Kind of like the 2D version of that one Donkey Kong game for the Wii
Except less insanely difficult. So far, at least. Tre's probably going to tell me that it gets insanely hard later.
But yeah, this game has really nice art. Didn't have a clue about what was going on at first though. Tre's probably going to give me a lecture about that too.
Generally it kinda goes like this: Ray and co. are doing their usual napping at the Snoring Tree (aka the character select hub) and it gets so loud and goes on for so long that it pisses off their neighbors down in the Land of the Livid Dead to the point of starting an uprising, which you have to keep from overtaking the Glade of Dreams and turning it into a nightmare.
That's it. That's nearly the entire plot, or all one needs to know at the start anyway.
And yeah, it does get pretty wickedly hard. Ubi didn't lose their touch in between the first game and 2011, but Origins is notably much friendlier gameplay wise, and the difficulty only really ramps up in two occasions:
1) the last 5 worlds of the game when played without the intent of masochism and 2) the aptly named Tricky Treasure levels, which are your keys to unlocking the real last levels of the game in the Land of the Livid Dead.
I've gotten up to the last two Tricky Treasure levels with the bro. I'm kind of convinced they're just barely on that threshold of damn near impossible because even he can't get them down, and he's always been the one to get those more than myself.
also I'm totally not going to take the opportunity to make a Rayman thread now, nope
Played some of Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed. It's fun, if surprisingly hard for a kart racer. There's a couple of gripes, like how it fails miserably to explain stuff like the drift system, but nothing game breaking. Like the original, it's pretty much to the Sega back catalog what Sonic Generations was to the Sonic series, right down to tiny things like achievements called "Fighting Viper" and the flag waver being Ristar. It's pretty clearly a labour of love.
This game is a Touhou-esque vertical shooter, though I take inspiration from a lot of shmups. :) I've considered including horizontal gameplay as well (à la Deathsmiles), but for the time being I will focus on vertical.
The controls are simple: the arrow keys move your character, shift slows you down, Z is used to shoot, X is the special attack, and C toggles between a few different types of primary attacks (this is as opposed to selecting attacks at the beginning, as is common in shmups).
"Aether" is gained from combos and grazing, and decreases from bad performance. Each time the gauge fills, it gains a level, and each time it empties, it loses a level; score gains from destroying things are multiplied by the Aether level, allowing the player to gain score faster. Its maximum level is 500.
The player begins with three hearts (life), and losing them all will result in a game over. Being hit uses up a heart. The player may gain more hearts by picking them up, and also at certain intervals in the player's score; therefore, learning to score points means more hearts! I think the maximum of hearts the player may have at a time will be 10.
The player has five power gauges, represented by the five little squares near the gauge display. If a square is filled in, it represents one full gauge. Accordingly, there are five power levels of the player's primary attack (affecting all types). The player may use up a full power gauge in order to use a powerful special attack that can also block projectiles. The player must pick up power shards from defeated enemies to restore their power.
I always thought it might be cool to make a shmup with RPG-esque progression. Or maybe an open world game where traveling between planets initiates a shmup type game or something.
I really like your idea though. Seems cool. Are you going to make it ridiculously insanely hard like the toe-hoe?
^Yeah, I'm kinda with Imi on this. Maybe you consolidate some of the meters or something?
More people have said that and been killed than there are thorium decay products.
Personally, I find that a little complex and hard to wrap my mind around
This design is relatively simple by shmup standards actually; Touhou games are more complicated and they are about as simple as a game of this sort gets. Just take a look at Hellsinker's display. ^_^
I really like your idea though. Seems cool. Are you going to make it ridiculously insanely hard like the toe-hoe?
:) I want this game to be challenging, but I think I will design two difficulties, in much the same spirit that Mushihime-sama has: a normal one (equivalent to Touhou's hard mode, or a typical arcade shmup) and a harder one (equivalent to Touhou's lunatic mode, or a second loop in an old shmup). "Normal" difficulty in Touhou is actually rather easy, once you learn the game mechanics and basic strategy, which many players never do before they give up. :)
I always thought it might be cool to make a shmup with RPG-esque progression. Or maybe an open world game where traveling between planets initiates a shmup type game or something.
