Here's our trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjMIO2nA62Q
Steam Store Page: http://store.steampowered.com/app/341530/
(LINK) GIF of updated character Select Screen with Green and Red's Mechas selected.
So you're a commander in a mecha and you'll be dueling it out with a sword and limited bullets, boosting around, reflecting bullets, and killing people. The spin on it is that you earn RP (reinforcement points) that let you charge up and summon reinforcements. The more RP you have, the more reinforcements you can summon. So you could have just a little recon unit or at max RP you could call out a full blown escort squadron. The game is not a bullet hell game, but it can feel like it's channeling a bullet hell vibe when a lot of ships are out on the field. The same kind of skillful control to dodge is necessary to avoid all the bullets that can start flying during big battles. Since you'll die in one hit.
The game can be deceptively strategic late in the battle since you'll have reinforcements to attack with or retreat behind. So while there can be a lot of bullets you also have a chance to retreat if the going gets to tough.
We also have a few different modes like king-of-the-hill and "Space Ball" which is a soccer style capture the flag match. And we also have a custom deathmatch option for a set-piece battle mode to choose how often pirates attack, how many lives you have, as well as starting RP values or potentially infinite ammo (which more or less turns the game into a really crazy 4-player bullet hell game). Definitely just a "for fun" option though. We also included a cooperative mode where players can fight waves of pirates, but it is definitely an aside from the competitive deathmatch style fights. Our goal was to create a game that channeled a shoot 'em up and applied it's principles into a different genre. We'd love for more people to play shoot 'em ups and I know a lot of newbies are intimidated by bullet hells, but during our tests, we found this game was somewhat of an entrance to introduce people to dealing with a lot of bullets, albeit in a much more managed eased-into kind of way. Your sword is your primary weapon and you can deflect bullets right back at enemies so your guns are more of a support tool as you maneuver around.
Soundtrack Available Also: http://jasonkoohi.bandcamp.com/
Full Soundtrack Available for Streaming on Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7y99cOV0 ... IoOUQCbPQ4
The game has just been updated to a newer version (v1.1) so a lot of cool new features and effects are missing from the trailer like new spark effects but you can get the gist of how the game plays from the trailer. It's very skill oriented.
We know a lot of people were sad to hear Heaven Variant got canceled, and we're super sorry about that. It was like losing a loved one for us, but our team recalibrated (and grieved) and decided that we'd try to create just a small game, something to perhaps get us back on our feet. If we can sustain ourselves we'd love to move back into Heaven Variant styled games with that kind of graphical look and over the top style. Which we very well could do at some point, so we'd love to get back to that kind of game once we can afford to do so. But in the meantime, we're really excited to have "STARDUST VANGUARDS" out. We showed the game at a few different shows, SXSW 2015 just recently and we were surprised how so many people enjoyed it. The game really rewards skill and if you're a fan of couch-multiplayer games and have a few friends to have a go at it with you, you'll really have fun. You do need a controllers, though we allow one player to use the keyboard in a pinch. I know that's a bit tricky, but we're limited in budget and just wanted to get something out that was fun! We really wanted to do an online mode, but the gameplay just won't allow for it. You really need precision and there can be over 100 ships on screen in the biggest battles (not to mention all their own bullets), so even if a slight amount of lag shows up it could really ruin the experience.
Anyway! I hope you'll let us know what you think. Cheers, and thanks again for all the support toward Heaven Variant back in the day, sorry about that one (we're trying to get on our feet so we can get back to games like that one day)! Thanks!
