Project Sylpheed

In Project Sylpheed, players take on the role of a rookie pilot and fly the Delta Saber starfighter in a campaign that comprises 16 missions. Typical mission objectives are to destroy specific enemy targets and to protect allied ships. There are also optional secondary goals, such as completing certain tasks within a time limit or without taking damage. Completing the primary objectives within a time limit successfully completes a mission; failure to do so ends the game. If the player fails a mission several times in a row, the game offers an option to skip to the next stage.

Players control the Delta Saber from a view as if they were in the cockpit, or a slight distance away from and outside the craft. The controller's thumbstick is used to fly the starfighter in any direction. By pressing the maneuver button and pushing the thumbstick in a direction, the player makes their fighter perform aileron rolls and 180-degrees turns (half-loops). Various button combinations control the Delta Saber's speed, allowing the craft to boost to great speeds with afterburners, coast on inertia without power, or match speed with a target.

Project Sylpheed's setting, exposited through flashback sequences during the game, is a fictional 27th century in which human civilization has expanded beyond Earth for 500 years, colonizing several worlds and forming the Terra Central Government (TCG). Seated on Earth, the government uses military force to suppress colonial uprisings. The ADAN Alliance, formed by colonists of four star-systems, initially engaged in politics to seek independence for their worlds. The central government's responded by destroying the terraforming facilities of an alliance planet, Acheron, killing many colonists and turning the world inhospitable. ADAN does not believe TCG's cover-up of its involvement in the planet's devastation and launches a war on what they see as a tyrant government.

The player assumes the role of Katana Faraway, a young talented pilot in the Terra Central Armed Forces (TCAF). Faraway possesses a strong sense of loyalty to his friends and affiliation. As the game progresses, he gradually falls in love with Ellen Bernstein, a close friend and fellow pilot. Pitted against them are the forces of ADAN.

Project Sylpheed was first announced by Square Enix to be in development in April 2006. The video games publisher proclaimed at an Xbox 360 conference in Tokyo, Japan, that the game was the company's first exclusive title for the Microsoft game console. This was part of Enix's strategy to diversify its market, spreading its interests among the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii. Initially titled Project Sylph, the game was renamed Project Sylpheed for a more obvious connection with its predecessor, Silpheed.

The original game, first released in 1986, was a rail shooter rendered with 2D computer graphics; dodging and shooting at incoming enemies, the player's starship moved around a playing field that scrolled vertically. Enix also credited Game Arts, the company that had created Silpheed, as the developers of Project Sylpheed.

Project Sylpheed received mixed reviews, with critics praising the core shooting but criticizing the repetition, lack of depth, and story.

G4TV's reviewer, David Francis Smith, said that the game's designers had "no idea how to create structured, intelligible action in such a big area". Several of his colleagues agreed, finding the game flawed in the design of its missions. They were disappointed that most missions, in the words of Xbox World's Michael Gapper, tasked them to "fly, shoot, rearm, [and] shoot more" endlessly. Reviewers were also irked that they were not informed about the secondary objectives in a mission; the goals were only revealed after the reviewers had completed them unawares.