PS4- RYM 9000 available..

[tate]

A frenetic one-button low-res (150x200) vert by Sonoshee. Visuals are aggressively glitchy. Music by Roex fits perfectly. Scoring is time-based.



Here's the first YouTube trailer. A single-level beta demo (level 3 of 5) was uploaded to itch.io last September. The final product is due mid-year.

[Shepardus]

Just to clarify, it's arrow keys + one button; "one button" makes it sound like an endless runner sort of game.

It looks cool, though I'm not sure my eyes could handle five stages' worth of those flashing colors. Would be nice if there were some info lying around about how to play it. There's apparently some sort of overheat mechanic?

Edit: Played this a bit more. The colored circles I was confused about actually just represent the time bonus you'll get by killing the enemy. Kill enemies quickly to receive more points, pretty simple system. There's an overheat mechanic where if you hold down the fire button for too long it becomes ineffective for a few seconds. I personally don't like it - it successfully prevents players from shooting non-stop, as noted in the development log, but I don't feel like that makes the game more satisfying or fun. I also don't like the slow movement speed - I'd rather have more stuff to dodge but also more mobility to do so. There's also a lot of waiting if you kill stuff quickly - could be remedied with bonus waves or faster progression through the waves à la Dangun Feveron or Thunder Dragon 2.

The game could use a faster pace overall - it's not that it's easy, but the gameplay's tameness feels at odds with the wild visuals and sound effects, especially if this is supposed to be the third stage. If you ignore the graphical effects it's actually a very methodical game revolving around pre-positioning and careful shot usage for optimal play, which isn't a bad thing but not what I was expecting based on the trailer and all the GIFs. Some enemies even require you to stop moving so they can lock on to you and dash at you, at which point they become vulnerable to your fire. This combined with the enemies that harm you if you destroy them makes for some interesting positioning gameplay that you don't see in many shmups but its rhythm feels slower than the background suggests, especially with your own sluggish movement speed.

F1, F2, F3, etc. adjust resolution, though you have to restart the game for it to adjust properly. Alt+Enter fullscreens but the game gets cut off on my display.

[Xyga]

What he said.

Words on the visuals: I like the idea, the style (the music's fitting). More than the trippy graphics it's the 'hand-drawn' speed & power effects like in comics, simulating greater sensations of movement, often missing in shmups when we're supposed to pilot something flying fast like a jet fighter.

BUT there's that - heavy - screen shake and ripple effect abuse, like in 99% of western indie games, wherever there's something hitting, exploding, breaking, and I fucking loathe that.

It repeatedly, completely breaks my focus for a split moment and that's unacceptable in a shmup, okay during the death sequence of a large enemy or a boss maybe, but definitely not in the middle of my fucking game for every little thing I kill.

Actually I think I'm more likely to have a seizure from all the violent shaking and ripples/distortion rather than because of the flashing colors.

[Sonoshee]

Hello everyone. I'm the developer of this game, I apologize in advance for only creating this account to reply to this thread. I was notified from Google Alerts and I'd love to answer some points and hopefully get some more input.
@Shepardus maybe we can stay in touch as I need some constructive feedback like the one you provided above. Here's my email: sonoshee.contact@gmail.com

It looks cool, though I'm not sure my eyes could handle five stages' worth of those flashing colors.

Indeed it's really exhausting! Even for me testing it for a long time makes me want to back off and catch my breath a little. I'm planning to have an end-level screen where you'll have to press a button before moving on to the next level, that's where you'll be taking your 10 seconds breaks ( If you you needed to) before moving on.

The colored circles I was confused about actually just represent the time bonus you'll get by killing the enemy. Kill enemies quickly to receive more points, pretty simple system.

I admit the demo wasn't explaining anything at all. And I regret having made it available to the public like so. Thankfully the final version will have a short tutorial levels that almost plays itself, explaining the scoring system and the shooting mechanics.

