Breather Level: In Director's Cut, there are two new bonus stages included. In each of these two stages, players fight only one boss; attacking it will cause it to release medals. Unlike the normal stages, the player is immortal; taking hits from boss attacks will result in only a loss of medals. These bosses double as Breather Bosses in this sense. The bonus stages serve as a means for players to have a chance to replenish the shield meter and restock on Bombs and Fairies from the total medals collected at the end of them.
Captain Obvious Reveal: The fact that Valbarossa is a woman is played up as a surprise to the heroes, however her feminine voice, which is not masked in any way, makes her gender clear well before she officially reveals the fact. This is mostly an issue in the Director's Cut version if voices are enabled (which is the default), since the original version did not have any voice acting until an update introduced it, but someone in-universe should have noticed that the enemy pirate they've been bantering with has a womanly voice.
Complacent Gaming Syndrome: The high score leaderboards consist of Azuma (based on the original craft from Raiden, with stats similar to Aegis from Raiden Fighters games), using the Swing Vulcan-Catch Plasma-Lightning/Reflect Laser combos and almost nothing else.
Contested Sequel: The game is even more divisive than Raiden IV, due to the heavy deviations from the usual formula (while also taking cues from Raiden Fighters games), including branching stages rather than the usual linear romp, weapon customization that opens up many options but is considered to be heavily unbalanced, as well as story elements (especially in-stage dialogue) that's either seen as adding flavor or an unnecessary addition when most shmup players do not care about story. Also, dated-looking polygon graphics.
Fan Nickname: Raiden V gives proper names to the series Big Bad and the world organization that launched a coalition against the alien invasion. Nevertheless, older fans of the series continue to use the names of these two narrative elements coined by a fan who misread the name given in material for the US localization of Raiden Trad for the Super NES:
"The Cranassians" for the Crystals. The name "Cranassians" is a misspelling of the name "Carnassials", given by the Super NES Raiden Trad manual. This is the only Western localization of the Raiden game to name the antagonists. The much-cited North American manual of The Raiden Project for the "Cranassians" name calls them "technologically advanced, alien 'exological' beings.
The Catch Plasma isn't terribly powerful at first, but at the highest levels this weapon easily becomes a Master of All and one of the strongest weapons in the entire series. Its orbs lock on to enemies instantly, allowing you to easily rack up that x6.0 multiplier on popcorn enemies, expand out in a wide angle allowing you to zap anything in front of you, and multiple orbs can target the same enemy at once, making it more than powerful enough to take on bosses. Once you upgrade it to level 10, the only real reason to use any of the other weapons (except the Reflect Laser, see below) is to get them to level 10 as well for the True Final Boss.
The Reflect Laser is pretty hard to use as it involves firing a laser into a crystal to launch rotating lasers out of it, so the player must be very careful to ensure that the rotating lasers keep going. However, a carefully placed crystal will waste bosses, ESPECIALLY Humpty Dumpty, in seconds with point blank rotating lasers that continuously damage the boss.
Hilarious in Hindsight: The Spirit of Dragon, despite its name suggesting it's of East Asian origin, is in fact an American-produced fighter. In 2019, the Virtual YouTuber talent agency hololive would introduce an "American dragon" streamer, Coco Kiryu.
I Knew It!: Many fans had a strong feeling that the Xbox One exclusivity wouldn't last long, much like with Raiden IV (arcade and Xbox 360 exclusive for a long time, later ported to PS3 and PC), especially due to the non-enthusiasm that Japanese gamers have for the system. This ended up being proven right in 2017 with the PS4 and Windows ports.
Memetic Mutation: Max's coffeeExplanation Of all the characters in the game, Max is easily the most well-known due to much of his dialogue involving his obsession with coffee.
Narm Charm: For all the criticism the game gets for having a heavier story focus than past games, there are people who like the game because of the dialogue, particularly Max's obsession with coffee, and think he helps add some needed levity to an otherwise grim and serious game.
The worst Stage 8 ending features the VCD returning to Earth, thinking they returned to Mars by mistake due to encountering a big red lifeless planet, only to discover that they did return to Earth and it's already been conquered by the Crystals, rendering their victory at the alien planet completely worthless.
