What combines a soap opera, space flight simulator, fast-paced action, spacecraft customization, epic battles, well-rendered cutscenes and a very good localisation job? Project Sylpheed is the name, and this is perhaps the best combination of all of the above on the Xbox 360. Project Sylpheed was developed by Game Arts, a Japanese developer best known for its Grandia and Lunar console RPGs, and published by Square Enix, of obvious Final Fantasy fame. You might think that an RPG developer combined with a RPG publisher would fail at making a compelling action game such as Project Sylpheed: you thought wrong.
Project Sylpheed is based loosely on the previous games in the Silpheed series, however instead of a 2-D shooter, you're now in the cockpit (or slightly above and behind) of your prototype Delta Saber fighter. It's a full-on 3-D environment now, where you control every aspect of your movement in three axes. Bristling with firepower, the Delta Saber you pilot can be configured before each mission with up to 4 different weapons mounted on the hardpoints of the fighter. Between the former and the latter, every single button on the Xbox 360's controller is utilized. Later in the game you become a squadron commander, and need to issue orders via the D-pad to your squadron. In short, this is a game that takes some learning to play effectively. Game Arts have considered this, though, and provided both a 'simple' and a 'professional' interface.
The game is set 600+ years in the future, when the human race has reached out past the solar system and colonized habitable planets in other systems. You are Katana Faraway, a kid who has just graduated from flight school and is assigned to a training squadron flying the prototype Delta Saber. Suddenly, you and your wingmate Ellen are thrust into a galactic civil war: several colonies have banded together to oppose the Terran Central government. Sounds like a recipe for some epic space battles!
The graphics during gameplay are great. You feel as if you're immersed in a battle, with capital ships duking it out and you weaving your way through the flak. Dozens of targets fly all around you, and like many Japanese space animes, your fire dozens of missiles at multiple targets, watching them explode in a shower of glowing shrapnel before you head off to your next batch of targets. Fighting capital ships is similar, where you switch to anti-ship weaponry and pick off different portions of the ships, from the cannons, to the engines, and then eventually the entire ship itself. Destroying a capital ship such as a carrier with your wingmen fending off the enemy fighters is intense, as your shields deplete from the flak cannon fire from the ships. Your shield's energy incidentally is your ticket out of the firefight to refit and refuel (as your afterburners use the same energy), so it's a constant juggling of resources to know when to break off your attack or continue charging forward.
During each battle, radio chatter abounds as you get updates from your wingmen, your commanders and even your enemies. It takes some getting used to, as most games of this intensity update you visually and the voices are just 'ear candy'. However, ships in distress will call out to you, giving you the option to go help them or continuing with your mission. If you being running low on ammo, your flight command will inform you of this, and when you're firing 24 missiles at a time, your ammo runs dry quite quickly.
If you're looking for something that should occupy 10-20 hours of your time with intense, epic and challenging space battles, a good storyline, lots of eye candy and something that rewards you for strategizing, Project Sylpheed is a game you should pick up.