There's an overheat mechanic where if you hold down the fire button for too long it becomes ineffective for a few seconds. I personally don't like it - it successfully prevents players from shooting non-stop, as noted in the development log, but I don't feel like that makes the game more satisfying or fun. I also don't like the slow movement speed - I'd rather have more stuff to dodge but also more mobility to do so.

I dislike it as well. I'm thinking of another way to prevent players from shooting non-stop without the overheating penalty; I'll probably remove the overheating mechanic altogether and have shooting reduce the movement speed by half, all while increasing the default movement speed because a lot of feedback pointed that it's super sluggish to control the aircraft ( despite personally not feeling like so)

There's also a lot of waiting if you kill stuff quickly - could be remedied with bonus waves or faster progression through the waves à la Dangun Feveron or Thunder Dragon 2.
The game could use a faster pace overall - it's not that it's easy, but the gameplay's tameness feels at odds with the wild visuals and sound effects, especially if this is supposed to be the third stage.
If you ignore the graphical effects it's actually a very methodical game revolving around pre-positioning and careful shot usage for optimal play, which isn't a bad thing but not what I was expecting based on the trailer and all the GIFs. Some enemies even require you to stop moving so they can lock on to you and dash at you, at which point they become vulnerable to your fire. This combined with the enemies that harm you if you destroy them makes for some interesting positioning gameplay that you don't see in many shmups but its rhythm feels slower than the background suggests, especially with your own sluggish movement speed.

This is something I'm working on in every polish iteration. It's quite hard to fix because adjusting how frequent enemies spawn means I'll need to rework some of the world's visuals and other aspects that depend on how long the level takes to finish. Thankfully I've managed to fix the pacing of the 1st level. The 2nd, 3rd, and 4th levels still have horrible pacing imo and they're waiting for a partial/complete rework of enemy-waves distribution ( that ultimately reflects on the overall pacing of the level)

F1, F2, F3, etc. adjust resolution, though you have to restart the game for it to adjust properly. Alt+Enter fullscreens but the game gets cut off on my display.

There will be an options menu to control all that stuff in the final version.

BUT there's that - heavy - screen shake and ripple effect abuse, like in 99% of western indie games, wherever there's something hitting, exploding, breaking, and I fucking loathe that.

It repeatedly, completely breaks my focus for a split moment and that's unacceptable in a shmup, okay during the death sequence of a large enemy or a boss maybe, but definitely not in the middle of my fucking game for every little thing I kill.

I understand where you're coming from. I personally find it very appealing that's why I'm going insane with all the game-juice.
I like to think, despite how stupid this might sound, that all the glitching/shaking is a gameplay strain that the player needs to overcome, and they will upon playing over and over, because that kind of intimidating game-juice only looks weird the first time you see it, afterwards you just get used to it.

[MommysBestGames]

I understand where you're coming from. I personally find it very appealing that's why I'm going insane with all the game-juice.
I like to think, despite how stupid this might sound, that all the glitching/shaking is a gameplay strain that the player needs to overcome, and they will upon playing over and over, because that kind of intimidating game-juice only looks weird the first time you see it, afterwards you just get used to it.

It doesn't sound dumb. Stick with that feeling. Your game is not like other shmups in which it only needs a few small tweaks to be like others. This is so clearly way, way out there that you just should stick to your design sense and push as far out there as possible (because nobody else is). Not every game is for every player. I could never make this game, but I think it looks and sounds amazing.

[Xyga]

I understand where you're coming from. I personally find it very appealing that's why I'm going insane with all the game-juice.
I like to think, despite how stupid this might sound, that all the glitching/shaking is a gameplay strain that the player needs to overcome, and they will upon playing over and over, because that kind of intimidating game-juice only looks weird the first time you see it, afterwards you just get used to it.

I really can't adapt to that, especially if it's this strong and frequent in a game.

