Illvelo Swamp

[m.sniffles.esq]

my name is actually printed in the LE booklet of Happy Together as a localiser

You've gone pro! Congrats!

(Will your tutorials will be behind a paywall from now on?)

Edit: So my SE came from play-asia (11 days, not too shabby), and... I'm glad I got it for free. The book is fine. The CD only really has two songs on it and the rest is just samples from the game (like the stuff that was on the Radirgy 2 button toy). You can check it out if so inclined. It's a little weird it was more expensive than Radirgy 2's, yet has less.

Double édition: I find it really funny that the concept of the game is that the original Illvelo Swamp has received an AI update. I also was a little shocked that it's single stick (besides using the second stick to switch weapons), as their last couple of games were twin-stick heavy

Triple édition: I guess the levels where it seems your stick just developed extreme drift are supposed to be a joke. Thinking that my stick had just developed extreme drift, I exclaimed "Oh my god! Are you fucking kidding me??" on the bus, which I don't think the person in the seat next to me found all that funny. (edit within edit: Man, this game gets really fucking hard after those levels)

I'm a little nervous to do Gotcha pulls as I've played too many MMOs that ran some kind of "exchange 1000 regular tickets for a once-in-a-lifetime super ticket" a day after I spent all my pulls on a bunch of crap to get rid of them.

[mojilove]

Steam page is up! June 19!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4539 ... elo_Swamp/

[m.sniffles.esq]

Ha! Great trailer

[KAI]

OMFG!!!! I've been obsessed about this game lately, I didnt expect the steam port this soon!

Since it came out 4 years ago i've been watching videos of people clearing it and I thought it was just too weird for me, and when i finally tried it felt even weirder. But after a couple of minutes reading the guide on the shmup wiki, the game clicked almost instantly.
Games on the Radirgy/Karous/Illvelo series keep evolving on top of previous game's ideas and mechanics, and this being a mix of the bonus stages of the original illvelo and the mission-based design of the 3ds "sequel", but in a continuous multilineal way, its pure genius.

Im not exaggerating when I say this is one of the most innovative things i've seen in the genre lately, and easily one of the best shmups i've played this decade alongside Radirgy 2 (steam port soon please!!!)

I can only dream about how Karous 2 is going to play like.

[1000Eyes]

Wishlisted

E: Mojilove's scoring run is nearly an hour long I also see a stage select and it has a hundred. Is there even a traditional 1cc mode in this game? Or is it an optimize single chapter / route style of modern games?

[Ms. Tea]

Swamp doesn't have a traditional shmup mode; it's focused on its unusual stage unlock/navigation/etc system and has an intentionally non-traditional game flow. Swamp Happy Together does add a traditional shmup mode that features a more standard set of stages alongside this mode. The two games are IMO complementary and don't replace each other, since Happy Together also redesigns how your core ship works is a single-stick game rather than a dual-stick game like this one. I'm guessing they plan to bring them both out here.

[m.sniffles.esq]

I'm guessing they plan to bring them both out here

Honestly, I wish they would have done what they initially planned, and release Swamp/Happy as a combo title. Since Happy is the same game just with the single-stick ship and dev mode stages (and gotcha)

(releasing Happy as DLC would be cool too. It's just that Mebius priced Happy as a new game, but it wasn't really that, and it felt a little disingenuous. Especially since RS34 previously stated they wanted to do the combo pack deal)

[1000Eyes]

it's focused on its unusual stage unlock/navigation/etc system and has an intentionally non-traditional game flow

Interesting, so like metaprogression? Is there any punishment for dying in this game?

[KAI]

You can play it as a regular shmup, starting always from stage 1 and leveling up your weapons on each run. It was designed that way i think, because scoring is tied to the routes you choose/reach, and the only way to get into long paths is by getting gud.
The rhythm of the game is similar to the special mode on illvelo wii, but with twice the mechanics.

Most of my runs so far lasted around 30 mins or less because i still suck at it, but the true ending is behind a 1 hour route from what i've seen.

[mojilove]

Interesting, so like metaprogression? Is there any punishment for dying in this game?

You unlock new branches in the game by fulfilling specific orders or a requisite number of orders in certain stages. Also, the rank of each stage goes up from 1 to 3 (or 1 to 5 in the case of boss stages) as you fulfil the orders in each stage. There is a degree of metaprogression in that sense. It feels like this metaprogression also helps to ease you into the game more slowly.

Dying in this game works like any other shmup - you lose a life when you get hit, and the game ends when you run out of lives. There are no direct score penalties for dying (no run-end bonus or anything), but the death animation is fairly long and so you can miss your chance to fulfil the orders in a stage if you end up dying in it, owing to the short timer in each stage (but you can always try again in a new run).

Your progress in unlocking stages/routes carries over between playthroughs. You can't continue in this game, but you can choose a stage you have already completed in the stage select. However, your weapon levels will be lower compared to what you would be at if you had started a run from stage 1. Weapon levels do not carry over between playthroughs, btw.


There are multiple paths in the game to explore, but once you get used to it, you basically have three main choices: The blue route where you aim for a high score (about 40 mins for a full run), the red route where you aim to complete the most orders in a single run (about 1 hour for a full run), and the yellow route where you aim to get the highest weapon levels possible (I can't remember exactly how long this one is but it should be about 50 minutes long for a full run)

[1000Eyes]

Thanks for the clarification everyone. I think I read somewhere that the OG Illvelo had all these emphasis on hidden bonus levels and have a great deal of memo to figure them out. I think it was the one Milestone game I couldnt get into.