![]() ![]() It especially helps that the pixelated artstyle of the game is incredibly detailed and adorable. There isn’t anything wrong with this insane presentation, if anything I’d say it adds a lot of fun to what could have just been a fairly basic retread of a cutesy nineties game. Then it’s revealed that Dark Mantle is actually a girl named Anna who was some kind of priestess who got possessed by a demon named Gastaroth who is actually Dark Mantle? So then you team up with some other gods to deal with that while Rocky just sort of runs around doing nothing. Black Mantle goes back in time to stop Pocky and Rocky from beating him in the original game by killing Pocky, who then goes to the spirit world and gradually fights her way back to the future where Dark Mantle has just sort of lit everything on fire. Whereas the original was just a story about Pocky and Rocky freeing their goblin friends from the mental manipulation of the evil sorcerer Dark Mantle, Reshrined adds in all sorts of new characters and world-hopping that at times can feel like a fever dream. It’s not frustratingly obtuse, or complex in a way where you have to know the rich lore of GBA spin-off Pocky and Rocky with Becky or anything it’s just really funnily convoluted. If there is one aspect of Reshrined that does feel like a bit much it’s the writing. Everything about Reshrined ’s presentation feels exactly like the original being improved upon and reconsidered in accordance with modern expectations and possibilities, without sacrificing the simplicity and charm it’s known for. What was once a pretty basic foray on a floating boat is now a hectic fight across flaming spaceships, and a lot of the classic bosses have been given either additional mechanics or an extra phase to their fights for an extra layer of complexity. While the original Pocky and Rocky was fairly straightforward (i.e you go from the shrine, to the woods, to the graveyard) Reshrined cranks each of these classic levels up a notch. The story mode is cute, with classically styled cutscenes, and a surprising variety of locales. The original game only had a story mode, which meant you had to watch (read skip) the cutscenes everytime you finished a level, so the compromise of two different modes to encourage replayability without slowing the player down is a nice one, especially for the type of sickos who are actually going for 1CCs or speedruns. #POCKY AND ROCKY 2 ENEMIES FREE#Free Mode lets you play through those eight levels again, but without the cutscenes, as any character you like, and potentially in local co-op. Whereas the original game had just Pocky and Rocky, Reshrined has a total of five playable characters, each with a completely different playstyle that gives the game the sense of modularity inherent to most other shoot ‘em ups. Story Mode is the eight levels of the game presented in a deliberate, curated way, with cutscenes and a different character depending on the level. Reshrined mixes things up immediately by being separated into two different main modes: Story, and Free. It’s not the Pocky and Rocky you remember, but it’s exactly how you want to imagine Pocky and Rocky having been. Was it a remake of the original game? Was it an entirely new one? The answer lies somewhere in the middle, with Reshrined taking the levels and concepts behind the original release, and updating them with all sorts of modern bells and whistles to make something that’s akin to idealized nostalgia. When Pocky and Rocky Reshrined was announced, it was pretty unclear what exactly it was going to be. #POCKY AND ROCKY 2 ENEMIES FULL#It’s a simple game, primarily and obviously as a result of its arcade origins (under the name KiKi KaiKai ) but there’s nothing wrong with that, especially way back in the era of “you just bought this licensed game of a TV show/movie for full price and it’s like two hours long and it’s going to be the most miserable two hours of your life.” ![]() You play as either a shrine maiden named Pocky, or a tanuki named Rocky, and you go around throwing spell cards and leaves at all sorts of crazy yokai across six levels. It wasn’t a barn burner by any means, another shmup in an era flush with shmups, but it was appreciated by many at the time for its novel, fun presentation. Pocky and Rocky was a fun little shoot ‘em up developed for the Super Nintendo just about thirty years ago by Harvest Moon publisher Natsume. ![]()
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