Jamestown

Dev team abandonned this game to work on a remaster, cheap move.

" neo-classical top-down shooter for up to 4 players, set on 17th-century British Colonial Mars." Can't give it anything other than a positive review when that's the opening blurb

Can't seem to launch the game. There's at least 5 forum posts discussing various issues preventing people from being able to launch the game going back years which are all unaddressed.

Intro music goes dumb hard.

SHMUP for beginners. Tutorial tells you how to play. Simple and easy. Controller works great. Keyboard works great. Mouse only is frustrating. Music is awesome. In order to advance to Stage 4 and 5, you need to complete the previous levels on high difficulties. Final stage is tough and you have to go through two bosses. Story is told through cutscenes, but you don't need to know anything important. It's a SHMUP. Score: 9 out of 10. Graphics are nice and pretty. You only get two credits per stage, so do your best to dodge all them bullets. There's no freeplay, so git gud. Buy Jamestown+ since it's an upgrade.

Ah, Jamestown... I picked this up back in 2011--14 years ago. The joints in my fingers are crunching as I type that out. Jamestown is a top-down bullet hell set in a steampunk Martian colony—beautiful, chaotic, and surprisingly welcoming for genre newcomers like me. From what I could recall (and what my Steam achievements tell me) I didn't get too far: just a couple of feats and the first boss kill. Then I shelved it--my appetite sated. Three years later, in 2014, I came back and finally managed to take down the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th boss to claim their respective achievements. More heads to add on my Steam mantel. And finally, in 2025, I finally defeated the Conquistador. To salt the wound, I even grabbed the prize of 'Completed a level on Divine' achievement! In 14 years, I've put in 4.2 hours into this game. If it wasn't obvious I'm not really a shmup guy nor do I really chase high scores. But from the 2 hour marathon (... I'm serious, that's a huge time investment for a 35 year old) I put in over the past 2 days I had blast. My heart was pounding during that final fight with the Conquistador especially the lead up to the fight. Each death in those narrow corridors had me saying "just one more time" as I plotted my new optimal route to avoid the flood of bullets. I haven't felt my eyes dry out from not-blinking during a hectic game in quite sometime. It was fun. Really fun. It's one of those games you can pick up wherever or whenever you've left off. I already mentioned trying the game in Divine difficulty. Which isn't something I would normally do and for good reason. I couldn't get through the second boss and I probably won't--at least not now. Which is fine. Just something to look forward to in my 50's.