Sora
Intorduction
I have never been a fan of bullet hell games reason being is that I always can’t keep up with the action that is going on the screen and I usually give up if it is too hard but as for Sora I liked it in fact I loved it and it is quite addictive, because it is manageable for me and I could say I did have a great time playing Sora. Sora tells the story of its namesake: the lone enhanced human, Sora, and her struggle to protect a fading world. Enjoy breathtakingly fast-paced combat in the Suguri universe, with improved game system and graphics along with original trance music by DEKU.
– Real player with 63.4 hrs in game
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Let’s be honest.
If you’re buying this game, you’re buying it for Sora (Military) and that’s the only reason.
Same with the other games.
But that doesn’t mean it isn’t good in it’s own right.
Out of the games that give you bonus characters i’ve played (AoS 2 hasn’t been released yet, and i don’t care enough about Aru (Scramble) to get her game) this is most certainly the best. The gameplay is more refined and detailed, the story is much more deep than “QP wants pudding back” and it actually makes you feel bad for the characters, even some of the bosses.
– Real player with 41.5 hrs in game
Dimension Drive
For about 20 years I’ve been waiting for that one game that could satisfy my latent Axelay needs. Konami promised us a 2nd part but we were left wanting. Many shoot em ups passed revue these latest year and they were delicious iterations on the R type or ikaruga games. The unique gameplay of axelay remained unique, there wasn’t a single shoot em up game that bought an extra dimension or dynamic or gameplay element to the game like there was in Axelay, and so it remained ….. until Dimension Drive.
– Real player with 63.3 hrs in game
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Dimension Drive is definitely a unique shmup, even in it’s early Access stage, coming across as a mix between your classic shmups and puzzle games like Portal. The dual-screen mechanic it uses a very simple in concept that, given proper exploration, has a ton of depth, something that the devs are clearly capitalizing on. It shows even in their current levels, gradually adding to each, either through obstacles, enemies, or even an additional mechanic. In fact, much of world 1 feels otherwise fairly polished, with some work still needing to be added to world 2.
– Real player with 60.2 hrs in game
ETHER VAPOR Remaster
I think ETHER VAPOR Remaster is an excellent title overall. Not perfect by anymeans, it takes a good bit of time getting used to the feel of the game. On paper, even with all the dynamic shifts in the action. It still plays like a vertical or horizontal STG at its core, but the movement and dodging seems to require a different type of finesse even if i can’t really quantify that.
It is eyecatching, challenging, and enjoyable in the end. It would of been nice to explain the extends better. As I suspected they are rewarded as shield points meaning the game still has the classic one touch death mechanic of traditional STGs. The continues are what will mix you up in that they are call “credits”. My final critique would be just that the game forces additonal continues and shield points on you. Thankfully you don’t have to change your shield/extend count so that doesn’t impact going for a one credit clear.
– Real player with 69.4 hrs in game
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A remaster of a classic doujin SHMUP. I’ve never played the original but their official site makes a comparison between this and the original in terms of graphics. http://edelweiss.skr.jp/works/ethervapor/re/index.html
Keyboard support is near non-existent as changing the controller settings also change the keyboard controls. Playing with either is left up to preference and it’s just a bit faster to learn how to play with a controller.
There’s no tutorial or instructions of any kind in-game so you’ll have to figure out on your own how to make use of your 3 weapons on your own. The game’s simplistic enough to be figured out in a short time, or at least have you know enough to play it.
– Real player with 19.1 hrs in game
Acceleration of SUGURI 2
I made the first review when I had about 20 hours of playtime in total. Now it’s… a little bit more, but still not 7k. Anyway, I now have rights to say everything I think about the game.
First, I want to start with singleplayer, which is not where you are supposed to spend a lot time. When you are a new player, it will be a perfect place to start learning. As for me, I think it offers pretty challenging battles with CPU, and also CPU can teach you some basic stuff like simple combos and movement. Do NOT ignore singleplayer if you have just started, be it story, arcade or match mode.
