Saviors released

[DrInfy]

After lurking around for some time, I joined this forum to create a poll about highscore tables one and a half years ago. I did that to better understand the mindset of players who actively play shoot 'em ups. I needed to understand shmup players, because I had a single goal in my mind: to create the best shoot 'em up game ever created.

Since we started project Saviors, I've played dozens of shmups, took part in STGT and tried playing DeathSmiles competetively with a somewhat decent score. I've also read Prometheus' guide to playing shmups and hundreds or thousands of your posts. New developer information, complaints about games, what makes game X good, speculation about decline of shmups, what to do to bring casual gamers back, how to improve your skills and how people like to play these games - all of this is information that I have found on these forums. I have watched all episodes of STG Weekly and even gotten a little direct feedback from some players on this forum (thank you Erppo and Cagar). I have compiled all that information and added it on top of my own vision to create Saviors. An attempt of making the best shmup ever.

I'll be the first to admit that our end result is not the perfect gem I wanted to create. We quickly noticed that graphics are expensive as hell to create and we didn't have enough resources to create a proper online leaderboard. I still think we did a pretty damn good job with the game, making story mode very easily accessible to new players and arcade mode should challenge any hardcore veteran for months or years to come. The game also has its own unique style and gameplay without being your typical Touhou or Dodonpachi clone.

The game is available for Windows on our website or from Desura for 6.99$ USD. The price is probably way too cheap, but we really wanted to make our game as easily accessible as possible.

While the game might be good, we really suck at marketing and it's a real struggle to find any time to generate buzz about our games when creating a good game takes such ridiculous amounts of effort. If you want to support the genre, give us a hand and buy the game. You can also tell your friends, visit our Indiedb page, give favorable review in Desura and throw a vote in Greenlight.

The game requires Windows XP or newer and a graphics card with at least shader model 3.0 support (most cards created after 2006 should be fine and integrated graphics starting from Intel i3/i5). Any XInput controller works straight out, but DirectInput controllers need something like x360ce.

Also there is no DRM, because I hate everyone and everything that has anything to do with DRM.

EDIT:
There was a nasty bug mixed in the demo build, that causes the demo crash after 3 stages on story mode. If you have downloaded the bugged version (1.0.4872), you can download this demo fix and replace the old exe with it. Even though the demo only has 3 stages, it can leave a rather bad taste if it ends in a crash.

[system11]

Needs more contrast between explosions and bullets - the explosions are too big and bright - bullets should never blend into them. Sometimes sparkles surround the ship - is this linked to your bonus? Makes it a bit distracting near your hitbox. Some enemies are too dark - the planes that fly in on their side in the second half of level one for example, I didn't even see them initially.

Aside from that it seems to play pretty well so far!

More comments:
Didn't seem to be a level indicator.
Difficulty spike 2 levels after the demo ends - some criss-crossing fire with enemies moving up and down the screen, I gave up here.

[pestro87]

I bought this as soon as I had seen the trailer. There seems to be plenty of content in the game as well! 9 different ships to choose from, Arcade Mode, Story Mode, Survival, Practice and so on. I've only played it for ~15 min so far but I'm liking it! I really like the secondary weapon that shoots sideways as well as a weaker frontal shot. It's what I've always wanted in a verizontal, haha. I'm also really liking the energy ship, it reminds me of the red and blue laser in the R-Type games for some reason (that weapon has always been my favorite in the series).

The gameplay is a lot of fun too. Lots of awesome explosions and the controls are fluid. This gets two thumbs up from me!

[DrInfy]

Needs more contrast between explosions and bullets

We spent a lot of time making sure the bullets are visible on top of the ridiculous explosions. They should be rather easy to see with the purple glow, but it might take some time to get used to. If you are still having troubles, you can try turning bloom off. That should help the brightness issue a bit.

Difficulty spike 2 levels after the demo ends - some criss-crossing fire with enemies moving up and down the screen, I gave up here.

