Details on scoring system so far.
The bulk of the scoring system is, just as with MoF, picking up point items at max value, and speedkilling bosses for spellcard bonuses. Nothing known about the endgame bonus yet. Point item value is determined by a double-variable system: a cumulative base value (1) is multiplied by a fluctuating tension factor (2), and the result at the moment of point item pickup determines the value you get.
Base value
It's the first counter (starts at 25,000 for Easy, 50,000 at Normal, 100,000 at Hard, and 200,000 at Lunatic). It is increased by picking up green items (looking similar to faith items in MoF). Every time you die, it's reset. Yes, just like that.
Large green items add 100 to the base value. Small items add 10, but not always. I haven't been able to figure out what condition must be fulfilled for them to add to the value.
Tension meter (What's the actual name for it, anyway?)
Acts as a multiplier to the base value. It starts as a 0.00—1.00 scale, with 0.00 being the default value. When you actively graze, the slider goes up to the maximum value; each grazed bullet instantly increments it by 0.05. Going above the point of autocollection boosts it to the max value instantly. When not grazing anything, it quickly decays (decrementing by 0.01 each 3 frames or so). If it reaches the maximum value once, the slider is freezed there for a short duration (about a second, though it probably depends on the multiplier value that you've built up — see below), and you only need to graze like 3-4 bullets per second to keep it at maximum value.
You can shift the scale forward by grazing: each 100 bullets grazed add 0.01 to both of its limits (i.e., at 100 graze points it becomes 0.01—1.01; at 2000, 0.20—1.20). These increments are permanent, like cherry max in PCB.
The character sucks all the freefalling items in automatically when the tension meter reaches maximum value (NOT just 1.00!), so there aren't any "free" effects upon grazing large amounts of bullets.
So far this sounds complex, but in practice it's much simplier: you just graze everything you can and/or destroy enemies in the process.
Enter the strategic part:
1) many enemies fly away before you can kill them if you don't do it quick enough (and you can't always do it quick when grazing, so you have to decide/calculate whether to increase the multiplier or to cash in);
2) you can inflate the tension scale
tremendously by abusing Reimu-A's (and only her!) bomb for powergrazing a-la EoSD, sacrificing any base value you've accumulated. See below for an example.
Further thoughts on the characters.
1. Reimu-A has the potential to be the new Sakuya-B for her bomb, which lets her graze freely at high movement speed for a couple seconds, and then do a global bullet-cancel. That and the firepower are her main advantages in terms of scoring, and it seems she has a tremendous edge over the others in that regard.
Reimu-A replay
here.
2. Reimu-C and especially Marisa-B still seem to me to be the most interesting and versatile characters otherwise, and they will likely come forth if Reimu-A gets nerfed in the full release. They can graze more than Reimu-A when not using bomb/suicide tactic, and kill more enemies at the same time. Also, their bombs are VERY powerful at point-blank.
Replays:
Reimu-C,
Marisa-B.
Additionally, since the initial base value for point items is much less at lower difficulties, green items offer a lot more sizeable increase in value than on Hard/Lunatic. This way, a correct equivalent for 1000 accumulated base value points is 400 graze points at Easy, 200 at Normal, 100 at Hard, and 50 at Lunatic. Considering that you can get around 20k worth of green items over the first three stages, you'd need to graze 8000 more bullets on Easy to offset the value, which isn't feasible at all. 4000 at Normal
might be feasible depending on the endgame bonus. In case its value is mostly dependent on the remaining lifestock and the
accumulated base value (i.e., on whatever you've gained via green items, disregarding the initial value), even Hard mode might have to be no-missed.
Overall, the scoring system still isn't the best, but I find it more strategically deep and engaging than both EoSD's and MoF's.
Also, GIL made a
no-horizontal run on Easy mode using Marisa-A (abusing the inflated power bar, obviously). Nothing particularly amazing, though, since he barely manages to escape game over by the end of the demo even considering the incredible amount of bombing.