– Real player with 1485.8 hrs in game
Right out of the gate:
As a casual game, I would highly recommend AoS2. It’s an extremely fun 1-versus-1 game that combines the best of the shoot em' up genre and the fighting game genre for an explosive experience that no other game has replicated. But as a competitive game, I would not recommend AoS2. The metagame at a higher level is extremely unbalanced, both in character balance and in matchup dynamics, and gravitates towards defense and timeout to the point where not interacting with your opponent is the ideal.
– Real player with 1273.0 hrs in game
eXceed 2nd - Vampire REX
Exceed 2nd is a bullet hell shooter that lifts its main gameplay mechanic from Ikaruga. All bullets/enemies come in two colors, and you can switch your own color to absorb same colored bullets (which recharges your invulnerable laser) while being vulnerable to opposite colored bullets. You also do more damage to opposite colored enemies, though it’s often riskier to do so.
Exceed 2nd is more of a traditional twitch/reflex game than the puzzle shooter Ikaruga though. You can still apply strategy to the stages and bullet patterns to get better at them, but it has a lot more flexibility and room for improvisation.
– Real player with 81.7 hrs in game
eXceed 2nd - Vampire REX, the sequel to Gun Bullet Children, has everything that the 1st one lacked: Astonishing graphics, a soundtrack you’ll want to own, and tight gameplay.
The game is story-wise a sequel to Gun Bullet Children, but this time you’ll side with the vampires against the Church and their Gun Bullet Children. You play as Ria File, a half-human, half-vampire (aka a deviant bloodline). She has the ability to shift polarity: switch elements to absorb bullets of the same element while the other type becomes fatal. This is a mechanic that shouldn’t be unknown to Ikaruga players. The game also has a dynamic difficulty implemented, whereas long survival and scoring gets you in a higher difficulty while playing, and dying reduces the difficulty. The overal difficulty of the game is okay. It might be tricky at first for newer people, but you’ll get the hang of it quickly.
– Real player with 12.1 hrs in game
eXceed 3rd - Jade Penetrate Black Package
The third in the eXceed series - Jade Penetrate (Black Package) - is a worthwhile and fun bullet-hell shmup. That said, it’s pretty easy on the lower difficulties. I comfortably cleared it on easy on my first playthrough, so I would recommend ramping ‘er up to at least normal on your first run unless you’re completely new to the genre. Unlike the previous game, Vampire, Jade Penetrate uses a more traditional mechanic of either spread fire (with fast movement) or focused fire (with slow movement to avoid projectiles and a homing weapon). You have bombs to avoid dying and you also power up your special weapon by “grazing” enemy bullets. While usually a more advanced technique, in Jade Penetrate this mechanic is used in quite possibly the best way I’ve ever seen it done - many of the shot patterns include very cool circular walls of bullets that you graze as they spin, quickly powering up your special attack to decimate the opponents you face. The visuals are also outstanding, colorful explosions and huge walls of enemy fire - it’s just what you’d want from a game like this. Different colored (yet easily distinguishable) shots, score tokens that are collected automatically, and bullets that you absorb upon an enemy’s death to rack up that high score. That said, the frame rate can suffer a little bit with so many sprites on the screen; however, in games like this the lagging frames may turn out to be an answered prayer, as dodging enemy fire is much easier.
– Real player with 73.0 hrs in game
I played this game after watching clips of the 5th boss. Literally only played it due to the hype music. Having good gameplay in addition to that was just a bonus for me.
A lot of the boss attacks have variance due to variance in boss movements. There’s a lot of reaction dodging due to this. At first glance the game appears to be more about skill & reflex than memorization & strategy.
There is still a good amount of strategy and routing available though. Even patterns that seem like pure reflex can be simplified by knowing which bullets to read & keep track of. Dodging 100% of the bullets is harder than completely avoiding the trajectory of 50% of them and dodging the other 50%, after all. Proper planning can make even the most skill intensive patterns more approachable for lower skill players.
