The modern shoot-’em-up (shmup) is a genre that has a strong following, with a dark line drawn in the sand for those who can and those who can’t. I recall reading recently that most shmups these days are made for shmup players, rather than give any kind of entrance ability to someone new to the genre.

Enter Kino One, a colorful and accessible shmup that comes from developer iTbGames. It comes racing across the table as an entry-level shmup, easy for those newer to the genre to pick up and feel like they’re accomplishing something. Kino One actually sells itself as a game bundle, adding in several versions of purposefully misspelled arcade classics, like TacMan, Break’n, Spacerocks, Invaders and Ping but in all honesty these additions were completely unnecessary. Kino One stands on its own two feet as an easy-to-pick-up shooter without the need for ancient remakes.

GAMEPLAY

Kino One is a pretty standard top to bottom space shoot ‘em up. The screen remains static on most levels as you’re in space, and the enemies roll your way from the top of the screen. Rather than net you points for each ship you kill, each enemy bursts into a set of colorful stars (that look just like cake sprinkles) each worth a different point value. By collecting as many stars as possible, you’ll net yourself more points. You can earn combos for killing multiple enemies with either a bomb or your charged attack, and overall it’s about netting a high score. I ended the game with around eighteen million points.

The first few levels of Kino One, I played with the keyboard. The option menu doesn’t give you a clear view of what button does what, or even the ability to change it, so it was a rough starting point. You have your standard attack button, your bomb button, and your warp button which can sneak you out of sticky situations. It wasn’t until I switched over to my gamepad that the game became a lot smoother. The entire title has the ability to co-op with another ship, but I played through the title as a lone wolf.

Kino One is simple. It’s broken into five zones of ten waves each, evening out at a total of fifty levels. Each wave has a finite number of enemies, and if you miss any, the wave keeps repeating until you kill everything off. Enemies come in all shapes and sizes and some are much tougher than others.

To keep the enemy ships at bay, the standard attack is pretty weak. But you collect powerups along the way which allow you to charge up your attack beam from level two through four, each taking slightly longer to charge. Once you unleash your charged beam, a wide attack wipes across the screen allowing for easy destruction of any enemies in your way. On the medium setting, a pattern of charge, dodge attack got me most of the way through the game.

Each wave of each zone zooms out slightly, allowing for more enemies on the screen at any given time. This all culminates with the tenth wave in each zone being a boss from the Soldak Empire, a giant spaceship guarded by smaller vessels.

STYLE

The interludes between the levels are some of the strong points in Kino One. Drawn in a bright and appealing comic book style, the game has enjoyable personality and humor.

And in the actual levels, the style is a more formal 3D in 2D space, with the ability to see three dimensions of enemies while remaining on a two dimensional plane. Spaceships crack apart and appear to fall off the screen against some of the bigger enemies.

Your own ship is nothing to write home about, but it packs quite a punch once fully powered up.

STORY

Kino One is the story of a man piloting a spaceship called the Kino One, charged with saving the earth from an alien invasion. Once the invasion is repelled, you chase the enemy to their home territory, slowly working your way up through the upper echelons of the enemy command until the fifth zone where you battle the emperor himself.

Some witty writing makes the game funny, as with humorous self-reflexive details such as a blinking arrow pointing out the “menacing red glowing planet” in the background.

A narrator also creates some self-reflexive humor by making fun of the simple story and the inherent tension built into it.

EVERYTHING ELSE

In the beginning, the soundtrack is an enjoyable element of the game, but as the title progresses it grows increasingly repetitive. It grates on you after a few waves of enemies and by the end of the game I found myself turning the volume down altogether.

In the end I had fun with Kino One and it feels like a good starter shmup for anyone interested in the genre. More and more hardcore shmups keep coming out, so it’s nice to have one that takes itself with a grain of salt.

You can nab Kino One for just $4.99 from the developer’s website. If you’re new or returning to spaceship shoot ‘em ups, I recommend giving it a chance. It’s not going to redefine the genre, but you’ll have fun racking up a high score.

[iTbGames provided DIYgamer with a copy of the title. This in no way affected the outcome of the review.]