Really I'm not at all against the concept of a visually over-the-top/trippy graphical experience to sustain the action, there are other quite successful shmups like that, take Hellsinker or several of the Touhou games for instance: throwing a lot of crazy visuals at your face, but never for a second the player is distacted from seeing exactly what happens so he doesn't lose his full control/grip of what he's doing inside the game area.
Cool visual effects are totally welcome, but if they get in the way of the gameplay flow they are just a flaw period. They can't be a part of the gameplay itself, that's a wrong idea, sorry.

EDIT: a simplistic illustration could be this:
.The average arcade or console shmup flow-focus graph: ______________ _________________ ________________
.Rym 9000's flow-focus: ------------- -------------- -------------

As we've often discussed in these very forums, what makes shmuppers favour the Japanese-style of controls and flow by a landslide (as opposed to the 'euroshmup' variant) is that there's basically nothing getting in the way of you and the machine-game at any time, no inertia, no health bar, no interruption, no or very few obstacles besides the enemy lasers and bullets, etc. The only moment the game 'releases' you is between the stages.
The feeling is like a neuronal connection or an extension of your limbs directly inside the game area to not exaggerate things too much, and what counts is your constant ability to react physically, instant-strategize and memorize on the longer term.
To me having that connection repeatedly cut off by a distraction (the heavy shaking and ripples here then) is like the game's rejecting me and I bloody hate that feeling.

As I think I've once recommended some other dev here: if possible add an on/off switch in the game settings for the potentially problematic and questionable features like that screen shake. Or whatever setting to at least tone-down a bit the most extreme visual features.
To begin there's already a flashing/seizure warning, meaning the game is already presenting itself as being self-aware of being a problem for a number of players, and while again I understand the graphical identity is fully part of its concept, I don't think it is a good thing to put a final 'exclusion notice' for those who won't be able to bear it.

Contrary to MommysBestGames I have a strong belief that with a genre like shmups there are some fundamental rules/laws that can't be broken otherwise the game could fall categorized outside of it, or even more dangerous seen as an 'oddball'.
Sorry to say it is a very conservative genre due to its roots, being one of the primordial, founding genres of the DNA of video games and all, but mind that its made its whole history while almost never seriously deviating from its basic principles, and the heavy screen shake+ripple raises a red flag imho.

Though the scenario where the shmup 'with a twist/quirk' ends up being loved more by a non-shmupper demographics, and ignored by the long-time primarily shmups-loving community (again definitely massively pro-JP style of controls and gameplay) is not rare.
So I am definitely not saying the game won't be a success, it's got a lot of good points after all. Good luck with it anyway!

[Special World]

I am heavily in favor of the extreme visual design--it is what makes your game unique, and it is how Rym will stand out. I don't need to have strict knowledge of everything onscreen, since (judging by this demo anyways) there's not a ton of intricate bullet patterns to weave through.

That being said, I do find the game to be a little simple. This could possibly work as an infinite shooter type game, with randomized enemy waves. But as a structured level-by-level affair, it's lacking a distinct sense of flow. The game just feels like enemy wave after enemy wave, and there's not a ton of variety or character between them. The enemies themselves seem very basic in structure as well. In my opinion this game very much feels like a modern de-design of Cho Ren Sha 68K, but it doesn't quite have the oomph of that game.

I would also say the scoring system needs some oomph. I'm totally fine with simple scoring systems, but I don't see anything here except "kill all the enemies." Which is fine, but that would really beg the question of why there's a player score in the first place. It's not going to keep players coming back to score-chase (unless I'm missing something completely). My initial thought is that, based on what you've said, maybe it would be better to nix the overheat mechanic and instead replace it with a charge-up mechanic. Between waves the ship will charge up a heavy shot, which can eliminate enemies for extra points. Therefore the player has an incentive and a reward for not shooting, and you get a little bit of high-scoring in there. Then again, this may still be too limited and prescribed, unless you get very clever with the enemy waves and force players into strict patterns for the charge shot. As in, maybe they'll charge shot the start of a wave, then need to do some fancy footwork while not firing to get a second charge shot off before the wave disperses.

