Mamorukun ReCurse! is the latest shoot ‘em up developed by G.Rev, the minds behind the fantastic G-Darius and Under Defeat HD+, to get a glow-up and a modern release. Originally released in 2008 in arcades and later onto XBox 360 and PlayStation 3, this game is what is often called a “cute ‘em up”, or a shoot ‘em up (aka shmup) with a more cutesy and often wacky aesthetic. And when the Cute ‘Em Ups come calling, I’m always ready to answer the phone. Time to see if it was a call worth taking.
Boy Meets Truck
Mamorukun ReCurse! Sees our main character, Mamoru, isekai’d into the Netherworld, waking up with no idea who they are. Mamoru meets the other playable characters and a Shrine Maiden. She’s the one who brought the characters here, and she needs help to dispel a darkness taking over the netherrealm, saving the day and clearing the cast of their convenient amnesia.
The story is told pretty much through the anime-style intro, conversations between stages, and each playable character’s ending. It’s a pretty basic and cliché plot for the genre, but as is often the case when it comes to shmups, the story is mostly window dressing. It gives enough of an excuse as to why anime characters are fighting cute, super deformed enemies in a colourful (and often quite beautiful) version of the afterlife.
The story is a nice addition for those wanting a little more out of the genre, and for those who just want to score and dodge, it’s easily skippable to get you right to where you want to be. It’s never intrusive, just how I like it in my shmup!
We Got All The Time
Mamorukun ReCurse! Differs quite a bit from the standard vertical Shmup template in that you have full control of how your “Ship” progresses through the stage, having much more in common with a twin-stick shooter than titles like the Cotton series, for example. You’ll be dodging bullets, fighting bosses, and scoring high as always, but you also have another much more looming foe throughout the stages: time.
You get a 5-minute timer to get through each of the stages in the game, meaning you need to keep moving forward while also focusing on dodging incoming death. Taking down bigger enemies and bosses adds time, but you’ll be constantly pressured by the clock ticking down. There’s a delicate balancing act that is quite intimidating on your first couple of runs, but when it clicks it’s quite a fun challenge and really forces you to learn the routes of the game and what enemies you should go out of your way to take down.
If the timer seems a little too much for you to take on, there is the Story Mode option which changes the game quite a bit. Instead of having “lives”, you get to play as each of the characters as your lives instead, and it forgoes the timer for a little more of a peaceful playthrough. Or at least as peaceful as a shmup can be anyway.
Variety is the Spice Of the Afterlife
The Story Mode is a great way of dipping your toes into the game to learn the different nuances of the characters, their bullet patterns, and the stages, and train to take on the challenging arcade mode. It’s still a tough little cookie to crack, but it’s an ideal way to learn what the game has to offer before you hit the score-chasing arc of your shmup story.
If Story and Arcade are bowing down to your bullet hell expertise, there is also an “Arrange” mode called Netherworld Action Mode. This switches up all the bullet patterns, limits your party to 3 of the characters, and has a pre-chosen stage set rather than allowing you to choose. It’s the ultimate challenge in this package and the one that will keep hardcore shmup enthusiasts coming back time and time again.
In terms of controls, Mamorukun ReCurse! Gives you the option to either play it with the traditional single-stick controls like in the original arcade release, which locks your direction when you shoot, or you can switch to the more intuitive twin-stick way of play. Much like Under Defeat HD+, after I made the jump over, I found myself having a lot more fun with the title. (Maybe I’m just starting to show my age!)
Rather than having a screen-clearing bomb like many shmups, you have the Curse Bullet. You can charge this bullet and fire it at enemies; it damages them over time and cancels any bullets they fire out during its duration. You can also fire the bullet into an empty space and open a Curse Circle, which if you run into it you gain a massive temporary power-up, ideal for taking down bigger waves of popcorn enemies and getting you a little more breathing room. There is no limit to how often you can use these Curse Bullets, with only a slight cool-down after you have fired, making for a delicate balancing act of choosing which type of curse to use.
Extra Extras
Mamoru ReCurse! offers plenty of modes to chomp through and a fantastic roster of characters to learn, including characters who were initially DLC in the original release. The inclusion of the Twin Stick control set-up and the unique challenge the game presents in each of its modes just adds to it. It’s a fantastic Cute ‘Em Up package that should keep players engaged trying to reach the top of the online leaderboards for quite some time.
Cute and Spoopy!
As a cute ‘em up, rather than the standard flair of shmup space ships, you have cute styled anime characters and yokai as your cast, which gives it that slight visual edge in the genre that is often eclipsed by the sci-fi genre. Personally, I love this style of shmup and its aesthetics for the amount of charm and quirkiness they often have, and I’m happy to say this game has both in spades.
Despite being set in the Netherworld, the world is a colourful, goofy place, absolutely swamped with some of the daftest yokai designs around. It’s far from a serious expedition, and I am 100% all for it. If you’ve ever seen titles like Parodius or Cotton, you know exactly what a colourful and fun experience your eyes will be having.
The developers have done a fantastic job at cleaning up the original 2008 visuals to make them more crisp and presentable on modern displays without impacting the original art direction, one which to me screams Dreamcast era arcade. Playing this game on the Nintendo Switch 2, it looked fantastic both docked and handheld with zero slowdown. It’s also available on PlayStation, Xbox, and PC, and while I haven’t tried those versions, I can imagine they also perform fantastically if they run anywhere near as well as this version.
The soundtrack in Mamorukun ReCurse! is an absolute standout in the genre with so many brilliant tracks. It’s a fun mix of arcade, spooky, and just outright slapstick fantasy music, which instantly transports you to the quirky Netherworld reminiscent of a SNES-era game. I found myself humming along with the tracks with each playthrough and cannot understate how much I actually appreciated the music in this one.
Verdict
Mamorukun ReCurse! has so much in common with G.Rev’s other title Under Defeat HD+ in that initially it had enough to interest me but didn’t quite grip me. Switching to the twin stick controls sold the game to me more, and I found myself losing hours to just trying to get further up that scoreboard, engrossed by its visuals, unique aspects, the soundtrack.
The game won’t be for everyone, it’s very much unabashed as a cute ‘em up and the timed nature of the arcade mode will put off some of the purists. But for those that can adapt or are happy enough to lean into the goofiness of the title, you’ve got a fantastic package full of content, and in my eyes, the definitive way to play the game. This is absolutely recommended for score chasers needing their next fix.
MAMORUKUN RECURSE! IS RECOMMENDED
If you are looking for another shmup, take a look at our review of DoDonPachi SaiDaiOuJou.
Many thanks go to Clear River Games for a Nintendo Switch review code (played on Nintendo Switch 2) for Mamorukun ReCurse!
Pride of utopia & greatest thing ever, I found the One Piece, Collected the Dragon Balls & won the Mortal Kombat Tournament in one night, it was quiet for me that night! Follow me on Twitter @powahdunk
