Kamui is the first title released in the "Tales of Alltynex" trilogy, a trio of 2d shoot em ups focusing on cinematic presentation, offbeat gameplay mechanics, and a strange and melancholy storyline about planetary warfare and rogue super computers.

In Kamui, players have access to a standard machine gun for destroying hordes of small enemies, a homing attack which only hits distant enemies attacking from the background, and a powerful beam weapon that focuses damage on a single target and nullifies enemy fire. The last two weapons are dependent on a recharging energy meter that must be carefully managed, because running out of energy can result in being overwhelmed. Destroying enemies with a charged homing attack also awards greater points, but requires players to leave dangerous enemies alive for longer and find perfect timings to blast them all, forcing mastery of the mechanics to achieve high scores.

I find these mechanics give Kamui a sense of chaos. Not only do players need to dodge and shoot the usual enemy formations and attack patterns found in shoot em ups, but they also need to be careful of enemies in the background and simoultaneously juggle three weapons with precise use. Beyond the mechanics, the game's actual execution of stage and boss design is refreshingly unique. Kamui has a slightly larger hitbox than most bullet hell shooters and an emphasis on agressive enemies and bosses with quirky attacks that go beyond the usual bullet ballets of the genre. The chaos and agression combine to give Kamui a very visceral feel.

There are drawbacks to Kamui's design choices, though. At times, the bullet cancelling beam dominates the game a bit too much, turning evasion into a matter of simple timing and placement instead of complex manuevering, reflex, or strategy. Playing for score alleviates this somewhat, forcing you to hold off on cancelling some attacks, but I still wish pure survival play wasn't as simplistic. I also don't like the vast amount of health players are given. The difficulty is balanced around it, but the sheer amount of life points the player has means that no matter how bad you do on any one stage, you're pretty much guaranteed not to die till at least the next stage, removing some of the tension from the game's first half.

However, when its playstyle clicks in the end game, Kamui truly shines. The last three stages offer one of the most intense and memorable climaxes in the genre, and the intensely visceral action throughout generally make up for some minor issues. For those looking for something a little different, Kamui is an excellent change of pace from shooting game norms.

A very impressive Taito-inspired doujin shmup with a lot of Rayforce cues. Spectacular presentation (within its idiom). Steer clear if you hate bendy lasers though.

The single BEST doujin shooter EVER. Nuff' said.

Great game, one of the best SHMUPS I've ever played. If you're familiar with Layer Section/Gunlock/Raystorm, then you'll have some sort of idea of what to expect with Kamui.

As with Layer Section, the gameplay is split into two layers, the plane you're on, and everything beneath you. On your plane, you can shoot a machinegun-like weapon and a powerful laser that uses energy, but also destroys enemy bullets. On the layers beneath you, you can attack enemies with a lock-on lightning weapon - this can be used to destroy or damage enemies before they become a threat, or attack enemies shooting you from below.

The more you use the bullet-soaking beam, however, the less energy you have for the lightning attack, so it's a double-edged sword. This makes the gameplay significantly about energy management in the short term (as you do recharge quite quickly). The scoring system ties in to this, as kills with the lighting attack recieve a multiplier.

Gameplay aside, it's a nifty little game with an amazing soundtrack - and while the graphics are a bit dated, they're well made; there are really neat parallax and explosion effects to see.

If you like shmups, check out Kamui. It's a good'n.

Even little details like how the stages connect together are clever in design; there’s no obligatory rolling out of background tropes like the jungle level or the factory level just so boxes can be checked. KAMUI is a seamless journey stitching each of the six stages to each other, offering a rare glimpse of chartable progress from cloud-covered sky, through depths of earth into the outer reaches of the planet to take on an orbiting weapons platform. It’s a real labour of love that not only does credit to its esteemed source material but manages to out-perform it. It’s more forgiving, more fluid, more concise.

Full Review // http://www.honestgamers.com/12435/pc/kamui/review.html

Do you want to become a lightning god?

Do you like lightning and explosions?

If yes, then buy this game right now.

Great shmup with a play-style similar to Ray-Storm.

Only complaint I have is that the screen size is not configurable and is always set to something @ 800x600.
Any way to change this?

Another fun shmup from the people who brough us RefleX (which was a fun shooter in its own right). Fast-paced gameplay and some intense boss battles make this a must-have for shmup fans on PC (though personally, I prefer the even more intense Crimzon Clover).

One of the best doujin shmups to have ever existed and the beginnings of the greatness known as Siter Skain.

A solid bullet hell with a slew with interesting mechanics. Trying to balance out the use of each of the three weapons is key to winning this game.

Well worth the $8 spent.

What's more interesting is that this is a series that was made backwards, meaning that kamui is the ending of the triology of games.

This is a pretty fun shmup games. Reminds me alot of R-type and gradius games. One thing that I would like to be aded in the game is the powerups and recharging my shield.

Kamui is shmup developed by Siter Skain and was recently brought brack to life by Nyu Media. It originally came out in 1999, but the gameplay stands up to the test of time. Initially I was concerned when I launched the game because the default display settings had the game so small, I found it hard to see all the bullets. They do provide a configuration utility which you can use to adjust the settings to your liking, which fixed the aformentioned issue I was having.

The game consists of six levels with multiple difficulty settings, with each taking about 5 minutes to complete. If you're the kind of shmup player who just likes to tear through shooters, you'll like that the game provides unlimited continues. In order to get the score based achievements though, you'll have to hone your skills.

Tight controls, nice difficulty, and solid gamplay make this a must have for the shmup pc player.

You can see my let's plays here:
http://youtu.be/GpJmAJpc_AE?list=PLKgGWqAhYeD_C2ud6AwVP3HuC62Gt4pGc