What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Anything from run & guns to modern RPGs, what else do you play?
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lilmanjs
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by lilmanjs »

Been playing Grid Autosport a bit lately. This game looks really darn good, and I'm glad that they made a Switch port at all, let alone the second best version of the game behind the PC release. Looks stunning still and plays great. Gotta get me a gamecube controller and adapter to properly play it though, but still enjoying it all the same.
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To Far Away Times
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by To Far Away Times »

Just got a quick and dirty 1CC in Super Chase HQ. Been playing it on and off for a little while. Not very hard once you know what you're doing, but the end part of the stages where you ram the suspects can sometimes feel like a crap shoot. Sometimes I end a hard level with 15 seconds on the clock, other times I time out, and my runs don't even feel all that different. It seems like you have to use your turbos just right to maximize the numbers of hits you can get on the suspect. Its a pretty stark contrast to the very improv frendly first half of each level. I ended up doing the extra level that appears when you don't continue on a blind run.

Fun little game. Feels a lot like Outrun but the first person perspective with the inside the cockpit view makes it feel different enough.
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Stevens
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Stevens »

The aptly named Fights in Tight Spaces.

Still in early access this one is pretty fun and has massive potential. It's a deck builder in which you play a Bond like agent tasked with administering beat downs on a grid play field. Attacking, moving and defending/countering is done via playing cards. There is also a combo meter of sorts that you need to build to use certain cards.

There are multiple decks which change your fighting style. Only used two so far, but the counter deck is pretty good.

Stylistically it's plain looking backgrounds with two tone fighters. It works really well, is easy on the eyes, and has a night mode.

Each stage (haven't cleared the 1st) is a choose your own adventure style mash up of rooms in which you are allowed to pick your path. Rooms have varied layouts - some are open, some provide tables in the middle of the room that can be used strategically. Every few stages you can go to the gym (upgrade cards) or medical. HP is not restored in between fights and currently the only way to heal is to get to medical.

Lastly since it is in early access the deck building aspect is only realized per play though with no carry over. I hope this is something they change - although with deck building table top games you always start with a starter deck so I understand from a design standpoint.
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MintyTheCat
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by MintyTheCat »

We've been playing Gauntlet on the SMS and Gauntlet 4 on the MD - very decent ports indeed.
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To Far Away Times
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by To Far Away Times »

MintyTheCat wrote:We've been playing Gauntlet on the SMS and Gauntlet 4 on the MD - very decent ports indeed.
I've been eyeing getting into Gauntlet. I played it casually a while ago and thought it was pretty dang good, especially for its time. Is it the sort of game that's fair / 1CCable? I'm a little less trusting of western developed arcade games.
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Mischief Maker
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mischief Maker »

To Far Away Times wrote:
MintyTheCat wrote:We've been playing Gauntlet on the SMS and Gauntlet 4 on the MD - very decent ports indeed.
I've been eyeing getting into Gauntlet. I played it casually a while ago and thought it was pretty dang good, especially for its time. Is it the sort of game that's fair / 1CCable? I'm a little less trusting of western developed arcade games.
Funny you say that, because Gauntlet's shameless health-draining mechanic was replicated in Capcom's Magic Sword.
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Then he says to the white dude "Watch out for that black dude, he wants a piece of your cookie!"
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Mortificator
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mortificator »

Gauntlet and Gauntlet II are, as far as I know, endless, so they'd be impossible to 1CC. You could go for pure scoreplay, though.

The Gauntlet 1 port included in Gauntlet 4's probably endless too. The quest mode has an ending, but it also has some added RPG elements.
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BIL
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BIL »

I always hear about Gauntlet pros completely obliterating it for the counterstop/rollover on a single credit, so I imagine it's definitely masterable (though I couldn't say how reasonable the process is :wink:).

MD Gauntlet is an interesting case. M2's first published work. They basically bedroom-coded it on the X68k, being fans of the arcade game. Eventually sold it to Tengen, rest is history (it was given the Gauntlet 4 moniker outside of Japan, but domestically it's really meant to be a super-accurate console version of the original game). Not sure when Quest Mode or Sakimoto/Iwata's phenomenal OST came aboard, but both are huge draws. Quest has an almost action/puzzler aspect, takes some lateral thinking to reach the towers' boss floors. Amusingly, the Japanese cart has optional full English text, though I wish the manual's short commentary from Ed Logg was in English too. Can't recall it being translated anywhere.
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Marc
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Marc »

Got a grand total of four hours before deleting Sunset Overdrive. Fun while it lasted, but I had one of those moments last night where I thought '20 more hours of this.... No'.

