Year released: 2002 (Dreamcast--Japan only), 2003 (Gamecube)

Number of Players: 1-2 cooperative

Graphics: Everything is very lushly rendered. It's all very sci-fi and plain--no vibrant colors. The backgrounds are rendered just as well. However, backgrounds are slightly faded to prevent the player from confusing the background with the actual playing field. There are some times I found myself confusing foreground as background and vice versa, resulting in deaths. This isn't a major problem--gameplay is fun nevertheless, and you learn where these things are. It's a rare occurence, but it is still a problem.
Oh, yes, and the game features a weird screen. It's more tall than wide, and there are options present to take advantage of special TV displaying methods. A normal television will do fine, of course.

Play control: (buttons taken from the Gamecube version) First off, it's entirely in 2D. Just like R-Type and Fantasy Zone. You fly around and shoot other stuff that flies around. You come from the bottom of the screen, enemies come from the top.
Use the joystick or control pad to move your ship around in any direction. The view constantly moves you upward (autoscrolling). Press B to shoot and hold to shoot rapid fire. A changes your ship's color (from white to black or vice versa). Your ship shoots bullets that are the same color as itself, and your ship can absorb enemy bullets of the same color.
As you absorb bullets, they are stored up, and once you have enough, you can press R to release the bullets in a homing attack on several enemies. The more bullets you store up, the more homing bullets you fire when you press R. Also, when you shoot your homing bullets, every last one is fired--you can't hold back.

Sound: Techno-ish music that is slightly energetic and tense. I really don't notice the music all that much when playing, take it as you will.
Shooting and stuff blowing up are generic. Yyyyep. When are they not?

Challenge: Ikaruga's bread and butter. Then again, it's a side scrolling shooter, what do you expect? You have to manage your ship's color to absorb the right bullets while avoiding crashing into foes and structures. You'll find before long that you need to rush in and absorb bullets of one color to clear out a small range for your ship, so that when another barage of opposite colored bullets comes through, you're ready. Basically, if you're not careful, you'll end up with bullets of both colors ready to hit you at once.
Foes of the one color will be damaged twofold by the opposite color, and all foes have a color. Oh, and foes only shoot bullets of their own color.
So far as high scores, there is one neat little nuance. If you defeat three enemies of the same color without defeating any enemies of the other color imbetween (for example, destroying a white ship, then another white ship, then another white ship, as opposed to a white ship, a black ship, then two more white ships), you get a chain bonus. If you complete another chain without shooting random stuff imbetween (for example, three black ships directly after your white ship chain, without defeating any white ships after your initial chain), you get more bonus. Keep this up and you get so many points you'll want to cry. I think.
In normal mode, ships of your color shoot at you when you destroy them. In hard mode, all ships shoot at you when you destroy them.

Gameplay: Not much to speak of that hasn't been already said. There are no powerups in the game. Only five stages, but boy are they hard. Ikaruga doesn't throw every trick in the book at you, but it does come up with some new tricks based on its color system.

Bottom line: In comparison to other side scrolling shooters, this game is pretty deep. Managing your ship between black and white can create some pretty tight spots, but over time you'll find different methods to ease up the game's difficulty by taking advantage of the color system. Also, there are extras to unlock. Luckily, not only can you unlock them by being good at the game, but you can also unlock them by playing the game for a long time.

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