Xbox Live has had a few classics brought to its list of late. Only last month we had the amazing Dreamcast classic Rez updated for the HD generation, and now its the turn of another Dreamcast great, Ikaruga.

Ikaurga was initially released for the Dreamcast way back in 2001, it was a great game then but the dying console did not give it much of a chance to make a mark, thankfully the publishers saw sense and also released this title for the Gamecube, but only in small amounts, making it one of the Gamecubes most sought after games and due to the limited amounts an expensive on at that. Now for just 800 MS Points you can purchase gaming perfection.

Ikaruga is a top down, 2D shooter, basically you control a ship at the bottom of the screen, the game scrolls up and its up to you to shoot all of the enemies on screen. There have been loads of games like this in the past, so what makes this one special?

First off the graphics, they are anime like in their appearance, making for some well designed ships and mechs to battle against, the backgrounds are just jaw dropping even for a game this old, and it moves along at a fair old pace. Keeping with the anime style is the sound effects, your ships lasers sound great and the explosions sound like they are taken straight from Macross.

The most original aspect of this title is the ability to change you ships shield, there are two modes, white and black, if you are about to get hit by a white laser, change to a white shield and absorb its power, the same goes for black. This will take a while to get the hang off as flying straight into laser fire is something I am not used to in games like this. Once you have absorbed the laser power, you are able to release it as a more powerful bomb, causing more damage to the intended target.

There are 5 stages to play through but each one requires some amazing flying and shooting skills to get through, each level has a mid point and end level boss, the mid point bosses are quite easy to dispose off, however the end level bosses are huge and release some awesome firepower to stop you in your tracks, you need keen eyes to learn each ones pattern.

The game is also like one giant puzzle, you must learn the movement and pattern off the ships and lasers to make sure you choose the right shield at the right time, in the first few plays you will die quite quickly, I had trouble getting to the first boss, but the learning curve on this title is perfect, yes it will punish you for a mistake, but you will learn not to be at that spot next time.

Worth a mention is the difficulty, even on easy this game is a challenge, if you want to go hardcore you can just play with the 3 lives supplied, however you can tinker with the options and add more continues and also change the difficulty settings.

Rather than just a straight port of the original, there have been a few new additions, as well as online leaderboards you are also able to play co-op, either online or at home. This is a great little addition to an already perfect game.

If this is the future of Xbox Live games I would love to see some more DreamCast classics like Caution:Seaman, Bangai-O and also the never released Propeller Arena hit the service. A highly recommended game.