Out of all the Cotton games that have been released for far during the 30th anniversary, Panorama Cotton has to be one of the stranger entries into the series as it doesn’t look or play like the others. Let’s take a look at Panorama Cotton for the Nintendo Switch and see how vastly different this game is.
Just as how the SNES received a Cotton game back in the 90’s, the Sega Genesis (Mega Drive in Japan) also received a Cotton game in the form of Panorama Cotton. What makes this Cotton game different from the rest is that the game is a “pseudo-3D” on rails shoot that has more in common with Sega’s arcade hit Space Harrier than with the SNES and arcade versions. As for the story, one day as Silk is recounting her previous adventure with Cotton, Knit, Slik’s sister, tells Slik that there is something wrong with Queen Velvet. The two rush over to the castle garden where Queen Velvet is on her steed, Pinky addressing the other fairies. She says that the world is in chaos and that she is the only one who can save it and then speeds off towards the supposed danger. Confused, Silk and Knit find a burnt Willow that was near the queen, coming to the conclusion that this is what was responsible for the queen’s behavior. Knit mentions that there have been monsters towards the north of the kingdom that have been burning any Willows they come across. Before addressing both problems at hand, Slik takes the burnt Willow and goes off to dispose of it, making sure that other fairies won’t get infected. As she’s about to dispose of it, she is suddenly grabbed by Cotton who tries to eat the WIllow but spits it back out due to the bad taste. Cotton starts to shake Slik angrily asking why she would feed something disgusting to her. As she is being shaken up, Slik explains that monsters are burning WIllows, which makes Cotton stop shaking her and gets angry at the thought. She grabs Slik again and flies off with her towards the monsters and towards their new adventure. As I mentioned before, story in shmups are just extra dressing and not the main course, which is the case for Panorama Cotton. Now the in-game texts and the cutscenes are in Japanese but will receive an update to where all text will be localized.
Now the gameplay for Panorama Cotton is much different from the other Cotton games as this one is an on-rails game that is similar to Space Harrier. But even though you are playing from a different perspective, the core elements are still the same: shoot everything, dodge and try not to die. You are able to control your speed, which is very useful as everything is coming at you very fast and being able to slow down or speed up really helps with maneuvering Cotton around.You also have magic spells and they work similar to how they work in the other games though you are not able to cycle through them. It takes awhile to get used to the new perspective in Panorama Cotton if you haven’t played similar games like it before (ie Space Harrier) as it has times messed with my depth perception while flying around. But after a few minutes of play I was able to move around and not run into everything. In terms of other modes, Panorama Cotton features standard and challenge modes as well as cheats that can be used in standard mode when unlocked in challenge mode, which is similar to Cotton 100%, But in addition to those modes, Panorama Cotton also has a score attack mode though it more like a time attack mode as there is a timer that tracks how fast you can complete the game.
The graphics for Panorama Cotton are a bit weird to say the lease. By that I mean since the pov is different from other games. Even so everything is bright and colorful as you fly past them, or in my case occasionally run into to them. As for the music, its very cheery, fun and upbeat though none of the tracks are really memorable.
Panorama Cotton does take some getting used to with its switch in perspective, but once you get used to it its is a ton of fun. The story is amusing, gameplay is pretty solid and graphics/music fun and upbeat. While it isn’t my favorite one out of all the Cotton games, it’s still a lot a fun and worth checking out.
