Let’s talk about a remaster, therefore, that on the PlayStation 4 Pro runs at 4K real and sixty frames per second, thus emphasizing the quality of a design that is still convincing and sometimes evocative, thanks to the excellent work done by the Hungarian team in collaboration with Suda51.
The story behind the game, surprisingly profound and interesting, is told through simple text screens and short cutscene (which, if desired, can be quickly advanced), and sees a group of rebel aviators facing the army of the Layil Empire with the goal of freeing the kingdom of Seol.
Our team is not made up of normal soldiers, however: beyond their being anthropomorphic animals, the characters we are going to control during the game’s campaign all have a peculiar ability: they manage to control the passage of time.
THE ETERNAL WAR
The events of Sine Mora EX develop through seven levels more and more complex, although for this remaster the developers have made the degree of difficulty starting more accessible than the original version. The plot will lead us to take on the role of different characters, each on board their plane, and to face the armies of the Layil Empire,
deployed in their entirety, within the most disparate scenarios: from the clouds to the subsoil, flying over the city or inside caves, in the huge hangars of secret bases or between the sea depths, comparing us with a total of thirteen huge bosses.
The rules of the game draw from the classics of the genre, while not disdaining a few clicks between the dynamics of bullet hell, so that in certain situations it will be frankly impossible to avoid the myriad of bullets that will reach us.
Fortunately we will not have to worry about a vital energy bar, but the timer visible in the center, at the top of the screen: when we take damage we lose precious seconds, recoverable by destroying enemies. But if the time runs out, it will be game over and we will be asked to choose whether to return to the main menu or take advantage of one of the “continua” available, in greater or lesser number depending on the degree of difficulty.
To successfully complete our mission we can count on main and secondary weapons that change according to the plane we fly, assisted by the special ability to slow down the time, which can be activated by keeping the R2 backbone pressed.
If the latter and the special weapon depend on the relative indicators and can be recharged via blue and green orb, the primary focus is instead enhanced by collecting red orbs. We move from the single projectile to the multiple shot, multiplying the effectiveness of our
offensive with the risk, however, to lose everything as soon as we suffer a blow: the orbs will abandon our plane and we will have to be quick enough to recover them, if not all of them, to avoid finding ourselves facing advanced stages of the levels without the necessary firepower.
PLAYSTATION TROPHIES 4
Among the twelve Trophies of Sine Mora EX there is one that you get stumbling in the game already in the prologue, while on the contrary another achievement is unlocked by overcoming that phase without suffering any damage. All the other Trophies depend on the degree of skill that we will gradually achieve, making us “promote” until reaching the highest grades.
EXTRA CONTENTS
The variety of weapons, the excellent balance of difficulty (however, seen in a hardcore perspective, where you have to learn from your mistakes to be able to continue successfully) and the interesting narrative outline still make today
Sine Mora EX a shooter with flakes, characterized by beautiful and well-differentiated bosses, composed of elements that must be destroyed separately, which sell the skin dearly and have maneuvers that can displace at first, leaving very little chance of survival: from the mechanical octopus to the iron giant, from the armored train to flying ships, we will really see some beautiful ones.
Completed in little more than a couple of hours the campaign, still a limit not a little, the fulcrum of the experience turns out to be actually the arcade mode, which allows you to replay all the levels in
any order, however, by selecting air and pilot (unlockable gradually along with alternative colors), so as to exploit their weapons and capabilities on a fixed basis, as well as special skills other than “bullet time” , in this case the possibility to activate a shield that reflects the enemy projectiles or to rewind the time to avoid, for example, damage suffered.
