Sidescrolling shoot ‘em up Hyper-5 from eastasiasoft and Hyper Productions is ready for you on PlayStation 5. Learn more in our Hyper-5 review!

 

Sidescrolling shoot ‘em up Hyper-5 from eastasiasoft and Hyper Productions is ready for you on PlayStation 5. The titular deep space scout ship receives a distress signal from planet 4GDT. It gives us a shmup that pays homage to the classics of the 1990s while giving us a 3D presentation with a good variety of enemies and bosses to take on as you explore each of the different routes available for the handful of levels on offer.

You can play this shoot ‘em up in one of two play styles. There’s Precision, which is best for shoot ‘em up experts. You’ll move faster with no inertia, you and your enemies will deal more damage, and projectiles will be faster, but you will get fewer Upgrade Points. If you go for the Progression option, you’ll have smoother movement at a moderate speed, you and your enemies will be stronger, and you’ll get to level up faster.

 

There are three different game modes on offer. You can play through the Story Mode, which will take you through all of the game’s stages as you take on the menace at hand. You can also enjoy Arcade Play, where you must use the Precision play style as you complete challenges to earn extra Upgrade Points. You must collect power-ups and weapon boost items to survive as you repair your damage with the green square items. The last one is Time Trial. For this one, you’ll take on one of two missions as you try to get as high a score as possible before time runs out. You’ll collect score boosters as well as time extensions to keep the cycle going for as long as possible.

You’ll control your spaceship with the left analog stick or the D-Pad, firing your gun with the R2 button, with missiles mapped to the al2 button. You can cycle between speeds with the Square button as needed. The Tech Bay can be used with the X button to activate whichever contraption you’ve equipped. While missiles will automatically reload, Tech Bay weapons need to be replenished by collecting the red squares you’ll find after defeating some enemies. The Circle button will allow you to aim the Outrider that you’ve equipped. This one will fire when you fire your missiles, it will protect you from harm as it damages enemies, to name some examples.

 

The Upgrade Points that you obtain can be spent at the Armoury. You can boost your guns, improve your missiles, increase your ship’s maximum movement speed, increase strength to make it possible for your spaceship to take more damage, or increase the number of retries you’ll get for each game session. Gun upgrades include bumping up the reload speed or changing the firing pattern. Missiles can also get a bump to their reloading speed, and you can also pay to add extra missiles per reload so that you can destroy enemies with ease. The more upgrades you buy for each part of your ship, the more expensive the next upgrade will be.

Depending on your performance during each stage, you’ll be rewarded with bonus Upgrade Points to improve your ship. You can get extra Upgrade Points by playing the game once, defeating a boss, completing the level, destroying X number of Y enemy types, and more. You will also unlock new weapons as you progress through Hyper-5. You will get to mix and match weapons, missiles, tech bay equipment, and so on. While you can upgrade your equipment, you can also downgrade equipment to recover some upgrade points to spend elsewhere.

 

As for the trophies, Hyper-5 has a full trophy list with a Platinum trophy. Hyper-5 is also a Cross-Buy title, so your purchase will give you both the PS4 and PS5 versions, with each one having its own separate trophy list. The list includes 10 Silver trophies and 8 Gold trophies. You’ll get most of them by completing the game since you have to complete all 5 levels, buy 3, 6, and 9 upgrades, defeat 250, 500, and 1,000 enemies, unlock 3, 6, and 12 gallery entries, take 1,000 total damage, fire your weapons 5,000 times, score 25,000 points or more in a trial mission, and unlock your third gun in the game.

Hyper-5 is a shoot ‘em up that pays homage to the classics of the 1990s while adding some 21st-century elements. You’ll unlock additional weapons as you progress through the game completing challenges for additional Upgrade Points so that you can improve your equipment to keep up with the increasing difficulty curve. Hyper-5 is available as a Cross-Buy title, so your $9.99 purchase will give you access to both the PlayStation 4 and the PlayStation 5 versions of the game at no extra cost, with each one having its own trophy list with a Platinum trophy.

Disclaimer
This Hyper-5 review is based on a PlayStation 5 copy provided by eastasiasoft.