MagneticBurn
Jikkyou Oshaberi's constant references spoiled me, I felt a little underwhelmed by this after seeing the pedestal it's placed on. Sorry I didn't vibe with it.
1991
Had to replay this to make sure I wasn't crazy about the weapon imbalance. After testing every weapon, Homing was the only thing giving me the consistent firepower and range I needed, S. Laser and Explode were okayish, everything else was totally ill-equipped to kill anything. And then one of the end-game bosses has the audacity to throw a nullifier at you that makes homing weapons useless.
It has generally fine gameplay and good background art if you can make it past that, but I couldn't get into this. I don't want to play a shmup where only 1 of 8 weapons feels comfortable, that just irks me in a deeply personal way.
It has generally fine gameplay and good background art if you can make it past that, but I couldn't get into this. I don't want to play a shmup where only 1 of 8 weapons feels comfortable, that just irks me in a deeply personal way.
I tried SFC Parodius a bit ago and despised it right out the gate, but this sequel turned out to be way better. In saying that, I still have reservations about the mechanical structure of these games. I like the huge cast of characters, enormous stages filled to the brim with pop culture and Konami references, and the adjustments to lives/respawns/ranking makes this infinitely more approachable than any Gradius before it without sacrificing the brutal challenge of the series. Really, the whole package here is obscenely high-budget, can you name ANY cartridge shmup from its time that has 8 characters, fully voice-acted commentary and battery backups for high scores??
Now what I really don't like about Parodius are bosses and enemy arrangement. Bosses react to your hits with a flinch that gives them i-frames and halts their attacks, kinda like a Mega Man X game. The plus side is bosses die about as fast whether or not you have powerups. The negative side is there's zero satisfaction in shooting them. I want to load massive ammo into these huge hitboxes, and when the boss has no damage reaction to 97.5% of my shots, I feel so out of it and bored. It's lame.
Enemies are my bigger pet peeve honestly. So like, Gradius enemies tend to be divided into (A) flying waves, (B) stage hazards, and (C) surface-to-air enemies. The latter of the three are those annoying-ass walker enemies that snipe you diagonally. Parodius feels like it's almost entirely surface-to-air enemies - which is inevitable, the enemy forces are these penguin guys that fight ground-bound with spitfire or whatever kooky contraptions they muster up. There's only so many flying enemy types you can make without shooting ideas out your ass. But on playability it means you're ill-equipped and vulnerable any time you don't have drop shots, and the rest of your fire's just doing jack shit. And it's not cool! I like Gradius because I power myself up and launch a giant torrent of bullets against impossible swarms, it's not fun to expend that weaponry on ceiling small fry and whatnot. It's like playing a Mario game full of nothing but Boo or Hammer Bros - you need fodder, fat to chew!
Maybe these complaints are just a unique issue to Jikkyou. I intend to play Gokujou and Sexy soon, I'll find out myself then.
Now what I really don't like about Parodius are bosses and enemy arrangement. Bosses react to your hits with a flinch that gives them i-frames and halts their attacks, kinda like a Mega Man X game. The plus side is bosses die about as fast whether or not you have powerups. The negative side is there's zero satisfaction in shooting them. I want to load massive ammo into these huge hitboxes, and when the boss has no damage reaction to 97.5% of my shots, I feel so out of it and bored. It's lame.
Enemies are my bigger pet peeve honestly. So like, Gradius enemies tend to be divided into (A) flying waves, (B) stage hazards, and (C) surface-to-air enemies. The latter of the three are those annoying-ass walker enemies that snipe you diagonally. Parodius feels like it's almost entirely surface-to-air enemies - which is inevitable, the enemy forces are these penguin guys that fight ground-bound with spitfire or whatever kooky contraptions they muster up. There's only so many flying enemy types you can make without shooting ideas out your ass. But on playability it means you're ill-equipped and vulnerable any time you don't have drop shots, and the rest of your fire's just doing jack shit. And it's not cool! I like Gradius because I power myself up and launch a giant torrent of bullets against impossible swarms, it's not fun to expend that weaponry on ceiling small fry and whatnot. It's like playing a Mario game full of nothing but Boo or Hammer Bros - you need fodder, fat to chew!
