Thanks to Clear River Games for the review code
Title: Truxton Extreme
System: Steam (PC)
Price: $24.99
Release Date: 07/30/2026
Story
In this return of Truxton, you take control of one of three pilots, as they must set out on an intergalactic journey to discover the secrets behind an invading empire, and a mission that has more behind the scenes to it than it appears…
I have to be brutally honest. Toaplan games in general have been very light on the story, with the closest to anything coherent and decent I found coming from the Hellfire S PC Engine port, which gave Hellfire a completely unique and brand new story from the ground up, even if it was pretty trope heavy. The two Truxton games before this one didn’t have much of a plot besides manual and flyer descriptions, so color me shocked how Truxton Extreme not only added in a story, but really pushed it hard and made it better than I expected.
Each character has their own set of chapters, and all of which are presented in a comic book style format, albeit without any voiceovers. The stages themselves play out as normal, (and in fact, you’ll have to repeat some of them as other characters) and only when you clear the stage are you awarded with the next cutscene. Without spoiling anything, this story gets pretty wild real fast, and I just wish the story mode structure wasn’t so repetitive to slow you down from seeing the rest of it. Needless to say, while this won’t be a story of the year winner or anything, I think this gives Hellfire S a run for its money when it comes to Toaplan stories.
Presentation
With some talent from MOSS (the modern Raiden guys) on board, it shouldn’t be much of a shock that this is a 2.5D vertical shooter, meaning you have 3D models here over sprites, and models that do a better job at looking the part than other similar games in this genre. Raiden III got the whole “3D ship looks pretty fine and shots are easy to see” aspect down pat a few decades ago, so I’m not surprised Tatsujin went straight to the modern experts for help here. The returning foes from the original game look pretty nifty in this 3D style, and as I primarily played this on a Steam Deck, I’m happy to report everything runs pretty well on it here, and I was able to enjoy my favorite Arena mode without any performance hits.
Unfortunately, the game is in a 16:9 aspect ratio during gameplay. This may sound like a weird complaint, but a lot of vertical shooters, including the first two Truxton games, really made the best use of the vertical screen, with their level design and enemy layouts being meticulously crafted for that aspect ratio in mind. Raiden III/IV even kept a vertical playfield despite moving to consoles by that point, but some shooters like Aero Fighters went to horizontal displays, and while I wouldn’t say every vertical shooter in a 16:9 view is poor, it definitely looks awkward and can even sometimes be tougher to play. While the gameplay side of things isn’t as bad here as I feared it might be, I can’t help but wish it was a vertical oriented game.
The music is pretty good, and consists of a lot of remixes of older Truxton songs, composed by the same guy who did the originals; Yuge was a composer, so this makes sense, and he does a bang-up job with these arrangements and the newer songs thrown in. Of all things that feel like classic Toaplan in this game, the music is by far the aspect that made me feel right at home here. There’s optional DLC to bring back the OG ship designs and sounds from the Arcade duology and Batsugun, if you happen to enjoy those versions more.
Gameplay
In the original Truxton, you took control of a ship that could drop bombs and use three different weapons. In Truxton II, you did that but the bombs were rarer and could be shot out, and the game’s difficulty was out of control and meant to make you cry. So how does Extreme handle the formula? Well, it’s the Truxton gameplay loop, but in 16:9. The bombs are akin to the original Truxton’s Rainbow Circle Shot, so no more piercing enemies with them, but otherwise this is indeed a precise stage by stage vertical shmup.
That doesn’t mean you won’t have new things to play with here; the stages are brand new for one thing, even with a lot of returning enemies. There’s a good bunch of new foes too, and they fit in fine with the other invaders. You also get two new weapons in the form of a purple shotgun blast and a white homing shot, both of which I found to be pretty useful and worth additions to the arsenal.
