Crimzon Clover is hands down one of the best shooters on the Switch. In the conspicuous absence of CAVE titles, Crimzon Clover’s DoDonpachi homage easily fills that niche and then some. 

The main loop is familiar–use your main shot to build up your BREAK gauge, which can be used to cancel bullets and temporarily power up your shot. In addition you can either build up the gauge further to go into a DOUBLE BREAK and extend this power up state, or spend the gauge early if you’re in a tight spot to use a more traditional screen clearing bomb, with each use requiring progressively more of the bar to be filled. 

Each choice is a bet against how long you’ll be able to hold out in the future, a bet against how long you can stay cool before the next release of tension. 

Supplementing your main weapons is your lock-on shots. Activating it slows your movement for more precise maneuvers and tags enemies outside your immediate range to take them down in one explosive barrage. Feeling out where to position yourself and how many enemies to lock onto before launching is the key not only to survival, but scoring, with a major multiplier rewarded for efficiently continuing your chain of lock-ons. Alongside the BREAK system it provides a perfect series of tense loops. A constant build and release that run in parallel then intersect in key moments. 

Which is why the new arrange mode doesn’t quite work for me.The standard BREAK bar is replaced with a new Gradius style powerup bar that adds new weaponry. BREAK can still be achieved, but it slots in at the end of the gauge, taking much to achieve than before. It breaks the perfect rhythm of the main game, and adds a few too many things to keep track of without ever giving the sense of strategic decision making that Gradius’ system confers. It’s more a puzzle of efficiency than of expression, and I felt more comfortable simply allowing the computer to take over choosing powerups instead, even if it resulted in less control. 

The new gadgets that flank the screen are similarly underwhelming, providing new visual flair but not feeling too useful in tracking scoring or planning routes. There’s score and stat tracking gadgets, but none that allow you to compare your current run to previous runs, or see how you stack up against friends or people on the leaderboard. Leaderboards themselves are lacking Friend Only leaderboards, a strange omission given that the Steam release had them. So you’ll have to make do trading screenshots on social media to more easily find your placings. 

But those are all small nitpicks on what is easily one of my favorite Switch shooters. Crimzon Clover is as approachable or intimidating as you want it to be, and with its arrange mode there’s even more variations to keep things fresh. 

Those perfect loops of build up and destruction stay oddly cozy, no matter how or where you choose to experience them.