Bullet Heaven is actually really heavy on the collecting-currency-and-upgrading-your-character thing. I think it is too involved for a fast-paced game, but BH is relatively slow and open-ended for this genre. As for the shmupping-between-planets thing: Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 do that quite a bit, yes? ^_^ There are shmups with open environments, even, like Diadra Empty.
More people have said that and been killed than there are thorium decay products.
If the bomb system caused you the excruciating frustration it consistently causes me, I think you would hate it too. :) My special attack is essentially a "bomb" but it doesn't make you invincible. It is designed after the power/bomb mechanic in Touhou 10 and 11, which I actually really like.
From what you'be said about Touhou, it often requires exploitation to succeed (e.g. intentionally killing yourself to prevent enemies from spawning). In my opinion, this is not real difficulty and I think you might want to avoid making your game that difficult.
As long as you don't make life work the same way it does in TH 11, I'm game.
I don't get why extra lives aren't connected to the points. If you're just a guy trying to get to the ending without dying, what's the point of the points if they don't help you?
More people have said that and been killed than there are thorium decay products.
From what you'be said about Touhou, it often requires exploitation to succeed (e.g. intentionally killing yourself to prevent enemies from spawning). In my opinion, this is not real difficulty and I think you might want to avoid making your game that difficult.
In the first six Touhou games, you can lower the difficulty rank by killing yourself, but there is no real benefit to doing this. It was styled after Raizing, the company who is *really* infamous for this sort of thing: in their shooters, yes, players must commit suicide at the right moments to lower the difficulty and maximize their score, so they can get more lives to suicide with. It is very silly. ^_^ Touhou toned this down with Perfect Cherry Blossom and removed it entirely with Mountain of Faith. Touhou is actually very well-made, although the really old ones (Embodiment of Scarlet Devil and before) get really cheap but conversely reward players for exploiting flaws in enemy formations (one of the reasons my lunatic run was painful).
As long as you don't make life work the same way it does in TH 11, I'm game.
I actually really like everything about that game and it is great, but life will be more plentiful and easier to get. :)
I don't get why extra lives aren't connected to the points. If you're just a guy trying to get to the ending without dying, what's the point of the points if they don't help you?
In TH11 they aren't but in my game they will be. :) To answer your question: scoring is a very competitive thing in the shmup scene, and while plenty of people can beat the game, not everyone can beat the game and get a good score along the way, which requires players to beat the game *in style.* :D
More people have said that and been killed than there are thorium decay products.
Yuugi is all about misdirection and streaming back and forth (her attacks are meant to *look* intimidating), except 1) her bubble attack, which you should bomb if you aren't comfortable with the hitboxes, and 2) her last attack, which even I think is really cruel with its clipping, so bomb that too if you are in a tight spot.
Ichirin is actually very easy: her main attacks make you do vertical movements at the right moment and place yourself where the openings will be, and when Unzan shows up, you can always predict where his fists will be (they are either in a static pattern (find a route and keep doing it) or aligned to you (misdirect back and forth), depending on the attack), giving you time to dodge through the bullets and out of the way. Only the last attack gets tough, with crisscrossing lasers at weird angles combined with fists, but you can still try to pay attention and get to a safe spot. Sometimes I bomb this latter.
I can offer more detailed strategies for particular attacks, if you like. :)
From what you'be said about Touhou, it often requires exploitation to succeed (e.g. intentionally killing yourself to prevent enemies from spawning). In my opinion, this is not real difficulty and I think you might want to avoid making your game that difficult.
It is perfectly possible (if incredibly difficult) to finish a Touhou game without dying at all.
Really depends on the minigame. The hide and seek game isn't badly designed so much as just kind of uncomfortable. It's really bizarre when you're a grown man in a suit of armor playing hide and seek with children.
More people have said that and been killed than there are thorium decay products.
ummm I cannot explain this either >_< It is like the same thing is happening to Lightning that happened to Yuna... except Lighting was actually really cool and tough and dignified.
Comments
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Kind of like the 2D version of that one Donkey Kong game for the Wii
Except less insanely difficult. So far, at least. Tre's probably going to tell me that it gets insanely hard later.
But
yeah, this game has really nice art. Didn't have a clue about what was
going on at first though. Tre's probably going to give me a lecture
about that too.
