Review of Apidya’ Special on PS5

Originally released by Kaiko on the Commodore Amiga in 1992, Apidya stood apart from the era’s spaceship-dominated shoot ’em ups by shrinking the battlefield to an organic micro-scale. In Apidya’ Special on PlayStation 5, this cult classic receives a faithful 24-bit rebuild rather than a simple emulation port, resurrecting unreleased 1990s console assets alongside modernized presentation.

You play as Ikuro, transformed into a heavily armed honeybee seeking vengeance across five bizarre insect realms, including overgrown meadows, murky ponds, toxic sewers, and biomechanical hives. The core mechanics remain firmly rooted in traditional horizontal shmup design, heavily inspired by Gradius. Defeated swarms yield power-up orbs that cycle through an upgrade gauge at the bottom of the screen, letting you stack speed boosts, dropping bombs, multi-directional lasers, protective shields, and helper drones.

The PS5 presentation strikes a balanced compromise between preservation and modernization. Players can toggle on the fly between the original 4:3 ratio and an expanded 16:9 widescreen display featuring gorgeous parallax scrolling layers. Complementing the crisp pixel art is a robust suite of CRT shaders, delivering authentic scanlines, shadow masks, and phosphor bloom.

DualSense implementation adds crisp haptic feedback to buzzing autofire and heavy detonations. Auditorily, the game is a triumph: Chris Hülsbeck returned to re-record and arrange his iconic, energetic Euro-synth soundtrack, and purists can instantly switch to the original Paula chip soundscape.

Mechanical adjustments make this version far more accommodating than its brutal Amiga predecessor. A flexible difficulty suite allows players to customize starting lives, disable post-death weapon stripping, practice individual stages, or team up in a newly minted local co-op mode where player two pilots an escort drone.

The game’s 16-bit heritage does reveal occasional rough edges. Dense foreground foliage and buzzing flora in modern widescreen mode can occasionally obscure small enemy projectiles or terrain collision boxes, causing frustrating cheap hits. Additionally, veteran shmup enthusiasts running on standard difficulty settings can clear the five main stages in under ninety minutes.

Final Thoughts

Even with those classic eccentricities, Apidya’ Special is an affectionate, polished restoration of European computer gaming history. It retains its unique identity, looks sharp on modern 4K displays, and delivers one of the finest retro audio experiences available on modern consoles.