Maybe these complaints are just a unique issue to Jikkyou. I intend to play Gokujou and Sexy soon, I'll find out myself then.
1992
I was far too uncharitable to this in the past, this is excellent. 10/10 level and boss design, a robust and intricate weapons system, a staggering sense of awe and power, and immaculate programming in the performance, visual tricks and object physics. Definitely the best SNES shmup.
But I really, REALLY dislike that extra loops don't carry over the weapons you earn from the stages, that's so stupid, that's so so so so so so so stupid, how, why, what's the point
But I really, REALLY dislike that extra loops don't carry over the weapons you earn from the stages, that's so stupid, that's so so so so so so so stupid, how, why, what's the point
Played this as part of Ys Book 1 & 2 but I don't have the desire to finish 2 right now :/
At a time when every RPG was simulating the grand adventures, rag-tag parties and obtuse mechanisms of table-top games, Ys is shockingly homely, meditative and streamlined. A short jog through the woods hiding in your backyard. It's just two towns, a couple adjacently-connected mini-dungeons, and a back-half set inside a giant tower. Although it has to commit to the 'monsters are becoming more dangerous lately' bit to justify the natural aggression of enemies, the conflict is archival instead of actively present; an ancient evil you seal for good, rather than a ravenous and militant force. Conversations are up-close and intimate with detailed character portraits, the menu-hopping grind is substituted for raw movement that Falcom themselves described as 'popping bubbles', and the game ends with Adol being forcibly teleported out of Esteria, his visiting time no more than a fleeting vision. These trendsetting quirks make this a tender and seminal must-play. But these same strengths are a mask to unfortunately bad dungeon design, bosses that range from punching bags to torture, and deathly repetitive sprites and tilemaps.
At a time when every RPG was simulating the grand adventures, rag-tag parties and obtuse mechanisms of table-top games, Ys is shockingly homely, meditative and streamlined. A short jog through the woods hiding in your backyard. It's just two towns, a couple adjacently-connected mini-dungeons, and a back-half set inside a giant tower. Although it has to commit to the 'monsters are becoming more dangerous lately' bit to justify the natural aggression of enemies, the conflict is archival instead of actively present; an ancient evil you seal for good, rather than a ravenous and militant force. Conversations are up-close and intimate with detailed character portraits, the menu-hopping grind is substituted for raw movement that Falcom themselves described as 'popping bubbles', and the game ends with Adol being forcibly teleported out of Esteria, his visiting time no more than a fleeting vision. These trendsetting quirks make this a tender and seminal must-play. But these same strengths are a mask to unfortunately bad dungeon design, bosses that range from punching bags to torture, and deathly repetitive sprites and tilemaps.
2005
Charismatic and electrifying - the NBA Jam for Gen Z.
1991
A novel, jazzy re-working of II, I definitely like it more than that game. Had an admittedly rough time w/ this but I can see most of its problems (aggravating speedup system, evil checkpoints, odd boss balancing) becoming less intrusive with practice, as any good shmup should.
Except that slowdown, I can stomach slowdown but there's zero rhyme or reason to it here, you'll tap a direction and the game does a DVD fast-forward into a brick wall.
Except that slowdown, I can stomach slowdown but there's zero rhyme or reason to it here, you'll tap a direction and the game does a DVD fast-forward into a brick wall.
1993
It's like the inbetween of Silpheed and SoulStar, it's uglier than Silpheed but it plays better than SoulStar, except it doesn't because bosses barely take damage and run on a timer so you have to take intentional deaths to restock your bombs to speedkill them and uougghghggh i need sleep
2018
Caravan games aren't my thing so i have no horse in the race of this game's quality but damn i genuinely can't fathom how this pushes as many sprites as it does with no perceivable slowdown
2023
The store page for Cursed Knight says its based on a 'die and retry' retro type of difficulty. That description made me think of Ghouls N Ghosts, but it equated to more like Super Meat Boy, even down to the unlimited lives. and post-stage death tally.
