G.rev

G.rev

Company type	Yūgen gaisha
Industry	Video games
Headquarters	Japan
Products	Arcade shoot 'em ups
Number of employees	10 (2011)
Website	grev.co.jp

G.rev Ltd. (有限会社グレフ, Yūgen Gaisha Gurefu), short for G.revolution, is a Japanese video game developer. The company was founded by former employees of Taito's arcade division who had worked on G-Darius and RayStorm, and is known primarily for their arcade shoot 'em up games.

History

G.rev was founded with the mission of developing arcade shooters, but they realized the cost of development was more than their initial investment capital. To generate revenue, they took on contract work for Taito and Treasure, co-developing the popular shooter Ikaruga with the latter. This relationship would remain fruitful, with G.rev assisting again on Gradius V, and Ikaruga director Hiroshi Iuchi assisting on G.rev's own Strania. G.rev's first independent release was a puzzle game, Doki Doki Idol Star Seeker, a Mine Sweeper-like arcade puzzle game, created with low investment and high returns in mind.

With the money in place to develop a full-fledged arcade shooter on their own, the team, under direction of president Hiroyuki Maruyama, set out to develop Border Down as a spiritual successor to the Taito arcade classic Metal Black. Border Down was met with wide acclaim among shooter fans following the release of its Dreamcast port, with particular praise paid to its unique beam mechanics and "border system", which put players on different paths if they died. They followed this success with Under Defeat, a helicopter shooter praised for its gritty wartime atmosphere. Its port to Dreamcast would be one of the last games released on the system.

Their next release was the unique hybrid game WarTech: Senko no Ronde, which combined shooter-like firing patterns and themes in a projectile-based fighting game similar to Taito's Psychic Force series. With the Dreamcast shooter support diminishing, they chose to port the Sega NAOMI game to Xbox 360, remaking the game's graphics and adding gameplay enhancements along the way. This release, Senko no Ronde Rev. X, became the first G.rev game to be released in North America as WarTech: Senko no Ronde. The American release was met with mixed reviews that praised the title's innovation but criticized the brief length and high pricepoint. Some of the gameplay enhancements of Rev. X were carried over to the arcade release Senko no Ronde SP.

Following the formation of Gulti, another small developer formed by veterans of the shooter genre, G.rev proposed a collaborative effort, as Gulti didn't have the capital needed for a full-scale shooter of their own. The two companies created Mamoru-kun wa Norowarete Shimatta, an overhead-view, multi-directional shooter with a Japanese fantasy theme, initially released on the NAOMI. The title was ported to Xbox 360 and a widescreen version made it to PlayStation 3 much later.

The company's next title was Senko no Ronde DUO: Dis-United Order, a sequel to their earlier crossover title. This time, G.rev chose to develop for the more powerful Taito X2 hardware, allowing the graphical quality of the arcade version to match the later Xbox 360 port. Unlike its predecessor, the title was not released outside Japan.

G.rev continued to develop on the Taito X2 hardware, releasing Strania: The Stella Machina, a vertically scrolling shooter that allows players to arm two different selectable/upgradable weapons at once. For the first time, G.rev decided to forgo a retail release, instead releasing an Xbox Live Arcade title, and promising some of the usual bonus features like an alternate course as future downloadable content. The home version was released simultaneously across all regions, giving Western gamers their first G.rev title since Wartech. They would later update the game as Strania EX for arcades on exA-Arcadia released in September 2020 to have both the Strania and Vower sides playable from the beginning, added the arranged soundtrack and a new Hell mode.

Games developed

Arcade games

Game	Year	Hardware	Publisher(s)
Doki Doki Idol Star Seeker	2001	Sega NAOMI	G.rev
Border Down	2003	Sega NAOMI	G.rev
Senko no Ronde	2005	Sega NAOMI	Sega
Senko no Ronde NEW VER .	2005	Sega NAOMI	Sega
Under Defeat	2005	Sega NAOMI	Sega
Senko no Ronde SP	2006	Sega NAOMI	Sega
Mamoru-kun wa Norowarete Shimatta!	2008	Sega NAOMI	G.rev
Senko no Ronde Dis-United Order	2009	Taito Type X²	G.rev
Senko no Ronde Dis-United Order Ver 2.0	2009	NESiCAxLive	G.rev
Seisou Kouki Strania	2011	NESiCAxLive	G.rev
Under Defeat HD+	2013	RingEdge 2	G.rev
Seisou Kouki Strania EX	2020	exA-Arcadia	exA-Arcadia

Console games

Game	Year	System	Publisher(s)	JP	NA	EU
Doki Doki Idol Star Seeker Remix	2002	Sega Dreamcast	G.rev	Yes	No	No
Border Down	2003	Sega Dreamcast	G.rev	Yes	No	No
Under Defeat	2006	Sega Dreamcast	G.rev	Yes	No	No
WarTech: Senko no Ronde / Senko no Ronde Rev. X	2006 (JP) 2007 (NA & EU)	Xbox 360	Sega (JP) Ubisoft (NA & EU)	Yes	Yes	Yes
Senko no Ronde DUO	2010	Xbox 360	G.rev	Yes	No	No
Strania	2011 2015	XBLA Microsoft Windows	G.rev	Yes	Yes	Yes
Under Defeat HD	2012	Xbox 360 PlayStation 3	G.rev (JP) Rising Star Games (NA & EU)	Yes	Yesa	Yes
Kokuga	2012 (JP) 2013 (NA & EU)	Nintendo 3DS	G.rev	Yes	Yesb	Yes
GameCenter CX: 3-Chōme no Arino	2014	Nintendo 3DS	Bandai Namco Games	Yes	No	No
Dariusburst Chronicle Saviours	2016	PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, Microsoft Windows	Kadokawa Games	Yes	Yes	Yes
Senko no Ronde 2	2017	PlayStation 4, Microsoft Windows	Kadokawa Games	Yes	Yes	Yes
Yurukill: The Calumniation Games c	2022	PlayStation 4, Playstation 5, Nintendo Switch, Microsoft Windows	NIS America	Yes	Yes	Yes

Notes

^a North American Xbox 360 version released in 2014.
^b Not released in Canada.
^c Shoot 'Em Up Portion only.

Mobile games

Game	Year	Platform	Publisher(s)
Star Seeker	2002	Mobile	Taito / G.rev
Fairyland Story	2003	Mobile	Taito
Densha De Go! 3D	2003	Mobile	Taito

Games published

Game	Year	System	Developer(s)	JP	NA	EU
Mamoru-kun wa Norowarete Shimatta!	2009	Xbox 360	Gulti	Yes	No	No
Gunhound EX	2013	PlayStation Portable	Dracue	Yes	No	No

Other works

• The Kaiten Mawasunda!! mini-game in SIMPLE 1500 Series Vol 66. (2001, Sony PlayStation) - Design.
• Ikaruga — (2001, NAOMI / Dreamcast / GameCube) - Programming and background graphic design.
• Gradius V — (2004, PlayStation 2) - Programming and background graphic design.

External links

• Official website (in Japanese)
• Developer interview