Illvelo Swamp: Happy Together

[m.sniffles.esq]

Since this is technically a different game, I'm going to be bold and give it it's own thread (if the mods disagree, they can zap it. That said, if the leaderboards are any indication, not a whole lot of people are playing it anyway. So it may just sink like a stone)

For those who don't know, it's a sorta/kinda sequel to Ilvelo Swamp released three years ago (the game itself calls it an "AI update" which made me laugh), with two major differences from the original. First, it's a single stick affair, whereas the original was twin (so the sorta sequel can be played with an arcade stick). And second, there's a whole new mode called DEV mode, which is more of a traditional, linear, score and survive deal. While the original was more focused on doing various specific tasks to unlock different branching routes

Anyway, the original campaign is still there. Albeit, with the new ship, and with the routes all unlocked from the beginning (you just select which one you want to follow before you start) so it plays more traditionally than in the original.

DEV mode, on the other hand, while the gameplay itself it pretty straightforward, it's intricacies are very... vague. To go into these at all would require me to preface pretty much everything with "I think" or "it seems", as I'm not 100% certain about anything. The one thing I am certain about is that it gets very hard.

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Now that the preamble is out of the way, I'll get to the point of me making this:

If anyone is playing, and has figured out what the indecision/decision sliders in the map under DEV actually do (or even what you think they may do) I'd love to hear it. I've tried every available combination and haven't noticed any discernible differences in the gameplay itself.

Also, does the "conversations with the developers" have any purpose other that spitting out cryptic nonsense? I know the actual developers love their cryptic nonsense, but it still strikes me as a bit strange to have an entire menu item devoted to it.

tia!

[mojilove]

i do intend to do a video some time soon, but for now, the "decision" setting is actually a setting for drugging up the brains in jars (see meaning 9 here). the higher the number, the more relaxed the brains will be, and the easier the stages associated with that brain will be. i made a table listing the brains, their associated route in the regular mode, the stages in dev mode associated with them, and the stage gimmicks thereof, but i seem to have misplaced it. i'll make a table here later
you can set the number up to a max of 3 for each brain, but you can only set each brain to 3 after making progress in each route in the original mode and/or making progress with the "debug report" things in dev mode.

the conversations with the devs are for getting to know the world better - i haven't read it all but i don't think those messages have any gameplay hints

gl!

[m.sniffles.esq]

i do intend to do a video some time soon, but for now, the "decision" setting is actually a setting for drugging up the brains in jars (see meaning 9 here).

Ha! I have never heard 'decision' in that manner before (or even knew that it could be used in that manner).

you can only set each brain to 3 after making progress in each route in the original mode and/or making progress with the "debug report" things in dev mode.

Okay, that actually answers another question I had (I have a lot). As to what were the keys are even for anymore, now that all the routes are unlocked from the get-go. It's all (kinda) coming together.

One thing that's been bugging me, is that it seems that the scoring is kind of... messed up in DEV mode (at least thus far). In that, my top score is from the second or third time I played, and didn't really know what I was doing. Since the mode seems to have ranked up (I'm guessing because of progress), it's much more difficult that the first few times I played. So it seems that the more progress I make, the worse my score is becoming. Which just feels kind of backwards of how it's supposed to work.

Anyway, it's good to know I can just crank those switches up as they become available. I wasn't sure if the spike in difficultly was due to me playing with those (although they didn't seem to be, I wasn't entirely sure)

[mojilove]

Okay, here's the table based on info from in-game messages.
Each stage has a brain associated with it and has different gimmicks. increasing the value in the dev tab on the map screen reduces the effects of the gimmicks. when the setting is at 3, the gimmick for that brain is gone (but you also cannot do any debug reports).
Making progress in orders (both key orders and sub-orders) in any of the routes in the main mode will help you unlock higher values for the setting in the dev tab for the corresponding brain. completing debug reports will also help you unlock higher values. your progress is displayed in the dev tab as well.

Happy Together Dev Mode
Dev mode stage	Brain	Gimmick	Main mode route
1, 2, 3	?	?	N/A?
4, 5, 6	1	Fast bullets	Pink
7, 8	2	Black hole	Green
9, 10	3	Strong enemies	Orange
11	7	Strong boss	Boss
12, 13	?	?	N/A?
14, 15	4	Dark screen	Blue
16, 17	5	Revenge bullets	Yellow
18, 19	6	Multiple gimmicks	Red
20	7	Strong boss	Boss

re keys in the normal mode, you still need them if you want to unlock routes in the "none" preset (next to the boss preset)
I think you score higher with more keys in a single run as well, and there are key leaderboards for each route too.

the dev mode should be getting easier the more you play it, especially if you increase the values in the dev tab. (it doesn't seem to get any easier if you have all the values set to 0 in the dev tab, even with a lot of progress in the main mode and the dev mode debug reports)
it is hard though, especially with the enemies that shoot fast bullets. try to speedkill the larger enemies before they shoot, or failing that, use a bomb. if you have no bombs, try to move constantly as a lot of the very fast bullets are aimed and will not hit you if you keep moving. the shield (yellow weapon) megalodoll attack and the regular spread attack (purple weapon) can also help you in a pinch.