R-Type Final 3 Evolved is a 2D horizontal-scrolling shooter game was released in 2023 for PS5, which was developed by Granzella and published by NIS America. It is a updated version of 2021's title such as R-Type Final 2 which was previously released for PS4, XBONE, XSX/S, Switch, and PC.
Before I begin reviewing the game, I wanted to talk about the Irem's classic shooter that was all started back in 1987.
R-Type is a horizontal-scrolling shooter game was created by Irem was originally released for Arcade, so it's really a simple straight-forward shooter where you take control of your star ship went for the battle to destroy the evil alien empire bent on wiping out all of mankind.
What makes the game quite interesting is that your ship has ability to use assisting device called force which protecting you from enemy firing projectiles and providing additional firepower, so that really adds up the new innovation for it's genre.
The game was commercially successful and being celebrated by many video game critics for its visuals and gameplay, and it is also being listed as one of the best shoot-em-ups games of all-time.
The success of the first game had spawned numerous of home console ports including TG-16, SMS, PC-88, MSX2, Atari ST, C64, ZX, GB and various of platforms are also received positive reception citing as really great conversion especially SMS version was immediately recognised as one of the best games available in the SEGA's 8-bit library, where as the TG-16 version being labelled as the system's most accurate home conversion of the arcade original game.
The game also spawned with numerous of sequel including R-Type 2 came later in 1989 for arcade and was ported later in between 1991 and 1992 to Amiga, Atari ST, GB, and of course SNES titled as Super R-Type featuring new stages and enemy types are also received similar praises as the first original game.
Then you have R-Type Leo which is a final game to be released in arcades around 1992 was met with positive reception.
The third game in the series was released in 1993 for SNES titled as R-Type 3: The Third Lightning calling it a solid shoot-em-ups title for SNES library.
In around 1998 and 1999, they bought R-Type Delta for PS1 as the first entry in the series to incorporate 3D graphics.
Then R-Type Final was released in 2003 for PS2 which includes over 100 unlockable playable spaceships.
Those games are amazing back then which defines not only just the shoot-em-up genre, but also a shoot-em-up libraries that cannot be forgotten because R-Type is a fantastic video game series that the fans of the shoot-em-up genre will never forget their wonderful nostalgia of their arcade experience that changed gaming forever.
So going back to this review now, I am so looking forward to play a new entry of the series titled as R-Type Final 3 Evolved for PS5 which I had the reason to play this because number one: I previously enjoyed the earlier R-Type games like the first and second title, number two: I was originally intended to get R-Type Final 2 for PS4 until I've found out the updated version just got released for PS5 which I've decided to get the R-Type Final 3 Evolved instead which has more additional features like 7 exclusive stages that aren't present in Final 2 version.
What did I think about this game? the stuffs will be answered on this review which is why I will cover all the positives and negatives to say that this game is either worth playing it or is it something that are not nearly good as you may think.
So without go further do, let's start the review.
Presentation
There are an opening scene which shows the bunch of crew members inside the small-sized craft area getting the star ship ready to take off for the battle which I believed the fighter star ship are fighting to protect the humanity from the threat of alien invasion team known as Bydo empire.
Yeah, there's not whole of story beside you can also check it out on R Manual on the main menu option to know the background history.
What I've liked about the game is the design of the star ships known as ultimate interchangeable fighters which includes three ships such as R-99 Last Dancer which is basically a simple regular looking ship, R-100 Curtain Call which has really cool pointy rear from the back, and R-101 Grand Finale has curvy design around it, which I got to say I really liked the overall design of these ships that are so mecha-like model to make it look like one of those 80's badass sci-fi ships you see from TV toys commercials, animated cartoons, and some sci-fi films...yeah that's just me being silly.
Aside from the opening scene and ship overall design, the stage presentation is actually brilliant because you have several of the locations which has different stage settings, so stuff like stage 1 which as piles of rock structures at the background, has nice waterfall and large sea, and of course really dim looking caves with purple glowing light.
Stage 2 has blistering stormy weather, enormous looking military sea ship, and the part where you can go under the sea water.
