Starting the first level and doing literally nothing will see you progress all the way till the end of the third level, where you will be swiped to death by a boss. Your second credit will see you to the final boss on level five who has some bullets that will actually penetrate the shield at the front of your ship and the final credit will see it through to the end-game credits. There is a sixth level to be had, but to see that, a hidden Milestone logo must be revealed on each of the previous levels. Yes, one of the main weapons is a glowing shield in front of the winged hero and it can protect against almost anything. It only works when the other weapons aren’t in use though, and since one of the alternatives, the sword, gives higher scores, the shield can’t realistically be relied on as the main choice, although some enemies can only be vanquished diving straight for them with shield powered up. The sword swipe is pretty fearsome but relies on close-quarter fighting – high scores require you to really get up close and personal with the waves of grey and extremely monotonous mechanised fiends. Firing from afar with the final main weapon, the shot, will be safer but with lower scores to match – the slower pace of life will give you more time to appreciate just how repetitive the attack waves are though. Apart from bosses, there’s around half a dozen enemy types that attack with the same selection of patterns level after level. The only differences come from the intensity of your attack - swift decimation will allow additional enemies to swoop in, that won't be seen under more defensive play.

Bullets are almost all cancellable with the shield and most are with the sword, so it’s worth aiming towards them rather than running away. Any enemy or bullet destroyed gradually adds to the level of whichever weapon was used – three gauges near the top display the current level. The weapons all power up at level 20 and then at level 50 – for example the shield develops doppelgangers that travel up the screen to help out. There’s an interesting juggling act to decide which order to power up each weapon. Go for scores with the sword, but rely on a low-end shield for boss encounter tight spots? Or choose another way. Certainly using the shield a lot makes the game easy, but without it, in the quest for scores, it's no easier than any other shooter of similar ilk.

For the most part the bullets all move really slowly, totally at odds with the frantic drum 'n' bass/breakbeat soundtrack that starts off promisingly enough, but then proves as repetitive as the levels themselves. Bullets speed up in some boss battles, but in general, it’s the sheer quantity of them on screen that ramps up the fear quotient. Thankfully, due to the cel-shading, as in Radirgy, it’s easy to see which bullet streams can be cancelled with the sword and which ones will slip through, so path-finding in bullet-swarms is relatively straightforward after a few attempts. In contrast to the majority of shooters, the enemies themselves can for the most part be flown above directly without taking damage, leaving the mind free to concentrate on dodging just the bullets.

The 3D background detail on the levels is actually fairly interesting, with the green organicity of trees and fields juxtaposed against vibrant neon-lit cityscapes. Sitting back and taking a good look shows that the graphics are very crisp and pleasing to the eye, even if the colours used are occasionally a bit drab. Flipping into Tate mode makes it look even better. Boss robots are particularly impressive – even though the cel-shading robs them of much real surface detail, the way they move is very convincing. Hilariously, the level four boss bucks this trend by opening a huge hatch in its stomach and firing plates of food or glasses of wine. Still, by that point, it’s about time something new happened.

After the general fantasticness and fresh feel of Radirgy, Karous feels like a cheap cash-in. The levelling idea for the weapons is novel for sure, but it doesn’t do nearly enough to rescue it from the distinctly one-trick level content. The fact that the shield protects the player and gets points at the same time might entice beginners to the shmup fold, but then again, it might put them off trying any better ones afterwards. All of which is a real shame because the initial presentation looks so appealing and sets the wrong expectation. It’s not terrible – just mundane.