Akane is a twin-stick shooter in where we play as a samurai on a suicide mission against the yakuza. The term suicide mission is quite appropriate here, as even if the player takes down hundreds of goons, more will take their place until they bring you down. We play as the titular Akane, a young woman with a thirst for vengeance so intense that she willingly steps into what she knows will be her death, simply to take down as many of her enemies as possible first. Playing through the tutorial will fill you in on a bit of her backstory, but the lore ultimately does not matter as there is no further story or character building afterward. It’s a darn shame considering how cool looking this world is.
Giving the tutorial a go is definitely something you want to take a few minutes to do, as starting the game proper immediately tosses you right into the fray surrounded by four katana-wielding enemies. The weapons you’ll find at your disposal are your trustworthy katana and a futuristic gun that charges its ammo back up over time. Whether it be chopping a foe in half or blowing his brains out with a bullet, a single hit is all it takes to kill all but a single enemy type. This includes bosses. If you get a hit in, they too will succumb to death. This works both ways around however, if you get struck it is over for you. With how many enemies usually swarm the play area, it can either be a one-sided bloodbath or an inglorious death as you run out of stamina.
A button masher this is not. You need to always be aware of your stamina to avoid dashing right into a foe and being cut down as you find that you can’t attack. Luckily, your gun doesn’t need any stamina to shoot, so you could easily dash towards an enemy to shoot him point-blank if you knew Akane was too tired to melee beforehand. It is a mesmerizing flow between melee and ranged as you try to take both your stamina & ammo into account as the never-ending stream of enemies rush in from all sides. Both your ammo, as well as stamina refill pretty quickly, but this is a game in where every second can mean the difference between life or death. Taking the time to aim your gun only to find it can’t fire is near suicide.
This is a fight we know we can not win, and our death is assured, but there are objectives to try to complete while you still draw breath. These range from killing 30 enemies without missing a blow using a katana, getting a 50x combo multiplier, or slaying ten foes by deflecting bullets back at them, to name a few. Doing them is well worth the effort, as that is how you unlock new gear to customize your character and tweak your playstyle. New katanas carry unique abilities and attacks, such as being able to throw them or perform a spinning slash. New shoes allow you to perform different dashing lengths or merely being able to sprint. Guns are self-explanatory. Some will have a shotgun-like spread while others are full auto. And a ton of different objects to equip including a glove that causes you to refill ammo faster by killing, or cigarettes that do nothing but change the color of the trail behind your character.
You get a set of objectives at the main menu that you must complete before you can receive new ones. It eases you in at first, though quickly become more challenging and asks dangerous things of you which one normally wouldn’t do. Like the aforementioned deflecting ten bullets back at enemies. You have three options to avoid the gunfire from the rare enemy type containing a firearm. Your first and safest bet is to get behind a solid object, given you have enough time. The second riskier option is to dash at just the right moment each of the three times he will fire before he has to reload. And finally, you can simply block it. You can either shrug off both bullets or melee strikes by attacking at precisely the right moment if you are daring, or simply use the dedicated blocking button for an equally effective maneuver. Ideally, you do not want to give someone with a gun the chance to fire even once as these foes are cybernetically enhanced to the point where they never miss. Yet, the promise of new loot is alluring indeed.
When things get too hectic, we have two trump cards up our sleeve. The first can be activated when you fill up a single bar in your meter at the bottom of the screen. It is a devastating attack that lets you line up your trajectory before Akane leaps into action and slays everything in that line’s path. Filling up all three sections enables you to use your ultimate move that will slaughter everything currently on screen, even the Tank type enemies that usually take several hits to go down. This meter is filled up far more quickly when you keep a long combo going, instead of killing off enemies one by one at your own leisure. With how quickly the combo chain can break, it definitely promotes an aggressive playstyle as you can only keep it going if you kill an enemy approximately every second.
There are only a handful of unique enemy variants. These range from cyber ninjas that can dash right at you from a long distance away, to your lowly katana-wielding grunt. Keeping that only a single hit will end your run in mind, every foe is a massive danger to you should you mess up somehow. With such a small selection of opponents, it soon becomes second nature as to how to handle them and what they are capable of. What should be a one-sided fight as you face an increasingly growing amount of enemies will eventually become a zen-like massacre as you slice, dash, and shoot your way towards a new high score that is solely measured in their body count. Every 100 enemies you slay will have you facing the only boss in the game again. The twist here is that he gets stronger every time he shows up and gains new abilities to keep you on your toes as you face this most dangerous of enemies.
The controls are tight and responsive, so death is always our fault. Nothing stings quite like getting cocky as you near a new high score, miss a katana blow, and get cut down by a common enemy. Akane’s gameplay is extremely addictive, and the type of experience you can either spend a few minutes or the entire day on, as you without fail think “last try” after you die once again. The fantastic soundtrack certainly does its part on keeping the player hyped throughout, and the gritty futuristic neon-soaked environments are just icing on the cake. It’s over the top death animations are also worth a mention, as it is quite satisfying cutting apart and blasting foe’s into pieces, all while knowing you will eventually meet that same fate. There is only a single map to play in, yet it doesn’t lose its charm as it is both cool looking and has well-placed enemy spawn points that feel fair. A lack of more maps is a shame, but the one heavily balanced arena on offer here is one you will not tire of soon.
One minor, though annoying oversight I do take issue with is the lack of any indication of when your katana’s special ability is ready. There is neither a visual or audio signal to alert the player, you just have to hope that your spin attack is ready to use as you charge into a group of foes. It is less of an issue with the thrown katana that you can attempt to charge up from a distance, but it is still not ideal. Another thing I found strange is how the game insists on playing a few cutscenes every time it starts up. With the lack of any kind of story, it is plain odd that you need to waste any amount of time viewing the same scenes time and time again while mashing the skip button. This also happens the first time you face the boss in a run. It is usually a sure thing that you will make it that far and then have to hear him repeat the same dialogue, which quickly gets old. While you can skip each individual event with a button press, an option to turn off all this fluff outright would be a welcome addition.
Akane is a deceptive game that may appear quite simple until you get your hands on it and continually learn more of its intricacies. I didn’t even know you could deflect a bullet by attacking until I was about to chop into an enemy only to wind up accidentally striking a projectile out of its course and offing a random nearby foe, giving me enough time to dash behind cover from the next shot. Sure there is a dedicated block button, but the fact that you can even do that was a cool and life-saving surprise. Another nifty little trick I learned is that you can bounce the unique thrown katana off of objects and catch it again like a boomerang. Usually, you need to go pick it up again, but bounce it off a taco truck or something and position yourself in its returning arc, then you no longer have to make that defenseless run to retrieve it. I could honestly go on about Akane all day. From the ton of customization options and intense challenges you need to even get that gear in the first place, to the single hit deaths making the addictive gameplay that much swifter and nerve-racking, I continue to be hooked. At the low price of five US Dollars, I can’t recommend Akane enough to those seeking nonstop action.
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