But I'm basically navel-gazing at this point. I think the visual design of the game is very good. And the core feel of the game is very good. All it needs is that layer of something extra. You are on the right track, and you are very close to having something very strong.

ED: Ah. According to your post, the scoring is time-based. And I see now that this is communicated by the aura. My personal thought is that it's best to make early shots feel like a reward, rather than late shots feel like a penalty. As in, Raiden for example will give you a 5x or whatever for quick shots. But in this it feels like "damn, I missed the 20 points and got 10 points." But I'm nitpicking again. Kudos for giving players a clear, unobtrusive indicator of the scoring, even if I seem to have missed it.

[tate]

Hello everyone. I'm the developer of this game, I apologize in advance for only creating this account to reply to this thread. I was notified from Google Alerts and I'd love to answer some points and hopefully get some more input.

Glad you joined. I'd considered starting a discussion on the game's Steam Greenlight page, but I think this forum is much more effective. I have a few responses and suggestions for you to consider. I think everything is clear without quotes.

Windowed mode: The game's Steam Greenlight page screenshots imply that you’ve added backgrounds for landscape oriented (yoko) displays. Please, please keep windowed mode as an option so the game can be played on portrait oriented (tate) displays. I couldn’t get Alt-Enter to work properly, but Borderless Gaming 8.4 provides pixel-perfect fullscreen on a 3:4 1200x1600 display/resolution.

Powerups: It seems that there will be more optimal powerups for certain situations. Maybe you could allow two slots like Steredenn – but with selection between them via a double-tap rather than another button? You could then randomize at least one of the options, assuming they always come in pairs.

Difficulty levels: Do you plan on implementing difficulty levels? Once a player resolves the puzzle-like elements in the demo, it makes them feel like a bad ass. But as the implementation is straightforward (e.g., getting the Jumper timing down) – as opposed to, say Ikaruga's – things could get boring quickly.

Inter-level pause: Has the potential to destroy game flow, like a loading screen on an old-school PSX game. Make it an option?

Movement speed: Once I got used to it I thought the movement speed was just right. I kind of like the fact that the game doesn’t adhere to modern control expectations.

Overheat mechanic: This has the potential to impose player choices – kind of like a typical Eurogame (board) – on what to destroy for survivability and/or points. But there’s definitely the potential for annoyance, particularly during boss fights.

Game-juice: This is what makes the game, really. But it clearly has the potential to be your most divisive choice. You could implement switches to disable effects, with scores segregated or flagged by which are disabled. Maybe the leaderboards could be restricted to the full experience?

DRM: Please consider a DRM-free option.

[Sonoshee]

@MommysBestGames
Thank you for the kind words!


@Xyga
I admit at this point Rym 9000 is very much deviating from the classic Shmup genre. It was never meant to be a conservative shmup to begin with, and I wasn't planning to satisfy hardcore shmup fans with this game either. I was mainly influenced by Daisuke Amaya's Cave Story and Guxt, so I set out to make a shmup in that fashion with my own touch. And I haven't played many shmups in the past either, only a few that managed to strike an urge in me to make my own.

I'm very much aware of how tough it is to focus in this game. I could make a toggle in the options menu to disable those effects, but that would sacrifice some of the game's own identity. And I'm not ready to compromise style over pleasing the widest possible audience, sadly.
Thank you for all the heads-ups though!


@Special World
About scoring system. I'm hoping online leaderboards will be enough for players to play over and over again to beat their scores and others' to compete over ranks, the classical way ( assuming I can get leaderboards to work immune to hacking)

The charging bit you said is a good idea. I might as well have shooting similar to that of Cho Ren Sha 68K where pressing the fire-button releases only one wave of bullets.
That way I can have a charging mechanic when the player keeps the button pressed, and normal shooting when they keep pressing repeatedly, thus the player needing to give shooting a rest once in a while because it's tiring. This also won't have me introducing a second key for a charge-shot.


