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Under Defeat HD hits Xbox 360 stateside after two years AWOL
So this is a bit of an odd one. Back in late 2012/early 2013, Under Defeat HD came to PS3 and Xbox 360 in Japan and Europe. In North America, Rising Star released the remaster of G.rev's Dreamcast and arcade helicopter shoot-em-up exclusively for PS3. Why? Well, we could speculate, but the answer's unknown. Then this week, around two years later and out of the blue, Under Defeat HD finally hit Xbox 360s stateside via Games on Demand. Despite being a vertical shoot-em-up, Under Defeat is ideally suited for HD widescreen life, as former Managing Editor JC Fletcher explained back in 2012. That HD "New Order" mode - which sadly doesn't have anything to do bizarre love triangles or blue Mondays - is part of the new Xbox 360 version, which is available now to download for $20.
How Under Defeat HD fills your HDTV
Welcome to Living in the Past, a weekly column about what's new in old games. Now get off our lawn. Vertical shooters don't really mix well with HDTVs and their 16-by-9 aspect ratios. They would if people were crazy enough to turn their TVs sideways, but that's generally not the most feasible option. Most shooters released on HD systems relegate the game screen to a relatively small window to compensate, leaving a lot of dead space on the screen.Under Defeat HD features a mode, new to the PS3 release of this Dreamcast-era game, designed to fill the whole widescreen display, called "New Order." It works well, and makes a convincing argument that 16-by-9 display can work ... for Under Defeat.
Under Defeat's Maruyama on shmup stagnation
G.Rev's Under Defeat was already part of a "new generation" of shooters when it was released in arcades in 2005 and on Dreamcast in 2006 – at least, compared with what most people would think of as the "golden age" for the genre in the late '80s and early '90s.And now, six years later, Under Defeat returns in HD on PS3. I asked G.Rev CEO Hiroyuki Maruyama how shooters have evolved since its original release."Well ... to be honest, I do not think there has been any evolution in the genre in the past few years," Maruyama said. "Around the year 2000, if you discussed shoot 'em ups, you could talk about several different types of games within the genre. It's sad to see that recently you do not come across the same variety of shooters in the market. As a company, we have tried to release shmups that we feel are 'different' than others ... but it is a difficult environment right now."%Gallery-163195%
Under Defeat HD drops price to $30, retail version full of extras
Under Defeat, a vertical shooter by G.Rev, was originally an arcade game, and then it saw home release on the Dreamcast in Japan – in 2006, long after the Dreamcast's natural lifespan had ended.Under Defeat returns this fall in high definition, on the PS3, a platform that is currently being supported. The price for the retail/PSN release has been dropped from $40 to $30 since publisher Rising Star initially announced the release plans, which is good news for fans of ten-dollar bills.The retail version, despite selling for the same price, will include bonuses like a "digital art book, all current DLC and patches, a soundtrack CD and an exclusive letter from the CEO of G.Rev and the game's executive producer, Hiroyuki Maruyama," boasts Rising Star on the PlayStation Blog.
