Otomedius

Otomedius
Japanesetitle(s)	オトメディウス Otomediusu
Developer(s)	Konami
Publisher(s)	Konami
Series	Otomedius
Designer(s)	Mine Yoshizaki
Platform(s)	Arcade
Release date(s)	October 15, 2007
Genre(s)	Side scrolling shoot 'em up

Otomedius (オトメディウス, Otomediusu) is a side scrolling shooter by Konami which featured personification of space fighters from various Konami games. The main characters are females, designed by Mine Yoshizaki, with a set of equipments resembling space fighters from the side-scroller games by the same company Gradius, Xexex, Salamander and Parodius. The name is a pun, being a portmanteau of the terms "otome" (meaning "maiden" in Japanese) and "Gradius". The arcade version makes use of Konami's E-amusement service to store player's data. It was first shown in August 2007 and later released on October 15, 2007. A port called Otomedius Gorgeous was later on released for the Xbox 360 in November 20, 2008 in Japan.

MMS2nd

In 2008, Konami released a set of figures based on the main characters on the game. These designs use the Konami MMS2nd figure as their base, the same used in their Busou Shinki line. The sets also each contained 2 penguin mascots which are common enemies in the game Parodius.

Gameplay

The game plays similarly to Gradius but with some differences. For starters, the player character already have a force field upon starting and re-spawning. When the character gets killed, they instantly respawn ala Salamander. And finally, they can use a D-Burst attack that acts as a bomb weapon which clears the screen of enemies and bullets.

Even how the stages are laid out are different. Instead of the traditional 6-10 stages that must be tackled in order, Otomedius allows the player to pick up to three stages in any order and set a difficulty for each stage. After playing the stages, the game ends, the player receives an Otome card and the his/her progress is saved to the e-amusement pass.

Character design

The character design is done by Mine Yoshizaki who already participated in the manga adaptation of Detana!! TwinBee, fifth game in the series TwinBee and second to appear in arcade. Among other works, Mine Yoshizaki is famous for his manga Arcade Gamer Fubuki addition to the well-known Keroro Gunso and design of Angol Fear for the game Soul Calibur IV.

Characters

Protagonists

• Aoba Anoa: pilot of Vic Viper (from Gradius)
• Erul Tron: pilot of Lord British (from Salamander)
• Emon · 5: pilot of Xel Viper (inspired by Ganbare Goemon)
• Madoka: pilot of Murdoch Viper (from TwinBee)
• Diol Twee: pilot of Serenity Viper (Flintlock from Xexex)
• Tita Nium: pilot of Big Core Examiner (Core battleship-inspired Viper)
• Operetta: (Operator)

Antagonists

• Eliza: from Gokujō Parodius!.
• Titi XIV: from Martial Champion.
• Irene La Tias: from Xexex.
• Gofer Sisters

Stages

Stage	Name	Boss
1	San Salvador Island	Princess Seiren
2	Tokyo	Eyegol
3	Alexandria	Ship of Sun Scarab Core
4	Antarctica	Crystal Core D-X02
EX	Versus Mode	Big Core MK I Abaddon Warship Mayhem Warship Tetran Viva Core Manbow Big Core MK II Rolling Core Covered Core MK II Death Zelos Force Fortune

Music

naya~n and Kashiwagi Ruzarin were commissioned to compose the original tracks for the arcade game. A whole slew of composers were brought in to compose music for the DLC song packs on Otomedius Gorgeous.

AOU 2007 version

The version presented on the Arcade Owners Union expo was different than the final version.

• It is only possible to play the San Salvador Island Stage or the Alexandria Stage. In the former L.B. Gofer appears instead of Eliza.
• In the first release, the only playable characters were Aoba Anoa, Erul Tron and Emon · 5.
• Another version of the game allowed to use Madoka and Diol Twee as playable characters.
• The final version of the game included Tita Nium as the last playable character.
• Demo Video.

External links

• Otomedius official website
• Article about the game's composers
• Fan-translation