[quote]Just saying, but I do have a curator page. If you like my remarks about games, you can find more of them here: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/44130985-TDP%27s-Gaming-Escapades [/quote]
[i][b]UPDATED TO REFLECT THE REVIEWER'S OPINIONS OF v1.0.0.1[/b][/i]
I was introduced to Team Black Hat Robot through their first game on Steam: Q-YO Blaster. It's a game I have not yet reviewed as I have no memory of it right now, yet I remember appreciating the visual design of the whole thing and thought it was decent. Eventually, my positive experience with that game caused me to become interested in Space Dragons, the team's next game, and purchase it in its early access phase to support the developers.
Unfortunately, the game got abandoned after the announcement of final incoming update. For two whole years, we had no idea about what had happened to the game. And the fact that a new game got released by the developers while this one wasn't even finished, just raised my suspicions. I was pretty harsh in my initial review about this matter, as early access games devs nowadays have gotten very used to just abandoning their titles. However, suddenly an unexpected development happened.
I frequently check my past reviews to see how they have done and if there are comments to respond to. One day, I froze in shock when I was going through them, as I saw Space Dragons had a new artwork. Being confused, I checked the store page and...
[h2]I owe you an apology, I wasn't familiar with your game[/h2]
Well I'll be damned! The developers actually came back after two years and took the game out of early access! I will not try to pry into the details that lead to what happened, so let me just say that I highly appreciate the developers coming back and finishing what they started; Unlike [i][b]some people...[/b][/i]
So anyway, the game is now out of early access. Now we have to see what has been changed and how the game is now like. Let's jump into it.
[h2]They've been listening...[/h2]
I was not a fan of the last early access version of the game. I found that version to offer a very bad shmup experience and since it was advertised as the nearly complete version of the game, I was sure the final release would be nothing short of a disaster. But here I am now, facing a game that has fixed some of its weakpoints.
The initial enemies no longer feel like bullet sponges that are a torture to fight against. The bosses have been tweaked and although the fights are still lengthy, they are much better than before. Normal enemies now show up in the boss fights and drop items so you have a chance to refill you special attack gauge. The upgrades you earn at the end of each level are now more effective. The execution move, which allows you to finish off weakened enemies and bosses to get a healing item, now has proper invulnerability frames afterwards on some of the ships.
There are several additions as well. New boss fight music tracks have been added to the game and you no longer feel fatigue after hearing the same track through all of the lengthy bosses. There are now story dialogues, appearing at certain point at the beginning and the end of some stages. Although there's one problem with these dialogues and it's that the game is still active while advancing through them; Meaning, you'll spend your extra weapons' ammunition while pressing the button to advance to the next dialogue.
As you can see, a lot of things have changed for the better in the final release. So you might ask: "why the hell has the overall rating remained the same then?".
[h2]...However![/h2]
Unfortunately, some of my biggest gripes with the game still remain in the final version, and these are issues that I cannot easily ignore.
The enemy patterns still have this uninspired and unfun feel to them, and you will see specific patterns getting repeated through the game and even in a single level. I assume we are seeing this behavior from the game because it's trying to encourage the player to use their special attacks more frequently and get more score, but it doesn't look good in my opinion. Worse than that, the enemies that suddenly arrive from behind the player in specific levels and without any warning are still there.
While some of the ships have gotten proper invul frames after performing an execution, certain ones are still like before and give you barely, if any, invul frames to protect yourself with. The worst example is the green ship which its execution move has a long wind-up animation, allowing enemy projectiles to get close and hit you upon finishing the attack. Your attack power may feel fine at first, but it will get significantly worse after progressing without proper powerups or trying to use the level select feature, prolonging the time you have to spend shooting at enemies or bosses.
[h2]Fire indeed hot[/h2]
Next, the overheat mechanic is still there in all its flawed glory. There's an overheat mechanic in the game which drastically powers down the extra weapons if you keep using them with no pause. But the problem is that there's no clear audiovisual cue in the game so you know when the heat is getting critical. The game only notifies you of your weapon overheating after it has already hit the critical level and needs to cool down. And since your extra weapons heat up rather fast, you have to constantly divert your attention from the playing field & firefights to the HUD at the top left side of the screen.
To be honest, I'm not even sure if the game even needed an overheat mechanic to begin with. Overheating is only applied on the extra weapons you get from the enemies, but those weapons already have a limit on how much they can be used with their limited ammo count. The overheat mechanic adds nothing to the game, and only serves as a distraction that makes the gameplay less pleasant and the boss fights to go on far longer.
But I think nothing is as bad as the next point I want to talk about.
[h2]Ah... my old enemy...[/h2]
Unfortunately, the visibility issues that were a big problem in the early access build of the game are still present in the final release. You still have various pieces of scenery in the foreground that block your view at certain points. Lots of the enemy projectiles blend in with the rest of visual elements due to their color palettes and size, leading into many instances when you don't even know what hit you. And the photosensitivity issue with the bosses is not remedied either.
As you damage the bosses, they repeatedly flash in a yellowish color to signify they are getting hit. Unfortunately, this effect is very bright and happens quite rapidly, and will start to hurt your eyes as the bosses get bigger in size. The worst offender in this regard is the Spiny Giant boss as it nearly takes half of the playing field. The bright flashes I had to endure in this boss fight were so nauseating that me, a person with no prior and current photosensitivity issues, had to close one of my eyes and just look at the left side of the playing field in order to be able to beat the level.
The inability to notice some of the enemy projectiles due to their properties is bad on its own, but the fact that I cannot even look at the screen in the boss fights is a major dealbreaker for me. I honestly don't want to play this game anymore because of this fact alone.
Overall, I honestly cannot recommend this. The fact that the game asks you to 1CC the entire thing makes it incredibly hard to recommend it to casuals or newcomers to the genre; And with its numerous shortcomings in the gameplay department which directly affects the experience and makes it not fun to play, it also does not make itself an appealing choice for shmup fanatics and enthusiasts.
[h2]TL;DR[/h2]
Even with all of the changes in v1.0.0.1 compared to the EA release, the game suffers from a variety of big and small problems that warrant an unsatisfying shmup experience for either casuals or pros.
