hit the trigger at something close in proximity. As well as a convenient dodge roll. The controls are constantly busy, and using the ir aiming instead of right analog clears out a lot of the harder hand cordination which the classic control scheme moreso requires.

The charge shot adds a constant pressure of prioritising whether to use it against rows of lighter enemies vs the more spongy units, maintaining the stage and keeping mobs at bay while dodging bullets and hazards is the meat of the game and mostly the game works except for a few segments where the depth perception makes incoming projectiles and enemy spawns hard to keep in track. .

Bossfights are a-plenty and they all stand out with fun and challenging patterns of bullethells and hazards you'll need to adapt to while slowly curving down sizable HP bars with as many charge shots as you can muster outside of your weaker neutral artillery.

While differing from its predecessor with its new couple implementations it is a really fun arcady shooter that does well in its own right.

There's something so "you get it or you don't" about Treasure games and other japanese action (JAction?) devs like Platinum, and you can probably guess which one I am.

Sometimes I like to think of games like a conversation between designer and player, typically the designer is posing questions like "can you beat this level? can you dodge this attack?" and the players answers simply by doing those things, but it's not a one way street.

Sometimes the player asks something like "Can I knock that full screen meteor right back into the boss's face?" and in this game the designer said "Yes, yes you can do that, here's a medal for it" and that's why this game is good.