Generally it kinda goes like this: Ray and co. are doing their usual napping at the Snoring Tree (aka the character select hub) and it gets so loud and goes on for so long that it pisses off their neighbors down in the Land of the Livid Dead to the point of starting an uprising, which you have to keep from overtaking the Glade of Dreams and turning it into a nightmare.
That's it. That's nearly the entire plot, or all one needs to know at the start anyway.
And yeah, it does get pretty wickedly hard. Ubi didn't lose their touch in between the first game and 2011, but Origins is notably much friendlier gameplay wise, and the difficulty only really ramps up in two occasions:
1) the last 5 worlds of the game when played without the intent of masochism and
2) the aptly named Tricky Treasure levels, which are your keys to unlocking the real last levels of the game in the Land of the Livid Dead.
I've gotten up to the last two Tricky Treasure levels with the bro. I'm kind of convinced they're just barely on that threshold of damn near impossible because even he can't get them down, and he's always been the one to get those more than myself.
also I'm totally not going to take the opportunity to make a Rayman thread now, nope
My sister and I used to play it all multiplayer'd
we named the three protagonists Drip, Soap, and Barrel
why, I don't know
The (tentative) screen layout: http://i.imgur.com/eB1c0qU.png
A short explanation:
This game is a Touhou-esque vertical shooter, though I take inspiration from a lot of shmups. :) I've considered including horizontal gameplay as well (à la Deathsmiles), but for the time being I will focus on vertical.
The controls are simple: the arrow keys move your character, shift slows you down, Z is used to shoot, X is the special attack, and C toggles between a few different types of primary attacks (this is as opposed to selecting attacks at the beginning, as is common in shmups).
"Aether" is gained from combos and grazing, and decreases from bad performance. Each time the gauge fills, it gains a level, and each time it empties, it loses a level; score gains from destroying things are multiplied by the Aether level, allowing the player to gain score faster. Its maximum level is 500.
The player begins with three hearts (life), and losing them all will result in a game over. Being hit uses up a heart. The player may gain more hearts by picking them up, and also at certain intervals in the player's score; therefore, learning to score points means more hearts! I think the maximum of hearts the player may have at a time will be 10.
The player has five power gauges, represented by the five little squares near the gauge display. If a square is filled in, it represents one full gauge. Accordingly, there are five power levels of the player's primary attack (affecting all types). The player may use up a full power gauge in order to use a powerful special attack that can also block projectiles. The player must pick up power shards from defeated enemies to restore their power.
But I am not a shmup shmupper so maybe it's just par for the course, I dunno.
I always thought it might be cool to make a shmup with RPG-esque progression. Or maybe an open world game where traveling between planets initiates a shmup type game or something.
I really like your idea though. Seems cool. Are you going to make it ridiculously insanely hard like the toe-hoe?
^Yeah, I'm kinda with Imi on this. Maybe you consolidate some of the meters or something?
Bullet Heaven is actually really heavy on the collecting-currency-and-upgrading-your-character thing. I think it is too involved for a fast-paced game, but BH is relatively slow and open-ended for this genre. As for the shmupping-between-planets thing: Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 do that quite a bit, yes? ^_^ There are shmups with open environments, even, like Diadra Empty.
Move left, move right
Shoot
but
i actually quite like shmups ;_;
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
So, yeah, no worries about complexity.
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
I don't get why extra lives aren't connected to the points. If you're just a guy trying to get to the ending without dying, what's the point of the points if they don't help you?
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
I still have a faint hope that, one day, I might beat Yuugi. No such hope for Ichirin.
Ichirin is actually very easy: her main attacks make you do vertical movements at the right moment and place yourself where the openings will be, and when Unzan shows up, you can always predict where his fists will be (they are either in a static pattern (find a route and keep doing it) or aligned to you (misdirect back and forth), depending on the attack), giving you time to dodge through the bullets and out of the way. Only the last attack gets tough, with crisscrossing lasers at weird angles combined with fists, but you can still try to pay attention and get to a safe spot. Sometimes I bomb this latter.
I can offer more detailed strategies for particular attacks, if you like. :)
I am at a loss for words, someone make sense of this for me.
Discussion of a decision to increase a character's bra size = devs being seen as "just 'regular' guys" = increased sales, in their minds anyway.
Is any of this good? No, but I can't imagine any other possible reason for it.