Rysen

Rysen is the game that I would like to say that “Thunder Force, is that you?”. The game could be a small love letter to the Thunder Force fans and other shump fans. I bought it on sales (because it was very cheap) and it has potential to improve even more. I really like the current state of the game though it still need more balance and improvements. Here are the pros and cons for the game: The Pros: + Has many references from the other STG games likes Thunder Force (especially Thunder Force 2), RayForce, Alltynex Second, Raiden, Zanac,... etc. + Beautiful pixel graphic with tons of explonsions, small details and parallax to make the game more enjoyable. + Coooooool musics. + Fully-supported keyboard mapping and controller with no input lags, NOICE!! + The gameplay is simple, likes the old-school shumps: Shoot & Dodge. With the lengthy 7 stages with 2 loops without any special conditions to unlock the 2nd loop so just chill out and play it to your heart contains, because get ready to...DIE...ALOT. Yes, literally!! + For the weapon systems, you have 6 weapons in total: Straight, Shotgun, Shield, 2 types of 4-ways (“x” shape and “+” shape) and the signiture weapon from the Thunder Force series: Hunter (Homing shot). You can use these weapons as default weapons at the beginning of the game. There are 2 weapon slots: Primary and Secondary, Primary will be your unchangable weapon through out the game and Secondary can be changed through out the game. Pick up the weapon icons dropped by enemies to change your secondary. But you have 2 weapon slots that doesn’t mean you are OP, there will be some drawbacks and benefits, you can use them seperately for their normal power. If you use 2 different weapon types like Straight and Hunter, the power of each weapon will be decreased, works well for large formations of popcorn enemies but not suitable for big enemies likes bosses. On the other hand, if you use 2 same weapon types, likes Straight and Straight, the shot will be powered-up to deal more damage, best for against the bosses. So choose wisely to suit your play style. + The flight speed can be adjusted for more better navigation. + The scoring mechanic is simple, kill an enemy formation will reward you points, some formations are huge, so this is your decision to clear them or not. + The game runs smoothly 60 FPS. + Good balance on the difficulties. The Cons: - Sometimes the bullets will blend with background causing some cheap deaths (especially at the later stages when things are getting faster). - The achievements won’t pop-up when playing in fullscreen. Overall, this is solid game with challenging gameplay, with some more improvements will make the game truly shine. Get the game when it’s on-sales, because shump fans need to play this awesome STG. This is a journey to the past! Final score: 8.5/10.

Tout nouveau tout chaud, voici qu'un petit studio Japonais nous propose une expérience de Shmup vertical pas piquée des vers, avec pour concept de base un Shmup oldschool - qui va vite tourner au bullet hell, malgré le disclaimer en encart, mais ne partez pas c'pas n'importe quel Danmaku non plus! - très nerveux avec de fort relent de Caravan-stage au niveau du rythme général de jeu. Voyez plutot ce gameplay qui fleure bon la simplicité, et partant, l'efficacité : vitesse sélectionnable à tout moment ingame sur une palette de 5 gears, pas de smart bomb, 2 armes disponibles à tout moment dont une fixe (choix en début de jeu, puis fixe) et une seconde interchangeable ingame, avec la possibilité d'échanger cette dernière par un bouclier à la Darius...et c'est tout! Ah, si, on peux quand même choisir entre 2 type de vaisseaux. Dont la seule différence est la mobilité de base. Et donc, cette simplicité, elle viens carrement au service d'un jeu au rythme endiablé, qui envois rapidement grave de la boulette, mais c'est précisément là que le titre dévoile tout son potentiel : le pattern design, et l'équilibrage général, sont GOLDES. En gros, on a la un mix de la saga Soldier/Gunhed/Aleste pour ce qui est du gameplay et du design, avec une grosse couche de M.Kai époque Judgement Silversword pour ce qui es du challenge, équilibrage général et même boss (pas des copies conformes, n'ayez crainte. C'est fait de belle façon.) Ajoutons-y un système de score se limitant aux chains façon Darius (donc un simple bonus donné pour la destruction de toute une série d'ennemis), et emballez c'est pesé. Le tout n'a pas la prétention que je lui colle artificiellement, et il faut avouer que niveau réalisation on a certes un truc qui fonctionne, mais vraiment rien de remarquable ni vraiment bien foutu au fond...non, Rysen, il propose une expérience pure de jeu, for the sake of playing. Et il le fait diablement bien, le bougre. On a donc naturellement une hitbox réduite - mais non représentée pour ce que j'en ai vu-, et elle semble tout de même assez imposante...pensez plutot Under Defeat que Mushihimesama ; on a également droit au petit temps d'invincibilité à chaque prise d'option, salvateur s'il en est quand ça chauffe en face...idem pensez plutot Super Aleste que Zanac Neo! 3 mode de difficulté de base, 7 stages, d'ailleurs dès le second ça commence à bien envoyer. Mais c'est typiquement le genre de titre ou il faut y aller au culot, et ou on a plusieur façon de pouvoir se sortir du pétrin : faut pas avoir peur de la boulette et tenter l'audace, le jeu est tout sauf rigide! Ca passera rapidement en se la jouant de cette façon. Ensuite il ne restera plus qu'a s’entraîner aux quelques phases un peu plus vicieuses des derniers stages, ce qui me permet de finir en disant ceci : ce titre semble être un excellent passage pour se former à l'esquive/aggression/gestion de priorités dans le Shmup, qu'on parle "oldschool pas trop rigide" ou danmaku! Car en plus de la variété très complete, intéressante et sans aucun accroc technique de l'adversité proposée ici, qui s'étalle INTELLIGEMMENT sur les 7 stages, rien que pour le mode normal, on note dès le second loop (qui n'a rien à voir à priori avec le mode de difficulté de base, donc) des bullets suicides dignes de Batsugun version spéciale. Et il y aurait 99 loop en tout. Miam, à table : il y a de quoi faire ici! WARNING : Pas de mode Tate pour l'instant, malgré le ratio d'écran adapté.