Stage 3 is basically the whole cave filled with glowing areas, objects of crystals, and abandoned facility room.
Stage 4 has the terminal rooms filled with factory made facilities that manufacturing enemy's ships and some miscellaneous stuffs going on.
Stage 5 is where you're on the dark areas of underwater seabed which has streaming bubbles at the backgrounds, and has sea-like seaweeds and stuffs.
Stage 6 has the large size of corridor room with unusual full of cogs of gear around the areas.
Lastly the Stage 7 has gloomy places filled with foggy areas around it covered by waves of puddles and has floating man-made objects at the backgrounds.
I consider these stage presentation design a significant because I have never seen anything look remarkable as any of shoot-em-ups games which proves that they have provided the best overall design that fits the series pretty well.
I also wanted to praise the R museum where you can able to browse and explore the underground aircraft is basically like the showrooms filled with many star ships which I really liked the option to use the first-person perspective when wondering around the areas is seems to be quite cool.
Oh don't forget you have R-Park which has really nice large area of lobby which you can not only to just explore around, but also interact and communicating with people.
Overall, it has brilliant stage presentation and cool overall ship design.
Gameplay
The game has various of game modes such as arcade, score attack, competition, and online.
On arcade mode, you get to select any of these playable ships and you will be played in 2D side-scrolling perspective as your goal is to beat every stage by defeating bosses while fighting the enemy's ships throughout the stages.
You control the ship by pushing the left stick controls or d-pad button to move around, but you can also change the speed of the ship by pressing the left trigger and left shoulder button which makes an easier to control the ship depending on which stages you're on or the enemy you're facing against may require good tactics.
You can also slow down the gameplay by holding the right trigger button which makes the enemy's movement and projectiles more slower while the player can able to move faster makes so much easier to evade their attacks as well as preventing being crashed onto corners, but I think it's perfect for the beginners to use it so you don't have too, unless if you're one of those people couldn't able to beat the game properly.
You'll shoot with your projectiles by tapping the circle button, while holding the circle button will charge up the wave cannon beam till it reached to full gauge bar which displays on bottom of the screen, so this will allow you to blast with the powerful projectiles does a heavy damage attack on bigger enemies.
You can also hold the square button to use rapid fire shot if you don't like to keep mashing the firing button, so having the rapid fire button can be useful for suitable players.
Defeating off the enemies will drop off one of these 3 power-ups items like the red coloured vulcan which act as the stronger version of primary fire, the blue coloured lasers which fires two lasers diagonally as well as ricochets around the areas, and the yellow coloured flames which fires the flames from top to bottom while crawling through the ground floors.
You have the device called force which allows you to use certain of things, so for example: when being attached on the front of the ship which it will protects you from the enemy firing projectiles at the front of the force device, while de-taching off from the ship which providing additional firepower like 3-ways or 5-ways firing shots which the force device can follow you around your ship when pressing the cross button, so you can also re-attach your force device on back of your ship will allow you to fire a projectile from behind makes it easier to shot backwards when you see the enemies are coming from the behind just works.
You can perform a devastating special weapon by pressing the triangle button when the dose level displays from the right-side of the screen are fully on 100% gauge can be slowly increased by your firing projectile from the de-tached force device, so this will allow you to use it to kill the enemies or damaging bosses entirely.
So far the controls works perfectly well in the game because just like the previous entries of the series, the ship movements and firing mechanics just plays it well throughout the game with no issues whatsoever.
I like the option of changing the speed of the ship which allows me to easier avoiding the enemy's projectiles and hazardous objects just works well on several of the stages that may have some tight spaces just like most of the R-Type games which requires you to carefully not accidently getting crashed onto the corners makes the game quite very challenging to play which is absolutely fine for professional players, but the casuals may not like the tight spaces design which not only it makes difficult to evade the corners or objects but most of the enemy's ships can may get in your way or shoot's multiples of their projectiles can be bit of a headache when attempting to get pass through the tight areas takes about a minute to get it done which is why you have right trigger button to slow down time may going to help you a bit for some tight areas.
