Raiden cover art

Raiden

The archetypal early-90s vertical arcade shooter of aimed bullets and screen-clearing bombs.

Here's the argument for where this game sits - disagree freely.
Match your experience?
EXECUTION8 /10READS0 /10VARIANCE2 /10OPTIMIZATION6 /10

the cheat-test profile

The four axes - the argument

Each axis is rated on its own - how far one cheat would trivialize the game here. They don't trade off; low on all four means the game is an experience, not a contest.

  1. Execution

    cheat: Aimbot - perfect inputs

    8/10

    Weaving through dense aimed bullet spreads

  2. Reads

    cheat: Out-predict an adaptive opponent

    0/10

    Enemy formations follow fixed scripts

  3. Variance

    cheat: See what's hidden / map the RNG

    2/10

    Aimed shots vary slightly with your position

  4. Optimization

    cheat: A perfect solver / coach

    6/10

    Weapon-color choice and wave memorization steady survival

How to read this

Each axis is named by the cheat that would break the game along it. Execution is the hands. Reads is out-thinking an adaptive opponent. Variance is hidden information & RNG. Optimization is the solvable systems layer. A game's region is the top one or two axes.

These four aren't one rating split four ways - they're independent 0-10 questions. A 9 on one axis takes nothing from the others, and a game low on all four isn't missing data: it's telling you there's no skill here to cheat.

The basis is how the majority actually plays this game - not a niche mode or a personal run. For a game with very different modes (a story campaign versus ranked multiplayer), that's the version most people mean.

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Game details

Released
1990
Developer
Seibu Kaihatsu
Platforms
Arcade, PS3, Lynx, SNES, Genesis/MegaDrive, turbografx16, DOS, FM Towns, Jaguar, PS1, PSP, Turbografx-16/PC Engine CD, Mobile, SFAM
Modes
Single player, Co-operative
IGDB users
78/100
ShooterArcadeActionScience fiction