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Super Galaxy Squadron EX Turbo is the result of a twelve year war and unsteady truce between human and Tau Ceti aliens. Both factions have been in an increasing arms race that leads to the formation of a war winning squadron of aces, the Galaxy Squadron. This fourteen strong squadron of ace pilots is humanity's secret weapon to win the inevitable second war between humanity and our alien antagonists. That's the premise of the game, but shmups aren't about the premise, lets get blasting.

I'm a tired of options in games, just give me the default settings and let me recover from decision fatigue. There's six ways to play Super Galaxy Squadron EX Turbo, three difficulties and the option to play with unlimited continues or perma-death mode. On top of that are the fourteen different pilots, each with their own special move and base stats. These pilots form a proverbial rainbow with their own nationalities, ages, genders and zodiac signs. It's the kind of crap that makes no difference whatsoever when your character is strapped into a metal coffin full of guns. In shmups the only diversity that matters is either scrolling vertical or horizontal. 

After picking Mr. Default and choosing the Veteran/Arcade setting, I set of on my crusade against the evil Tau Ceti, or Earth, or whatever. The action starts and it becomes clear that Galaxy Squadron Ex Turbo takes after legit bullet hell shmups instead of just being an indie poser. the telltale narrow aspect ratio and crowded action make Galaxy Squadron feel like it could almost be a cabinet port. The music scores the beefy explosions and tense weaving between the donut shaped enemy bullets, and oh boy, there are bullets. Bosses and larger ships will fill the screen with projectiles, so using your small hitbox and slo-mo meter will be vital, especially on bosses. The bossfights bookend every level and are far from unbeatable. Even if it weren't for the merciful health drops, Super Galaxy Squadron EX Turbo was a pretty easy game, or so I thought. 



At first Veteran with unlimited continues had me second-guessing my difficulty choice. The campaign was so easy at times that I could go without using the slo-mo or hyper attack, at least until the game's final boss. The little spherical ball of hatred was so much harder than the other bosses that it turned my otherwise one-and-done playthrough into a two-parter, my nerves were fried. This isn't to complain that a bullet hell game lives up to the appropriate level of difficulty, but that the difficulty was so unevenly spread that I was blindsided by the game's final challenge. I doubt that this was the developers intention, so I count it as a flaw. Good shmups should have peaks and valleys of challenge, at least having a few big hurdles to overcome before the games end. 

Lopsided difficulty aside, the load of options both help and hurt Galaxy Squadron EX Turbo. As a standalone shmup game, I like to play a game in the definitive way that's neither going to feel cheap or simply be too difficult to finish. The options in this game and huge amount of ships to choose make it tricky to play the game in a definitive way. An area where the options help, are either making it harder for the sake of practicing shmups, or as an entry level for inexperienced players. The game's bosses make good bullet hell practice, even if they're too easy, great for someone looking to boost their gamer skill. If you're a noob that doesn't have any gaming skill and wants a shmup with nice assets and a lot of player options, then Galaxy Squadron EX Turbo can be really forgiving with it's unlimited continues and progress saving features. I doubt anybody needs 14 pilots to choose from, but I'll leave it for you to decide, Comrades. 


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