Hyper Echelon

[quote]Follow my Curator page, [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41363546-Fruit-N-Doggie-Reviews/]Fruit N Doggie Reviews,[/url] so you can be updated whenever I post a new review.[/quote] [h1]Overall Rating - Seriously Flawed ★★☆☆☆[/h1] [h1]First Impressions[/h1] The SHMUP genre is heavily saturated on the PC, so unless its a well-known series, any particular game blends together with the rest. What made Hyper Echelon (HE) stand out for me was the inclusion of game mechanics that aren't par for the course, with video reviews also emphasizing that it was a quality SHMUP. Between these two factors my curiosity was piqued, so I decided to give it a shot. [h1]Gameplay[/h1] One of the mechanics that caught my eye was how each level has four mission objectives to complete. The first is defeating the boss at the end of the level, the third involves collecting 10 plasma containers, and the fourth one is killing every single enemy. These are constant no matter what level you play, but the second one can range from collecting enough gold or all of the relics to killing a certain enemy type. Each stage also has four difficulty levels available, and the only way to unlock the next highest one is to complete all four missions on the prerequisite difficulty level. You'll have to complete missions to unlock new stages as well, so you don't have much choice in the matter. Collecting gold would be pretty pointless with nothing to spend it on, and in this case it upgrades parts of your ship: cannon, laser, drones, armor, radio, shield, focus, and cyclone. Each of these can be upgraded 40 times. Most of what these parts would be for are fairly obvious, but upgrading the radio increases how often you'll summon an independent wingman to join you mid-mission. Also, the last three are special abilities you can activate at your discretion. Even though HE isn't a bullet hell by any means, it's very easy to be mislead by that fact and think the game is either easy or not plagued with visual overload. Instead of covering the screen with bullets, you're instead bombarded with a variety of things to bear in mind at the same time: unkillable enemies, projectiles, gold, plasma, mission objectives, stage hazards, your drones, and alternating power-ups, all while navigating both yourself and your wingman to avoid taking damage. That's a lot to pay attention to at any given time, and stages have gimmicks that make this even worse. For instance, the hyperspace warps include enemies and mines that don't scroll in from the side, but teleport in different areas around the screen. To be fair it's not random, you can memorize these waves and patterns, but unless you do it'll be as if random crap is coming at you from all over the screen. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2794873937 [h1]Controls[/h1] SHMUPs tend to have simple controls, and aside from activating special abilities, you'll only be weaving about and firing at enemies. Thankfully you can just hold the fire button down constantly, and I never noticed any input lag or other problems with handling my spaceship, so I had no problems here. [h1]Story[/h1] Even though your forces would theoretically extend beyond the small crew you're a part of, you'll be the only visible units going up against the invading threat known as Exodon. They seek out the power source plasma, but instead of working with the inhabitants of a planet and doing so peacefully, they extract it at any cost and with no concern about who gets hurt in the process. Traveling back through space from where they originated, you'll attempt to decimate them at the source so they can't hurt anyone else. With events progressing in-between each stage, it conveys a simple but enjoyable enough plot. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2794874082 [h1]Visuals[/h1] Frankly, HE is a very good looking game, with crisp and clean visuals. Environments make use of different palettes to convey how alien worlds might look, but still allows for enemy projectiles to be visible against them. I thought a nice attention to detail was when the enemy spaceships would cast shadows on objects beneath them, such as when flying over ground or asteroids. However, the spaceship you control and its hurt box is larger than you might expect for a SHMUP, so dodging everything can be difficult. [h1]Sound Design[/h1] I wasn't able to find a soundtrack for HE, but I believe each stage has a unique song, which would account for about a dozen tracks for the whole game. There's some interesting and unique sounds used as part of the music composition, which gives the songs a bit of flair. I think it fits the atmosphere and setting of the game well, and was easy on the ears. The sound effects are sensible and match well with what's taking place, such as getting a power-up. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2794873844 [h1]Pros[/h1] 🌟 There's boss rush and survival mode available, but it doesn't give you any rewards that I'm aware of. Just bragging rights. 🌟 I enjoyed the good natured banter and bickering amongst the characters. 🌟 It's a great looking game. [h1]Cons[/h1] ❌ With certain stage hazards, such as wind gusts, interfering with the player's movement, I think the game violates one of the basic unwritten rules of SHMUPs. Present a challenge without shaking the steering wheel as I try and control the game. ❌ You will replay the same stages multiple times if you plan on beating HE. That's not exactly what I'd call a great time myself. In fact, I'd start making casual mistakes simply because I was bored. [h1]Tips[/h1] 🔍 You can earn star carts from seemingly any stage, so there's not much penalty to grinding the first stage. I focused on the 2nd difficulty level, as that seemed to maximize my gold earned by getting the multiplier for not taking damage. 🔍 First and foremost, I invested my money into my primary weapon since its the main damage dealer. My next areas of focus were on the lasers and drones, for similar reasons. 🔍 It's easy for your eyes to wander with so many things to focus on. If you're getting stuck, focus on particular matters of importance or only one mission at a time. [h1]Final Thoughts[/h1] The main problem I have with HE is how it includes so many increments that make it seem as if there's more value and content to the game then there really is. Every upgrade you purchase for your ship makes so insignificant a change you won't even notice unless you buy several at once. Replaying the same stage so many times, buying dozens of upgrades, and shooting the enemies down no faster than before really makes you feel cheated. Yes, that's an exaggeration, but they should cut 40 upgrades down to half if not fewer. The same is true for four difficulty variants for each stage. I'd rather play 15 or 20 stages with an easy and hard version instead of 10 with easy, normal, hard, and extreme variants. Especially since it doesn't change the stage layout, and only seems to make minor changes to enemy waves. When I played later stages with my max level cannon and it didn't seem to make much difference with all the distractions and stage hazards forcing where I moved, I got sick of the grind and didn't want to repeat the game even more than I already had just so I could say I beat it. [table] [tr] [th]PC Specs[/th] [th]Performance[/th] [/tr] [tr] [td]Ryzen 2700 RTX 2070 16GB RAM ADATA SSD 1920x1080 [/td] [td]The game ran without incident on default settings. 💖 - HE is healthy [/td] [/tr] [/table]

