Tsurugi is an arcade game by
Konami, reminiscent of their highly interactive
Bemani series.
The player faces a cabinet fairly similar to the usual sort and takes on enemies of the usual sort, the difference being that the player takes in hand the hilt of a
katana, and swings it around to
kill things.
So the
offence is pretty thought out, and even though you'll probably look stupid waving a sword handle around the arcade like the giant
samurai geek you are, it's great fun.
The game does not suffer from the same problem as most
shoot-em-ups, that being the
defence. If you kill something before it kills you, great. But in real life (well, in real life you'd probably take a gun to those unending hoards of
sword-wielding maniacs, so we'll pretend it's real life in the
meiji era) you can dodge things. This is where games like
Time Crisis stand out. Just as in
Time Crisis, you are able to avoid attacks through the use of a foot pedal, which also has the handy purpose of preventing you from cheating like everyone used to in
Duck Hunt.
The cabinet itself it pretty standard, although oversized and with a nice stone-effect paint job. Other additions include a shaped display designed to mimic classical Japanese architecture. Large sheets of plastic with images of a samurai in a field protrude from the sides and prevent you damaging observers.
Released in 2001, it was originally destined to be a wide release, but you are unlikely to see it outside of Japan in the near future.
The name means sword in Japanese, by the way.