Fantasy shooter adventure Air Twister from ININ Games and YSNET is ready for you on PlayStation 5. Learn more about this fast-paced release in our Air Twister review!

Fantasy shooter adventure Air Twister from ININ Games and YSNET is ready for you on PlayStation 5. YSNET is the studio that video game legend Yu Suzuki – he of Space Harrier, Out Run, Virtua Fighter, Daytona USA, and Shenmue games – established back in 2008. This game was originally released as an Apple Arcade exclusive last year, and it’s now made the jump to consoles, landing on PlayStation 5. It’s a game that has been influenced by games such as Space Harrier, Star Fox, and Panzer Dragoon.

After the game boots up, you’ll be greeted by Symphony of the Swans, the first song in the game’s soundtrack by Dutch composer, producer, singer, and multi-instrumentalist Valensia. It has a very keen Queen vibe going for it, and I’m sure you’ll let it play in full before starting your journey with Air Twister. The rest of the game’s soundtrack includes brand new songs, as well as new renditions of previous songs from Valensia that sometimes feature different lyrics to better fit the overall motif of Air Twister.

Once the starting cutscene is over, you’ll be able to jump straight into Practice Mode, where you’ll get to learn all the basics as you take on the role of Princess Arch. This one is played by moving your character around with the left analog stick as you avoid incoming attacks and line your attacks. You’ll shoot by using the R2 button. Tapping it will allow you to launch powerful bolts of energy. Moving your character over enemies without shooting will first lock onto them so that you can then release homing attacks that will search and destroy them.

Along with the main campaign, which can be completed in an hour or so depending on your experience with on-rail shooters – there’s also the Adventure Map to explore. This is where you can spend the Stars collected while playing the game. You can use Stars to unlock boosts for Princess Arch, such as adding yellow hearts – which turn into pink hearts when you collect 20, effectively granting you an extra life. You can also unlock special accessories that can grant you special abilities to make subsequent runs a bit easier. You could get the Crash Blocker, a shield that can protect against obstacles and iron ball collisions. Another option is the Need Aegis, a very useful item that shields you against boss attacks when your health is low.

There are hundreds of things to unlock on the Adventure Map, including opening up the path to additional islands that have more stuff to help you. One of these upgrades will increase the number of lock-ons you can have. Another grants you the ability to slow down time around you for a bit. You can also unlock new weapons. Along with those, you can unlock face paint styles, outfits, and hairstyles to customize the look of Princess Arch. Oh, and you can also unlock Boss Rush stages, stages for bonus modes Tap Breaker and Stardust. There are other things you can unlock with Stars, but I’ll let you find out about them on your own!

Given the game’s mobile origin, you’ll have a bunch of daily tasks to work on, along with weekly tasks and time limited tasks. Daily tasks include things like starting up the game, vanquishing 20 enemies using normal bullets, and clearing all daily tasks. Weekly tasks can ask you to play the main game X number of times. Time limited tasks can require you to collect Y number of stars. As you complete tasks, don’t forget to collect your rewards! These include Stars, Fluffy Tickets, bonus costumes, face paint patterns, hair colors, hairstyles, and more.

And now, the trophies! Air Twister has a full trophy list with a Platinum trophy. It’s certainly a long list with a ton of stuff for you to do, and it won’t be an easy trophy run. There are 45 Bronze trophies, 5 Silver trophies, and a pair of Gold trophies for you to work on. The first trophy to pop will be for completing the game’s tutorial. After that, you’ll have trophies pop for completing each of the levels on offer. And then, there’s the grind. You’ll have to clear all stages without hitting any obstacles, vanquish 1,200 Dodecabeans and 888 Octrons, play for 5 minutes 10 times in one week, have over 10,000 stars in your inventory, activate super slow 1,000 times, complete the game without using super slow, collect all outfits, head, and face paint cosmetics, unlock all challenge stages, wear all equipment at least once, clear 30 daily tasks, and play the game for 50 and 100 hours.

Fantasy shooter adventure Air Twister is a fun game that pays homage to games such as Space Harrier, Panzer Dragoon, and Starfox, giving us an on-rails shooter that can be completed in an hour or so… as long as you’re good at it! You’ll probably end up replaying the game multiple times to collect enough stars to upgrade Princess Arch so that she can have more health while also gaining new special abilities like the super slow down and even unlocking additional customization options for your character. An easy trophy run this is not going to be since there’s a trophy in there that requires you to beat the whole game with a single life. Air Twister is out on PlayStation 5 with a $24.99 price tag.

Disclaimer
This Air Twister review is based on a PlayStation 5 copy provided by ININ Games.