The difficulty shouldn't really spike, but rather raises steadily through the stages and by the time you can clear the game, you should be ready to start the game on a higher difficulty. That's a rather important design aspect in the game, making it easy to do constant progress. That said, I really recommend players to start with the story mode, even if you are a hardcore master. It gives full health at the start of each stage, making it easier to do progress.

I'm glad you like the game pestro87 and specially the trailer, I was a bit afraid that it'll scare everyone away.

[the2bears]

Needs more contrast between explosions and bullets

We spent a lot of time making sure the bullets are visible on top of the ridiculous explosions. They should be rather easy to see with the purple glow, but it might take some time to get used to. If you are still having troubles, you can try turning bloom off. That should help the brightness issue a bit.

I agree with System11, there needs to be more contrast. You're right, they *should* be rather easy to see. Where you should re-think things is asking the player to "get used to" it. Depends on your target market I suppose. If you want those passionate about shmups to like the game, valuable advice is available here, at the forum. I've just seen too many developers listen to their inner developer voice and discount too easily the opinions of people who play these games almost full-time

Bill

[pestro87]

I haven't had any problems whatsoever with not being able to see the bullets. They're perfectly fine as they are right now imo. And I also think that the difficulty is well-balanced so far (I've managed to get to Level 6 in arcade mode (normal difficulty) so far).

I'm really liking some of these stage designs and bullet patterns! And the OST is kick ass!

EDIT: I just got to the Forest level and damn... this stage is beautiful!

[brentsg]

It looks interesting but I don't use Windows. Do you have any plans to release it for other platforms?

[DrInfy]

I agree with System11, there needs to be more contrast. You're right, they *should* be rather easy to see. Where you should re-think things is asking the player to "get used to" it. Depends on your target market I suppose. If you want those passionate about shmups to like the game, valuable advice is available here, at the forum. I've just seen too many developers listen to their inner developer voice and discount too easily the opinions of people who play these games almost full-time

I don't want to start a fight arguing about the bullets and the contrast, but I'll try to explain my thoughts a little bit. First of all the bullets have different hue from the explosions: bullet are blue to pink while explosion are yellow to orange. Bullets also pulse, have dark border around them and a purple glow that is on top of explosions. This is rather similar to what SDOJ has for example, yet I see no one complaining that the bullets are hard to see even when there are shitload of distracting stars in the background. I believe this is because players are so used to playing Cave games that they are instinctively ignoring every distraction and just focusing on the bullets. You can see this effect even better in games like Battle Garegga, where the contrast between bullets and background is ridiculously small and no mortal man can clearly distinguish some bullets as bullets. Yet the people who have played the game a ton, easily dodge the projectiles that other players view as nearly invisible.

My comment of "get used to" here was because I think it's quite possible that System11 was focusing on the wrong things and distracted from the actual projectiles (I've done that myself multiple times in DeathSmiles). I also gave him the advice of turning the bloom off, because that can screw up the dark borders on the projectiles and make it harder to distinguish the projectiles on top of the explosions. The bloom effect is on by default because it makes the game somewhat prettier and casual players generally like pretty graphics. I also don't just blindly follow the advice anyone gives me, no matter who that person might be. I'm willing to admit though, whenever I'm proven wrong or just realize that myself when someone points it out. That is exactly why we worked a ton on making those bullets more easily visible.

It looks interesting but I don't use Windows. Do you have any plans to release it for other platforms?

I think I'll do at least the Linux build some day if and when MonoGame gets its own content pipeline ready. It would be way too much work otherwise I think, but unfortunately I have no idea how long it will take for them to get there.

[system11]

I agree with System11, there needs to be more contrast. You're right, they *should* be rather easy to see. Where you should re-think things is asking the player to "get used to" it. Depends on your target market I suppose. If you want those passionate about shmups to like the game, valuable advice is available here, at the forum. I've just seen too many developers listen to their inner developer voice and discount too easily the opinions of people who play these games almost full-time

I don't want to start a fight arguing about the bullets and the contrast, but I'll try to explain my thoughts a little bit. First of all the bullets have different hue from the explosions: bullet are blue to pink while explosion are yellow to orange. Bullets also pulse, have dark border around them and a purple glow that is on top of explosions. This is rather similar to what SDOJ has for example, yet I see no one complaining that the bullets are hard to see even when there are shitload of distracting stars in the background. I believe this is because players are so used to playing Cave games that they are instinctively ignoring every distraction and just focusing on the bullets. You can see this effect even better in games like Battle Garegga, where the contrast between bullets and background is ridiculously small and no mortal man can clearly distinguish some bullets as bullets. Yet the people who have played the game a ton, easily dodge the projectiles that other players view as nearly invisible.

