Cosmo Machia acquires Triggerheart Exelica

[Jonpachi]

This port is solid on Switch, but the lack of any Practice/Save States is quite a shame, and really unforgivable at this point. I have always liked this game, but it's a taxing experience to constantly grapple/toss enemies, and the slog through the slow early training stages makes it tough to practice. I dread replaying some of the more puzzley set-ups where it suddenly wants to be Ikaruga.

[To Far Away Times]

$30 for this game now is rich considering it was $10 on release date for Xbox 360 back in 2008. And excluding a very niche 2007 Dreamcast release, the Xbox 360 version was most people's first exposure to the game as well.

Conveniently, the backwards compatible Xbox 360 version was delisted last year to make way for the price tripling.

Tis a shame, since Triggerheart is a solid shmup, but I hate to see business practices like this.

[Sima Tuna]

No practice modes, no buy. I expect autofire and practice modes as the bare minimum for any modern shmup release. $30 is on the higher end for digital shmup releases too.

[cfx]

While I understand the point, I will never use a pracitce mode, because for me there's no quicker way to ruin a game where I will never ever want to touch it again. Playing the same part of a game over and over and over is work, not fun.

The arcades didn't have practice modes and I prefer to play the same way. But I know I'm not a hardcore player and will likely never master a single game.

I'd buy Triggerheart except aside from the Dreamcast original which I missed, it's never on hardware I own.

[NeoStrayCat]

Yeah, Steven, seems the Steam Deck and Linux Proton from what I've read/heard here and in the steam forum for this game has problems getting it to run proper on 60FPS. Its getting up to 45 FPS. Also, Cosmo Machia did get back to one user about the issue...

Regarding the issue you pointed out, we at SteamDeck also requested technical support from Valve due to similar issues such as frame rate drops on SteamOS during development, but there was no response before the release.
There is no verification approval from Valve for the compatibility program, and the store display only supports operation on Windows OS.

This software uses VulkanAPI for 3D drawing, and DirectX is only used around the controller. There is no technical support from Khronos Group, and there is no driver support from AMD, so developers are having trouble finding a solution.

We will continue to investigate, but currently we have not found a solution, so if you would like a refund, please apply to Valve on the website.

Hopefully they fix that eventually for Linux Proton and Steam Deck users. (There is also color issues people are seeing on the PC/Steam version and its affecting users with AMD graphic cards. That should also get looked into by Cosmo Machia.)

And while I get that $30 is a bit steep, considering the X360/XBLA (BC) version, back then when it was still available before delisting, was $10, Cosmo Machia is in the market to make a profit, I get that, but it'll tick some people off, even those that got the X360 version in the past too. And IMO, the X360 version (with the PS2 version a close second) is better for me, cause I can score higher for some reason than the other ports. The current gen version has the scoring based on the Naomi Arcade and Sega Dreamcast version.

Also, the game does have Training/Practice mode options, but you would have to press a couple of buttons to get there. Its not immediately there on the main menu in the current gen port when the previous versions has them straight from their main menu themselves. You'd have to go to "Mode Select" then go to "Training Mode", then choose your options (fairly limited ones at that, just the basic ones and no options to start at specific points of the stage or even at the boss.)

Either way, just got both the PC/Steam and Switch versions now. PC/Steam version works just fine on my laptop, while the Switch version, a decent port (the Switch Lite is not a good control method under default controls, I can tell you that.), it has some slowdowns at certain points in stages 4 and 5, though it could either be a blessing, or a curse, depending on how you look at it. But otherwise, fairly identical to the PC/Steam version and works just fine.

[Jonpachi]

I will never use a pracitce mode, because for me there's no quicker way to ruin a game where I will never ever want to touch it again. Playing the same part of a game over and over and over is work, not fun.

I fully agree that playing the same part over and over isn't fun, which is why Practice Modes are such a blessing. I personally tend to pop between full runs and practice, where I'll play a credit through and then jump into Practice to have another shot at the levels I was just having problems with. This way, to your point, I don't have to play the same part over and over by slogging back through levels 1, 2, 3, etc to get the point I want to try again. I can just hop in there, and have the content at my fingertips.

I guarantee you the old arcade masters of yore would have played with save states and practice modes if they could. It's just a helpful tool.

[To Far Away Times]

I have to have practice modes unless the game is fairly easy.

Honestly, Practice and Replays should really be the standard now.