Strania-The Stella Machina announced for steam (Out Now)

[Observer]

How many stages does the game have? I assume Side Vower mirrors the amount of stages.

I've reached stage 4 so far and I'm getting my ass kicked all over. Getting used to the different weapons is not easy. Direction feels bloody useless or just hard to master overall, Reflection+Side look great for narrow spaces and Side in particular is your best friend at some scoring moments, Missiles+Rocket would've been more useful if the missiles were actually faster and locked on properly but, as they are, I would rather get up close and personal with the sword and lolSword everything. Double swords have a combo that makes you way too vulnerable to be useful so I usually just pick one sword. Normal+Vulcan provide a way to increase the overdrive meter faster but the spread of the Vulcan makes it quite weak. The less I talk about Bomb, the better.

So, yeah, guess it's about finding the right balance at the right times. I'm not sure I'll go for those 10-dan thing, screw that, dammit, I hate that type of grindy achievements.

P.S. The hitbox is the little point at the center, right? Your entire mech has collisions with everything (walls, enemies, etc.) but the damage hitbox for bullets is there?

[Chaos Phoenixma]

6 stages on Normal. Then a 7th TLB stage if you're playing Hard or Expert.

[Obscura]

Direction feels bloody useless or just hard to master overall

Direction is tricky to use well, but I find that it's nearly mandatory for stage 5. You need to be able to cover all kinds of "behind you" angles in that stage.

My "weapon plans" for each stage that I've seen right now are:

1: I switch around a lot here for the easy S-Rank points, but I ultimately end with Sword + Vulcan + Rocket
2: Right at the start, I swap Vulcan and Rocket for Missile and Side, and stick with that through the level.
3: Replace the Missile with a Vulcan early.
4: Replace the Vulcan with a Laser right before going into the cramped area with the mines (mainly because I want it for the boss, but also because I think it shoots through the green walls of light [need to watch that more carefully next time]).
5: Still experimenting with what to drop for Direction, but right now I'm leaning towards Side.

[Squire Grooktook]

Direction is pretty good yeah.

Also glad to be reminded how good this game is. Was slow to grow on me, but once it did, I really started to savor it. More shmups need smart weapon choices.

If I had a single nitpick, it'd be that the weapons are too visually similar (ie a lot of them are variations of blue/red bullets being shot in a certain direction, ie scatter, reflect, direction, side). But aesthetics aside, it's great.

[MathU]

So what's the verdict on this release? Is this yet another notch in a depressing year of shooters getting screwed by DRM?

[Necronom]

So what's the verdict on this release? Is this yet another notch in a depressing year of shooters getting screwed by DRM?

It's been a while I played the 360 version but the steam port runs buttery smooth on my i5 with a gf840m! Also, contrary to Musihimesama you can choose lots of resolutions inside the game (16:10 support!). Long story short: awesome port and at the current price a very generous package.
DRM? I don't care. I see it as a virtual arcade release. You don't own the game. You pay for a freeplay ticket.

[MathU]

DRM? I don't care. I see it as a virtual arcade release. You don't own the game. You pay for a freeplay ticket.

It is quite unfortunate that you don't value ownership. Would someone else be kind enough to answer my question?

Can this be run on its own or is it crippled with Steam garbage?

[Obscura]

Even if you can play it without Steam, you still wouldn't own it.

You buy a software license, not ownership of the software itself.

[The Coop]

DRM? I don't care. I see it as a virtual arcade release. You don't own the game. You pay for a freeplay ticket.

It is quite unfortunate that you don't value ownership. Would someone else be kind enough to answer my question?

Can this be run on its own or is it crippled with Steam garbage?

If you start the game's executable, it starts Steam before the game runs. However, you can play the game in the newest version of the Smart Steam emu, so that's not an issue if it really bugs you that much to play it through Steam.

[MathU]

Well thanks for the info. That's really sad to hear.

[Tregard]

How did I miss this news? In fact how did I miss this game? Never heard of it before and it looks just my cup of tea since I love environmental hazards. Hadn't planned to buy anything on Steam ever again due to an obscene backlog, but hell, I would actually play this one.

Steam's shmup library is becoming highly respectable. What a time to be alive.

[Domino]

At first I found the music to be bleh, but a second play thru today completely changed my mind. So far the game is too, but too many shmups too little time, ugh!

[Danny]

DRM? I don't care. I see it as a virtual arcade release. You don't own the game. You pay for a freeplay ticket.

It is quite unfortunate that you don't value ownership. Would someone else be kind enough to answer my question?

Can this be run on its own or is it crippled with Steam garbage?

