2013 was a bleak year for the 360 when it came to interesting Japanese-made exclusives. With MAGES/5pb jumping ship by making PS3/Vita ports of their newer games and Cave going a bit mellow (the last few releases were merely compilations and remakes of their established shooter hits), times like these called for the proverbial barrel-bottom scraping.
Contrary to the context however, what you find at the bottom isn't necessarily bad.
I was able to single out a couple of shoot-em-up franchises that seemed worth my while: Cave's Deathsmiles and Konami's Otomedius series. While I'm no stranger to the genre (My childhood was spent trying in vain to clear Gradius, Star Soldier and Summer Carnival '92 Recca), I'm not too spectacular at it either. These titles were chosen for the appealing character designs, and of course, for being the most accommodating towards non-shooter fanatics like myself.
The main focus at the moment though is Otomedius G (Gorgeous) and X (Excellent), both of which hit the big 100% in this month alone.
