It is the 6th installiment title in the Cotton franchise, and also a follow-up to 2000's rail-shooter titled as Rainbow Cotton for Dreamcast, and the first main entry of the series in over 20 years.
I love playing side-scrolling shooter games back then, when we had such many great titles that not only defines our childhood nostalgia but also defines classic gaming that created the genres known as "shumps" which is a short term for shoot-em-ups. So stuff like Konami's Gradius 3, Technosoft's Thunder Force 4, Compile's M.U.S.H.A, Treasure's Radiant Slivergun and Ikaruga, Square Enix's Einhander, Taito's Darius Gaiden, and Capcom's Mars Matrix. So those were a good times when we had the best libraries of shoot-em-ups games being played on various of arcade machines and home consoles.
Going forward to my todays gaming where I've still had both my PS3 and PS4 console, I also did enjoy various of modern shoot-em-ups games like Edelweiss's Astebreed, HUCAST's Ghost Blade, CAVE's Deathsmiles 1 and 2, MOSS's Raiden 4 Overkill, G.rev's Under Defeat HD, Qute's Natsuki Chronicles, and Digital Reality's Sine Mora EX which are also plays just as good as any of shoot-em-ups libraries.
The shoot-em-up are also shared with their subgenres such as cute-em-ups, a term that feature a cutesy colourful anime themes and shoot-em-ups gameplay being fused together were pioneered by the likes of Konami's Twinbee and SEGA Fantasy Zone, along with the later ones such as Hudson Soft's Star Parodier, Konami's Parodius, and Victor Entertainment's Keio Flying Squadron.
There's one of the franchise that grabs my attention was Cotton, a 2D side-scrolling shooter series that was popular back in the 90's era of Japanese arcades had many praises and earning several awards from Japanese gaming magazines regarded the game series as a pinnacle of the cute-em-up subgenre.
It had those classic titles back in the 90s such as Cotton: Fantastic Night Dreams for Arcade, X68000, and TG-CD, Cotton 100% for SNES and PS1, and Cotton 2: Magical Night Dreams for Arcade and Saturn which are well-received 2D cute-em-ups was praised for visuals, playability, and replay values that made the franchise quite popular among with shoot-em-ups fanatics in Japan, where as Panorama Cotton for Genesis/MD made a major departure from the original gameplay formula into a pseudo-3D shooter are also received positive reception from the critic and players which many consider this as a truly superior title than the SEGA's Space Harrier 2, so those were amazing games to play with except that turd like Rainbow Cotton for Dreamcast which is a 2000's rail-shooter title was met with negative reception for its outright clunky controls and poor overall design making it one of the worst entry that kills-off the franchise so badly which is why they began to stop creating another Cotton game after the failure mess of Rainbow Cotton couldn't give the series any justice.
Thankfully the series made a return in the year 2021 with Cotton Reboot! for PS4, Switch, and PC, which was developed by Rocket-Engine, had garnered a much better reception for being faithful recreation of the X68000 conversion with flashy and colourful visuals, various game modes, and core gameplay are fully praised by critics and fans making it a great comeback to the cute-em-ups franchise.
Then we get a recent title that was released last year such as Cotton Fantasy: Superlative Night Dreams which is why I am here to review this title because it's been a long time I've haven't reviewed any of shoot-em-ups games since I've already covered the review of Sine Mora EX in 2018, but going back to this topic right now because I had a physical copy of this title for my PS4 console bought it off from eBay online store which is why I am looking forward to play this kind of game featuring a cutesy anime girls goes on their action and battling against bunch of enemies to save the fairyland is what I liked about the Cotton series as a whole.
So what can I say about this title? is it a cute-em-ups title went all fun once again like the previous installiment of 2D classic shooter or is it yet another dull and dumpster fire experience as the terrible 2000's Dreamcast title? So we are taking a look of this recent title in the franchise with several of things that made the game plays good and some stuff that it could have made it bit better.
So without go further do, let's start the review.
Presentation
The game takes place in the home world of Fairyland, so the story had began when the candy-like objects known as "Willow" are vanishing from the Fairyland and the Fairy Queen asks the tiny-little fairy named Silk to seek young witch named Cotton for desperate help.