Another bad ending has the Bellwether receive a series of distress calls from Earth, detailing another horrifying discovery of crystals followed by the crystals changing the composition of the Earth's atmosphere. Max orders the Bellwether and all Raiden fighters to rush to Earth to help out, and it's not revealed whether they made it back in time...
On the whole, this game manages to make crystals terrifying. Large batches of them can be seen in stages 2 and 8, and their key schtick is using a given planet's military technology against the inhabitants of the planet. They're also capable of instantly transmitting information from one crystal to the rest, allowing the collective to adapt to any strategies tried against even just one of them.
Play the Game, Skip the Story: The game is noticeably more story-heavy than past entries in the series, but all it ends up doing for many players (especially main-series players) is have them shut off voices and top-of-screen subtitles, or simply ignore them since they're not exactly obtrusive (and in fact are genuinely difficult to pay attention to if you even want to, as much of the dialogue is drowned out by gameplay).
Sequel Difficulty Drop: This game is tons easier than the past games, due to some fundamental changes to series' staples as a result of the game not being an arcade release (and thus being mandated to be Nintendo Hard): Weapons no longer power down upon death, the recharging shield mechanic is more forgiving than a discreet Video-Game Lives system (although you no longer gain bombs upon being struck), and overall enemy difficulty is much lower (due to the game being exclusive to home platforms), meaning that you have to turn up the difficulty level for arcade-standard difficulty.
Spiritual Adaptation: The game has a lot in common with MOSS's other shoot-em-up, Caladrius. In particular, the Catch Plasma acts very similar to Noah's Life Stalker attack, and both games feature a weapon system where you can mix and match weapons and individually power them up.
Strawman Has a Point: Lt. Campbell and the rest of SHIFT get on the VCD's radar because of their illegal research on crystals, not to mention that he hired a pirate to steal crystals from the Bellwether. While Max is right in reminding him that crystals shouldn't be taken so lightly, Campbell also points out that the Bellwether and the Raiden fighters exist due to SHIFT's crystal research, and that the Montevideo agreement was in the way. Max doesn't bother to address this point and continues to have the SHIFT facility assaulted, making him look like an Ungrateful Bastard.
Blow of Hornet, the Stage 5 boss, has a Wave-Motion Gun accompanied by aimed shots that are fired periodically and rotating sidewinding bullet sprays at both sides in its last phase. The laser attack already doesn't leave plenty of free space, but navigating the already fast bullet sprays while trying not to get hit by the aimed shots is very troublesome. Expect to get hit once if you try not to bomb at that phase.
The fortress midboss in Stage 8 launches a massive barrage of bullets that is almost impossible to manage through as said barrage is full of very fast bullets launched in a dense pattern. To say that the midboss is an instant bomb is an understatement.
The first attack of Humpty Dumpty's last phase consists of rapid rotating shots that provide little space to move past the gaps of its extremely fast bullets. You better take out Humpty Dumpty fast or else you will be overwhelmed by the sheer amount AND speed of this attack.
Divine Rampart's last phase starts with 3 streams of rapid shots fired from each of its three arms, then the number of bullets fired from each arm grow rapidly to the point of no telling where to dodge as the entire screen is flooded with bullets moving at breakneck speed.
That One Boss: Humpty Dumpty, the Stage 8 boss, is this if you don't have plenty of bombs, a full Cheer meter, or the Reflect Laser. Its first phase is manageable, but drag on the fight too long and you'll be overwhelmed by its Attack Drones' attacks. Then its attacks are both dense and insanely fast, and if its last phase's attacks aren't difficult enough, it will shield itself and proceed to launch a barrage of bullets flying everywhere. There's a good reason why the Reflect Laser is a must to take on Humpty Dumpty.
They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: This game receives considerable criticism from players who were first exposed toRaiden II and Raiden DX as their entry point into the series. The main points of contention in Raiden V by these players include a shield mechanic replacing lives,voice acting, Yoshimi Kudo composing the soundtrack instead of long-time series composer Go Sato, and a story that is more than an Excuse Plot like earlier in the series to flesh out many mainstay narratives in the series that had gone unexplained until this game.
, the first stage theme.