{"id":25882,"date":"2025-07-04T00:01:40","date_gmt":"2025-07-04T00:01:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/?p=25882"},"modified":"2025-06-21T09:37:19","modified_gmt":"2025-06-21T09:37:19","slug":"irem-collection-volume-3-switch-ps4-ps5-xbox-x-s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/2025\/07\/04\/irem-collection-volume-3-switch-ps4-ps5-xbox-x-s\/","title":{"rendered":"Irem Collection Volume 3 (Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox X\/S)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Irem was a video game publisher who made a lot of arcade classics like Moon Patrol, Kid Niki: Radical Ninja, Kung Fu Master, and R-Type.\u00a0 They also made a lot of console games, including a couple of my favorites: Kickle Cubicle on NES and Steambot Chronicles on PS2.\u00a0 Sadly they went out of business in 2011, but now you can play a handful of their arcade games in this collection.\u00a0 There\u2019s nothing that really ties any of these games together except they are all 2D shooters that march to the beat of their own drum.\u00a0 This collection is available on most current consoles but reviewed on Switch here.\u00a0 Let\u2019s take a look at the games on this collection!<\/p>\n

Mr. Heli<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mr. Heli was known as Battle Chopper worldwide, but I never saw it in arcades.\u00a0 You pilot a cute little helicopter as you shoot baddies in areas that sometimes are free-roam, and other times autoscroll.\u00a0 You can shoot straight ahead, use missiles to fire upward, or bombs below when you are on the ground.\u00a0 There are rocks that you can shoot from above and below that\u2019ll contain crystals for you to collect, and shops you can spend them on power-ups like better weapons.\u00a0 But if you get hit too many times, you\u2019ll have to start at the beginning of the stage with no power-ups.\u00a0 And that\u2019s really the main problem I had with this one is that it was too darn hard.\u00a0 One cool thing is that they also let you play the PC Engine home console version of this game (the PC Engine was known at the TurboGrafix-16 in the US). It\u2019s a bit more manageable, but still tough.<\/p>\n

Mystic Riders<\/strong><\/p>\n

I had never heard of this one either.\u00a0 It\u2019s a 2D side scrolling shooter that definitely takes inspiration from Cotton<\/strong><\/a> as you pilot little witches on flying brooms.\u00a0 I\u2019m glad that this one lets you start right where you left off if you get a Game Over.\u00a0 The graphics are beautiful to look at, but also the game\u2019s downfall as the detailed backgrounds make it hard to see bullets and other things that can hit you.<\/p>\n

Dragon Breed<\/strong><\/p>\n

And last is another 2D horizontally scrolling shooter with a unique hook.\u00a0 You play as a little archer dude riding atop a dragon.\u00a0 Both you and the dragon can shoot and get power-ups.\u00a0 The dragon can deflect bullets but anything that touches your rider will make you lose a life.\u00a0 Like Mr. Heli, it\u2019s one of those games that starts you back at the beginning of the stage if you die, so it\u2019s way too hard.<\/p>\n

And those are all the games!\u00a0 My only big problems with this collection is that there\u2019s only three games, and none of them are real standouts.\u00a0 Even though the games are way too hard, at least you can use rewind features and activate cheats.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Kid Factor:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Irem Collection Volume 3 is rated E-10 with an ESRB descriptor of Fantasy Violence. You can shoot flying machines and monsters that just explode and disappear when defeated and that\u2019s it.\u00a0 I grew up playing games like these and I turned out OK.\u00a0 Reading skill is helpful but not necessary to play.\u00a0 Younger players may find the games too difficult, though.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Irem was a video game publisher who made a lot of arcade classics like Moon Patrol, Kid Niki: Radical Ninja, Kung Fu Master, and R-Type.\u00a0 They also made a lot of console games, including a couple of my favorites: Kickle Cubicle on NES and Steambot Chronicles on PS2.\u00a0 Sadly they went out of business in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":25876,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-game-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25882"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25882\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25884,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25882\/revisions\/25884"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}