– Real player with 57.3 hrs in game
Game Tengoku CruisinMix Special
Game Tengoku CruisinMix is fast-paced, cute, funny, colorful, and nostalgic. The glimpses of Streetfighter playing in the background and the Tetris-ish blocks are nice retro touches. Rainbow colors fill in the details in the background. Adorable characters and bosses are plentiful. Bubblegum pop sets the tone but it is not distracting.
There is an arsenal of six unique anime characters that move at the same speed but each character has different fire power capabilities. During gameplay, the characters can catch bombs and powerups which adds options of mini characters to increase your fire power and spread. There are many opportunities to increase your bomb arsenal so there really is not a need to use the bombs sparingly, which is helpful. The characters are vocal in cutesy Japanese when good things happen.
– Real player with 32.5 hrs in game
Game Tengoku is a wonderful cute em up port of the game released for Saturn in 1997. Controls are manual shot (with a charge shot if held down), autofire, bomb, and display or hide score (Saturn only). Ships all move at the same speed but have different shots, and the game has no slowdown button.
Positives:
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Solid 60 fps
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Arcade Mode has 6 levels with a 2nd loop; 2nd loop adds suicide bullets
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Saturn Mode has 8 levels: adds Karaoke and Console level
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Leaderboards for each character
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Time attack
– Real player with 24.1 hrs in game
QP Shooting - Dangerous!!
In most of the Shoot’Em Up & Bullet Hell games, they are fun to play, delivers good intense bosses moments and frustrations that sometimes enrages you like never before (that depends though). Such elements are well expected in this genre and that’s what make the games nice, if it is. And for that, QP Shooting - Dangerous!! is one of those games in that genre that delivered quite nicely, in a way. Let’s check it out.
The Gameplay
In this kind of game, there’s nothing much to expect, except shooting enemies at sight. It is very straightforward and pretty simple to play. You shoot, evade the incoming bullets and defeat all the bosses until to the end. Of course, the simplicity depends on how hard the game is, in which in this case, is the opposite. One might think playing the Easy difficulty would be fine, but it’s just as unexpectedly hard. And don’t think about the Super Difficulty (the Ultra Hard mode) as it’s insane. Then again, since this is a Bullet Hell game too, so it’s understandable. Moving on, the interesting features in this game are there are the different formations and modes. This is nice because it has so formations and modes to choose from, thus, making you wonder which is the one that fits you best. So, even for just a stage, you can replay it with many different formations and modes. However, unlike most generic games, it has no continue and once all the lives are depleted, that’s it, game over. You can’t continue and that makes it very super frustrating, especially if you’re going for certain achievements and ended up dead in final boss stage. Bummer! Speaking of achievements, there are a few easy to get while some are insanely hard to achieve. It kind of makes you wonder, what were the developer thinking to make such an achievements that could enrages you to the level you’ve never imagine could. Hard game. Plus, it only has 5 stages so it’s kind of short for a shoot’em up game. In fact, it’s kind of rare too.
– Real player with 28.8 hrs in game
Despite how simple this game looks, it’s a shockingly deep and polished bullet hell smup. While, if your a fan of the genre, you’re probably not going to encounter many completely original mechanics, what you will find is a large range of ways to approach a familiar formula. Unlike many bullet hell games, where defensive play is essential, in this the majority of bullets are produced by low health minions, and since bullets are transformed into points on death, aggressive strategies are shockingly valid. The game also allows you to customize your bullet patterns (although most need to be unlocked) and switch between three of them on the fly (either with a direct bind and/or with cycling if your prefer). While most are fairly simple, some are complex and can be affected by the direction of your movement, your location when you switched to them or the use of slow move (the essential bullet hell feature reduces your speed and displays your hit dot for precise dodging).
– Real player with 19.6 hrs in game
Xmas Shooting - Scramble!!
