I can’t believe they didn’t screw this game up. How did they not screw this game up?

It’s like they finished it two years ago and then just tested and tested and tested and tweaked forever.

The structure too! As soon as I get bored with one mode I move to the next and it’s a whole new thing again. The six modes shepherd you around the game in a cyclical way so that you never grow tired of the mechanics: every mode emphasises a different mechanical nuance, trains a different muscle and, like a balanced work-out, improvement in one area has benefits across the whole.

I think this is why Bizarre Creations left out a pause menu ‘instant restart’ option (a decision that’s so conspicuous it must have been made through design rather than forgetfulness). In this way the game always presents you with a way out of frustration, a way around that wall you’re hitting in your own ability. You always have to deliberately choose where you go to next and, in a perverse way, it keeps you playing for longer as a result.

And to have all of the leaderboards on one entry screen, clarifying your next challenge each and every time you switch the game on. And to have your closest rival friend’s score on the play screen at all times, like it’s the only thing that matters because it is the only thing that matters.

Every day I go back and Leo Tan’s leap-frogged my scores again so I have to sit there for three hours until I’ve done the same back. There’s always somebody just ahead and somebody else nipping at your heels. It’s almost perfect.

The resurgence of high-score focussed gaming that started with the first Geometry Wars and ramped up with Pac-Man Championship Edition is wonderful and evolving. And this time round it’s not just a niche activity for hardcore Ikaruga players, but, thanks to XBLA, a mainstream pursuit everyone can join in with.

There are those who don’t get it, though. Here’s Hilary Goldstein concluding his review for IGN:

A solid sequel. Three of the six modes are great fun, with the other three being at least serviceable. But this is a game and a series that is showing its age.

What? What?. GW2 would be as relevant in five years time as it is today. Good gameplay doesn’t grow bad with age and the ideas that led this game’s structure and presentation are fiercely contemporary (I’ve not seen the competitive element of the game replicated with such focus and precision anywhere else).

Anyhow, whatever. I’ve leaderboards to work.