Bitmaster (XBOX One / Series X|S)

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Sturmvogel Prime
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Bitmaster (XBOX One / Series X|S)

Post by Sturmvogel Prime »

Looks like Sometimes You is back, but unfortunately, is not with Satur Entertainment.
This time, it teams up with CoMiGo Games who've brought us Bitmaster.



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If you like Cannon Spike, you'll prefer to play that instead.

Bitmaster is an arena shooter that borrows elements of games such as Williams' classic Robotron and even Capcom/Psikyo Cannon Spike as we'll be facing large hordes of enemies and carry multiple weapons that we can switch on the go as we unlock them. The arena design is interesting enough as it utilizes labirynth elements to put you and your enemies on a dead end with both "Solid light" and physical walls. While both block your path, the enemies can pass through the solid light ones, making the strategy of "Locking them in a room" very uneffective, relying on constant movement and picking power ups as fast as possible.
You'll have a couple of problems that you're gonna get used to them: First one is the slow fire rate. For instance, the regular gun fires in a rate of "- - - -" like 1 bullet per second or so, while the explosive bullet fires 1 shot per 3 seconds, and since you're a humanoid on a Mattel Hoverboard of some sorts like in Back to the Future Part II, you'll be suffering of constant bouncing to the walls like if you're the ball from Pong, so it's hell on your controller because there's nothing more frustrating that dodging an enemy just to bounce back and crash with a larger crowd of enemies.



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It's not just 3D, It's Crap-O-Vision, the new way of playing games.

If bad controls and poor fire rate weren't bad enough, prepare for the incoming trainwreck. This game pulls random on-field effects called "Factors" which will affect your gameplay. While there's some positive ones like increasing your speed and fire rate for a while, most of the times these will ruin your game in multiple ways. From distorting the screen with weird colors like those 3D magazines of the 80-90's, slowing your movement speed or reducing your fire rate even more to deplete your shield and health bar and blocking the shield regeneration, and to make things much worse, it can apply the same effect twice, so if the game applies the shield-health depleting effect, say goodbye to your game.
Also, this is one of those games that suffers from the oh-so-common Turridamage flaw and it acts much worse like in Turrican. Remember the Genesis port where the life was depleted four times faster than the Amiga version? That's what happens here. If you're trapped by a flock of enemies, then say goodbye to your shield and maybe 3/5 of your health, rendering the game almost unplayable.

To add more crap to the crap factor, when there's multiple enemies on the arena, the game will suffer slowdowns.



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STAY COOL!
Someone wakes the noise up!


After 19 waves of enemies you have to fight the stage boss, which will be randomly selected by the game. From an UFO called Vortex Defender, a mobile turret called Stronghold, a clone of you called Twin and a worm called "Dragon". All of them have unique attack patterns like picking crystals to slow Dragon down and shoot to its head, most of them will throw pop-corn enemies that have to be destroyed before they overfill the battle zone. Also, some of them have shields and they can almost one-shot you dead due to their overpowered strength. In Stronghold's case, it has a short ranged lightning attack that hits you with god-like precision since it doesn't miss a single lightning bolt. Also, most of the bosses have shield bars that regenerate, making the game downright unfair.



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Congratulations! You've unlocked the only checkpoint this game gives you!

After eliminating the first boss, you'll be awarded with the Shortcut option, which allows you to skip the first 10 waves at expense of losing your score like a Continue. While this sounds good, there's one critical flaw: It only works as a "Start at Wave 10". If you thought you could improve the shortcut to Wave 20 after the second boss, forget it. If you die in Wave 90 it's start back at Wave 10 or reset to nothing, and keep in mind, each Level consist of 19 levels and a boss fight.



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What does each skill perk do?, God knows.

After completing the boss stage and before starting Wave 20, you can select one of four random preset skill perks. while the screen says "HOVER FOR INFO" implying to move the cursor to get a brief description, nothing appears. So you have to figure out what they do. That is some screwed up problems. ¿How am I suppose to know what item does by making a blind choice?
Anyway, the game "Saves" your progress after defeating the boss, but that only works when you select the "END GAME" option in the pause screen and resume the session later.



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Each Sold Separately. From Mattel.

Throughout the game, you'll get crystals which can be used to buy other characters which have unique status and abilities giving you unique advantages on your next battle. Keep in mind, the price to unlock them will increase after you buy one (15, 20, etc.). Also, the Shortcut is only available for the character you're currently using and you have to level them up from scratch, and when you're in Level 7/10, there's that feeling of you're not making progress to level up to 8 or further, adding more frustration. So you have more than double the job. Good luck on not throwing the XBOX controller out of the window or uninstalling the game.
Also, for some reason, when you select Shortcut, the cursor doesn't show the red corners indicating the option was selected. Another testimony of bad programming.



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*"Wrong Tone" from Ginga Force plays*

The rotten cherry on the top of this mess: Die once and you'll have to start all over again. As if the bad controls, the Turridamage, random punishments, bad fire rate, overpowered bosses that almost one-shots you down with god-like precision, the "Shortcut only applies for Wave 10" rule and the "Unlock each shortcut for each character" weren't already bad enough, the game pulls the no lives trickery. You thought Breakthrough Gaming was the "Worst Developer Ever"? But even in their atrociously bad games like Space 2 the game was at least playable while Bitmaster is all the examples of bad difficulty you can imagine crammed together.



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Now you see why I said this game is horrible?

Remember when you were a child and your parents said videogames were made to defeat you?
Well, this is that game made to make you lose, since it will feel if the god damned thing cheats in any aspect possible. It's like "You died not because of your stupidity, because the game trolled you".



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I've saw better art on CNN's courtroom sketches.

Graphically, it aims for the classical "Minimalistic" look of utilizing simple shapes and less details, like your face-less, very poligonal humanoid characters that kinda look like the prehistoric ancestors of Virtua Fighter's character models. The maze pattern never changes, so it's easy to memorize the potential dead ends, shortcuts and exits.
The game features cutscenes to add some story and plot to the game. However, the cutscene art is in between Stellatum and I, AI in quality since it is a rough sketch illustration like in Stellatum, but at least it has colors but without the amazing drawing style of I, AI.

The music is a bad, repetitive retro-electronic that tries to sound like the experimental era of Kraftwerk, and you'll be hearing that through all the game.


CURIOSITYMASTER

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Does Namco will be upset for this?

- Pac-Man makes a cameo in the opening cutscene as a citizen of Factor City.


Unfun, Unstable, Uncontrollable, UNPLAYABLE. That's what Bitmaster is. If you've picked this game for a quick "Achievement Hunt", then I feel sorry for you 'cos this game will make that impossible for you.
Playing this game is as fun as Nadia Vivie doing a Vivie-section on you, but conscious and without anesthesia. In other words, Bitmaster is DEFINITELY a "Must Avoid" unless you like your games to be downright unfair with you and enjoys one stupid move after another.


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Does someone need to say "Lea hates you"?
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