I hate to be the guy that breaks this to you but even buying physical copies of modern video games you are just "licensing" the game as supposed to buying it, it's been like that for about 10 years now. And yes there is a difference and the reasoning is to take rights away from the consumer. For example here in the UK you are allowed to make one legal backup of any software you legally own but since game companies have changed the terms of sale for video games and are only "licensing" the game to you, you can't do that any more.

Licenses can be revoked and the content of the game changed for whatever arbitrary reason the publisher wants while if you actually own something they can not take it away from you or change anything without your permission. Of course no game developer/publisher would just go ahead and do it because of the bad press but if they want too, they can and because games have waved their rights to ownership there would be nothing we can really do to stop them.

[cfx]

.

[AntiFritz]

It is quite unfortunate that you don't value ownership. Would someone else be kind enough to answer my question?

Can this be run on its own or is it crippled with Steam garbage?

I hate to be the guy that breaks this to you but even buying physical copies of modern video games you are just "licensing" the game as supposed to buying it, it's been like that for about 10 years now. And yes there is a difference and the reasoning is to take rights away from the consumer. For example here in the UK you are allowed to make one legal backup of any software you legally own but since game companies have changed the terms of sale for video games and are only "licensing" the game to you, you can't do that any more.

Licenses can be revoked and the content of the game changed for whatever arbitrary reason the publisher wants while if you actually own something they can not take it away from you or change anything without your permission. Of course no game developer/publisher would just go ahead and do it because of the bad press but if they want too, they can and because games have waved their rights to ownership there would be nothing we can really do to stop them.

While probably all true, it still doesn't answer his question. There are games on Steam that you can run without the client. He asked for the answer to that question, which The Coop finally did answer. Everyone else just jumped on him for asking like they always do because apparently any criticism of Steam isn't allowed.

Or because he brings it up every chance he can.

[Obscura]

DRM? I don't care. I see it as a virtual arcade release. You don't own the game. You pay for a freeplay ticket.

It is quite unfortunate that you don't value ownership. Would someone else be kind enough to answer my question?

Can this be run on its own or is it crippled with Steam garbage?

I hate to be the guy that breaks this to you but even buying physical copies of modern video games you are just "licensing" the game as supposed to buying it, it's been like that for about 10 years now. And yes there is a difference and the reasoning is to take rights away from the consumer. For example here in the UK you are allowed to make one legal backup of any software you legally own but since game companies have changed the terms of sale for video games and are only "licensing" the game to you, you can't do that any more.

Licenses can be revoked and the content of the game changed for whatever arbitrary reason the publisher wants while if you actually own something they can not take it away from you or change anything without your permission. Of course no game developer/publisher would just go ahead and do it because of the bad press but if they want too, they can and because games have waved their rights to ownership there would be nothing we can really do to stop them.

Software (and pretty much all other media, BTW) has always been sold on a license basis. Seriously, if you have PC games from the 80s, go look closely over the packaging and materials -- you'll see it spelled out clearly in the EULA.

If it wasn't, it would be entirely legal for someone to buy it, make a bunch of copies of it, and then sell it. The person doing this would be able to undercut the price of the original software developer (since they're only having to pay for physical media, not development), and it would be impossible for a company to sell software and stay in business.

The entire "oh noez, you're only renting it!" nonsense is just that -- nonsense.

[NeoStrayCat]

Yeah, yeah, can we get back on topic for Strania, and not having to complain on "MathU" always complaining on Steam and its DRM, which is rather annoying every time he mentions it, enough. >_>

OTT - Still getting back to it, close calls, not even close enough. Decent runs on my part end up turning bad out of nowhere at some points, but oh well, still gotta keep going!

[Danny]

Software (and pretty much all other media, BTW) has always been sold on a license basis. Seriously, if you have PC games from the 80s, go look closely over the packaging and materials -- you'll see it spelled out clearly in the EULA.

If it wasn't, it would be entirely legal for someone to buy it, make a bunch of copies of it, and then sell it. The person doing this would be able to undercut the price of the original software developer (since they're only having to pay for physical media, not development), and it would be impossible for a company to sell software and stay in business.

The entire "oh noez, you're only renting it!" nonsense is just that -- nonsense.

First of all you would not be able to "make a bunch of copies and sell them" because that's covered in copyright law which is totally different from signing a EULA. My point is that the EULA's for both physical and digital games are kind of f'ed in 2015 and to describe it as "nonsense" is not doing a very serious topic about consumer rights in video games justice.