Definitely worth checking out if you wanna scratch a bullet hell itch with something short and sweet. Really solid, a fun way to spend an hour or so.

Infinite looping shmup that (probably?) plays like the old games it's inspired by. Has some weapon loadouts choice where you either shoot a strong version of one or a weak version of both types equipped.

Why this game don't have more reviews is beyond me. A great shooting game of the more caravan enemy spawns with maybe a bit of bullet-hell. Mayhaps Dark_BMX or ShmoopJunky could help this gem of a game out by giving it some exposure? Who knows. I don't. Rocking soundtrack, killer visuals, tons of things. Customizable keys, flashes, everything. You've got your shot button, your second shot button and a change of SPEED button. This is a minor gripe because it cycles through 1 to 5 by 1 step. So for instance if your at speed 3 and want to dodge some tight patters you got to press the SPEED button 3 times to go from 3 to 4 to 5 and finally to 1 which is the slowest speed. Thank you, dev. Wish you got more buys... But such is the unpopularity of this genre, I guess. What a life!

Rysen is a fun shmup, and it deserves more attention. One thing I want to address first - the store description says "no bullet-hell", but personally I would classify this as a bullet hell shmup. Whatever you call it, it gets very intense and there are a lot of bullets on screen. But the difficulty is reasonable, and it always feels fair. In terms of overall game flow, Rysen feels fast paced. It reminds me of something along the lines of Judgement Silversword or Eschatos. Like those games, you don't get a focus button or a full screen bomb. The action feels fast, but bullets are clearly visible and never move at an unfair speed. Extends are given out pretty generously, which is part of the reason why the difficulty is reasonable. When you die, you'll respawn in place and won't get sent back. At the start of the game, you'll choose a primary weapon and secondary weapon. You lose the secondary weapon when you die, but it's not a big deal because these weapons are dropped pretty often. For my secondary weapon, I always chose Shield. It absorbs up to 3 shots, and it was good for me as a beginner. One interesting thing to note is that you don't take damage when colliding with an enemy. So, you can move freely and just focus on avoiding bullets. Rysen's stages are designed with this in mind, because you'll see enemies swarm in from all sides of the screen. Since you don't have to worry about them crashing into you, it feels a bit different - but it works really well. Scoring is simple: you get a bonus for killing an entire wave of enemies without letting any escape. There are also some destructible things in the background that give points. I didn't really play for score, but I suppose you'd want to choose one of the more aggressive secondary weapons (not shield) to clear enemy waves. There's also a second loop of the game, but I didn't try it. There are a lot of settings, including customizable controls. However, there's no TATE mode. I had a minor issue getting Rysen to run properly in full screen, but it turned out to be an issue with my Windows settings (display scaling). Once I sorted that out, full screen was good. Rysen is priced very low, and it's definitely worth it if you're into this genre.

나쁘지는 않은데, 패턴이 좀 많이 단조롭다. 보스전은 진짜 이게 뭔지도 모르겠고....