If players have to get used to the way bullets are presented rather than just being able to see them immediately, there is already a design problem. It's worth noting the revised Garegga ROM revisions fix the problem. My post was just an observation/criticism from a customer - the bullets and enemies in several places need to be lighter.

I did turn bloom off before even playing my first game, knowing that it would just make things harder to see.

This topic is reminding me of when the initial version of Last Hope came out - it had visibility issues and the developer got very defensive instead of just listening to the opinions. Ultimately they released Last Hope: Pink Bullets with many improvements which they'd argued against in the beginning - and it was a much better game.

[Obiwanshinobi]

I needed to understand shmup players, because I had a single goal in my mind: to create the best shoot 'em up game ever created.

As a shmup player, I like to feel devs tried to please me rather than compete with each other. Playing games under my roof is very unlike cheering on football teams.

[DrInfy]

If players have to get used to the way bullets are presented rather than just being able to see them immediately, there is already a design problem. It's worth noting the revised Garegga ROM revisions fix the problem. My post was just an observation/criticism from a customer - the bullets and enemies in several places need to be lighter.

I did turn bloom off before even playing my first game, knowing that it would just make things harder to see.

I think you are still misunderstanding what I meant with getting used to the bullets, but I appreciate your feedback and now I also know that you know what you are talking about. Thank you.

[Obscura]

Played the demo a little.

How does the "more complex score system" in arcade mode work? I can't find it on the website, and the game didn't tell me anywhere, or if it did, I missed it.

EDIT: Also, the weapons are waaaaay too weak. Even "basic" enemies take a ton of fire before they die, and the side-gun position is completely worthless since you can't kill anything with it before it leaves the screen.

[DrInfy]

Played the demo a little.

How does the "more complex score system" in arcade mode work? I can't find it on the website, and the game didn't tell me anywhere, or if it did, I missed it.

EDIT: Also, the weapons are waaaaay too weak. Even "basic" enemies take a ton of fire before they die, and the side-gun position is completely worthless since you can't kill anything with it before it leaves the screen.

Right, I guess it really is never properly explained. I think I kinda wanted to give players the excitement of figuring some stuff by themselves.. But anyways in arcade mode, the multiplier rises and drops faster than in the other two. Killing enemies also spawn point items based on your multiplier which give score based on multiplier. Collecting point items also increases the break multiplier, which stays throughout the game and cannot be decreased. Point items are also worth more and increase the multiplier more if collected when they are glowing (glow something like 2 seconds after spawning). Bosses and minibosses also generally drop shield items, which converts into points if you are already full.

As for weapons being too weak, are you using the secondary fire? The weapons are intentionally a bit weaker than in other games, because you are supposed to use that secondary weapon from time to time and especially in the earlier stages you are given way more ammo than is required for blowing everything bigger than the smallest ships.

[Obscura]

As for weapons being too weak, are you using the secondary fire? The weapons are intentionally a bit weaker than in other games, because you are supposed to use that secondary weapon from time to time and especially in the earlier stages you are given way more ammo than is required for blowing everything bigger than the smallest ships.

Yeah, but the secondary fire doesn't really help enough. Using "aggressive" type, the raw power of those homing missiles is pretty low, and they don't give much coverage (despite the homing, they still always seem to aim within the cone of forward fire), so there's still always shit scrolling off the bottom unkilled. Furthermore, I always run out of ammo about 2/3rds of the way through stage 1 (which seems to be longer and harder than the other two stages in the demo, wtf).

