Deep Space Waifu is an overhead Shmup in where we pick out a waifu from a dating app and attempt to shoot off all her clothes, without getting blasted apart yourself. Our character is a hoverbike riding bear and its best not to think about the premise too much as it doesn’t get any less strange from here on out. At first, we only have a few waifus to choose from in the app and are given the choice to equip one of three abilities. These being a projectile clearing bomb, the power to slow down time and last but not least, the ability to move twice as fast and cause double the amount of damage. All are viable choices with the next screen offering us a few more options, most importantly the difficulty setting. Choosing an easier setting doesn’t seem to affect the game aside from simply giving you more lives to get through the stage.
After that, we are in and can finally meet our waifu. She is little more than a giant image with a bit of animation to her, with her clothes being your main enemy that you must free her from. There is little reason not to hold the firing button at all times to eliminate both her clothes and the aliens trying to stop you. One shot is all it takes to see us become little more than a smoldering wreckage so balancing between your deadly foes as well as your main objective is crucial. This is made even trickier due to the camera auto scrolling around the stage, dragging you with it even if her clothes are still intact. It has a surprising amount of strategy to it and does not take long to ramp up the difficulty to stop your waifu conquest.
It is hardly what I would call a hard Shmup, but it does pack much more of a punch than one would think, making it a rather fun title even without the anime nudity. Your trickiest opponents will be the bosses that spawn in once you’ve reached “too much intimacy” with your waifu. Once it shows up, we are free to destroy her undergarments if we can and get her completely nude. This is easier said than done as you will be pelted with projectiles all throughout and must still wait for the auto moving camera to go to your intended location. It becomes a battle of endurance if you want to destroy her panties and can be rather risky if you are low on lives. The battle lasts as long as it takes, up until you destroy the boss which can happen whether or not any clothing is left so careful not to accidentally kill him too soon.
On the other hand, we don’t actually have to destroy the clothes and can complete the stage by shooting down all of our foes. As soon as the boss shows up, we can kill it and go along our merry way. There is even a “Gentlemen” mode in where destroying any clothes will result in a game over, and that is harder than it may sound. The main setback to not undressing her is that we are rated by stars based on her clothing, and we need more stars to unlock other waifus. Each waifu is basically a stage so you’ll definitely be wanting to get as many as you can. In total there are 14 of them to meet with their own unique clothing and attack patterns you may face. Some have their own dialogue that is actually pretty funny alongside small tweaks such as your projectiles being dollar bills.
The English translation has some flaws though you can understand what they are trying to say and there is so little text overall that it is a very minor issue. And finally, the elephant in the room. The nudity itself. Yes, it is censored like most other anime games with nudity but what separates it apart is just how absurdly easy it is to uncensor if you choose to. All you have to do is go to the data file of the game and make a text file with the name”nude.patch”. Doing so doesn’t add anything to the game aside from said nudity though it is a nice and surprisingly simple way for those that want to add it into their game. Even without naked waifus or the lewd nature of this title, it still stands as a rather competent Shmup in its own right.
The entirety of Deep Space Waifu has the laid back and chill vibe to it, from the music to the announcer that alerts you when you get a power-up. It is all too easy to go into a zen-like state and effortlessly avoid the near bullet hell levels of projectiles being flung your way. Both the visual feedback and the sound effects makes it feel satisfying whenever you destroy an enemy alien. It’s a shame that there are no online leaderboards, but it is still fun to try to beat your own high-scores, especially since the stages are so short that it won’t take much of your time. The more you annihilate your foes, the more dark stars you collect that will refill whatever ability you selected, making it that much more strategic as stocking up for a boss is not a bad idea.
A rather strange feature is the Retro mode that makes the visuals appear pixelated if you desire. Scouring through the files, I’ve found that they have included a bunch of wallpapers to proudly present our waifus. There is quite a bit of content here for a mere two dollars and is actually not a meme game to ironically play. It can stand on its own as a rather decent Shmup with the clothes destroying feature actually adding some strategy to the formula aside from killing everything that moves. No one will believe you that you are playing Deep Space Waifu for its gameplay but its well worth disappointing your friends and family for.
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