This basically is QP Shooting Dangerous with New Year theme and Aru the rabbit as a main character.
This game is danmaku, e.g, bullet hell: there will be a lot of enemies flying toward you and shooting cover fire. You need to avoid incoming bullets and shoot down enemies. There will be some bosses, who usually have much bigger HP pool and shoot tougher patterns.
Gameplay-wise, Orange Juice’s danmakus are much simplier than regular danmaku. Bullets are somewhat bigger and usually easier to avoid. The distintictive feauture of Xmas Shooting (and QP shooting) are formations, which determine direction of your fire. You can choose 3 out of 27 formations and switch between them during the game.
– Real player with 6.5 hrs in game
Full review at: https://thegamehoard.com/2020/01/05/12-games-of-christmas-xmas-shooting-scramble-pc/
By having multiple difficulty settings, a mode with saving between levels, and destructible shots that clear away other bullets to help prevent the screen from getting too cluttered, Xmas Shooting – Scramble!! is able to make a more accessible bullet hell game without sacrificing the important elements of the genre. Success still requires precise dodging and the enemies have plenty of shot types that make them diverse and consistently challenging, but there’s definitely a content problem in this small spinoff title. Few stages and most of your shot types requiring repeated plays to buy mean you’ll likely have you fill of Xmas Shooting – Scramble!! before you can purchase most of them, but it’s a fun and cute shoot ’em up for the short time it lasts. While definitely a stranger pick for a game to play on Christmas day, it’s still a lighthearted and colorful way to enjoy the holiday even though it requires weaving through a screen full of deadly lasers.
– Real player with 5.8 hrs in game
BULLET SOUL / バレットソウル - 弾魂 -
BULLET SOUL / バレットソウル -弾魂- is probably my favorite shmup ever, so let’s get that out of the way. I want you to know that because this review is not going to sing it’s praises. It’s biggest problem is that it’s a pretty straight port from the console version (released in Japan, not the U.S.). This means the rotation options aren’t great, for those of you using vertical monitors for your shooters. The options are there, they just involve a lot of tweaking and ugly stretching. That also means you get no resolution options. So all the fancy gamers who need high resolutions and instant refresh rates aren’t going to find them in this game. Even the banner art and cinematics are low-res. Also, being that it was never released in the United States, the voices are all in Japanese. Not a big deal, given that the text is all in English but it would be nice to know what the characters are saying in the ending cenematics. However, I don’t care much about any of that. I care about how the game plays… And it’s amazing. This game uses bullet-canceling on a level that other shmup games don’t. Any bullets fired by an enemy vanish when that enemy is destroyed. Additionally, you are rewarded by being very close to the enemies as you defeat them. This encourages you to get right up in the face of the enemies on screen while maintaining just enough distance that the bullets will cancel out before they hit you. It makes for a very fun little dance as you learn the levels and enemy patterns. The game is also pretty forgiving for people who are inexperienced, providing an auto-bomb option and unlimited continues. Although it’s great for those who want to be serious about it too; Offering the chance for really high scores and different modes that offer different challenges. I really enjoyed the “Caravan” mode and played the heck out of that mode in particular, since it offers a sort of “bite-sized” amount of game play with it’s 2 minute timer and unique level. I would definitely recommend this game to fans of the genre, as well as those who are new to shoot-em-up types of games. I am so glad to see this on Steam and I am looking forward to more!
– Real player with 41.1 hrs in game
Everything about the game just screams FUN! The graphics are bright and gorgeous, the music is really joyous and the game rewards you a lot for playing aggressively with proximity scoring and the enemies taking more damage the closer you are to them.
Some see the excessive bullet cancelling as a negative but I don’t, it encourages you to get up close and personal and play for score rather than survival and lets you keep one eye on the secret bonuses which this game has in abundance.
Definitely worth a tenner, it cost me something silly for the 360 version at launch and this version has all the dlc.
– Real player with 28.6 hrs in game