18 stages?!?! Is that a typo?!?! That's like Gradius V long, at least.

[DrInfy]

Uhm, can you check your version number? Right bottom corner on main menu.

I think you are playing an older version, the current one is 1.0. We buffed the damage for the A-types by a shitload and reduced the first stage length, exactly because of the issues you mentioned.

[Obscura]

1.0.49

[DrInfy]

Alright, what you are experiencing is a bit weird to be honest. Just one homing missile is enough to kill any ship in stage 1 (just tested to be sure). Two of them blows a ship up instantly no matter what the multiplier is. I've played the aggressive type most myself and I've never had any problems blowing up stuff, even when it had reduced damage and the first stage was almost 30 seconds longer.

Also the 18 stages is not a typo as the game has exactly that. I have timed a full playthrough and it takes about 45 minutes for me (the stages are somewhat consistently 2-3 minutes in duration). I think that's a pretty decent length for a one loop game.

EDIT:
I think it kind of comes with the ship type. A-1 has a way smaller hitboxes in its bullets than some of the other ships and there are way fewer shots available for the homing missiles in comparison to some of the other secondary types (kind of required to keep it balanced). P-1 and P-3 for example have way easier time hitting enemies with the side shot, but they are nowhere near as precise as you can be with A-1 timing wise. I do believe the ships are quite well balanced, but the learning curve is rather different for each of them. A-1 is probably the hardest one to get started with (although I didn't think it was quite that bad).

[system11]

I think the Versatile type is my favourite ship, at the moment I've getting angry restarting level 1 over and over again. Reason - no hit bonus is high.

[DrInfy]

I think the Versatile type is my favourite ship, at the moment I've getting angry restarting level 1 over and over again. Reason - no hit bonus is high.

Woah, now that's a major design fail from my part. The multiplier is the only one indicating player performance. The rest of the stats only show the specifics... I can totally see why you misunderstood that though.

That is something I really need to fix, I think. Might as well fix some of the other text/font readability issues too. I'll see what I can do about the bullet visibility and reducing the "sparkles surrounding the ship" just a little bit.

[system11]

I think the Versatile type is my favourite ship, at the moment I've getting angry restarting level 1 over and over again. Reason - no hit bonus is high.

Woah, now that's a major design fail from my part. The multiplier is the only one indicating player performance. The rest of the stats only show the specifics... I can totally see why you misunderstood that though.

That is something I really need to fix, I think. Might as well fix some of the other text/font readability issues too. I'll see what I can do about the bullet visibility and reducing the "sparkles surrounding the ship" just a little bit.

I mean - at the end of the level you get a bonus if no shields are lost. The bonus is quite large, probably 80% of my total stage score, so if I lose a shield it is better to just abandon and start again.

[DrInfy]

Right, I totally misunderstood that one. The fonts really needed fixing though (no idea what I was thinking when I made them), so I removed pretty much all the shadows and gradients from every font and pretty much everything is SOOOOOOOOO much easier to read now.

I played stage 1 on insane (although you can get that ridiculous rocket cancel bonus only on insane) as a demonstration for getting started with scoring and also to showcase the new fonts and enemy bullet glow. I made the enemy bullet glow much darker, which should help with the bullets over explosions issue.

No damage bonus gets smaller in relation in later stages. 500k in normal is not that much really in the overall score, it's more important to increase.

patch v1.1 for the full version. Just unzip and overwrite the previous version.

[BulletMagnet]

Purchased the latest Bundle in a Box a few days back and finally got around to trying Saviors, which is included: still have to figure a handful of things out, but it's definitely one of the best Euro-developed shmups I've tried, some neat stuff happening (what better incentive to do well than to trigger even bigger enemy explosions?). Unfortunately there's only about 12 hours left for the bundle at the time of this posting, but in case anyone's interested I'd recommend tossing a few bucks their way, as this and One Finger Death Punch are likely worth the entry price on their own, IMO.

[Pteriforever]

Looks really nice! I love the music :3 The patterns seem really well designed, too.

I won't be playing it though; I usually don't pay for games.