Cosmo Machia announced it has acquired rights to the Triggerheart Exelica shoot ’em up intellectual property developed by Warashi. The studio plans to produce and distribute Triggerheart Exelica with the goal of making the title known to worldwide users.
Alongside development and publishing duties, Cosmo Machia is seeking licensees for Triggerheart Exelica. The studio plans on respecting all of the original creators for the title while creating new content. New projects for the Triggerheart Exelica IP will be revealed at a later date.
Here’s an overview of the shoot ’em up, via Gematsu:
About Triggerheart Exelica
Triggerheart Exelica is a vertical scrolling shoot ’em up game released by Warashi Inc., marketed as an arcade game at the end of May 2006.
Unlike other shoot ’em up games of the time, the game featured a “mecha girl” design, in which the character of the ship was a beautiful girl equipped with a mecha. The appeal of these characters also attracted attention, and the game was featured in articles in magazines related to bishojo characters and mecha-girls. The main character, EXELICA, was ranked No. 1 in the “Monthly Arcadia” character poll of 2006, published by Enterbrain Inc. at the time.
Later ports were developed, with the Dreamcast version released in 2007, the Xbox 360 version (Xbox Live Arcade only) in 2008, the i-appli version in 2008 and 2009, and the PlayStation2 version in 2009.
There are two types of ship to choose from, with different shots depending on the EXELICA and CRUELTEAR (either a diffuse shot that spreads out like a fan, or a narrow shot concentrated forward).The game is vertical screen, vertical scrolling, and overhead view type, but the most distinctive feature of this work is the ability to eject (shoot) “anchors” at enemies and use their wire connections to knock them down and destroy them. The controls use an eight-way lever and three buttons: the A button is used for the “shot,” which fires in rapid succession; the B button is used for the “anchor shoot,” which captures enemy aircraft for use in attack and defense; and the C button is used for the “bomb,” which attacks enemies across the screen.