Say for example you wish to leave your collection of video games to your next of kin when you die. Because of the EULA's that most people sign without even knowing, you would have no legal right to do so since in the small print you are not allowed to transfer those licenses. There was a very famous case where Bruce Willis (yes the actor) got in to a legal tangle (note: he did not try to actually sue them) with Apple about this very subject. He wanted to know if he was legally allowed to pass on his iTunes digital music library to his family in the event of his death, well there are similar stipulations with pretty much everything you buy digitally.

Could this also extend to physical products as well? Yes but as of right now it's impossible to actually enforce. (unless upon death someone literally sends a person to your house to verify who own's what but I digress) I will say it again I doubt any gaming company would brazenly try to attempt this kind of maneuver publicly as it would most likely flush consumer trust in their products down the toilet. With that said the legal hashing out of "ownership" of video games is something that needs to actually happen (especially for digital purchases) because who knows whats going to happen a couple of decades down the line.

For the record though yes I am OK with buying video games, especially digitally as I have almost 1400 on Steam as of typing this message one of which being Strania which is a fantastic game I might add. I am comfortable in buying games and will continue to do so as all this legal stuff will get sorted eventually but people do need to talk about this (and not just in terms of Online DRM which is the point I was also originally trying to make since that's all people seem to actually focus on in this forum) so that it can be sorted and not just brush it off as "nonsense".

Sorry I will stop talking about this subject on this thread. If you guys wish to talk to me about it please feel free to PM me. Thanks!

p.s: Buy this game it's awesome!

p.s.s: I am not bashing MathU, just pointing that removing DRM does not automatically mean you actually own something since you know games are sold on a license basis

[Obscura]

Say for example you wish to leave your collection of video games to your next of kin when you die. Because of the EULA's that most people sign without even knowing, you would have no legal right to do so since in the small print you are not allowed to transfer those licenses.

Pretty sure Steam's EULA specifically allows families to share accounts. I know a couple years back they changed some bits of how their accounts work in order to facilitate this.

Could this also extend to physical products as well? Yes but as of right now it's impossible to actually enforce. (unless upon death someone literally sends a person to your house to verify who own's what but I digress) I will say it again I doubt any gaming company would brazenly try to attempt this kind of maneuver publicly as it would most likely flush consumer trust in their products down the toilet.

How technologically ignorant are you? Physical products that phone home as an anti-piracy measure are almost as old as the internet itself.

With that said the legal hashing out of "ownership" of video games is something that needs to actually happen (especially for digital purchases) because who knows whats going to happen a couple of decades down the line.

It's been hashed out for decades. You don't own the game. You can't "own a game", because "owning a game" would imply that you own the code, art assets, etc., which would obviously be very problematic for developers. You own a license to use it for an indefinite period of time.

[Danny]

Could this also extend to physical products as well? Yes but as of right now it's impossible to actually enforce. (unless upon death someone literally sends a person to your house to verify who own's what but I digress) I will say it again I doubt any gaming company would brazenly try to attempt this kind of maneuver publicly as it would most likely flush consumer trust in their products down the toilet.

How technologically ignorant are you? Physical products that phone home as an anti-piracy measure are almost as old as the internet itself.
[/quote]

Erm did I say that Physical product could not? Most console video games I know don't check for that. (Remember it was going to be introduced in the Xbox One but it was publicly rejected) PC ones do because serial key checks. Again I don't actually have a problem with DRM in fact I welcome it and I actually love steam and aware of the family share feature it has. (the ps4 also has it too if I recall)

And the whole thing of EULA's not being legally binding, That depends of the EULA, some have been upheld by law.

EDIT Polite reminder PM me if you wish to continue this convo. Sorry for Jacking thread mods!

[NeoStrayCat]

Alright, enough with the DRM bullshit, it isn't relevant to this topic. But what is though, Strania on Steam got a patch to 1.02, which installs an .ini file (look for the game in your "SteamApps" folder which has the words "strania" and edit the config file.) that adds in and possibly fixes some things within.

-V Sync Option (To help with the Screen Tearing)
-Rebindable Keyboard Controls
-Screen Mode Settings (Fullscreen is on by default)

More info here... http://on.fb.me/1IOIPWh

[Aquas]

The STG Weekly interview with Mr. Maruyama is now available for separate viewing from the episode. Some people requested this. Hope everyone is enjoying Strania!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXCwmKHc0dI

[NeoStrayCat]

Strania updated to Ver. 1.03 (http://bit.ly/1RyXGwO)

Fixes leaderboards (probably with fusing usernames or probably ones with special characters [JP text I assume]), and changes the font for usernames on scores.

Fixed bug that wouldn't work on some digital devices. (Whatever that means, lol.)