Still enjoying Iconoclasts. Assault Suit Leynos is kicking my ass on the third level, I'm not too into the free-roaming bit of it, they were also the worst bits of Cybernator IMO. Might have to play that through again actually.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mischief Maker »

There's a new arcade Gauntlet-alike that came out today called Battle Axe with what looks like really good pixel art and chiptunes by some industry veterans.

Haven't played it myself yet, so I make no promises.
Two working class dudes, one black one white, just baked a tray of ten cookies together.

An oligarch walks in and grabs nine cookies for himself.

Then he says to the white dude "Watch out for that black dude, he wants a piece of your cookie!"
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vol.2
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by vol.2 »

Mischief Maker wrote:There's a new arcade Gauntlet-alike that came out today called Battle Axe with what looks like really good pixel art and chiptunes by some industry veterans.
I guess I'll hold off judgement till I see it IRL, but the photo renders on the GOG page are terrible. It looks all blotchy and blown-out.

Also, it's funny how much the druid looks like like Balin.

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Sumez
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

Battle Axe came out over a month ago with physical copies in wide distribution, and I'm a little suprised I haven't seen any more talk about it here, compared to the attention it's gotten most other places.
I'm curious about the game for sure, all the talk I've heard about the it so far has been really positive, and in terms of structure it sounds like it's surprisingly arcade-like, which is probably what's drawing me towards it the most.
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Mischief Maker
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mischief Maker »

I picked up Battle Axe... I dunno, it feels like I would love the game but for one fatal flaw: you can't remap keys or buttons. It defaults to MAME standard, but that's the complete opposite of my usual layout.

Beyond that it is indeed geared at Arcade difficulty. To the point that you don't even have the option to credit feed. There's arcade mode with hand-made levels, and infinite mode with randomly generated grid maze levels.

It feels almost more like an overhead run-n-gun than a brawler. Each character has a ranged attack, melee attack, and an invincibility dash with a brief cooldown that doubles as a crowd-clearing super attack. You can also pick up consumable items.

Enemies are mostly popcorny with spectacularly over-the-top death explosions. Animations are wonderful, and the music is quality.

I'm also not sure what to make of the scoring system. In some levels enemies are set, in others there seems to be unlimited spawns, and it's not clear if there's a penalty to milking them. There's also a strong RNG element with treasure chests where sometimes the same chest might drop a bunch of score pickups, or a 1 HP healing chicken, or a full HP healing potion (that you can save for later), or a bomb, or a bomb spell, or coins you can use to buy permanent upgrades in the between-level shop.

If I could move that dash button to a more comfortable key for me, I think it would transform the experience, but I'm putting it down until they add the option.
Two working class dudes, one black one white, just baked a tray of ten cookies together.

An oligarch walks in and grabs nine cookies for himself.

Then he says to the white dude "Watch out for that black dude, he wants a piece of your cookie!"
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BareKnuckleRoo
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BareKnuckleRoo »

Can you use JoyToKey (for controller) or AutoHotKey (for keyboard)? It's really stupid that games are still being released without control remapping, but don't let their design flaws stop you from enjoying them.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BrianC »

Mortificator wrote:Gauntlet and Gauntlet II are, as far as I know, endless, so they'd be impossible to 1CC. You could go for pure scoreplay, though.

The Gauntlet 1 port included in Gauntlet 4's probably endless too. The quest mode has an ending, but it also has some added RPG elements.
The NES Gauntlet has an ending.
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Mischief Maker
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mischief Maker »

BareKnuckleRoo wrote:Can you use JoyToKey (for controller) or AutoHotKey (for keyboard)? It's really stupid that games are still being released without control remapping, but don't let their design flaws stop you from enjoying them.
Shame on me, but I ended up requesting a refund.

It has the look and sound of a modern arcade classic, but the core gameplay feels like it doesn't know if it wants to be Ys or Mercs, so it excels at neither. The elf was the only one of the 3 characters I had any fun with (melee powerhouse) but the first boss can only be hit with projectile attacks so all the dash-brawling exploding-popcorn-enemies gameplay fun of her character was lost in favor of plinking the boss to death with the worst projectile attack in the game.