As silk had managed to reach her old friend and told the story about the Willows disappearing incident that had happened, Cotton is willing to help her out and goes on their adventure together, as their goal is to defeat several monsters and retrieve Willows back to Fairyland where it belongs.
It may sounds strange to you guys, but honestly it's pretty quite easy to follow because I really liked the idea of making the story about everyone's favourite candy are indeed taste very sweet, so they wouldn't survive without having something to eat sweets stuff like hard candy, mints, toffee and so on.
All of the Willows got magically disappeared from the kingdom meaning there will be nothing else to eat something sweet which is why you have Cotton and her friend was sent on their quest to restore Willow back where it came from.
It's like saying let's just pretend that it may happen in our real life where we had a bunch of sweets piled up in the sweet factory, until in very next day you'll see nothing but a empty spaces due to supplies of candies are likely being stolen or got lost from the factory meaning there will be no more sweets left to sold at candy shop and got nothing to eat, so there are a possible solution of getting the candy back at the factory where it belongs, so this what makes the plot in this game quite interesting because the story as a whole are quite a charm with silly humour and has it's own sweet moments that give us a wonderful laugh which is why I liked about having two duos goes on adventure, defeating bunch of enemies, and saving the kingdom by retrieving a special candy that Cotton always loves is what made the game quite entertaining to watch during the cutscenes.
I got to say the characters in the game are actually likable, so you have Cotton who had an obsession with the Willows which seems to be the only thing she ever cares about. She's shown to be gluttonous and selfish girl at the start until she was bribed by Silk to help others, but I also liked her humorous part in the game that made her quite memorable.
Then you have Silk which I considered her as adorable-lookin chick just like any of anime girls in general. She had lovely long pink hair, bright purple bikini outfit, shoes, and wrist-wear, and has cute looking wings which I find her just as appealing in the series.
I find their character's animation are quite adorable looking things, but also are hilariously comical and entertaining with the use of funny facial expressions and wacky humour is what made the character's personality quite interesting throughout the sequences.
As the game shares with charming sense of humour and recognisable cute characters, the entire presentation as a whole is very good indeed which I really liked the anime-themed settings with bright and colourful environments, and manga-style sequences just adds up pretty nicely in the game.
Each stages shares different style of scenery such as Castle Garden which is a night-time place filled with old houses, big castle, fireworks, trees, cave, and waterfall. Riverside has hanging bobble, skull-moon, bridge, and river. Ancient Ruin and Royal Tomb had filled with Egyptian landmarks stuff like pillars, beamlight, flametorch, Pyramid, and has wall-structures of Ancient Egypt portraits.
Twilight has windmills, floating hills, cloudy environments, and prehistoric bones object. Blue Sky filled with skies and clouds, and flying ship.
Lastly Space stage has bunch of space ship flying around the galaxy, wrecked structures, space station, and of course an giant looking pink willow at the background.
Overall, it has charming story, cute characters, and very good art-style presentation.
Gameplay
In single-player mode, you will have 6 playable and 1 unlockable characters at the characters selection menu.
You will have Cotton as a main playable character, 5 guests including Appli (from Cotton 2), Umihara Kawase (from franchise of her same name), Ruffee (from Dokidoki Poyatchio), Psyva Ria (based on the Axiom 001 fighter from Psyvariar), and Fine (based on the Sanvein fighter from Starfighter Sanvein), and lastly 1 villain called Tacoot as secret unlockable character.
You're playing as ether with Cotton or other playable characters in 2D side-scrolling perspective, as your main goal is to beat the entire stage by defeating the bosses.
Each of the characters will have different style of shot type like shooting range, weapons, and bombs which I will explain it for later on this review.
You will have 3 action buttons such as shot, special, and auto. Hitting the shot button rapidly or hold down the auto button to perform a shot attack, while holding the shot button down to perform a charge attack which has 3 different magic stock like red, blue, and green variant.
You can also launch a powerful bomb by pressing the special button will expend one option which wipes out enemy's projectiles or instantly kills off enemies in one screen.