I wanted to like this game, since I have extremely fond memories of Tyrian and other similar vertical scrolling shooters. But this just isn't it, for a couple of reasons: 1. Too many invincible enemies. Enemies can be 'parasited' which makes them indestructible, with the rate increasing if you up the difficulty. Collision damage is extremely high, so on higher difficulties it becomes purely a matter of dodging invincible enemies. That's okay but I wanted to shoot things and blow them up. 2. Related to the above, too much emphasis on mazing the player with obstacles and getting them to path through it. Problem is that I believe this sort of mechanic only works if the player has a smaller hitbox to work with. Your character's hitbox is huge, so is the hitbox of your wing pilot, and trying to keep the wing pilot alive will get you killed on the higher difficulties. 3. In order to compensate for this, the game introduces a linear progression track to grind your way through the difficulty, making your weapons super strong, giving yourself plenty of shield and armor, and increasing the number of special abilities you can trigger. The later levels seem to be balanced around having some progression, as there are several gauntlets with what appears to be unavoidable damage, instead depending on the player having enough progression to just tank the hits. 4. Difficulty progression gated behind in-mission collectathon objectives. The standout exception is an escort mission. Kind of interesting that the escort mission is the most fun secondary objective in the game. 5. Pure RNG distribution of unique power-ups called 'star carts', which can do things like give you a starting speed buff or passive regeneration. These are the strongest buffs in the game and the ones you happen to get are pure RNG, which is silly, since the good ones are intermingled with *cosmetics*. I'm okay with memorizing levels, I'm okay with large hitbox based difficulty, but I'm right now staring at a few hours of grind to max out the progression to get the last difficulty levels done, and I just don't really want to bother.