@tate
Thanks for creating this thread!
About Windowed mode: I added those landscape-sides only after I took the screenshots just for the sake of looking centered in the Greenlight page, because portrait images on Greenlight are panned to the left (as shown in the first 2 gifs)
I'll definitely keep the game windowed though. I wish I could make fullscreen an option but I can't. The game is rendered in a way it can only look right on distinct resolutions, i.e. 150x200 times 1, 2, 3, 4... and I still don't know of a way of displaying black bars to fake fullscreen. I'll look this up later on, for now the game is ( and will stay) windowed.

Difficulty Levels: I do have game modes planned that are meant to increase the difficulty of the game, and that can be toggled independently before launching the aircraft ( as long as the ones you chose don't contradict each others). So far I have these planned:
- lethal borders
- Inverted controls
- Movement is twice as slow
- No shileds; insta-death
- Leaving an enemy alive deals (somehow) damage to the player
[assuming the overheating mechanic persists:]
- Gunners consume twice as much heat
- Lethal overheat
What's cool I think (if I can get it to work) is that each game mode has its own class in the online leaderboards. So the one ranked 1st in Normal mode might have 50,000 in score while the 1st in Inverted Controls might only have 5,000. I think it adds a new dimension to the competition.

Inner-level pause: I always try to reduce the duration of those bare-bone "cutscenes" to the minimum. They're still important for the player to rest their hands and have a look at the geography around them, so I have to keep them.

Movement speed: Indeed it's all about getting used to it, really. I'm currently in the middle of whether I should increase the speed or keep it, as that will introduce some re-tweaking enemy-behaviors since the player's speed has now changed.

Overheat mechanic: I thought it was original at first but, as stated before, it makes the game less satisfying, so I might ditch it after all.

Game-juice: I'm not sure I want the game to be played in a less-stylized way, even if it means a significant portion of players will miss out on the game. But I'm always considering the option of disabling/reducing those effects.

DRM: The game will be primarily available on Steam, as well as itch.io and probably GOG. Leaderboards are planned to be independent of Steam, but I can't promise the same for achievements. Rest assured though, it's a priority for me to make the game almost fully functional while being DRM-free.



Thanks guys for all the input! This was a real goldmine of feedback that I needed so badly.

[Xyga]

I admit at this point Rym 9000 is very much deviating from the classic Shmup genre. It was never meant to be a conservative shmup to begin with, and I wasn't planning to satisfy hardcore shmup fans with this game either. I was mainly influenced by Daisuke Amaya's Cave Story and Guxt, so I set out to make a shmup in that fashion with my own touch. And I haven't played many shmups in the past either, only a few that managed to strike an urge in me to make my own.

I'm very much aware of how tough it is to focus in this game. I could make a toggle in the options menu to disable those effects, but that would sacrifice some of the game's own identity. And I'm not ready to compromise style over pleasing the widest possible audience, sadly.
Thank you for all the heads-ups though!

By all means please don't see my comments as coming from whatever hardcore shmups culture or anything like that (I've been playing shmups regularly for over three decades but never fell into the 'hardcore pit', not interested)
, rather I like to think what I said is valid for all shmups and other genres of shooting games as a general rule; basically anything, any event that significantly alters the readability of the action also automatically disrupts the concentration/focus of the player (think of any shooting situation even in real life, any significant shaking or whatever 'blinding' movement the human brain cannot follow or more or less compensate by averaging, is to be avoided or used in very limited quantity in the design.
So it's not just for a specific audience or specific category of shmups, it's something that is always true.

EDIT: think of a thread running in circle between the display>eyes/brain>hands>back-to-display, if you snap that thread with scissors remember the player will either have to fix it with a knot as quickly as he can...or lose. Though I can understand the idea that it could be seen as a new type of challenge, I sincerely doubt it will ever come to be appreciated because of the obnoxious, frustrating and naturally 'non-welcome' nature of it.