After defeating enemies will drop any 4 coloured crystals that you can collect and use them, so you can also switch the colour of crystals by simply firing them till its changed.
The yellow crystals which raises EXP, so you will level up when the EXP gauge is full meaning this will allow the range of shot goes wider and bigger, the easier its damages the enemies quite faster.
Red, Blue, and Green crystal will also change your current shot type, as well as it adds to the magic stock that I've mentioned above.
For example: the red stock fires a 3-way shot and huge flaming dragon, the blue stock fires a rapid-firing plasma and long blue lighting, and the green stock fires a homing wave-shot and big green tornado, so using these kinds of magic attacks will not only just wipes out enemies entirely, but the enemies are also drops out numerous of golds that increases your scoring combo points as well.
As I've mentioned before about the each characters have their own unique gameplay mechanics such as Cotton and Appli have traditional playstyle while each of them having their own unique magical spells.
Umahara Kawase has ability to capture and toss enemies with her fishing rod, Luffee has only a single spell type but also having more of a straightforward beginner type style compared to the other characters, Ria utilizes the buzz system with her shots levelling up by grazing on enemy's bullets, Fine has access to 3 different shot types at all times which can be cycled at will, and then lastly Tacoot plays much like Cotton and Appli but has ability of launching her staff which can hit enemies and float in place while shooting its own shots until the player calls it back.
Having each of the playable characters with different abilities is what really adds the great element of gameplay because each of them will have their advantages like your speed, strengths, and special depending on which any of these playable characters you have selected that suits your playstyle is what I've liked about this game.
Cotton and Appli are recommended for experienced shoot-em-ups players are much preferred for traditional game style and aiming to gain a fair amount of hi-scores, where as others are great for those who wanted to play something different rather than just the traditional gameplay.
For example: Fine utilizes the time mechanics from Starfighter Sanvein instead of lives, so she has a timer which constantly ticks down and acts as a life gauge with the timer going up for as long as the player keeps shooting enemies down and collecting their crystals which I got to say it's nice to have a shoot-em-ups game that gives you a choice to choose a traditional play or playing on different game mechanics just adds the new experience.
I also wanted to praise a scoring system entirely because using a combination of shot and special just multiplies the scoring combos meaning that you will gain 10 times or even more enough scoring points that adds ups to your hi-score total, so it worked amazingly well throughout the stages.
Speaking of gaining many scores as possible, you will also participate the two of the 3D bonus stage, similar to Panorama Cotton, where you need to collect many lampshades which also adds up your bonus scoring points, so yeah it's quite a beneficial for score hunters are aiming to gain a higher ranking score on leaderboard to see who is the top best hi-scorers in local or global ranking.
The best part in the game is the bullet-hell style elements where many of the enemies on the screen just shoots out the multiple of projectiles which makes the player difficult to avoid it meaning that you had to carefully evade their projectiles as possible without having to touching these, otherwise you'll be instantly get killed in action.
It really adds up a not only just being quite challenging, but also a overall fun factor is what really matters because the more you keep practicing the game, the better you could play perfectly that makes the game even fun for experienced shoot-em-up players.
While the gameplay plays really well throughout the game, I also wanted to point out that the arcade version had their exclusivity features such as 2-player co-op and arrange mode that was completely missing out the PCs and console releases which is quite a shame because that would have been giving us a complete Cotton experience if they have included these features for PCs and console versions.
As much as I am happy with the 5 playable guests and one unlockables in this game, I wish they could had added the Silk as playable character just like they did the same with the Cotton Reboot! So I don't understand why they didn't include her as a solo play in this game.
I did appreciate with the 5 unlockable stages after beating the game numerous of time are actually quite good as well, so having to select any of multiple stages at the level selection menu just really adds up a decent overall of replay values.
Overall, it has great gameplay mechanics, amazing scoring system, and fun bullet-hell elements.
Graphics
The graphics are amazingly stunning for its cute visuals and colourful design just adds the game's appeal.
