Area 4643 is a spinoff to Ninja Slayer - a light novel/anime series that I had never heard of before now, and honestly, based on reviews, seems kinda mid, or at least nothing truly special. But this game, by Neko Navy (which legitimately is one of the best shmups of the 2010s) developer DEATHMOFUMOFU, is a perfect advertisment.
And I think the chief reason is that 4643 is a game that starts pretty good, and then only gets better. The baseline starts fairly strong but nothing particularly special - it's a well designed twin stick shooter with particularly good feedback on kills and some occasionally fun bullet patterns, but lacking a bit on enemy and combat variety. And the first boss shows up and it's some rad fish thing that looks like it jumped out of darius - cool.
And from there, using the base, as the game goes through it's sub-hour runtime, it is just continually improving. The enemy variety gets better, as do level layouts, the spectacle goes from a simple rooftop shootout to a train raid on a horse in the wild west (actually hell-kyoto or something idk the lore) to truly bonkers shenanigans, as you finally end up in the eponymous AREA 4643 and are met with a proper behemoth of a final level with bosses aplenty and all the chaos you could ever desire.
Its all backed by a story with all the depth, silliness and tenuous grasp of english of the Zero Wing opening, as well as quite exceptional art/sprite work. Between this, Neko Navy and the upcoming, Amazing looking Nekoningen Eugene, Deathmofumofu really proves that unity really can be used to great effect in 2D games, and they're truly the master of the craft.
Area 4643 is short, coming in at about an hour - but in that time it packs in such a wonderful amount of entertainment. It's probably not something i'd immedietly come back to - but saying that the game has 4 characters that play completely diferently and a surprisingly good scoring system, so who knows.
Since it has Cats and is a shmup, I prefer Deathmofumofu's Neko Navy by default, but Area 4643 is certaintly a game of similar quality. A delightful hour long romp that just keeps getting better and better before ending with a spectacular crescendo that leaves the game's final impressions sky high.
And I think the chief reason is that 4643 is a game that starts pretty good, and then only gets better. The baseline starts fairly strong but nothing particularly special - it's a well designed twin stick shooter with particularly good feedback on kills and some occasionally fun bullet patterns, but lacking a bit on enemy and combat variety. And the first boss shows up and it's some rad fish thing that looks like it jumped out of darius - cool.
And from there, using the base, as the game goes through it's sub-hour runtime, it is just continually improving. The enemy variety gets better, as do level layouts, the spectacle goes from a simple rooftop shootout to a train raid on a horse in the wild west (actually hell-kyoto or something idk the lore) to truly bonkers shenanigans, as you finally end up in the eponymous AREA 4643 and are met with a proper behemoth of a final level with bosses aplenty and all the chaos you could ever desire.
Its all backed by a story with all the depth, silliness and tenuous grasp of english of the Zero Wing opening, as well as quite exceptional art/sprite work. Between this, Neko Navy and the upcoming, Amazing looking Nekoningen Eugene, Deathmofumofu really proves that unity really can be used to great effect in 2D games, and they're truly the master of the craft.
Area 4643 is short, coming in at about an hour - but in that time it packs in such a wonderful amount of entertainment. It's probably not something i'd immedietly come back to - but saying that the game has 4 characters that play completely diferently and a surprisingly good scoring system, so who knows.
Since it has Cats and is a shmup, I prefer Deathmofumofu's Neko Navy by default, but Area 4643 is certaintly a game of similar quality. A delightful hour long romp that just keeps getting better and better before ending with a spectacular crescendo that leaves the game's final impressions sky high.