Where to get it

Steam

2001 · Alfa System · Action · Arcade

Mobile Light Force 2

Castle of Shikigami is a dark, supernatural shoot-'em-up classic. Choose one of six characters and utilize their unique abilities to defeat the demons infesting modern-day Tokyo in this vertically scrolling shooting game. Use each character's shot, special Shikigami attack and bomb to conquer each stage and it's boss to ultimately discover who or what is behind "The Castle of Shikigami Incident".

Released: 2001
Platforms: Arcade Nintendo Switch PlayStation 2 Windows Xbox Xbox One iOS
Genres: Action Arcade Shooter
Developers: Alfa System
Publishers: —
Modes: Co-op Multiplayer Single-player
Perspective: Bird view / Isometric
Themes: Action
Country: Japan
Age ratings: ESRB E PEGI 12 CERO A USK 0
Languages: English, Japanese
Time to beat: 0.5hmain story2hcompletionist

About

Shikigami no Shiro (式神の城, lit. Castle of Shikigami), released in North America and Europe under the title of Mobile Light Force 2 and in some PAL regions as MLF2 - Mobile Light Force 2, is a 2001 shoot 'em up developed by Alfa System and is the first game in the Shikigami no Shiro series. It was originally released as an arcade game and later ported to the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and Microsoft Windows. The game was titled Shikigami no Shiro Evolution (式神の城 Evolution) for its revised version for Xbox, which was then ported to Windows as Shikigami no Shiro EX (式神の城 EX).

When localized, publisher XS Games re-titled the game as a sequel to Mobile Light Force, but in reality the games are unrelated. Mobile Light Force is known as Gunbird in Japan, and was not developed by Alfa System.

›Story

Summer, 2005: The summer heat is scorching. Tokyo's Metropolitan Police Force is investigating an occult serial killer and they've had enough. One after another, 32 female victims were found brutally murdered. Could this be the work of the occult?

Specialists have been called in to investigate. The case is called "The Castle of Shikigami Incident".

Players say

Media

The articlegameplay, story, development, reception

Gameplay

When holding down the attack button, the player moves at slower speed, and all on-screen items are automatically retrieved. The player character is invulnerable when a special attack is in effect. When the player character is close to an enemy bullet, the points gained from destroying enemies and retrieving items is multiplied by a factor based on the distance between the bullet and the player character's center. The closer they are to the bullet, the higher the scoring. When destroying enemy in shikigami mode, the multiplier also applies to the number of items dropped by enemy and all items dropped by the enemy are automatically retrieved.

The Xbox release adds Practice mode, Gallery, and Replay mode, while the PlayStation 2 release adds Practice mode, Gallery, and Side Story modes. Windows includes I.R. mode and vertical screen layout from the arcade game. The North American and European releases of the game removed the screen rotation mode and all in-game plot.

Story

In July 2005, a string of serial murders take place in Tokyo. All the victims are female and killed by external injury. The killings take place within 20 hours. On July 21, the 31st victim is found.

The police force classify the case as special crime #568, and begin to seek investigators from occult sources. On July 23, there is a 32nd victim.

Reception

In Japan, Game Machine listed Shikigami no Shiro on their November 1, 2001 issue as being the fourth most-successful arcade game of the month.

The PlayStation 2 version received "mixed" reviews according to video game review aggregator Metacritic.

Releases by platformdates and regions as published

Platform	Released	Regions
Arcade	31 December 2001	Japan
Xbox	14 March 2002	Japan
PlayStation 2	27 June 2002	Japan
Windows	8 August 2002	Japan · Worldwide 15 June 2017
iOS	2 October 2014	Worldwide
Nintendo Switch	23 April 2026	Japan