{"id":26926,"date":"2026-06-10T00:01:21","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T00:01:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/?p=26926"},"modified":"2026-05-24T13:08:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T13:08:09","slug":"psyvariar-3-switch-1-2-ps5-x-s-pc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/2026\/06\/10\/psyvariar-3-switch-1-2-ps5-x-s-pc\/","title":{"rendered":"Psyvariar 3 (Switch 1 & 2, PS5, X\/S, PC)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Psyvariar was a vertically scrolling bullet hell shooter series in the arcades around the late 90s\/early 2000s.\u00a0 It had a sequel soon after, but I\u2019ve never heard of these games, or don\u2019t remember them.\u00a0 But then, shooters like these were a dime a dozen back then.\u00a0 And now, more than two decades later, here\u2019s a third game in the series.\u00a0 Psyvariar 3 is available on current consoles and PC, but reviewed on Switch 2 here.<\/p>\n

In the game, you can choose from a handful of characters, each with their own ship and firing patterns.\u00a0 Move with the L stick and fire with the button.\u00a0 Another button lets you send out a screen clearing bomb, but you must use those sparingly as they are limited.\u00a0 Psyvariar 3 does two unique things to the gameplay.\u00a0 By quickly rotating the L stick or holding one of the shoulder buttons, your ship will spin around and your shots will be more concentrated while you do this.\u00a0 Powering up also works differently. Instead of collecting icons to power up, your ship will level up and change shape as you defeat enemies and \u2018graze\u2019 bullets by you as close as possible.\u00a0 At the end of each stage is a boss, and depending how well you do, you can choose harder difficulties in the next area.<\/p>\n

There are quite a few gameplay modes.\u00a0 Arcade is the standard game with limited credits to continue, but as you play you\u2019ll earn more credits so you can get a little further each time.\u00a0 While I\u2019d rather have unlimited continues from the start, this is better than nothing.\u00a0 Arrange mode has you fully powered up, but with only three lives and no continues.\u00a0 Mission mode gives you objectives to complete, like shooting down a certain number of enemies. These missions are pretty hard, though!\u00a0 Caravan has you trying for a high score with a limited time, and Endless has you do one continuous randomly generated stage.\u00a0 Finally Practice mode lets you do each stage you\u2019ve unlocked.\u00a0 So there\u2019s plenty to do here.\u00a0 While these kinds of bullet hell shooters aren\u2019t my cup of tea, this one seems pretty good with nice music and graphics.<\/p>\n

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

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

Psyvariar 3 is rated E-10 with an ESRB descriptor of Fantasy Violence.\u00a0 You just shoot spaceships that explode and that\u2019s it.\u00a0 Reading skill is helpful for the menus, but not necessary just to play.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Psyvariar was a vertically scrolling bullet hell shooter series in the arcades around the late 90s\/early 2000s.\u00a0 It had a sequel soon after, but I\u2019ve never heard of these games, or don\u2019t remember them.\u00a0 But then, shooters like these were a dime a dozen back then.\u00a0 And now, more than two decades later, here\u2019s a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":26924,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26926","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\/26926","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=26926"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26928,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26926\/revisions\/26928"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}