I really liked the details of stage environment are being nice and bold thanks to sharp textures surfaces
that made the game looked clean, and it has a great use of parallax scrolling with 3D backgrounds and layers of foreground objects.
For example: in Twilight stage, you'll see a swooping 3D background of large castle at the beginning of the game, while you'll see a nice looking windmill and dusty clouds being placed in mid and front side, as well as floating hills at the landscape are incredibly impressive for its unique overall design.
Blue Sky stage had the best looking 3D large ship floating around the stage are just as impress me the most because it delivers an eye-catching moment that brings the true sense of action-packed shooter.
lastly, the 3D bonus stages are kinda look like from SEGA's Space Harrier with bunch of flying lampshades scrolling towards at the screen is what we should have gotten us a Panorama Cotton true sequel instead of what we had end up with the Rainbow Cotton in early 2000s.
I also liked the use of the special effects on bullet projectiles that are bright and vivid looking which makes it easier for player to see where the enemy's projectiles firing it from, while the colours on projectiles stays perfectly balanced that are not difficult to see things preventing the confusion on the player, who may not liked the small potion of projectiles that are totally overloaded, will able to spot things and make easier to avoid it from being hit by enemy's projectiles during the gameplay.
Overall, it has stunning stage environment design, great use of parallax scrolling, and vivid special effects.
Music and Sounds
The original soundtrack as a whole is quite sounds fantastic overall that made the game quite energetic.
It had a mixture of retro-style chiptunes and upbeating music that fits everything well for cute-em-ups title.
It was both composed by Keisuke Hayase and Kenichi Arakawa did their job everything right with the soundtrack are being as the finest things that Cotton game has to offer.
The sound design has the same old-school jingles effects from the previous classic entries really never gets too old, while the rest of the whole shoot-em-up action did however had a good range of environmental sounds and the use of cartoony noises are perfectly sounds clear as crystal.
The voice for every characters in the game are considered as super cute which is why I really liked the anime related stuff that features a Japanese voice over that can speak with their adorable sounds just really puts the joy in our faces.
Overall, it has fantastic original music, good sound design, and adorable Japanese voices.
Special Features
The game has 5 unlockable stages and 1 unlockable character which is really good, but like I just said it before the PCs and console releases are missing out 3 things from arcade counterpart such as 2-player co-op, arrange mode, and of course Silk as playable character, so I was hoping they will consider adding all these 3 features in near future as free updatable patch or maybe free DLCs if possible, then I would have given a score bit higher.
Overall, a bit fair, but the game just needs to add more features.
Advantages
Very good art-style presentation
Great gameplay mechanics
Amazing scoring system
Fun bullet-hell elements
Stunning visual design
Fantastic original music
Disadvantages
Missing out 2-player co-op, arrange mode, and Silk as playable character
Final Verdict
Presentation 8.5/10 - charming story, cute characters, and very good art-style presentation.
Gameplay 7.5/10 - great gameplay mechanics, amazing scoring system, and fun bullet-hell elements.
Graphics 8.5/10 - stunning stage environment design, great use of parallax scrolling, and vivid special effects.
Music and Sounds 8.5/10 - fantastic original music, good sound design, and adorable Japanese voices.
Special Features 6/10 - has 5 unlockable stages and 1 unlockable character, but misses out content from arcade counterpart.
Overall 7.5/10 - As much as I've enjoyed the previous entry like Cotton Reboot! This game is just as about stepping in the right direction that give the classic cute-em-ups franchise a fair justice thanks to charming presentation choices, great use of playability, has various of playable stages and characters to choose from, eye-catching visuals, and upbeating soundtrack are the major highlight part of the whole game just delivers a shoot-em-ups experience.
I am glad that the game had turned out pretty positive because I had a ton of blast of playing this game for days and hours which is why the game are actually pretty good so far that deserves a another sequel in future perfect.
The game cost around between £25 and £35 of physical copy for both PS4 and Switch, where as the digital releases for all platforms are slight bit higher for £35, so this is definite a buy for shoot-em-ups fans will able to appreciate a recent Cotton game that deserves the same love as the previous 2D classic entries in the franchise.
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