Also those randomized chests have such an outsized effect on your run, on top of the lack of penalty for milking (both for score and for coins to buy permanent stat boosts between levels) and I'm not seeing a long life as an arcade game in my collection for this.

All that PLUS no key-remapping and I'm done.

I already dropped a ton of cash on R-Type Final 2, only to find several stages with unfinished gfx, I gotta cut my losses somewhere.
Two working class dudes, one black one white, just baked a tray of ten cookies together.

An oligarch walks in and grabs nine cookies for himself.

Then he says to the white dude "Watch out for that black dude, he wants a piece of your cookie!"
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Stevens
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Stevens »

Stevens does not play FPS games, or at least he hasn't for a very long time. Yeah I played them when they were new, but when the genre was steered towards realistic military shooters that concentrated on multiplayer it lost me.

I will admit that seeing people here talk about Doom 2016 and Doom Eternal made me curious. I checked them out but ultimately didn't pull the trigger on either.

Over the last few weeks I started seeing more and more FPS how up on my Steam recommendations, and I noticed that even though they were new games there was something intriguing about them. They looked very retro. And then one really caught my eye.

FAST gameplay. Aliens, blood, big sprawling levels, and not a realistic gun in sight. And then I bought it:

Prodeus

I'm not sure if the love affair will last, but it is nice to see that (I'm a little late I'm sure) there are still people willing to make hyper kinetic, fun as fuck FPS's.

Still playing Fights in Tight Spaces too. Really dig the aggression deck. Was able to pummel my way to the 4th stage once. I've managed to build a few really good decks since then (there is a healing card), but have made fatal mistakes which ended my runs earlier than they should have.
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vol.2
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by vol.2 »

If you are into older FPS, Give Ion Fury a try. It's a newish Build Engine game (Duke Nukem 3D) updated just enough to make it run better and look a litter sharper.

There's going to be a DLC for Ion Storm over the summer that's supposed to be almost a whole new game's worth of content, and it's supposed to address the two main issues with the first game (lack of crazy weapons and too few enemy models). Still though, the game doesn't really need the crazy weapons, it's just something on people's wish list as being from Duke like the shrink gun and the freeze gun.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Stevens »

vol.2 wrote:If you are into older FPS, Give Ion Fury a try. It's a newish Build Engine game (Duke Nukem 3D) updated just enough to make it run better and look a litter sharper.

There's going to be a DLC for Ion Storm over the summer that's supposed to be almost a whole new game's worth of content, and it's supposed to address the two main issues with the first game (lack of crazy weapons and too few enemy models). Still though, the game doesn't really need the crazy weapons, it's just something on people's wish list as being from Duke like the shrink gun and the freeze gun.
Are you thinking of Ion Fury? If so that is definitely the other one that caught my eye. I appreciate the suggestion!

Also I just discovered there is a lot of user made content for Prodeus. It apparently has an insane map creator that people are taking advantage of already.
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vol.2
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by vol.2 »

Yes, I clearly got my edit in before your post. :p

I thought it was incredibly fun and really took me right back to the 90's in the best possible way. There are nods to tons of great FPS, including Shogo and the original Half-Life.

Only thing I would say is that the boss battles are absurdly difficult. The first time you encounter the walking Mech enemy, the curve spikes way up. It has missile-type weapons that insta-kill in a broad area. It took me several tries to figure out a strategy for many places in the game and checkpoints were crucial.

But that's part of what makes it so good. I wasn't ever confused about what to do or bored. Pretty much just fun maps both from level design and environments.

I'll check Prodeus out too. That looks like a good time.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BulletMagnet »

Just finished up Sakura Wars on the PS4, and thus my personal weeb-o-meter ticks up another notch from "smelly" to "pungent".
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Mischief Maker
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mischief Maker »

Stevens wrote:Still playing Fights in Tight Spaces too. Really dig the aggression deck. Was able to pummel my way to the 4th stage once. I've managed to build a few really good decks since then (there is a healing card), but have made fatal mistakes which ended my runs earlier than they should have.
Picked it up yesterday on your recommendation. Great game! I don't know if it's better than Slay the Spire, but I definitely like it better than Into the Breach.
Two working class dudes, one black one white, just baked a tray of ten cookies together.

An oligarch walks in and grabs nine cookies for himself.

