Loving something campy doesn’t mean that you overlook its flaws or shortcomings. I positively adore the collection of Disney’s afternoon animations, but I still recognize that Darkwing Duck was an ambitious, flawed game, or that having Baloo be a Prohibition era pilot in Tailspin was, to put it mildly, confusing. Yet leaning into the camp is a delicate line to walk in order to entice, indulge and support the fanbase. Too little camp and it’s little more than coattail riding for attention. Too much camp and it’s hokey to the point of being unwatchable/unplayable. So, in spite of some seriously busted gameplay moments, the revival and long-delayed localization of 70’s Robot Anime Geppy-X is a welcome and wonderful release from Bliss Brain. Not only is it a semi-decent side scrolling shmup, it’s also a master class in homage pastiche.

Yes, it takes all three of them to form one giant robot. That’s just how these things work.

Geppy-X has never existed. At least, not in the way you might think. Created by Implicit Conversions and published by Aroma (who was also busy promoting a piss poor Tenchi Muyo sim), there isn’t an actual Geppy-X anime or manga. Rather, this was crafted together as a massive nod to all the giant robot animes from the 70s. Each chapter of the game is crafted as an episode of a television show, complete with opening theme, commercial bumpers, an actual fake commercial and closing credits, plus a sneak peek at the next episode. It’s all fully voiced, with actual, hand drawn animation segments, some PS-1 era CGI at different points, and some singular cells with full audio to bring the episodes to life. This game, I kid you not, used four CDs on the PlayStation 1 for eight freaking stages. The same number of CDs as Final Fantasy VII.

Every episode has the same structure. You’ll get the reason for why you’re engaging with the enemy (stealing the world’s toilet paper, growing a glacier in Hokkaido) and then off you go. You’ll shoot a few waves of enemies until the first boss arrives, take a break, then go after a second wave and a second boss. You cycle through three different pilots, each with their own personalities (not relevant) and shooting style (somewhat relevant). You’ve got the main weapon that can charge into a stronger weapon, but charging is automatically canceled if you’re hit. Hell, even the weapon itself is canceled if you’re hit. There’s also some sub weapons that sort of work better but are more limited. You have a super weapon that does serious damage once your Super X Meter is charged. And, very important, you can turn around. Get ready for enemies to hit all sides!

Must continue blasting into nothing! Enemies might be coming!

Geppy-X isn’t a great shmup title. There’s certain degrees of exploit you can work with that makes the game better, and the scaling difficulty can be changed at any point during the game, but it doesn’t do enough to disrupt the crux of it all. First, of the three pilots, only the main pilot (X1, aka Keiichi) is worth a damn. He’s got the most standard bullet patterns and his charged X-Beam is usually worth it. X2 and X3 (Hitoshi and Riki, respectively) have more unique fire patterns, but they don’t pay out in a majority of cases. X3’s range is way too limited given the number of collision hits and unstoppable bullets that exist, even with his charged up X-Typhoon. X2’s main shot hits the whole length of the screen, but also has a terrible cooldown period. His charge, the X-Seeker, chain-lightnings multiple enemies, but does very weak damage.

Even with some serious time investment, the irregularity of the hitbox of your character makes elements of the game very frustrating. You expect bullet hell titles to be tough because that’s what they’re there for.  This isn’t a bullet hell: it’s a parody with utter sincerity that is a wonderful spectacle to behold. But when you’re trying to progress the game so you can witness more, it’s very harsh to realize that, even on easy, bullet density is thick and relentless. Thankfully, there’s a good amount of healing items that drop from both the enemies and the support bots that show up, but it can’t always balance things out. Each form of Geppy-X moves too slowly and too awkwardly to properly thread the needle, at least on the Nintendo Switch. You end up resigning yourself to taking your lumps and hoping they’re not too severe.

The left arm of the enemies is a shield, but they always stand over there, so it does nothing. Perfect.

Having said that, I need to make it very, very clear: you should be playing Geppy-X. I am a massive sucker for well done comedy, especially things that don’t go out of their way to be too silly, but create humor by leaning into what makes something wonderful. Dana Carvey’s impressions are excellent because they aren’t perfect, but spotlight on what makes a person memorable or odd. Excel Saga is a fantastic anime thanks to the attempts to emulate nearly every genre of animation along the way (though some of the humor has aged poorly). Geppy-X looks at everything that made this era fantastic and cranks it all the way to eleven. The music being that era of bravado, throaty Japanese pump up tunes, even in the middle of battle. The explosions and screaming voices for even the smallest error. And the writing. My God, the writing.

Why the hell would a group of three shonen (young boys) all look like they’re easily in their 20s or maybe 30s? What would possess the doctor to answer the phone “Hello, Secret Geppy-X Base!” If the villain is planning their revenge, how come they need to make it clear they’ll get Geppy-X “next week??” At one point, a young boy from seemingly NOWHERE runs out and is crushed by the boss monster (bloodless, of course). Keiichi vows to avenge Tarou, while the other two pilots wonder aloud “Who is Tarou, and how did you know that boy’s name?” It’s so beautifully on-the-nose with zero attempts to mitigate what’s happening. As a result, the gameplay almost feels like a means-to-an-end to move along the story. It should be noted that each boss encounter has a different animated screen depending on which of the pilots delivers the final blow. FOUR CDS.

NO, NOT MARMADUKE!

You’ve got this incredible soundtrack of 70s era Japanese music, all of it bespoke and original, you’ve got these animated sequences that run the gamut of what was available technically at the time, and then there’s the commercials. If nothing else, you need to see these commercials. Created to promote all the products and services that Geppy-X creates (and definitely do not exist), they are the funniest things I’ve seen in a Japanese game in a long, long time. They change between animation and actual live-action things, meaning some of these Geppy-X goods were mocked up at one point and are hopefully in a museum somewhere. The poseable toys. The promotion for a different anime series that was definitely a rip on Ashita no Joe. Oh my God, the robot-shaped shampoo bottle. If they had made the game half as good as the commercials, this would usurp Ikaruga.

As with all games that finally make their way out of Japan’s isolated market and to the broader world, I’m thrilled that 70’s Robot Anime Geppy-X is now out in the wild. With a digital manual attached, a bestiary to outline every baddie you shoot and the ability to rewind the game when you get unfairly merced, Bliss Brain did a solid job with this port. The wallpaper borders keep the screen from stretching out, and they look great as well. Visually, aurally, historically, everything here is top notch. The gameplay is, well, just very mediocre in terms of a shmup. It lacks a good challenge to input balance, and the frustrations are not a skill issue, but a general gameplay issue. It’s weak in the core element of shooting, and that’s a problem for a shmup.

If this is how your children use shampoo, it might be time to let them go.

However, less than superior doesn’t mean bad. Just because I can’t buy Jollibee doesn’t mean I’ll refuse KFC. Seeing Journey without Steve Perry is still frigging awesome. And Nicholas Cage’s acting is pretty middling in National Treasure, but I’ll definitely watch that all the way through because it’s a fantastic film (seriously, you want the best Cage, you watch Bringing Out the Dead). For me, that’s my stance on Geppy-X. There are issues with the gameplay, but the package more than makes up for what it lacks. It might not be the strongest shooter, but it’s definitely the most fun for me.

70’s Robot Anime Geppy-X is available now on Steam, Microsoft Store, PlayStation 4/5, Xbox Series One X/S and Nintendo Switch (2).

Reviewed on Nintendo Switch 2.

A copy of 70’s Robot Anime Geppy-X was provided by the publisher.