You spend this whole game just trying the same shoddily-programmed automated sections over and over again because your hitbox is too big and your HP is too low. There's all these different gameplay styles and with exception to the Metal Storm-esque gravity mechanics (which feel great to control with Mode acting as a shoulder button toggle), they're implemented like trash and play even worse. It's too slow and easy for the first half and then way too cheap for the second half, and then it has the audacity to hit you with an auto game over after the last boss because you didn't do it fast enough.
I don't hold anything against the developer cause this was obviously a test run for larger projects they wanna do - they're making a sequel with Alien Soldier type mechanics, - but I think the final product feels extremely low-effort and ameteurish, even though they obviously had to learn a lot to make something like this. It's just 2 steps away from rage game territory. There's also a certain sneering attitude you feel coming from certain high-difficulty games, and i think as a developer, you really have to earn your worth to get away with it - this game acts tough and can't even put proper angle kerning on enemy spread shots. So much moxie for what can't score higher than a bad self-insert megaman fantasy.
You spend this whole game just trying the same shoddily-programmed automated sections over and over again because your hitbox is too big and your HP is too low. There's all these different gameplay styles and with exception to the Metal Storm-esque gravity mechanics (which feel great to control with Mode acting as a shoulder button toggle), they're implemented like trash and play even worse. It's too slow and easy for the first half and then way too cheap for the second half, and then it has the audacity to hit you with an auto game over after the last boss because you didn't do it fast enough.
I don't hold anything against the developer cause this was obviously a test run for larger projects they wanna do - they're making a sequel with Alien Soldier type mechanics, - but I think the final product feels extremely low-effort and ameteurish, even though they obviously had to learn a lot to make something like this. It's just 2 steps away from rage game territory. There's also a certain sneering attitude you feel coming from certain high-difficulty games, and i think as a developer, you really have to earn your worth to get away with it - this game acts tough and can't even put proper angle kerning on enemy spread shots. So much moxie for what can't score higher than a bad self-insert megaman fantasy.
1994
the controls ruin this otherwise impressive-looking tech demonstration. it starts rough with the rail shooting's bad collision detection and acceleration on movement, and then you get to the ground missions and face one of the worst doom-style control schemes ever conceived. It's like, the dpad moves forward/backward and strafes, except when you're moving forward which replaces your strafing with turning, but that's inverted if you're holding the strafe button, which you also use to control your Z axis hovering, which also locks your forward momentum in place until you release it, and moving also skews the axis of your shot, so if you ever shoot while moving ahead your shot just hits the ground, and even if you do land a hit everything takes like 20 shots to kill.
All you had to do was show off some impressive pseudo-3D sprite scaling. What should be the highlight of the console's graphical capabilities is reduced to floppy, unplayable drivel. Man.
All you had to do was show off some impressive pseudo-3D sprite scaling. What should be the highlight of the console's graphical capabilities is reduced to floppy, unplayable drivel. Man.
1989
Pure Taito adrenaline... filtered through the spiderman gb ign tweet filter.
This Sega CD version probably would be more recommendable if the visual compromise was in the asset loading pipeline instead of the rendering fidelity, if that makes sense. Something like Burning Force, fewer assets at a slower speed but it still matches the console's native resolution.
This Sega CD version probably would be more recommendable if the visual compromise was in the asset loading pipeline instead of the rendering fidelity, if that makes sense. Something like Burning Force, fewer assets at a slower speed but it still matches the console's native resolution.
How unfortunate this game's awesome ideas go totally blemished by the downright horrendous hitboxes and performance. The main mechanic of hijacking enemies by jumping on their back, controlling them, then jumping off with their downloaded weapon data is amazing, but you can rarely have fun with it when half the enemies have no visual indication for whether or not you can hijack them, and the other half explode 3 seconds after they get jumped.
1992
I played this years ago, and I liked it. Then I replayed it some times, and hated it. Then today I was listening to an audiobook and needed to kill an hour while waiting for an online meeting and went, 'hm, whats a game i could easily 1cc in an hour' and got reminded of this. And I played it again, and like it... conditionally.
