Uploaded December 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Merry Christmas! Why not celebrate Christmas day by playing the best Christmas-themed game ever made, Deathsmiles II? (Well, it's either this or ESP Ra.De.)
This replay is from January 2023, so it's actually been quite a while since I've played this myself. Supe was the last character I needed to get a decent score with at the time, but since I never recorded my Windia PB, I'll play with her next time I go back to this. They both play pretty similarly, but IIRC, Supe has faster movement speed, so it was easier to score with her. The revenge bullets catch up to Windia as you kite them, so she ends up being the most difficult character to use in this game, despite her being the 'face' of Deathsmiles. But her and Supe play very differently from Casper and Lei, so it's fun to learn all of the different playstyles.
If you're not familiar with Deathsmiles II, it was Cave's follow-up to the extremely popular, Halloween-themed original. They switched to custom PC hardware for their arcade release, went from 2D to 3D, and ended up with a fairly ugly game that was fraught with development issues. I get the feeling they abandoned it after it reached a "good enough" point because of all the problems that were piling up with the hardware and game development.
But despite the unskilled 3D graphics work, I like the art style and worldview, and the music is excellent as always with Cave, so for me, it still has a pleasant presentation.
The game itself isn't nearly as "complete" as the original Deathsmiles either, especially in comparison to Mega Black Label, which has more characters, several more stages, and a far more granular difficulty level that can satisfy anyone, from people who never played a shooter before, to the most seasoned masters looking for a new challenge. So if you go into this expecting an even more expansive sequel, you're going to be let down. Instead, you get a nice 20 minute long, really fast paced shooter that's easy to jump back into at any time. I like that Cave tried to take advantage of their new engine too, putting more emphasis on background enemies and building the scoring system around bullets that can smoothly chase you around. I don't think they could have made this on their old 2D hardware, since the game they made after this, Akai Katana, also had an unusual bullet gimmick, and it was practically in constant slowdown (the home port runs faster).
I think this game is pretty excellent overall, but if you want to *really* play it and score well, I can't recommend the Steam version, which is what I'm playing here. It's *fine*, but it runs much faster than it does on the 360, which makes it quite a bit harder all around. I don't know if the Switch or PS4 version is any better, but for ease of use and more casual play, they're ultimately not bad options. But again, if you're going to play it seriously, 360 is the way to go.
This is the Arcade mode, but there's also a fully revamped X-Mode, which has more detailed graphics, more stages, higher resolution, more characters (Follett returns!!!), and completely different game mechanics. It's great for an arrange mode, but to me, arcade is still a lot more fun.
0:00 Intro
2:10 Field A - On this Holy Night...
4:24 Field C - Demon from the Depths
7:14 Field B - City of Despair
9:36 Field D - Shadows in the Ruins
13:27 Final - Bewitched Palace
17:58 Satan Claws
20:14 Ending & Credits
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Beat 'em Ups (e.g. Final Fight): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvMhpG1GR9sk8OYiWQMZZTgl
2D Action (e.g. Metal Slug): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvNFjpnJ59Th6N0IU1PSpD3d
STG/Shmups (e.g. Dodonpachi): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFE6B3779BE759F71
Merry Christmas! Why not celebrate Christmas day by playing the best Christmas-themed game ever made, Deathsmiles II? (Well, it's either this or ESP Ra.De.)
This replay is from January 2023, so it's actually been quite a while since I've played this myself. Supe was the last character I needed to get a decent score with at the time, but since I never recorded my Windia PB, I'll play with her next time I go back to this. They both play pretty similarly, but IIRC, Supe has faster movement speed, so it was easier to score with her. The revenge bullets catch up to Windia as you kite them, so she ends up being the most difficult character to use in this game, despite her being the 'face' of Deathsmiles. But her and Supe play very differently from Casper and Lei, so it's fun to learn all of the different playstyles.
If you're not familiar with Deathsmiles II, it was Cave's follow-up to the extremely popular, Halloween-themed original. They switched to custom PC hardware for their arcade release, went from 2D to 3D, and ended up with a fairly ugly game that was fraught with development issues. I get the feeling they abandoned it after it reached a "good enough" point because of all the problems that were piling up with the hardware and game development.
But despite the unskilled 3D graphics work, I like the art style and worldview, and the music is excellent as always with Cave, so for me, it still has a pleasant presentation.
The game itself isn't nearly as "complete" as the original Deathsmiles either, especially in comparison to Mega Black Label, which has more characters, several more stages, and a far more granular difficulty level that can satisfy anyone, from people who never played a shooter before, to the most seasoned masters looking for a new challenge. So if you go into this expecting an even more expansive sequel, you're going to be let down. Instead, you get a nice 20 minute long, really fast paced shooter that's easy to jump back into at any time. I like that Cave tried to take advantage of their new engine too, putting more emphasis on background enemies and building the scoring system around bullets that can smoothly chase you around. I don't think they could have made this on their old 2D hardware, since the game they made after this, Akai Katana, also had an unusual bullet gimmick, and it was practically in constant slowdown (the home port runs faster).
I think this game is pretty excellent overall, but if you want to *really* play it and score well, I can't recommend the Steam version, which is what I'm playing here. It's *fine*, but it runs much faster than it does on the 360, which makes it quite a bit harder all around. I don't know if the Switch or PS4 version is any better, but for ease of use and more casual play, they're ultimately not bad options. But again, if you're going to play it seriously, 360 is the way to go.
This is the Arcade mode, but there's also a fully revamped X-Mode, which has more detailed graphics, more stages, higher resolution, more characters (Follett returns!!!), and completely different game mechanics. It's great for an arrange mode, but to me, arcade is still a lot more fun.
0:00 Intro
2:10 Field A - On this Holy Night...
4:24 Field C - Demon from the Depths
7:14 Field B - City of Despair
9:36 Field D - Shadows in the Ruins
13:27 Final - Bewitched Palace
17:58 Satan Claws
20:14 Ending & Credits
-----
Beat 'em Ups (e.g. Final Fight): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvMhpG1GR9sk8OYiWQMZZTgl
2D Action (e.g. Metal Slug): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfI6IYca_kvNFjpnJ59Th6N0IU1PSpD3d
STG/Shmups (e.g. Dodonpachi): youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFE6B3779BE759F71