I got to say that I really liked the various of power-ups on each playable ships which has an advantages because they will have different kinds of firing attacks like your vulcan, laser, bombs, missiles, and you name it does make a really cool firing damage attack on any types of enemies you see on screen.
Completing stages will reward you with two types of currencies system such as main and materials, so the main coins are used for purchasing stuffs like decals and stuffs from the shop menu, where as the materials comes with red, blue, and green currencies are used for purchasing a new playable ships up to 99 through R museum area, so this is really awesome because I really liked unlocking stuffs in the game when beating each stages to get a rewards is what makes the game so great to play.
I had to say that the boss battles are incredibly epic which is a highlight point of the game such as you have long-ass sea dragon and two-tentacles eyeball creature in stage 1, undership eyeball sea monster in stage 2, long centipede creature in stage 3, pentagram like machine in stage 4, large looking seaweed monster in stage 5, cogs-like gears machine in stage 6, and large pointy creature coming out from wavy area in stage 7, so those bosses are actually pretty good in the game that requires good amount of strategy which is why those are tough as nails to beat gets really intense to play.
As I enjoyed the main arcade campaign, you can also play 7 previous stages from the Final 2 which is a great addition to this game because you wouldn't need to get Final 2 to play those 7 levels if this has already included in the Final 3 Evolved, so I also had a good time with the Final 2 stages are just as fun to play.
Unfortunately for those who own the copy of Final 2 for previous platforms may going to miss out 7 new exclusive stages that's being included in Final 3 Evolved, so yeah you really need to get it on PS5 in order to play these 7 new exclusive stages, so tough luck for PS4, XBONE, XSX/S, Switch, and PC owners will never had a chance to play Final 3 Evolved still remains to be stuck on PS5.
Speaking of fun, you can also get an extra stages as an homage stages course DLCs which includes the stages from the previous entries of the series like from first two R-Type arcade games, R-Type 3, R-Type Delta, and list goes so on, but the good news is that you can get season pass vol.1 for free and the bad news is that you had to pay vol.2 and vol.3 for £16.99 each makes £32 both together which is hella stupidly expensive because these DLCs stages are surprisingly amazing to play but you just don't want to spend that such a high price which you had to wait for the sales go down to £8 each instead, so I just got lucky I had all three season pass (including vol.1 is free) quite cheaper which is why I really wanted to re-visit the classic stages from the previous R-Type games so badly.
There are other game modes that are quite decent to play like the score attack mode where your goal is to make a higher score as possible in one of the individual stages, but you can also create an original course by arranging the stages they've completed in any order, so up to 10 original courses can be saved.
Then you have competition mode allowing players to challenge others across the globe, as your main goal is to complete two of these virtual space station stages in competitive score based action, and there's also the online mode called R-Park which allows you to explore around the large areas of lobby for players to interact with each other.
There's one of the thing that kinda bums me the most is the lack of local 2 or 4 player couch co-op which is a shame because that would have made the game enjoyable to play if its has the feature which is sadly been missed out in the game.
That being said, I really enjoyed the whole game which turns out to be really great to play it on PS5 system with no regrets whatsoever.
Overall, it has great controls, epic boss battle, fun game modes, and enjoyable single-player arcade action.
Graphics
The graphics is looking excellent on the PS5 hardware system despite being released on the PS5 console providing the newer engine such as Unreal Engine 5, in comparison to Final 2 which runs on the Unreal Engine 4.
The stage settings is looking amazing for its 3D-like environmental design that are bold, sharp, and detailed which proves that the game is providing such strong quality such as nice reflection on water and waves, the structures of the level layouts has really hard surfaces textures giving a fine detail on stages, the use of lighting and shadow effects are keeping intact in some areas with the balanced level of glowing and toning surfaces, the player's and enemy's projectiles are nicely bright making an easier to spot-on screen, the weather system in one of the stage is incredibly good with winds and blows everywhere, the use of colours is remarkably vivid on some areas, and of course the player's star ships and bosses has really fantastic use of animation.