If you like your shmups on the best possible interpretation of the 'euroshmup' style, this is a solid one - not European-developed, but definitely in a similar spirit, with its slower pace, level-up system, fixed fire rate and a number of other quirks. The art and presentation is undoubtedly the centerpiece - warm parallax backgrounds setting stage for arduous warfare against dozens of giant steampunk battleships. Unfortunately this all comes with nonstop slowdown, bullet-sponge bosses, environmental hazards that feel impossible to dodge at points, a sluggish 50 minute runtime, and a couple repeated fights that drag it down. You have to go into this with the expectation of a slower comfort game, it's a far cry from the perfectly balanced bite-sized portions of Thunder Force games and whatnot.
If you like your shmups on the best possible interpretation of the 'euroshmup' style, this is a solid one - not European-developed, but definitely in a similar spirit, with its slower pace, level-up system, fixed fire rate and a number of other quirks. The art and presentation is undoubtedly the centerpiece - warm parallax backgrounds setting stage for arduous warfare against dozens of giant steampunk battleships. Unfortunately this all comes with nonstop slowdown, bullet-sponge bosses, environmental hazards that feel impossible to dodge at points, a sluggish 50 minute runtime, and a couple repeated fights that drag it down. You have to go into this with the expectation of a slower comfort game, it's a far cry from the perfectly balanced bite-sized portions of Thunder Force games and whatnot.
2020
Endearing little homebrew project with some really impressive technical quirks, including:
- FAUX-MODE 7 ON GENESIS - ~ It's top-down 360-rotating action just like the Contra III side-stages. How I think they pull it off is by rotating the pivot points of the tilemap, and then choosing a pre-rotated tile that matches the POV's angle. Very novel stuff, and it moves super smoothly in-game.
- FULLY VOICE-ACTED DIALOGUE - ~ There's fun workshopped-at-home voices for all 5 characters, and yes, literally everything is voiced (except the tutorial text). Crazy to fit that on 4 MB.
- FULL USE OF 6-BUTTON CONTROLLER - ~ The default controls let you toggle all 3 weapons with XYZ and access the map with Mode. Very nifty. There's even implementation for keyboard/mouse play if you do the work of soldering one together for genesis use. Ridiculous.
Besides that it's pretty by the numbers. I picked this up because it had Granada vibes and I thought it would fit into my shmup backlog, but it's a lot more like a Wolfenstein 3D played from a top-down view, navigating blocky mazes and shooting the few goons that get in your way. It's very easy and doesn't have nearly enough enemy types, it gets old pretty quick. It's fun and humble though, you can tell a lot of passion was put into what's here.
Give the developer your support on their Itch page: https://arkagis.itch.io/
- FAUX-MODE 7 ON GENESIS - ~ It's top-down 360-rotating action just like the Contra III side-stages. How I think they pull it off is by rotating the pivot points of the tilemap, and then choosing a pre-rotated tile that matches the POV's angle. Very novel stuff, and it moves super smoothly in-game.
- FULLY VOICE-ACTED DIALOGUE - ~ There's fun workshopped-at-home voices for all 5 characters, and yes, literally everything is voiced (except the tutorial text). Crazy to fit that on 4 MB.
- FULL USE OF 6-BUTTON CONTROLLER - ~ The default controls let you toggle all 3 weapons with XYZ and access the map with Mode. Very nifty. There's even implementation for keyboard/mouse play if you do the work of soldering one together for genesis use. Ridiculous.
Besides that it's pretty by the numbers. I picked this up because it had Granada vibes and I thought it would fit into my shmup backlog, but it's a lot more like a Wolfenstein 3D played from a top-down view, navigating blocky mazes and shooting the few goons that get in your way. It's very easy and doesn't have nearly enough enemy types, it gets old pretty quick. It's fun and humble though, you can tell a lot of passion was put into what's here.
Give the developer your support on their Itch page: https://arkagis.itch.io/