Silhouette Mirage
Following genetic experiments conducted by a group of scientists at the turn
of the millennium, a biological explosion contaminated the genetic structure
of life on Earth. Two attributes emerged from the ruins, known as Silhouette
and Mirage; like Yin and Yang, they cannot exist without each other, but are
fundamentally opposed in their nature and ideology. Only a Messenger, one who
contains both attributes in a balance, is able to get to the Edo facility and
reverse back the genetic disaster, destroying both Silhouette and Mirage. This
messenger is a young girl named Shyna Nera Shyna.
_Silhouette Mirage_ is a side-scrolling action game. The basic gameplay is
somewhat similar to that of Gunstar Heroes. The game’s standout feature is the
concept of the two attributes. Depending on the enemy’s attributes and the
type of attack used by Shyna, damage can be increased, and spirit (equivalent
to magic power) can be absorbed from enemies. Shyna can dash, jump, crouch,
slide, and grab enemies, executing combo attacks. It is also possible to
master moves, acquire money, and purchase special creatures called
“parasites”, which teach Shyna various types of attacks.
Silhouette Mirage takes place after a catastrophic event that causes a massive explosion and everyone in the world to split into two beings. Silhouette and Mirage. In case such an event happened humans created the "Edo System" to restore peace to the world, if the message was received. That Messenger is Shyna Nera Shyna known as the "Messenger of Destruction". Unfortunately, Shyna's memory has been mostly erased and she cannot remember where Edo is and has to find her way there. However, once she begins her journey she learns that the Silhouettes and Mirages are at war with one another, and to make matters worse is that both of them agree on thing and that is to eliminate Shyna.
Beautiful Backgrounds
Great music
Multiple endings
American Playstation Version is way too difficult
The PlayStation version is missing all background animations
Scaling is off in the playstation version
The extra boss is definitely an afterthought
The Saturn version has no save feature, but loads much faster.
Odd control scheme on both.
A beautiful game by Treasure! That is if you have the Saturn original. Unfortunately, most have either through the Playstation store or on the Playstation, both of which lack the second video display processor that helps with scaling and background animations. Due to that the scaling is wonky on all playstation ports. Working Designs really messed up the American release by somehow increasing the difficulty and removing sprites of the bunny smoking (probably to keep a low rating), but the game was difficult enough as it was and definitely did NOT require more hits to each enemy and so on.
What I love about this is the quirkiness of each character and how Shyna keeps trying to correct each enemy she faces saying she is the “Messenger of Justice”, but this also poses a problem as the characters are quirky for the sake of being quirky…
The sound design is about equal, however, the Saturn for some reason has the voices of Shyna and other characters far clearer than the Playstation. Same goes for the music.