In the case of Rym 9000 I understand disabling some effects would be too much and betraying the game's essence, but if for instance in a future revision you could introduce different levels of shaking/distortion strenghts (full / medium / weak) that would probably make the people like me who can't take such heavy disturbances in the course of game play change their opinion.

NOTE: by weaker shake strenght I mean: narrower amplitude and shorter duration -> easier for the brain to average and not lose focus.

In any case I'll definitely pay attention to your work from now, because putting aside what I said, there's defnitely quite a bit of talent and ideas here, congratulations.

[Pixel_Outlaw]

I can appreciate your time making this but it was uncomfortable for me to play.
I appreciate flair but this was like somebody shining a light into my eyes on a dark night.
When you take a genre that needs a lot of focus and start blasting the players with flashing and shaking it becomes frustrating on some level.

That said, your program seems to run fine in Wine for we shit tier gamers using Loonix.
I would encourage you to keep working and not let opinions discourage you. But they should hold some weight when a lot of people say the same thing.

[d0s]

My honest opinion is that I find nearly everything about it incredibly unappealing. I'm sorry and you should not let that discourage you as I'm sure there are people out there who go for this sort of thing but for me it just comes across like the entire game is visually telling me to go fuck myself, so I do not want to play it.

[kid aphex]

In any genre there's room for outliers.
...and I'm definitely not one for democratic game design.

This is an amazingly well-made thing, at last from a visuals perspective.
Keep following your vision.

[BIL]

In any genre there's room for outliers.
...and I'm definitely not one for democratic game design.

This is an amazingly well-made thing, at last from a visuals perspective.
Keep following your vision.

Agreed. This looks cool, interested to see where it ends up.

That said, I don't think this style would be appropriate for something demanding absolute precision, say Raiden DX. Looks like it'd be a blast in a more forgiving but still substantially dangerous model ala Soldier Blade's Hard mode.

I really like the audio cues as enemies spawn. Seems like a smart compromise with the loud visuals, speaking as a fan of seizuretastic STG aesthetics ala Robotron and Defender.

[Vludi]

You could use Metal Black, Darius Gaiden, Xexex as reference, they have crazy visuals but never interfering in the way of gameplay.

[d0s]

...and I'm definitely not one for democratic game design.
Keep following your vision.

I 100% agree with this as much as I personally don't care for it, it would be worse to focus group it and make something that isn't your own. Though you said you didn't play a lot of shooting games, I think you should go back and really become familiar with the genre and what makes a game work before making your own.

[kid aphex]

You could use Metal Black, Xexex as reference, they have crazy visuals but never interfering in the way of gameplay.

Unless you count being so ugly that I refuse to play them.

[Squire Grooktook]

You're definitely in the minority there. Metal Black's gameplay might be an acquired taste, but its surreal aesthetics are peerless.

I am interested in this. Screenshake and stuff like that is nice for adding a sense of viscerality and hype to blows, but it's something that needs to be finely balanced. The trailer definitely made it look exciting. I'll have to try the demo later when I have time.

[kid aphex]

but its surreal aesthetics are peerless.

Thank God for that.

[Stevens]

Watched the demo. The sense of speed you evoke is unlike anything I have ever seen.

Please include an option to adjust/turn off the screen shake though. As is the game would be unplayable for me. Maybe similar to Beat Hazard Ultra where you can turn it down from 100% to off in increments of 25%?

Best of luck!

[Magicalbottle]

This is something else, looks very nice aesthetically.

[tate]

Steam page is up, with a release date of January 15th. Also coming to itch.io.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

Bought the Rym 9000 demo through the itch.io site (even comes with a Steam key also) and have to say that the low-res visuals and rocking soundtrack to match the trippy visuals is ace in my book. I think it'd be cool to try out Rym 9000 on a Japanese candy cab setup with an Ultracade uVC and see how it plays/fares on a true low-res 15.7kHz arcade monitor -- definitely a slick and cool indie STG game. If it takes someone to do an all-out visual and trippy indie STG game these days, I'm all for it as Rym 9000 has it in spades. Something different for a change of pace indeed.

