In R-Type II, you play as a starfighter called the R-9c on a solo mission against a biomechanical alien race called the Bydo, a hive mind of rapidly-evolving insect gargoyle robots. They have no regard for their own lives, there are a million of them and there's only one of you. It's a really clever concept. R-Type II is named after r-type reproduction, which is when animals focus on having as many children as possible and hope that some of them work out, as opposed to the k-type reproduction of mammals, which means having a smaller number of children that are actually cared for. R-type reproduction can be witnessed in nature by disturbing a beehive, buying an ant farm, or looking at the top grossing games on the Google Play Store.
R-Type II, on the other hand, is a product of k-type reproduction. The level design and enemy design are jaw-dropping, and the game itself is a nearly impossible gauntlet of dodging bullets and enemies, which is exactly what you want from an arcade shooter. There are six stages, and each one is wildly different from the others. There's also a generous variety of special weapons, from a straightforward double helix cannon to electric blue lasers that bounce off the walls. For most of the game, you'll also have a turret called the Force pod, which you can attach to your ship, use as a shield, or send it ahead to clear the path in front of you. If you're getting annihilated at a particular section of the game, you're encouraged to experiment with different configurations until you find something that can get you through. R-Type II looks good, sounds good, plays well, and completely deserves its classic status.
However, as good a game as it is, there's a major issue with how it's ported onto the Android. R-Type II is a game originally designed for a joystick, and this mobile edition instead has you controlling your ship with your finger on the screen. This basically makes the speed power-ups redundant, and it also makes the game very frustrating to control. It's not that the touch controls make it hard to maneuver so much as it's the fact that your finger will be blocking important parts of the screen no matter where you put it. R-Type II likes to surround you and attack you from the back, so much so that attaching your turret to your back is a viable strategy for some levels. This is a really cool element of the game, except for the fact that with touch screen controls, you'll find yourself 75 percent of the way through a level, only to be killed by a weird little cyborg oyster that you didn't know was there because it was completely covered up by your thumb.
Unfair deaths can ruin an experience like this quickly, and this game is only really fair if you can see everything that's trying to kill you. I tried a bunch of strategies to try and mitigate this problem, things like controlling with my right hand, controlling with my index finger, and playing the game with my phone on a flat surface, but nothing was intuitive. It's a shame, because it's not really bad porting so much as it is an inherent problem with playing this game on a touch screen. The only way I could imagine fixing it would be to only dedicate part of the screen to the actual game, and dedicate the rest to touch-activated buttons.
So should you play R-Type II? It's a tricky game to recommend, because I can't say enough good things about the game itself, but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the serious control problem that comes with porting it. If cheap deaths make you angry, this port will make you furious. On the other hand, if you want an action game for Android and you're willing to be a little patient with the touch controls, R-Type II is a complete, well-designed experience that's much, much more satisfying to play than the thousands of neglected, underfed endless runners out there that almost died in the nest.
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