The Grey Place Between Black And White (Karous (DC))

Member Name: scream4bruce

Product:	Karous (DC)
Date:	18/09/08 (107 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Stylish strategical shmup

Disadvantages: Bland graphics and music, not so skillful shmup, can't save high scores

March 8 2007, and Japan sees what is likely to be the last ever game for the Dreamcast, with Sega bringing an end to the GD-ROM. Only months later after release the vertical scrolling shmup is to be lined up for the Nintendo Wii Virtual Console.

Karous certainly has a visual style of its own, the graphics are cel-shaded like in Radilgy, but whereas Milestone Inc's previous was a colourful affair, Karous has a subdued palette where dark shades go against various greys to give the game a bleak outlook. Weapon aspects are coloured differently and the bosses are fairly unique; while the game does pass over neon-lit landscapes in the later stages the low level of detail and bland enemy ship designs still make for a dull visual experience. Both types of enemy bullets do see to some detail however, and thankfully they remain distinguishable from background for when all (bullet) hell breaks loose. Of note, the white backpack worn by the black crow-like creature - whom you control - neatly makes for an obvious hit-box.

A standard spray shot, a sword and a shield are means of damaging the enemy with each earning experience points for doing so. Employing the DFS generates a surrounding force field for absorbing bullets which also goes towards levelling up, and there are icons that can be swiped with the sword to determine which weapon should gain a level. These icons do cycle through speed-up and speed-down dials, which the game could have done without - it's not as if there's fault with the control of the ship.

Finishing the game isn't too tough a task. For all it's crazy bullet patterns Karous rewards to negate rather than to dodge, putting strategy before skill, hence Hard - with it's higher bullet count - is not necessarily a step up in difficulty from Normal. Easy however, only allows you to tackle the first three levels, and is not worth the effort (or lack of). Taking into consideration that the bosses will eventually time-out (as is with these games) means Karous can be reduced to several tricky spots. There is a challenge in defeating the TLB (True Last Boss), but as it's too easy to miss out on a requirement, getting to face the TLB can be tricky.

Unfortunately, since Karous doesn't force you to survive bullet hell - at least the way it should be - it can become a point scoring exercise above anything else. Enemies come and go, but instead of arriving in timely fashion, the next wave of enemies appear as soon as the current one is destroyed - get ahead of schedule however and you might get to put away a couple of extras. Other forms of scoring come from juggling multiplier icons (by swiping with the sword) and milking bosses for their bullets (a visible timer would have been handy here if only to draw the line as to when to go in for the kill).

A low point for Karous is a saving issue which was present in Chaos Field (Milestone Inc's first release) but fixed for Radirgy that meant only game configurations, and not high scores can be saved. It's not helped by the fact that you cannot immediately access the scoreboards. On this low note, I did find the drum and bass music in this game to not be particularly memorable.

As a shoot-em-up Karous can be about as forgettable. While I did clock up numerous hours (aiming for a respectable high score for sure) I find that, from the first to the final level the action is perhaps too steady to the point where the excitement never does peak. As such, I can only recommend this to hardcore fans of the genre. Those who enjoyed Radirgy should like this as well.

Summary: Karous for the Dreamcast