The game's performance just runs really well on the 60fps with just a little bit of frame-dips didn't really affect the overall gameplay because I believe it's an bit of slight improvement over the Final 2 releases which I'm glad the game just ran fine with no issues.
Sadly, this game just got released on PS5 which they had no plans to release on other platforms like PC and XSX/S, so this made me feel puzzled because it's not impossible for them to release Final 3 Evolved for PC and XSX/S because I'm pretty sure these systems can manage to handle Unreal Engine 5 games, so why not?
Let's hope the game can get the PC and XSX/S release in the future, when the time is right for developers to consider releasing it to other platforms, so who knows?
Overall, it has amazing 3D-like environmental design, fantastic use of animation, and solid performance.
Music and Sounds
The soundtrack in this game, especially with Final 2's OST, is sounds magnificent because I really liked the style of electronic trance music just really fits the game's action in many stages. It was composed by Yuki Iwai which she was known for creating music for games like X-Men vs Street Fighter, Tech Romancer, and the first R-Type Final, so she did such an incredible job for creating the energy of the original soundtrack that adds up the game's intense action.
I also liked the calm and soothing song at the ending credits which has two options on the sound menu such as full Japanese vocal sang by Mai lida and humming vocal sang by Haruka, so they are both sounds good but I kinda much preferred set it to the Japanese version over the humming version makes it everything better in my opinion.
The sound design is also quite great which I really liked the loud environment of the explosions, firing shot, and collisions just about right in each stages.
Overall, it has magnificent soundtrack and great sound design.
Special Features
The game did however had several of unlockables including stage select, some decals and stuffs from shop, has multiples of playable ships up to 99, galleries, and of course stage courses DLCs.
The physical copy of the game comes with nice artbook, official soundtrack CD, and reversible cover.
Overall, a good stuffs.
Advantages
Brilliant stage presentation
Enjoyable single-player arcade action
Epic bosses
Fun game modes
Multiples of unlockable ships
Excellent overall visuals
Magnificent soundtrack
Disadvantages
Tight spaces can be frustrating in some areas
Missing local co-op mode
Overpriced season pass vol.2 and vol.3
No PC and XSX/S releases for this game (Why?)
Final Verdicts
Presentation 8.5/10 - brilliant stage presentation and cool overall ship design.
Gameplay 8/10 - great controls, epic boss battle, fun game modes, and enjoyable single-player arcade action.
Graphics 9/10 - amazing 3D-like environmental design, fantastic use of animation, and solid performance.
Music and Sounds 8.5/10 - magnificent soundtrack and great sound design.
Special Features 8/10 - stage select, some decals and stuffs from shop, has multiples of playable ships up to 99, galleries, and of course stage courses DLCs.
The physical copy of the game comes with nice artbook, official soundtrack CD, and reversible cover.
Overall 8.5/10 - R-Type Final 3 Evolved is a remarkable 2D shoot-em-ups title that never disappoints the fans of the genre will likely going to enjoy this amazing arcade game filled with terrific stage courses with chaotic level design and crazy bosses, solid gameplay system with smooth controls and cool power-ups, some of great game modes to play, and beautiful graphics engine with strong quality design and performance is what makes this game a stunning overall shooter for PS5 library.
Unfortunately for PC and XSX/S owners out there may not able to play R-Type Final 3 Evolved because you may going to miss out the 7 new exclusive stages being included on PS5 release, so like I said before hopefully they will consider releasing two platforms in the future, but I don't think they gonna bring it to 8th-gen console due to Final 3 Evolved running on Unreal Engine 5 as opposed to Final 2 running on Unreal Engine 4.
Both of the physical and digital copy of the game is hella pricy which cost about between £40 and £45 despite most of the NIS America's product is not that really cheap to purchase, but unless you may consider getting the physical copy for it's extra goodies being included in the case like what I've mentioned before, and to those who are rather much preferred to get it digitally then look it up to PS Store.
Is it worth it? the answer is absolutely yes if you're really into with the shoot-em-ups games in general, so go for it and see what you think I guarantee this may not going to disappoint you because it's a really fun game to play.
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