Edit 2: switching back to Thumbs down, now for good. After getting out of initial two-three areas, I am realizing that game simply doesn't have enough content to let your upgrades come naturally - so it forces you to grind. How? By making levels not just difficult, but frustrating. There is an overwhelming amount of indestructible things and special events that you can't do anything about except evade. Its not just parasitic indestructible enemies, which go up in numbers as you increase difficulty - its things such as enemies literally spawning underneath you in warp levels, turrets that clog the whole screen with fire, lava that you can't stand over, torrent of bubbles that slow you down, sniper that shoots at you.... and all the while, you have to keep attention not to miss any enemy or plasma plushie if you want that S rating. It isn't even the bullet hell type of thing where you have small enough collision and good enough precision that you can navigate between bullets - you're massive and you also drag your wingman with you which is equally massive. In other shootem ups, I felt rewarded with the challenge. This? This feels like artificially bumped up difficulty without any common sense, just to prolong your playtime because otherwise you'd be done in 3-4 hours. Thanks but no thanks, there's way better shoot em ups to play out there. Absolutely not worth 22$. What a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ shame. Edit: turns out I'm dumb - there's controls remapping, seems like I'm too old and too blind to find it on my own. Dev's response explains where it is, therefore, switching to well-deserved Thumbs Up. Original review: Game mechanics, graphics, sounds and overall feel are great and very well worth the money, but perhaps not the full price. About 25%-35% discount sounds right (I got it at 60% discount). So why the Thumbs Down then? One thing that is absolutely abysmal, that brought it from about 8/10 down to 2/10 - is input controls. You can't remap keyboard input (perhaps you can override it with Steam Input, didn't try), and they're bound to arrow keys and space; thing is, in a lot of keyboards, hitting various combinations of three keys at once doesn't produce a scancode for one of them, and in MANY keyboards, down arrow + L/R arrow + space results in a block. So with a keyboard, you often end up in a situation where you're a sitting duck - you stop moving and you aren't shooting. Incredibly flow-destructive. Fortunately, you can just use the mouse, and it has a great "QoL" that it immediately starts autofiring, which you can't disable. While this is a drag, because you can't time your slower firing weapons properly (like lasers), it is nowhere near such a huge problem as the fact that you don't actually move your SHIP with the mouse; what happens is that you move your pointer with full mouse speed to any location on or OFF the screen, and your ship slowly moves to it. What this means is that your eyes have to continually switch from wherever enemies or bullets are, to finding your pointer so that you can gauge your positioning. I haven't tried the controller to see if it works, but between those two flawed input methods - they really, truly destroy the gameplay. For me, mouse is completely unusable even with speed upgrades, and keyboard snaps me out of immersion every 10 seconds or so. I am going to switch this to Thumbs Up if I manage to remap controls with Steam Input, but to leave such a glaring flaw in a game so well designed like this one, is just a slap in the face. Literally, @dev, wtf dude.

Classic Shumps. Not too bullet-hell-y with upgrades and unlockables. You get a wingman ship to help, that is much more enjoyable with a second player controlling it for co-op flights. A great topdown https://youtu.be/9yx8-frpCJA

[h1]Delightful, classic SHMUP![/h1] [b]Plays very safe, treads very well-known waters, but does it with a lot of charm and finesse and outcome is hard to not recommend fullhearthedly.[/b] [b]A[/b]nd as a result it is a crying shame [i]Hyper Echelon[/i] flew under the radar for most of the people completely unnoticed. It's not necessarily a groundbreaking hidden gem, but it certainly is a very faithful, well made and enjoyable homage to top-down shoot 'em up genre hitting all the right notes, and in the end such limited spotlight given to it feels a bit dishartening. [b]S[/b]afe recommendation for both new and seasoned fans of the genre. Thanks to smooth difficulty curve, well-designed progression systems, replayability factor distributed within the main campaign and additional modes, and sufficient enough amount of depth [/i]Hyper Echelon[/i] ought to be a very pleasant adventure regardless of ones' level of experience with games in this format, age or owned PC configuration (thanks to very light system reqs). [b]Consistently fun gameplay, visually pleasant, mechanically polished, lightweight and easy to pick up and play. If you're crawing for one more 'of those' - this one here is a no brainer. Especially on any sale![/b]

After 15 minutes I can already say that this game is the FIX you need if you crave more Skyforce. For those that don't know that kind of game, it is basically a shmup with progression and you might not know it yet but you want this game, trust me. The gameplay, music and art style just feels right, I'm buying it again if it comes out as a physical version. Also, something fun I perceived is the many influences coming from 90s games in term of music and boss design. <3

Игра в целом неплохая, но основная концепция прохождения игры устарела. Самих уровней мало, и для того, чтобы продвинуться по сюжету дальше, тебе нужно зарабатывать "звёзды" - т.е. проходить уже существующие уровни, выполняя некоторые условия. Собрал 9 коробочек с плазмой вместо 10? Переигрывай. Убил 99% врагов - переигрывай. Серьезно? Если вы хотите, чтобы люди больше играли в вашу игру, наверное, нужно сделать больше уровней, а не заставлять играть в одни и те же. Ну а из хорошего - графика приятная и отзывчивое управление, если играть на геймпаде.

