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R-Type Command may have switched genres, but rest assured it is still as challenging as ever.

Originating as a side-scrolling shooter from the arcades of the late eighties, R-Type is a genre classic. Famous… or infamous for its degree of difficulty as a fast paced and frantic shooter those of us who have played and finished an R-Type game are few and far between. Well, with the latest incarnation, R-Type Command, the developer Irem has decided to slow things down a bit. Way down.

In fact, R-Type Command is a turn-based strategy game. Gone are the lightning fast jaunts through branching corridors while dodging wave after wave of enemy fire. The corridors have been replaced by a hex grid. The enemy fire slowed to a turn-by-turn pace. At least the difficulty is still intact.

At first I could not understand why Irem would alienate their hardcore shooter fans by switching gameplay in such a manner. Were they trying to expand the audience to a segment of gamers that would never have picked up an old school shooter? Perhaps... or maybe they were catering to the same audience that, twenty years after the first R-Type, needed a more geriatric friendly genre that was less demanding on the reflexes. Whatever the reason, I must confess that despite my doubts, R-Type actually works very well as a TBS game.