The most notable change to your weaponry comes from the EX meter, where holding down the EX shot button will intensify your current weapon and make it deal way more damage, and also turn the defeated foes into yellow gems that will home in on you upon releasing the button, and it really helps out against bigger enemies, and is a fun little risk/reward for timing a shot with lots of enemies on screen for those extra points. You can also adjust your speed with the shoulder buttons, so if you pick up too many speed powerups you aren’t stuck zooming around. Each stage is broken up into two halves, and they’re decently long, but not to Truxton II absurdity, at least not in a way that it felt obvious to me during gameplay.
You have the Heart Starter mode as the one you’re encouraged to try out first, and it serves as nothing more than a glorified tutorial. Super easy stage with infinite lives that’s meant to show you the ropes of the game without wording it out for you. Fine enough I suppose, but to go from that to the story mode is a little bit of a jump up in difficulty. Luckily you can change some gameplay settings to make things easier, albeit at the cost of leaderboard access.
Speaking of said Story mode, I mentioned earlier how weirdly ambitious and in-depth it gets for a series with next to no plot at all, let alone for a developer who barely puts out things with a plot, but you indeed get a story that’s intriguing enough to go through in short bursts. You have three characters with their own set of chapters, and in order to see all the stages this way you’ll have to play as some of the other characters who will go to their own stages every now and again. Since you can play a stage, break, and go to the next one later, I think this is a smart way to introduce the main levels to the player and help them practice.
Unfortunately, I do think the story mode has a rather irksome annoyance; since you need to play stages where the other characters also went on the same mission, you’ll be replaying certain stages multiple times, with nothing to shake things up. No new ship design, new shot types, nada, you just do the stage again as if nothing was different. The cutscenes get awarded to you at the end of the level, so you could easily just forget you’re meant to be playing as someone different until the stage ends. It’s honestly a bit of a miracle the plot is as good as it was, since I can still see this being worthy enough for someone to stick through to the end, albeit with long breaks between stage replays. I would have at least liked if the three characters had their own decals for the main ship or something to visually distinguish them outside the cutscenes.
Luckily if you don’t want to go through the story mode but would like to play this as a normal shmup, Arcade Mode has you covered. Limited lives, no continues, and just playing through the main stages per a normal vertical shooter. Here’s where the game tends to shine and feel the most like the original Arcade games, and as its own Arcade experience I’d put it between Truxton and II. The stages are fun enough, but the 16:9 aspect ratio bugs me more than I’d like to admit. There’s also a two player mode that seems akin to the Raiden IV Dual Mode, but I have nobody else to test this with so I had to skip playing it.
Last but certainly not least is the Arena mode, which is this game’s version of a Caravan stage. Insanely difficult and by far one of the hardest things in the entire game, you go through a level fully focused on scoring and is meant to have you abuse the EX shot to gain a ton of bonus items and rack up those points. You can either do this with infinite lives or try to do it legit, and I honestly found playing this with the latter to be the most satisfying and exciting part of Truxton Extreme in any way, shape or form.
With online leaderboards, a short stage and a very high challenge, this one’s pretty dang addictive and loads of fun. There’s an in-game “rank” that gradually unlocks more things as you play, and I found the pacing of it to be fun enough that every unlock felt semi-natural. Needless to say, mastering Arena is a very easy way to make that process quicker if you so choose.
Conclusion
Ultimately, Truxton Extreme is a pretty fun return to form for Toaplan, even if I felt it might be a bit too safe. The two new weapons are fun to use, but nothing you haven’t seen before in other games, or even other Toaplan shooters, (Zero Wing had a homing shot too) while the stages being pretty long is a stubborn tradition that might not be fit for everyone, especially those who want to go for clearing the Arcade mode. Thankfully, Arena mode is the highlight of the game for score chaser fans, and was by far my favorite aspect of the overall experience, while the plot of the story mode was way better than it had any right to be, despite the repetition of having to replay select stages over and over.
I just wish Truxton Extreme was a bit more bold, and had stuck to a true vertical aspect ratio like the original duology. The 16:9 layout here is fine enough, and I still would rather play this than Truxton II, but considering how groundbreaking and addicting the original games were, this sequel is just fine enough, and a decent way to get some in some shooting action.
I give Truxton Extreme a 6 out of 10.