Then he says to the white dude "Watch out for that black dude, he wants a piece of your cookie!"
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Steamflogger Boss »

BulletMagnet wrote:Just finished up Sakura Wars on the PS4, and thus my personal weeb-o-meter ticks up another notch from "smelly" to "pungent".
Now play through the old ones with a translation guide. Enter the final weeb form. :)
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Stevens »

Mischief Maker wrote:
Picked it up yesterday on your recommendation. Great game! I don't know if it's better than Slay the Spire, but I definitely like it better than Into the Breach.
Excellent! The aggressive deck is a lot of fun. Easy to build combo and lets you take the fight to them, haven't unlocked the trick deck yet. Counter deck seems solid, but feels a bit too passive and the starter deck seems kind of meh.

Aggression seems to be the name of the game. Sound effects are nice and meaty. Setting up the right play, getting a good hand, and unleashing devastation is very satisfying. RNG can fuck you, but that's any deck building game.
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Mischief Maker
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mischief Maker »

I wish the interface made it more explicit when it's showing the attack range an enemy could make verses an attack they WILL make next round.
Two working class dudes, one black one white, just baked a tray of ten cookies together.

An oligarch walks in and grabs nine cookies for himself.

Then he says to the white dude "Watch out for that black dude, he wants a piece of your cookie!"
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BulletMagnet »

Steamflogger Boss wrote:Now play through the old ones with a translation guide. Enter the final weeb form. :)
I'm pretty sure doing that would overload the meter and result in a devastating cherry blossom explosion, obliterating several surrounding blocks and leaving only desiccated corpses clad in sailor uniforms behind; even miles away from guroundo ziiro people would for years suffer cowlicks that could never be combed out and a near-pathological need to refer to oneself in the third person.

Back on topic, cleansing the proverbial palate with Mario Galaxy 2; biggest complaint so far is the "dash pepper", I certainly hope there aren't too many of those segments in here, the first one was pure distilled suck.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Blackfielding »

I finally tried Ghost of Tsushima (on PS5). It seems like it's going to be really damn good. I'm only like 2.5 hours in. It's weird how the game runs locked 60fps, but some of these early cutscenes are pretty choppy.

At the moment I am playing Shadowlands. Obviously, it isn't perfect. There are some balancing and tweaking which need to be done and will continue throughout the expansion. However, this is an expansion where I can honestly say the core systems feel solid. Blizzard has struck an outstanding balance between giving us plenty to do and respecting the fact not everyone can play 24/7. I'm currently at a point where when I have free time, I want to log in and do things instead of feeling like I have to for x, y, or z reason. It's a great feeling. When I am pressed for time I can get levelling option at despize.com. I like that they provide money protection and can boast to have a live support. That is awesome. Like the whole Shadowlands. Highly recommend both the game and the site.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by chempop »

Is anyone playing Returnal on PS5 yet. I don't own the console (yet), but I really want this game.
Reminds me of Gunvalkyrie, the enemies fire bullet hell inspired patterns :shock:
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Searchlike »

chempop wrote:Is anyone playing Returnal on PS5 yet. I don't own the console (yet), but I really want this game.
Reminds me of Gunvalkyrie, the enemies fire bullet hell inspired patterns :shock:
I don't own a PS5, but I'm also super curious about this one. Looks sick. Anyone?

---

Another Super Monkey Ball breakthrough...

Expert Mode + Expert Extra 1CC
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Yes, I reached Master Mode with 2 lives remaining. I had to quit at Master 3, not because it was too hard, it is, but because I couldn't keep playing as I had some IRL stuff to attend to. :evil: Thankfully, I can still play these 3 stages in practice mode. The biggest challenge will be finding enough time to once again 1CC all 60 stages plus an extra hour or so for the 8 Master levels I've yet to clear... an extra hour... yeah, sure... :lol:

I'll be here for a long time...
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Blinge »

chempop wrote:Is anyone playing Returnal on PS5 yet. I don't own the console (yet), but I really want this game.
Reminds me of Gunvalkyrie, the enemies fire bullet hell inspired patterns :shock:
I am suffering man. you know what i mean.

also I've been playing a bit of Valheim solo now and then. found a swamp with like 6 crypts and emptied 3 of them to totally max out my iron gear.
I just take the forge on my boat and build it again in new lands.

Utterly destroyed the bonemass, it wasn't even close.

now i live in a hole under a silver vein in the mountains :lol:
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