After making up for 3D work last quarter, we can finally work on our game, which we have renamed to Strangeview. The game process was long and arduous, with a lot of us going back and forth on certain ideas. Most of which were probably for the better, we finally have a menu set up that makes sense, along with a Viewmaster inventory system that adds to the charm of the game. It's changes like this that make our game stand out a bit more, B movie survival horror games are pretty cool in our opinions. We also got to the specific mechanics, which are separated by floor, are now defined and in a set order. We also have our controls down, so we have a less ambiguous game now. What's also important is that we don't have to do as much thinking as to what we should do, it's already outlined in our document.
Other than that, we can actually start posting on the website made for the game, and give a bit more into what we're working on. See you then.
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The seventh game in the mainline Touhou series, or rather the second game in the more well known Touhou games developed for Windows, it improves upon Embodiment of Scarlet Devil and fine tunes the game's system for a more rewarding system. There are five base levels, an extra level, and the Phantasm level. You play as one of three playable characters shooting enemies which fire danmaku (projectiles, lasers, anything that can kill you) towards you, a mini boss, then a boss fight. You have a limited amount of lives and three continues, you can cancel enemies and projectiles with a limited amount of bombs. Bosses and mini bosses consist of regular projectile patterns, and spell cards, really difficult (and pretty) attacks where you can't die or use a bomb if you want to capture it. You obtain different bonuses when you clear the stage. The main objective is to finish all the stages, but the good ending is when you can beat it without a continue, and also collect the highest score you can. This system is a very solid example of using flow, if you've ever seen the game without playing it, it looks impossible and very visually appealing. But when you actually play the game you see something else, you can see a path to sneak through and the right way to take it, also you have a tiny hit box, you can practically kiss the danmaku and you will live. That is the first part of playing any sort of bullet hell game, getting to understand danmaku patterns and knowing how to lead shots at enemies as you do that. You will die a lot, use a lot of bombs, and eat up your continues just to see what the stage and bosses even look like. But after a lot of repeated attempts, you can practically do whole stages without using any bombs or dying. The impossible eventually becomes possible, then it becomes easy, this is the skill return that makes the series so addictive. The changes in difficulty do have a sorta steep curve once you get to The Prismriver sisters, since their stage's enemies have large chucks of projectiles all flung at you. On the first play through, You would die a lot, the only way around this and to grab all the score items in time is to fly around the edge of the screen, which goes against a lot of schmup thinking. But, that's Touhou for you, so the best thing you can do is go with the flow (ooh pun) and always play with the whole screen. The flow stays intact since there is a practice mode, so you can focus solely on the stage and boss, eventually mastering that one boss that tears you in half without the hassle of the bosses you already mastered just eating up your time. You also tend to find favorite bosses through practice (*cough* Konpaku *cough*), which also keeps you going. With some precarious curiosity, you can eviscerate through some spell cards The flow learning the pattern and shooting the boss until it's become second nature. But what keeps this system going is the difficulty setting before you even start. What makes Touhou difficulty settings so interesting is that each pattern and spell card is revamped with more projectiles, lots of bosses and mini bosses will even have new spell cards that you can't even witness until you play higher difficulties, further rewarding mastery of previous levels. Which leads up to the fact that it's really up to you on how confident you are in your abilities to see what else the game has to offer, self-challenge is what keeps the flow flowing without infuriating the player, since the player is deciding how difficult they want to play. But there is another feature that follows completion and that is score, because this is a traditional arcade game at heart. There are many ways to get waaaaaay more score than playing normally, from shooting unfocused to item grabbing by going to the top to shooting closer to a boss so a spell card can be beaten for a better time score, they are all very dangerous and can only even be considered if you know the original stage/spell card. But this is what throws the flow into the stratosphere, building a new score as you learn projectiles is addictive, supplementing the gameplay further. Cherry is also important since it auto-grabs items so you can focus on dodge projectiles So, the last thing to talk about is the game's main draw, which adds a new score feature called Cherry. You get cherry from grazing, shooting, and cherry items. If you collect 50,000 points worth of cherry, you activate a barrier, which acts as a free bomb that activates when you are hit are you use a bomb. But, you can keep the barrier up for a nice score bonus, which means you can't use a bomb or die when it's active, further reinforcing the skills that is expected of you. You will be cashing out your barrier bonus for a large score during a spell card, which is fun with the sound effects and huge numbers on the screen, really really addictive. There is also the characters and music, what makes Touhou so unique. if you've been on the internet and have even grazed (oh look another pun) anything video game/anime related, you have maybe seen a character (Cirno probably lol) or heard a music track without even realizing it: Bad Apple, Night of Nights, UN Owen Was Her, Hartmann's Youkai Girl, Gensokyo Past and Present, and the millions of popular tracks covering each song. So does Perfect Cherry Blossom's characters and music tracks stack up? Yes, absolutely because of how energetic and powerful they are, the tone and mood is perfectly set by each track. MIDIs fit the Touhou games well from the fact that they are meant for PC games from that era (early 2000s). But really, all the Touhou tracks in every game are actually good, so yes they do stack up. If you want to know more just look them up and see what fan made anything is made on them. Touhou characters are easily recognizable, which is where they're so popular. The interactions in the base game are funny too. It just works, separately or together. So overall, you should play the games, from learning how to be patient and gradually getting better to just being able to love what is arguably one of the most recognizably obscure video game series out there. What did we learn about? No seriously I went off and forgot what I was writing about
Obligatory Score: Chen/10 *All footage was recorded in medium difficulty of practice mode
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JamesHe aspires to be a game designer, let's just hope he gets there. He also happens to goes to DSA. Categories
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