Is it possible to include a 640 x 480 & 320 x 240 resolution mode as well?

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[Sonoshee]

Bought the Rym 9000 demo through the itch.io site (even comes with a Steam key also) and have to say that the low-res visuals and rocking soundtrack to match the trippy visuals is ace in my book. I think it'd be cool to try out Rym 9000 on a Japanese candy cab setup and see how it plays/fares -- definitely a slick and cool indie STG game.

I think it would be cool to have the game on arcade cabinets too. Definitely something I'll be looking into in the future (an "arcade cabinet" mode, that is)

Is it possible to have a 640 x 480 or even a 320 x 240 resolution mode as well?

I'm afraid that won't be possible as the levels (mostly the backgrounds) are made with a 150x200 resolution in mind. I could add some HUD to the extra sides though if I were to go with 320x240.

[MommysBestGames]

Looks like it's out on Steam.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/774561/Rym_9000/
Hope there's a good attract mode to just let it run in the background at clubs.

[Shepardus]

Hope there's a good attract mode to just let it run in the background at clubs.

And give passersby seizures?

Anyone here given this a try? I'm wondering how my impressions of the demo a year ago hold up with the full version.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

I am interested in this. Screenshake and stuff like that is nice for adding a sense of viscerality and hype to blows, but it's something that needs to be finely balanced.

I'm always impressed by the brilliance of Score Rush which made screen shaking a gameplay mechanic (anytime you trigger one via enemy kills you are invulnerable during the shaking, shake time depends on enemy type/size).

I like the trippy art style, but more from a "this is a neat and interesting aesthetic that makes me think of what schizophrenia must feel like" and does not at all look enjoyable from a gameplay standpoint.

[CBM]

Looks like it's out on Steam.

The itch.io-edition is out, too, even made the front page.

[Zaarock]

I played through the itch.io version a few days ago. It's an interesting ride in terms of presentation, reminds me of Rez / Child of Eden in that. Similarly to those games it's a chill game in terms of surviving to the end, just some basic memorization. If the music isn't to your taste this game is probably not enjoyable. If the music and visuals are enough to keep you interested in seeing what happens in the next stage then it can get you hooked.

I feel like the shake from player pushing the shot button could be toned down a little. You do it all the time so it loses its impact compared to most shmups where it's just when you blow up enemies. Stage 1 already takes it to its extreme. It doesnt really get worse after that. Stage 1 boss is basically fighting the screen shake which is a strange concept. Somehow the strange gameplay decisions and memo have its own appeal though. Reminds me of old school irem/taito shmups when shmups weren't so standardized.

If the game had some major point where it suddenly tones down the shaking and effects for a moment it could be a neat change of pace and you could do some harder patterns. The presentation of the game is really cool at parts. If it were combined with engaging gameplay you could make a really stand-out indie shmup.

This trailer is sort of amazing. Someone linked it and it sold the game for me. Delivered about what I expected.


Imalice is another game that took heavy inspiration from Guxt. I thought it has really appealing scoring system and gameplay for just a stage 1 demo. Looks like it's indefinitely on hold sadly.

[microfolk]

I have to agree with Zaarock's opinion. Like Rez and Child of Eden, if the general aesthetic of Rym 9000 appeals to your tastes you will probably enjoy the game a lot. If it doesn't, the gameplay is not engaging enough to hold the game on its own.

Luckily for me I fucking love the audiovisuals of this game so I'm really liking it. The beginning of the 4th stage is one of the most memorable moments I ever saw in an STG, it's really cool.

A thing I think wasn't in the demo is how when you get hit you enter a state where the screen gets even shakier and glitchier than usual (it's almost impossible to understand what's happening in the second phase of both stage 1 and 3 boss in this state), but you get an incredibly powerful shot that allows you to get a lot more 3x multiplier compared to the regular power ups. You need to be in this state to get the most out of the scoring system, I'm having fun with it.