일단 가격을 생각 한다면 조금 비추임 2만원 정도까지는 잘 모르겠고 할인 하면 조금 할만함 내 플레이 시간을 보면 알겠지만 노가다도 좀 하고 13시간 걸림 피지컬이 좀 되고 노가다 많이 안하고 진행하면 더 짧을거임 본인은 마지막 보스판이 좀 어렵겠다 싶어서 공격, 레이져, 드론, 쉴드 이렇게 네가지다 풀업하고 했는데 생각보다 너무 쉽게 깼음 해본결과 풀업까지는 필요 없었음 장점으로는 설렁 설렁 하기 좋다는거임 보통 슈팅게임 하면 어렵기 때문에 피지컬이 되야 되는데 이게임은 로그라이크 요소도 있고 해서 심심할때 한판 해볼까 하기에 나쁘지 않음 그리고 그래픽이 아기자기하다? 확실히 도트는 예쁘게 잘찍어 놨음 약간 트윈비 느낌이 나기도 함 단점을 얘기 안할수 없는데 좀 많음 읽어 보고 이건 아니다 싶으면 안사는걸 추천함 일단 비행개체가 두개가 있는데 둘다 똑같음 파일럿이 다르고 색만 다르지 업그레이드도 공유하고 뭔가 다른게 없음 일단 스토리에 두명이 주인공이라 넣은거 같은데 구색용인거 같음 (코옵 있으니까 그냥 같은거 두개쓰라는거 같기도 하고) 그리고 업그레이드가 있는 대신에 맵에서 얻을수 있는 버프(?)가 별로임 보통은 탄의모양 나가는 방식등이 바뀌는게 일반적이나 이게임은 공격속도, 이동속도, 체력+, 돈 이렇게 네개가 다임 돈모아서 업그레이드 해도 탄수가 조금 늘어나고 세방향으로 퍼지나 그게 끝임 (잘 안보이는데 유도탄도 생기긴함) 그리고 윙맨이 있는데 세명임 골라서 데리고 다닐수 있는데 아래 초상화가 그 주인공임 리자드맨 붉은용 기계 이렇게 있는데 일단 효율은 리자드맨이 짱임 붉은 용은 1자 공격 밖에 못하는데 주인공이 거의 1자 공격 일변도라 크게 의미가 없음 기계는 공격범위가 넓으나 공격력이 넘 구려서 안좋음 맵마다 4개의 과제가 있는데 나중에 가면 그 과제를 어느정도 완수해야 되서 모서리쪽네방향으로 공격하는 리자드맨만 쓰게됨 나머지 윙맨은 그냥 스토리 다깨고 나중에 재미로 할때정도만 쓸만함 윙맨 스킬은 보호막이랑 공격 스킬이 있는데 주인공 공격 스킬과 더불어서 공격 스킬은 솔직히 써도 그만 안써도 그만임 중요한건 쉴드랑 시간 느리게 만들어 주는 스킬이고 난이도가 낮다고 했는데 서바이벌 모드는 버프가 없이 진행되서 어렵게 하고 싶으면 가능은 할거 같음 보스모드는 안해봐서 잘 모르겠음 암튼 어케 얻을 일이 있거나 좀 싸게 살수 있다면 나쁘지는 않아 보임

Parece Sky Force, tem uma vibe retrô incrível, trazendo toda a nostalgia dos clássicos dos arcades, mas ainda assim me diverti muito jogando! A jogabilidade é envolvente, os gráficos são simples, mas muito bem feitos para o estilo e, apesar de ser um jogo mais antigo, oferece um desafio que mantém o interesse. Se você gosta de jogos de tiros com uma pegada clássica, com certeza vale a pena experimentar. Recomendo bastante!

The retro feel, the upgrading of the battleship, the enemies..I just love all of it! This game was made with love!